Seemlessly

An At Home Day today, much needed although we did end up popping out to collect the car which included a trip to the shop for apple supplies.

Bean, 9, has been a whirlwind of activity. He began with making a projector using a tutorial he had seen on YouTube. He needed a little help with the craft knife but it was a really simple idea. The image came out upside down and he fiddled with it on and off all day until he had worked out how to get it to project the correct way up.

I had made moonsand for Plum, 5, and her friend J who was coming to play. Bean immediately began construction on The Great Wall of China and a whole heap of questions ensued about who built the wall and why and can you climb over it.

Bean showed me a riddle he had heard on The ANT Farm about Antoni and Cleopatra and Ceaser, we worked it out together and then Bean was asking questions about who they were so we pulled the Egyptian book off the shelf and looked them up.

Next we searched for the Usbourne book on castles as Bean wanted to build a castle in minecraft. This was followed by 5 card draw which Pumpkin, 8, joined in and we used pennies to bet with.

I played Top Trumps (superheroes) and Plop Trumps with Pumpkin and we tried to all hook up via multiplayer on Terreria and Minecraft but for some reason we couldn't.

Our friends A and J came to play. Plum and J played together for hours, Pippin, 2, joined in too. They played moonsand and in the rabbit hutch and then doll's house and Grosseries.

Pippin put on Peppa Pig and we watched The Angry Birds movie. Pippin got a giant floor puzzle out and we put it together and then took it apart more than a few times.

It was an unexpectedly active day.

Ginger Cat Cake

Another At home Day. This time planned. Bean, 9, had a wedding cake to make in the style of a stripy ginger cat.

Pumpkin, 7, enjoyed not having to share the computer and watched all day. He watched Skylander walkthroughs and Skylander cartoons, he watched DanTDM and Stampy, he watched The Simpsons and probablt other things that I missed.

Plum, 4, also spent most of the day watching on her tablet. After Pippin had a very long afternoon nap, they played together. They each had a dolly and a buggy and they kept putting on coats and shoes so that they could 'go out.'

Bean spent 9 1/2 hours baking and decorating cakes, with food and drink breaks included. It took 2 hours purely to mix and bake the bottom cake. This one on the top was a chocolate cake recipe that grandma gave us. We covered it with a thin layer of marzipan and then had to leave it until last before we covered it with foundant icing and put strips on it. For the following layer we made a Victoria Sponge. We mixed and cooked two layers but he decided only to use one. This was covered with butter icing and orange foundant and then cut out pieces to create the facial features. Next we made a batch of vanilla cupcakes. We used four of these for paws and covered them with orange foundant and decorated them with claws. Bean used a fifth one to make a mouse. The tail is a long roll of orange foundant.

We have used Pinterest to get design ideas for the face and recipe books and people knowledge to get different recipes to try. I have been baking a cake a day this week to try different flavours and sizes and strength and successfulness. Today Bean used YouTube to watch tutorials on how to shape and ice cakes. Daddy went out shopping to find a board to place it on. He couldn't find a cake board big enough so bought a large pizza board instead.

We will all be eating the left over cupcakes and one layer of Victoria Sponge.