Relax

We had a fairly relaxing day. It took us all morning to eat and dress and prep to go out. We played a bit of terreria together, bean, 10, pumpkin, 8, and mummy. Pumpkin gave me two grappling hooks and showed me his costume wardrobe.

Pippin, 2, got the roller skates out for the second day in a row and had various success on the carpet. She tried on all three pairs. And then she played babies with plum, 5. Pippin has been playing a lot with the dog soft toys and putting them on leads and playing with rocky (the rocking horse.)

We then went to gymnastics. Bean, pumpkin and plum all went into the session and pippin played with another toddler. Pumpkin really enjoyed it. We ate our lunch at the lesiure centre before coming home.

Everyone disappeared to seperate corners when we got home watching/playing on their tablets. I took plum and pippin out to vote and when we got back bean, pumpkin and plum played sims 4 together. They created a new toddler character for their household.

Dispite having been fed all day, there was a lot of additional eating from all the smalls in the evening before pippin fell asleep on the sofa, bean and plum had stories and pumpkin went to bed after me (as per normal) Bean is currently reading through the Chronicales of Narnia with daddy and plum stil has brown bear, brown bear every night and we make up the animals.

Responding

Bean, 10, made himself scrambled eggs for breakfast. He decided he didn't want to feed the animals today because Charlie is gone (Charlie was his pet) and he had a little cry. He watched Bakugan and decided that that is what he would pike to do his next project showcase on, he came up with a few ideas and i contributed with a few more, some better received than others. Bean then made batter with me so that we could have battered sausage for lunch.

Pumpkin, 8, and mummy played terreria today. I died a lot. He showed me his pet museum and and gave me a tour of the world and showed me his outfits. It was pumpkin's suggestion to have battered sausage and it seems to have been successful and well received by everyone except pippin. In the evening he drew Native American face designs onto plum's face and a heart onto pippin's face with felt tip pen.

Plum, 5, and pippin, 2, played role play together. They were walking the dog on his lead. Plum organised her bedroom bits today and seperated her hair ties from her nail varnish and jewellry. She put them into her hello kitty case. She also played dolls's house today and played cbeebies games online.

Pippin watch madagascar twice and toy story with woody and she got the toy story puzzles out. She did some colouring and pippin had a bath with plum in the evening.

Rainy days

Plum, 5, and Pippin, 2, spent over an hour role playing together. Today's theme was schools. They reasranged the letters and words on the fridge and had 'lessons' and then took their babies and fed them and put them to bed. They then repeated this over and over again.

Pippin and mummy made a marble cake together that Bean, 10, declared to be his new favourite cake.

We buried Charlie the guinea pig. Pippin played guitar and sang a 'goodbye charlie' song and bean got his prayer book and we said the 'thank you for our dead pet' prayer.

In the afternoon we went to Fisher's Farm. We played in the new indoor area and then all the smalls went for a pony ride. It was pippin's first time on a pony ride. We then played on the go karts for half an hour before heading home.

Back home bean and pumpkin, 8, played terreria together. Plum and pippin played together before she went and lay in her bed and watched on her tablet. Pippin fell asleep on the sofa and the boys watched more Simpsons.

Let the sunshine

Thursday is gymnastics day for Bean, 9, and Plum, 5. The smalls spent the morning playing. Plum and Pippin, 2, played a mummy and baby game which largely involved Pippin sitting in the laundry basket and being pushed around by Plum. Bean and Pumpkin, 8, played Doughnut games, Terreria and minecraft together. Bean also worked on a growing lego creation.

Daddy made it to gymnastics today in his lunch break. Bean was doing forward somersaults into the pit and jumps off the spring board. Plum was doing piroettes and then jumping into the pit.

Back home the big three played the role play pirate game again and then we took our bikes to the park for a couple of hours. Plum's chain came off her bike so we fixed that when we got home.

The big three then played the Prison Game together (based on The Escapist) until food was ready and then Plum put on The Mr Men dvd being inspired by finding a Mr Men book at the park.

Both boys took a bath, Pippin, Plum and Bean all had stories before bed.

Japan Showcase

The morning was spent with Plum and Pippin, 2, playing obstacle courses in the dinning room with the chairs. They were using the cars inittially to navigate the course which then evolved into them climbing up, down and through the course.

Bean and Pumpkin were looking at Where's Wally books and listening to music in their bedroom.

After visiting the last Japan Showcase in October Bean, 9, and Plum, 5, were both inspired to display their own Japanese interests at todays Japan Showcase. Bean displayed the origami that he has been putting together for weeks and we took the instructions and origami paper too so that others could have a go. Plum put together all her Hello Kitty belongings and, thanks to a fellow HE mum, we were able to play her dvd too.

Bean set up his display, invented his own pokemon at the pokemon display, had his name written in Japanese and played Japanese board games with another HE family. Pumpkin, 8, spent the time watching others play on the wii, playing outside with the other children and playing zombie cards with Bean (making up their own game). Plum showed her collection, played outside in the glorious sunshine a lot with Pippin, she flew origami areoplanes, she had her name written in Japanese and enjoyed some prawn flavoured crackers.

Back home we watched Toy Story and played Terreria together.

Doggy days

Part of Bean's, 9, unschooling journey has involved us recently connecting with dog owning families via borrowmydoggy. Today we met Archie for the second time and went for a walk with his owner Kat and her children. It was the first time that Pumpkin, 8, Plum, 5, and Pippin, 2, met Archie. He is a young cockapoo with soft blond curls who has lots of energy but is really friendly and well behaved, he's a perfect match for our family. The excitment of meeting him also ment that we all managed to get dressed and out with everyone on side. Next time we will have Archie all to ourselves for a play.

Bean fell in a pile of freshly sprouting stinging nettles and stung his whole hand back and front which continued to bother him for the remainder of the day. We also read an9ther chapter of Harry Potter together.

Pumpkin played on the Pokemon minecraft mod for the first time and loved it. He played Terreria with Bean and they watched cartoon network together.

Plum and Pippin played together all morning. They made dens from umbrellas and blankets and put their teddy bears in with them.

Pippin fell asleep on the sofa under a blanket early evening. She had said she was tired and wanted to sleep after lunch but because we had a date with a dog the best she got was a rest whilst in the buggy.

Legotastic

Monday.
We were up later than normal, all of us. Bean, 9, took to playing on his tablet in his bed and Pumpkin, 8, played on his downstairs. Plum, 5, and Pippin, 2, played with the Peppa Pig and Bing small world toys.

Bean had a message from a friend inviting him to play Terreria via the magic of the internet. We managed to work out how to join fairly simply and then set to finding skype contacts (which took a bit longer but we did it) Bean and his friend A played happily for a short while and then Bean went back to playing on his tablet in bed.

We set up Lego Club in the afternoon. One other family came. There were moments when we were enjoying it. Bean and mummy made their names using lego bricks. Plum found have made vehicles and adapted them. Pippin took the bowls and filled them with lego repeatedly. We played a few rounds of build battle towards the end. However mostly the smalls took it in turns to cry or be angry with each other so we packed up early and came home. They all disappeared to their safe and quiet spaces when we got home and i made drinks and snacks and an extra large dinner for them all.

Mummy and daddy made a concious effort to guide them all to bed a bit earlier tonight. And it was successful.

Tangled (again)

Monday.

Bean, 9, is keen to watch prison break films however we don't own any so we settled for heist movie instead and watched Oceons 11. He is also constantly asking about coding but we are struggling with how to carve time for him to do this so that we can help him and the others are not distracting. Today he also reminded me that we haven't been swimming for a while, he would like to be keeper for a day at Drusillas, when are we going to Harry Potter World, can we go to LegoLand next year? He's definitely a boy with a plan (or two!) We also downloaded Carcasonne today and played it several times.

Pumpkin, 7, had a playdate today. Our friends A and J came to our house to play. Pumpkin and A played Terreria together, build battle on minecraft (their own version multiplayer LAN) and discussed and compared Pokemon. They also played Skylanders on the wii and Bean introduced A to his home made Skylanders role playing game.

Plum, 4, still isn't well. I think she has had this cough for over six weeks now. She is finding it draining and irritating and she is tired. However, she still musters the energy for the things that she loves and so this morning she went out with SGG and SGS to Little Verse. Predictably she crashed on the sofa when she got home, snuggled under a duvet and watched on her tablet for a couple of ours with pizza and apple juice.
When Plum had rested and refuelled she played with her friend J. They played at being dogs together and then playdough and cafes. Plum fell asleep on the sofa after our friends went home.

Pippin, 2, has spent time drawing today and cutting up grapes into small pieces, watching Bing and Topsy and Tim. She managed to stay awake until about 4pm when our friends had left and then she fell asleep on the sofa.

Bean put Tangled on again and Pumpkin asked for his hairbrush and spent the whole film brushing out his knots. Bean and Plum both had a bath tonight and we were all in bed by 10pm dispite the girls late afternoon nap.