Home Ed group activities

Today we went along to the scout hut at Bonaly where Ruth, Jimmy and Andrea were running an activity making moving models using cams. Mollie worked with Afra and made a spinning ice skater. Hannah, who has little patience with this sort of thing watched Taegan make a box - in her words 'at least I learnt something, I didn't know how to make boxes before'. It was nice to see friends we haven't seen for a while, what with the bad weather and illness.

Afterward Hannah went to visit with Taegan for a while and Mollie gatecrashed Calum's birthday party. She had a great time playing with everyone, Calum's dad had made a treasure hunt for them and then they all tucked into pizza and birthday cake. Mollie's only complaint was there wasn't enough red pepper - I suppose we must be doing something when the children are compalin about lack of vegetables when presented with birthday cake :)

Riding Lessons

Wednesday afternoons are riding lessons with friend Taegan. This week the girls were given to choice to go out in the sun but chose to stay in the indoor arena practising their sitting trot. I think Hannah is getting impatient at the amount of time it is taking to progress on to cantering.

Little friend Afra came along too to watch her big sister Taegan ride, and was very amussed at the bigger girls going in and out of jumping position. After the lesson we took advantage of the nice weather and gave Zorro a good groom out in the sun while Afra had a pony ride around the complex.

Then we went back home. Mollie cleaned out her chickens with lots of help from Taegan and Afra while Hannah helped me make Quiche for tea. This was followed by fresh fruit and chocolate fondue, which was then liberally shaken by playing 'Just Dance' on the Wii :)

One foot spin

Tuesday morning saw us back at the rink. Hannah has found the one warm spot in the place - the ladies toilets, so sits in there reading to keep cosy !!

Mollie has been working on the one foot spin for her Gold Star. You might think I was videoing so that she could assess her technique but no, she wanted to see if her skirt stuck out. It did, and she was happy.

Oh, and she did finally get the four revolutions she needed :)

Piano Lessons

Monday is piano lessons. Mr Gillespie comes to the house and everyone gets half an hour. It's great because we are in our own home and can be getting on with our own things when it's not our lesson. Plus we get a nice musical backdrop to work to - makes a change from Bon Jovi...

Mollie is working on Three Blind Mice, Hannah is playing Lightly Row and I get The Fifty-Ninth Street Bridge Song - which is much easier than last weeks Scarborough Fair.

Chickens

Mollie has taken the oppertunity of a day at home to spend some time out in the garden with her chickens. We have had them since November and they have settled into their new purple home very well. I just wish we could get their neighbours, the moles, to behave as well.


All of them have adapted very well to the water container that came with their house. Despite having never seen one before they all managed to work out that pecking the silver bits at the bottom releases water for them.


Now they are laying well Mollie has started giving them a bit of mixed corn in the afternoons in addition to their layers pellets in the morning. It seems that Daisy is first in line for her treats, but Ginny, Bella and Henrietta are not far behind,


Mollie picked up this basket last week at Hampton Court. They informed us they were orginally used for selling grapes in but it is working very well for egg collecting now.

Bithday Celebrations

In (early) celebration of Hannah's 14th birthday we went for dinner, with friend Taegan. at the Witchery, in their secret garden. Very nice main courses were followed by delicious dessert taster plates which had minature versions of all the desserts on the menu - definatly better than having to choose just one.

Then we went on to the Edinburgh Playhouse to watch the Russian Siberian National Ballet perform Sleeping Beauty. They are in Edinburgh for the week but performing a different Ballet each night, which is why we went on Wednesday when Hannah's birthday isn't until Thursday - she has already seen Thursdays offering of Swan Lake :)

Skating Classes

Today Mollie had her first session with coach Alice at Murrayfield ice rink. Given that she has only skated for fun since we came home from Spain she has remembered a lot, and from now on will be going every Tuesday and Friday for a lesson.

It seems she has almost finished the UK LearntoSkate programme, including the Bronze, Silver and Gold awards and will soon be able to move onto National Tests.