Day twenty three - books, baking, a fire and some songs

Today has been a good day, well lived in spite of colds.

We started with book work - their idea, not mine! 

J did a bit of everything - Maths (area / perimeter) Science - human organs and anatomy, Reading - My Dad's got an alligator, Hand writing practise and English - using powerful words.

Then A did a lot of everything Maths - adding and subtracting, totalling 20, counting up in 3 4 or 5, counting down in 3 4 or 5.  Science - human body, food chains, nutrition.  English - Capitals and full stops, complete the words and then she read another book.

M was reluctant to move from his youtube videos, but didn't like the idea of not doing anything, o eventually he did Maths - ordering decimals and fractions, English - root words, Science - conductors and insulators, hand writing practise and reading.

L worked happily on approximating, rounding, significant figures and limits.  This is another fairly big thing for him.  Maths does not come particularly naturally to L, and he tells me he finds any sums as easy or hard as any other, so the idea of approximating first to get a ball park figure is alien to him - as he says, why not just do the maths right the first time?  We have encountered this A LOT over the years, and finally he seems happy to do it, regardless of his almost philosophical objection to the idea.  Then he looked at persuasive texts (or manipulation and propaganda as he called it!) and ICT.

Later the kids each cooked a savoury pastry for their dinner - here are the obligatory pictures :

After that, we ate them :)

Then the younger three went to their scouting activities - A and I to a campfire, J and M to the school for more "normal" evenings.

Ready for bed and story now - we're reading "My friend Walter" by Mr Morpurgo - gluttons for punishment!

Day twenty two - whose idea was that then?

The younger three got up and ready fairly smoothly this morning, all of them seemed keen to get to their weekly sports session, and they even left the house on time!

L and I settled down to some work as soon as the others had left - looking at powers and roots, which is the interesting sort of maths he loves.  He was just about finishing when the others got home.  Then we spent a while talking over a story he is writing for a mine-craft game he is working on.  He is creating lore for a world, and then quests, and has it fairly nicely mapped out.  He has put a lot of time and effort into the story, and it's a nice bit of creative writing. I have never managed to get him writing fiction happily, so I will quietly take this as a victory of intrinsic motivation, and enjoy seeing how it progresses.  Later in the day he also showed me a design for a steampunk cat to go on a t-shirt, that he had created on his PC.

Once everyone had eaten and had a short rest, we moved well and truly out of our comfort zones . . .

All the children are growing, and so we went on a mass clothes shop.  J and M do not shop well.  They get bored, they are very choosy over their own clothes and complain everyone else is taking too long to find things.  In essence they become the epitome of the saying "the devil makes work for idle hands"

It was a mercifully short trip, only about 3 hours (including a lunch break), and we ended up with almost everything we needed.  Even then, we were not happy bunnies on the way home.

Because we had cut the shop short, we had nothing in for dinner, and went to Macdonald's before dropping L off at one of his weekly games.

Now it's bedtime and story time for M, J and A, and internet shopping for me to get those last few bits.

Days twenty and twenty one

The weekend was busy - which is why I'm writing this on Monday evening ;)

Saturday was mostly eaten up by our family Pathfinder* session, with A playing out for most of the day.

After the game L cooked - he made burgers from scratch and some wedges, which we ate whilst watching Dr Who.  J and I are getting a cold, so early nights were had by all.

Other stuff happened over the day - J read to A, there was some drawing, and some mine crafting (of course!)

On Sunday M had another rugby match - the team played much better this week, although they still lost, and there was a definite feeling that they are settling in o their new roles at long last :)

A and I went to church - she began a series of lessons on Saul / St Paul, I continued trying to get three boisterous lads to think about Abraham.  I had them carrying a tent around, then pitching it, and we played a variant of "I went to the moon and I brought . . ." which ran along the lines of "Abraham went to the desert and he took . . ." I was quite pleased with the idea of the game, but it didn't work as well as it could have - we have a child in the group with quite unclear speech, and whilst I can normally translate he has a cold which makes it all worse :(

After that we all went to my in laws house for a birthday celebration.  Family gatherings can be very stressful with two Autistic children in a small space - especially when you add in people they barely know who have no understanding of their quirks.  Surprisingly the boys were well behaved, and whilst there were a few sticky moments none of them were caused by M or J :)

We got back very late, so there was a brief story and then bed for all :)

*Pathfinder is a roleplaying game, and we are playing an on going story called Reign of Winter.