Catch up: 21/10/2014 Halloween madness, 04/11/2014 Firework fun

21/10/2014 Halloween madness

Potion ingredients

Experimental potions were made from a choice of many ingredients including ice cream, biscuits and chocolate. Some were great and others were best described as... interesting.

Recipe: Sausages

Sausages made by our boys.

• 1 kg of pork shoulder 
• 100 g salt
• 1 tablespoon of sage
• 1 tablespoon of parsley
• 1/2 tablespoon of black pepper
• 1/2 tablespoon of grated nutmeg
• 6 feet of sausage skins (28 mm diameter)

07/10/2014 Sausages!

Playdoh Aliens

For a session that started so badly I think it ended up being one of my favourites. Our initial problem was that the village hall had been double booked so we were offered the Pavilion by the local recreation ground instead. I'm grateful that everybody managed to find us.

Playing catch up: 09/09/2014, 23/09/2014

Life is hectic at the moment offering me little time on the computer so here is a quick round up of what we have been doing over the last couple of weeks.

09/09/2014 Thread painting and flat breads

Marble and thread painting

This activity was organised by a young lady working towards her Arts Award. There were two techniques to try:

New dates for a new term

Fiddleford Manor, copyright English Heritage

We had a lovely 'Not back to school' picnic* at Fiddleford Manor. It was a calm, peaceful location that we were lucky enough to have all to ourselves. But now autumn term is definitely upon us and it is time to make plans.

Recipe: Tarte aux pommes

Pastry, sweet short crust:

15/07/2014 Butterflies and rockets

Armed with our print outs courtesy of the big butterfly count  we explored the long grass area in the local churchyard and managed to identify a White butterfly, a Ringlet, a Speckled Wood and a Red Admiral before we scared them all away. There were also a number of smaller brown butterflies darting around that refused to settle so we couldn't identify which they were.

08/07/2014: Bouncing with mischief

Counting

We seem to have a lot of boys with us at the moment and yesterday it felt as if they had all been touched with the joy of summer. Watching them reminded me of my early years of home educating with my eldest boy (now 12) when I didn't feel the need to do any formal work throughout the warmer months.

Recipe: Pea Soup

Pea soup

A simple but quick and tasty recipe that was prepared by the older children during our meeting. As with most soup recipes quantities of ingredients do not need to be exact, just chuck in what you've got and hopefully it should taste good.

24/06/2014: What a scorcher!

Working towards an arts award

I think that most of us will agree that recently the temperature has been fairly high, perhaps uncomfortably high for some. Today was no exception and there was a definite feeling of lethargy at our group.

17/06/2014: Coke and Mentos

Our last session was a hot one. After half an hour of creating Hero Factory characters we were all ready to head off to the park to have a play with diet coke and mentos. What were the results of our experimentation? We found out that it was a great way to have a lot of fun!

10/06/2014 The inspirational sun

Straight into the confession: I took no photos at the group. I hang my head in shame. Unfortunately (luckily?) some people managed to leave their art behind giving me the opportunity to take photos at home, there's a silver lining in every cloud.

03/06/2014: West Bay

We had a lovely day trip to West Bay on Tuesday. Despite initial concerns that I might be Nellie-no-mates I'm pleased to say that several families joined us at the park before we all moved on to the beach. The weather prediction hadn't been great but the grey clouds swiftly blew over to give us 3 glorious hours of sunshine. The children played well together and the adults chatted away to such an extent that I didn't realise that I caught the sun until we were home. I'm now very, very pink and not feeling quite so happy about gentle sea breezes that keep you deceptively cool, grrr. 

And next time...
10th June 2014: Back to normal at the village hall. We have suncatchers to decorate and sunsets to paint plus all the usual games and fun. I'm looking forward to it!

20/05/2014: Paint, soap and beads

Rainbow

Another great session. Lots of colourful pictures, the children are clearly a talented bunch!

06/05/2014 Junk and Journals

Junk modelling - making a crocodile!

Our focus this week was to be crafts for adults with a bit of junk modelling on the side. This wasn't entirely successful; note for the future - junk modelling needs a direction or a prize! One lad happily whiled away an hour creating a crocodile but otherwise the table of mess was generally ignored.

29/04/2014 We found the park

Two not so young children enjoying the dressing up :-)

Our first helter-skelter session is now behind us and, I'm pleased to say, it went well. As the weather was not looking good we had brought dressing up, sports equipment and some toys for little people  to play with whilst in the hall. Knowing my children's capacity for turning anything into a weapon I chose not to take our hockey sticks little realising that badminton rackets apparently also make good swords!

22/04/2014 Busy, busy!

Dream catcher

We had so much going on that I was exhausted by the end of this session! The older girls made some fabulous dream catchers.

01/04/2014 Eggs galore!

Today we had the hama beads out for decorating Easter cards. They had a special surprise in them, a small packet of poppy seeds for scattering!

18/03/2014: WaterAid

A volunteer from WaterAid joined us yesterday to talk about the work that the charity undertakes throughout 26 different countries. It was a fascinating session and quite eye opening to some of us. I would like to write a whole essay on it but will stop myself and simply state that it is incredible to realise just how much difference having a local safe source of water can make to so many different aspects of peoples lives.

04/03/2013 Kick back and relax

Typewriter was a surprise hit

After a manic start to my day our home ed session this week was surprisingly calm and relaxing. Crafts were brought out but, overall, were ignored in favour of play and chat. There were some great paintings created, amazing domino runs set up and lots of tapping away on the typewriter.