OOOOO ORGANISING WORKED TODAY

Hiya

Today was the first day of the new timetable which I'm supposed to be putting into action proper in September, but thought I'd use it from now to organise finishing work off ready for end of year.  There are only two subjects a day and regular social meetings are scheduled in, so no surprises.  It's a 2 week timetable as we do some things fortnightly, but it now shows Callum exactly what to expect and when.

So today he was up early surprisingly and remembered to shower.  Can't believe he remembered to shower as he normally needs reminding, so that was a good start.  We then sat having our first cuppa in the living room and started on a discussion which was another of those wonderful subject to subject to subject ones that never cease to amaze me and makes me thankful for my decision to home educate in the first place.  I can't exactly remember how it started, but I know we ended up going from currency to strength of the pound to affiliation with Europe and the Channel Tunnel to tectonic plates (Callum wanted to know if eventually the tunnel would collapse due to the movement of plates) to the moon moving away from us to world destruction to space travel and ideal planets to colonise and then onto orbits, lengths of days vs lengths of years and finally finishing on fact that a lot of what you see in the night sky actually probably doesn't even exist anymore.  We got out books; talked about programmes we'd seen and news items we'd read and obviously his own theories.  Surprising how you can cover geography, politics, economics and science in just over an hour without even trying.

Then off to sign up for khanacademy and codeacademy for computer studies session.  He ended up watching all the videos on how to work out areas and perimeters and after the initial grump about having to do it, found he thoroughly enjoyed it.  Didn't try any of the challenges, but that's for next time.  And as for codeacademy; I had trouble getting him off it.  Think that one was the clear winner and he'll probably be back on that one whenever the mood takes him rather than when he's told to.

Science next, had one failed experiment where we were supposed to create rainbows using water and light reflecting through, but didn't manage to create any rainbows at all.  Oh well, beauty of science; some work, some don't.  We then went onto refraction and used submerged coins and immersed thumbs to demonstrate Snell's Law.

The submerged coin.  Top one real, bottom one refracted image

The fat thumb

This afternoon was round at a friends for a belated birthday lunch and social time.  Didn't see Callum all afternoon.  Friend's house was lovely (had moved some months ago and we just hadn't managed to get round to visiting).  Was nice to catch up and have a good natter with lots of cups of tea, pizza, nibbles, cake and strawberries.  Left later than we were intending, but even then, Callum was reluctant.  Promised we wouldn't leave it so long for next visit. Got home just in time for his dinner which he wasn't really up for eating, so has eaten that a little later on this evening.

All in all a good day and all ran pretty much to plan.  Callum happy and has had a good day.  Hopefully tomorrow's meeting at Faversham will be as enjoyable (usually is).

Cya

HORRIBLE HISTORIES AND A PIZZA HUT

Hiya

Firstly I would like to apologise for my moaning on the last post.  This really is supposed to be about Callum, not me, so sorry folks.

We did go ice skating on Friday and, as usual, Callum didn't ice skate, but sat with us adults.  They did the draw for the teams for the home ed 'olympic' sports day and Callum is in blue team.  I'm not sure what he will join in with and what he won't, but luckily he has some other kids on his team that he knows well.  Now just have to check out his wardrobe for a blue Tshirt; know he has blue trousers.

When we got back we pulled down all the boxes of science kits from the top of the cupboard and went through them deciding what we were going to finish and what we were going to sort out for the open day.  Obviously he got distracted and ended up 'playing' with the electric fan he'd made some time ago.

Saturday was a long day.  Callum wasn't really looking forward to it to be honest, although it was the length of the day and the worry about what we would do between shows that was bothering him.  Must admit I was concerned myself about whether we would be able to fill the time and whether he would want to come home early, but it all turned out really well and we both had a fab day.  Thanks go to Lorraine for organising.

Started at just after lunch by meeting up with Dawn and Stew to catch the train to Dartford, picking up Lorraine, Mouse, Boy Wonder and nephew on the way.  Met Carol and Squirt outside the theatre and went in for round one of Horrible Histories - Vile Victorians!  Was brilliant as usual; we've been to shows before.  Learnt about, amongst other things, the Tay Bridge disaster, baby farmer Amelia Dyer and various children's work such as chimney sweep, 'trapper' in the mine and factory work.

What to do in between - Pizza Hut!  Decided that this was probably the best place to suit everyone's tastes and it was pretty nearby.  Group of ten (4 adults and 6 children) found tables outside (because it was busy inside, not because of our number) and a frantic ordering took place.  Pizzas, pasta, salads, drinks, prawns and potato wedges and a bottle of wine for us adults.  Then a few puds and more drinks.  Surprisingly almost 2.5 hours went really quickly and the kids all had fun and food.

Wasn't sure about Callum for the second show as he spent the majority of it cuddling Carol and looking like he was falling asleep, but he said he was ok.  Terrible Tudors this time with the spanish armada attacks (particularly funny), Henry VIII's wives,  Anne Boleyn's sixth finger, Edward VI's death as a child and, of course, Bloody Mary (Queen Mary I); it is horrible histories after all!

Caught a train back at 8.45pm and got home around 9.30pm, so it had been a very long day.  Made a cuppa for both Callum and I and we had a lovely chat about the day before he went off to bed.

Today we have had a day at home.  He's been on the computer, played on the Wii with his dad and is now back on the computer again.

Tomorrow we get on with finishing some work off and getting some science kits started.

There no moaning from me, although now he is on Facebook, he can virtually poke me as well as physically, but at least FB ones don't hurt. ;-)

Cya

Hiya all you lovely people.  Hope you all had a fantastic Jubilee weekend with the extended bank holiday and that you have all now recovered.

We had two parties to go to.  One family and one friends.  Sunday was our family get together.  Callum loves going to Uncle Stephen's.  They have a pretty large house and garden and a Bassett Hound called Floyd who is a bit naughty when it comes to food, so has to be permanently watched.  Not good when you are BBQing and have a buffet out.  Must admit at one point he did show his intelligence by pulling on the end of the runner and trying to get the tablecloth to come off the table and all the food with it.

Both Phil's brothers and their wives were there (obviously one of the brother's and wives would be there as it was their house) plus his elder cousins with their boy/girlfriends and his other cousin who is 16 and who is also an Aspi.  There was also Teresa's sister and hubby there; so a nice little group.  Lots of food and drink, Flotilla on the telly in the background and a silly 'Royal' quiz later on.

Managed to fit the BBQ in between the showers, but we ended up mainly indoors.  Left about 8pm which was just about right.

Next day we were off to one of my friend's house for her red, white and blue party.  BBQ again in the garden and two tables full of food within the house.  Pat does know how to provide a good spread!  Weather held off and the sun came out on occasion.  Had a firepit in the garden under the marque type shelter which is where Phil and Callum sat themselves for most of the afternoon.  Sean's son, Victor, was there too, so Callum had someone he knew there, even if it was only vaguely.

I had a great time catching up with people I haven't seen for ages.  Again, we didn't stay too late as Callum was getting a bit overwhelmed by the two days of socialising.

Tuesday we had a quiet day with no visitors or visits to make.  Spent it pottering about watching TV, playing on the computer and generally being lazy.

Wednesday Callum had his school friend Callum D round for the afternoon and Terri, his sister, did her usual Wednesday visit.  Callum and Callum D don't get together as often as they used to, but as soon as they are it's as if they have never been apart.  Sign of a true friendship in my book.  They had a great afternoon on the Wii and upstairs in Callum's room making up games using the marble run and Callum's numerous tanks.

Today we worked!  School work that is.  We had 3 write ups that hadn't been done and so we knuckled down and got them out of the way.  Bee Release at Dungerness; Tree Walk at Capstone and Mini Beast Hunt at Riverside.  After writing up the days; searching the net for a press release re the bees, pictures of things that we hadn't got photos of and extra info and putting all the photos we did have into a display with added info, 3.5hrs had gone by.  Must remember to allow an average of 1hr per write up in the future.  Was very interesting to see how much Callum had remembered and to search the net for information when the discussions led us down a slightly different route, but we were both mentally shattered at the end of it.

Tomorrow he has, hopefully, another friend round and next week his dad is off, so we won't be doing any 'proper' work now until a week Monday.  But as we will be out and about a few days next week, I'll sure Callum will have some new experiences and lots of fun.

Sorry no photos today, but I kept forgetting to take my camera out with me.  Silly me.

Cya

WE HAVE NO MOTIVATION

Hi all, yes I know it's been ages!  We don't seem to have any motivation at the moment.  Everyday is a struggle to get anything done or planned.  I know that this is just a lull, but it's beginning to worry me.

Callum has definitely turned into a teen or at least a preteen.  He's reading every night (which isn't a bad thing) until about 11pm, but that means he isn't getting up until 9am, sometimes 10am.  Again, this isn't a real problem as we aren't having to get ready for school, but it does mean that by the time we are up and ready it's verging on lunchtime!  The weather hasn't helped either as it's been so miserable that that affects my moods and I've been having more headaches and having a general feeling of blurgh!

So what have we done?  Well, we've still been going to ice skating and the Faversham meetings and Callum has still be doing trampolining.  He's now somersaulting!  Did six this week, with 4 of those in a row!  Go Callum!

Last weekend we held a charity tea party in aid of the Blue Cross (animals) and managed to raise just over £100.  Callum helped make a few of the cakes and posted invites to the neighbours.  He also helped clean up the house in readiness for our guests.  So I suppose we could class that as life skills, haha.

Sunday we went off to the local Flower Festival at Cozenton and bought some veg and fruit plants for the garden and some alpines for Callum's little sink garden.  It needs digging out and redoing, so that is something I'd like to get done before the weekend if the weather stays dry.

Monday this week we went off to London with his sister, Terri, to visit an art exhibition in Somerset House.  We are supposed to be looking at colour and light and The Courtauld Gallery had a Mondrian/Nicholson exhibition on, so I thought that would be a good one to visit as Mondrian (and Nicholson) used blocks of colour.  Callum really enjoyed it, in fact he also enjoyed having a look at the other exhibitions that were on, "I liked seeing the different ways of painting" he told me on Wednesday when we were doing a write up to go in our folder.  In fact, he even said he would like to go and visit some other galleries!

Callum's own version of Mondrian

Afterwards we then walked back towards Waterloo East and went off to the Imperial War Museum for a couple of hours.  Had totally forgotten how much of it there was and we have decided another visit is necessary.  We only managed one floor and the main hall.

Callum with his sister, Terri

Just about reach!

As I've already said we had trampolining on Tuesday and yesterday Terri visited us again and they had a little art lesson on creating pictures in the style of Mondrian or Nicholson (see Callum's above).

Today, it's overcast again, I have a headache and Callum is in his pjs on the Wii.  Tomorrow is the ice skating meet and we have Mini Beast Hunting and Tree Identification Walk at the weekend.

Hopefully we will feel more motivated next week.  Not so out and about which means we might be able to get some experiments done and some more maths.

Cya

THE CASE OF THE DISAPPEARING CHOCOLATE CAKE

Good afternoon my lovely people. How are we all this fine and sunny day? We are good; having a lovely chilled morning (doing M&L still though) and a family visit this afternoon.

But, what did we do yesterday? Well, we had a social day. A visit to some old friends who we haven't seen in ages due to one thing or another. Had a bit of a lazy morning getting stuff together and left around 11.30 for a drive to Bromley, Keston actually. Took us about 45mins so a rather nice run.

We took up some veggie food, jar of home made plum chutney, a bag of apples (isn't like we are short of them) and some of Phil's home made beer. Ann provided additional food such as bread, cheese dough balls, cola cooked ham, popcorn chicken (all home made and gluten free), sauces, etc, plus bottles of gluten free beer which Ann and myself could drink. Put together there was a wonderful spread that fed 4 adults and 5 children. Ann's food being gorgeous as always.

Now to the reason of the title. Ann had made chocolate cakes, three tiered little piles of chocolate gooeyness layered with chocolate ganache....yummy! Callum had one of these little creations on his plate and was just staring at it. The rest of us, knowing it was impossible to eat without splitting the layers, had divided it into 2 smaller pieces. Callum followed suit splitting his into 2 smaller cakes, but continued to stare at it. We all carried on talking, but when we turned back there was only 1 layer left on his plate. No-one had seen him move, but the puffed cheeks and smiley eyes gave it away. He'd stuffed the whole piece in his mouth and had now realised that although it fit, he couldn't actually move it around to chew it. The expression on his face and the speed at which he'd done it had us in fits. Unfortunately that caused another problem for Callum as now he was trying to dissolve the cake in his mouth so he could swallow it and not laugh at the same time. He managed it without choking himself only to do exactly the same thing with the other half of cake. Boy is he a quick mover, but obviously not a fast learner! Although you could argue that he was retesting his findings to find out how accurate they were, haha.

The boys then went off to play and the adults plus little Johnathan retired to the living room for a sit down and a coffee (us adults not Johnathan of course). William joined us a little later and they happily played with the Lego; William building rather fab robots and Johnathan playing with the animals.

We left after about another hour and drove home. Callum had had fun being with the older boys on the computer and we had had a lovely catch up chat. Ann and her husband Roarke were the first people I met after taking Callum out of school and Ann was always the one I turned to when I needed support. We don't see anywhere near as much of them as we used to or as much as we'd like, but then times move on and we are both so busy in different ways it's just nice that every now and then we make the time to catch up...long may it continue.

Thanks to Ann, Roarke and her boys for making us welcome as usual.

As I've said today is a bit quieter and later we have his sister, Terri, coming round. I will probably be in the kitchen making more chutney and Phil is upstairs redoing the bathroom shower doors and putting in a shelf. Callum has been reading the local paper and getting outraged at the new bus shelter that has now been completed in Chatham along with no guard rails, no litter bins, no toilets, no crossings and mobility access problems. Well, looks like the Council has done it again..why do they bother if they aren't going to do it properly!

Cya