Winter Break!

Well unsurprisingly the last 5weeks have flown by!  We had a few jobs to do around here, in particular getting the carpet cleaned in all the bedrooms created a little chaos, but it's nice to have our home feeling refreshed after a thorough clean!  Everyone around here has jobs to do, and in some ways the little ones (Arden and Irving) are easier to direct to tasks, as Damien and I have more realistic expectations of where and how they can help, than we did with the older two, and they are accustomed to the idea that everyone has to help out to make our home feel loved and be liveable.  So we pulled all the furniture out of all the bedrooms, got the carpet cleaned and moved everybody into different rooms!  Was a bit of a job, but satisfying at the end when everything looked and felt so nice!

We headed off the Spare Parts Puppet Theatre's performance of "The Arrival", this time at UWA.  We had seen this before, but we love Shaun Tan's books and figured it would be worth seeing again.  It was the first time for Irving to see it, and he was entranced!  We had a little walk through UWA's gardens (I do love it there!)

We have an enormous old suitcase filled with lego, and I thought that it was time we started sorting it (we made quite a bit of progress but still have to finish).  The amount of blocks has been making it hard for everyone to rebuild models, so I started putting things into coloured boxes.  We managed to get one of our oldest sets rebuilt...The Knight Bus!

And whilst on the Harry Potter theme, Gabriel decided that he is interested in reading Harry Potter in Latin, and the first book arrived in the post recently!
"Harrius Potter et Philosophi Lapis".

We managed to get down to Elizabeth Quay for some iceskating again this year, we had been all intending to go, but we left booking a little late.  Personally I preferred the ice-skating being in the cultural centre, where we could sit and watch the skaters more easily, but the rink is a better size at the Quay.  Also we missed the very early sessions, when we could get up whilst it was still cold and feel like we were somewhere wintery!

Otherwise over the break, I've managed to get a little sewing in (working on my first pair of trousers-linen ones for Gabriel), taking in a skirt, learning about pattern drafting, adding embellishments to some pants that I had that are starting to look a bit sad!  So I've been pleased to clear out my pile a bit...still some stuff left there and a few days left, so hopefully more will get done!  Plus Gabriel's trousers aren't quite finished!  I ran out of thread, just as I got to the hems and sewing the belt loops!  :/  Gabriel and I had hoped to get through the pair he'll make during the break, but instead we're only just starting them.  On a positive not I feel like I know the process of making them well enough that it should go fairly smoothly.

Irving and Arden and I have also done a few walks, bike rides, bit of scootering and skateboarding and catching up with friends.  We'd been a bit slack with getting Arden riding a bike, he had a balance bike when small, but we hadn't got around to him pedalling, so we finally got that sorted, and spent some time alone the river.  Plus of course given the time of year that it is, we got wellies out and went splashing through puddles!

Checking out the water draining.

Puddles at the Park.

Stopping off for a drink!  (Plus had to take wellies off to be comfy!)

Umbrellas in preparation for rain, and heading out for a walk with Willow!

Relaxing in the various seasonal weather!

Time Constraints

I must admit that now that we have come into Irving's 4th year of life I was hoping that I would have more time to post on this blog a bit more regularly, and some of the time I can manage it, and other times this year, I feel like we are off doing something, supporting Willow on her uni experience or having family time.  We are finally on our winter break, and it is lovely to be able to take it a easy for a bit, and also enjoy the very mild winter that we have been experiencing.

Arden and I did some history walks around the city, earlier this past term, including an art deco tour of Perth and a Boom and Bust trail. 

Fabulous art deco building on Wellington st, was once a school.  We had a chat about going to school in such a beautiful old building, and talked about trying to imagine all the girls leaving school  (it was a girls' school).

We liked this gate.

We imagine that it once went up the hill, and to St. Mary's cathedral, but now it is barricaded and looks into the carpark!

We enjoyed a few coffee stops on our outing...part of the fun IMO.  Matcha lattes have been going down well around here!  :)

This was a nice surprise.

We discovered this hidden garden on our walk, on the way to trying to find the back view of Bishop Hale's house.  Even after living her 6years now, the city still has some unexpected surprises.  It did feel a bit like an elite hideaway, given that it is tucked down the back of bank offices, and was totally deserted since it was the weekend when we went through.

And at the very back of the garden, we could see Bishop Hale's house, which is now a restaurant.  Made us wonder about what other beautiful homes might be once been along the terrace and in the area.

We had been intending to get to Tranby house during this last block, but that still hasn't happened, and so will sit on my to do list for a while I imagine.  The last block that Arden did was focusing on animals, and some of their processes.  Arden did a bit of study on cuttlefish (I had not idea they were so fascinating- can change colour and shape!), Giraffes and Siberian tigers.  Plus we had some discussions about humans and sex and babies, and he did a self portrait. For Sex and babies we are big fans of the BBC's Human Body Series, and Willow and Gabriel grumble now when I show it!  I used it twice as preparation for the kids for home births (the younger two were born at home), as I like that it gives a bit of insight into birthing at home and avoids the horror stories that some women experience (which IMO is not a healthful introduction to birth and babies for small people).

Arden's self portrait.

Arden managed to finish his embroidery project and I need to help him to create it into a pillow now, and we took a break from formal maths, as he is a bit ahead, and we spent some time looking at the Wooden books mathematical series.  He also has been spending some time getting familar with his new wooden piccolo.

Gabriel has been working on doing some sketches of Games Workshop miniatures for his  art this term.  He will be progressing on to modelling and designing his own.  His sketches are coming along beautifully.

Gabriel has been improving his time management and we are now discussing his progress twice a week.  Beginning of week to see what he's up to,and at the end of the week to review his progress.  He is currently working on writing in the style of an epic, and is also planning an essay on the Trojan War.

Arden and Irving and I went down to WAAPA to see Eneksis in their free lunch time concert, we saw some of it, however Irving was finding it a bit difficult to settle this time.  A lovely lady, kept an eye on Arden so he could watch all of it, and then we spent a little time in the nearby park again, and we took a look at the fish pond.

Irving has been taking a little interest in writing and numbers, and is starting to get a bit easier to play games with.  Turns out he is quite adept with mazes too!
Some copywork by Irving.

Damien and I went down to see Willow perform in WAAPA's Life as a Cabaret performance recently.  She only had a small part as a volunteer and diploma student, but it was fabulous to get to see her in a show again, and doubly fun as it was probably the first child free wedding anniversary Damien and I have had since before Willow was born....though as she pointed out not quite child free!  She has also been doing a lot of drawing, and writing now that she is on  holidays, and has recovered from her weekend volunteering at Supernova.

This is a recording from Oratorio, when Willow performed in it earlier this year.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsY1YDIpBLs

Willow's drawing

 
Willow has finally made it in Australia!

I was a little tempted to buy Willow this baby bib.  At the time of her birth I did not like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Damien found the name in an old story....sadly he doesn't know where!  Anyhow at the time of her birth there were very few Willows ( we liked that it means liberated in old English), and now she keeps being asked if she was named after Willow on Buffy, and unfortunately for her it was just not the case! 

I have finally finished sewing myself a bag, and now have 2 nice bags!  For years and years, I've had fairly sad bags for carrying all sorts of children's treasure, and as with my decision to be clean with my fourth child (no more smudgy marked pants for me!), nice bags seemed to be in order...even if they do still end up with interesting collections!

Bag no. One.

Bag number two

I also made another bra recently, and am thinking of trying a silk one next.

This past week has seen us busy giving the house a clean over, celebrating Irving's 4th birthday and heading off to see Shaun Tan's "The Arrival" performed by Spare Parts Puppet theatre.

Candles and Cake for Irving's birthday

Wandering through UWA on the way to see the Arrival.

Enjoying the mild winter at Elizabeth Quay with the family.

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2025

Irving has just done a series of Shaun Tan classes at the Literature centre.  We have gone out of our way, over the years, to attend various activities that relate to him, as he is such an interesting artist, and storyteller.

Some other posts with Shaun Tan related excursions.

Tales From Outer Suburbia.
https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2013/10/journeys.html

Rules of Summer.
https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2017/10/fishes-family-learning.html

The Arrival again.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2017/07/winter-break.html

Hilariously I am back in a needing new bags stage.  All of my lovely bags started falling apart and I have had such a busy year, that I have not made any effort to do anything about it.

Outings

We're currently on holidays- we decided that we like having a longer break during winter, so we've taken four weeks this time.  Turns out it is very useful, when we've ended up with so many events on!

We all went to see Spare Parts puppet theatre perform "The Little Prince", which is one of our favourite books around here.  The  puppet show was nicely done we thought, but we thought it was a little sad, how the kids couldn't just run with the imagination in it, and had to box it into reality.  The whole "that's not real" type of thing. 

We also had a homeschool excursion to Wilkinson's homestead in Gosnells, and took a walk along the Canning River.  The Homestead outing covered a good range of topics, fruit picking, making do and olden days school.  The kids all liked getting old fashioned names.  It was a very wet day, and we were lucky that it stopped raining before the end, so that we could pick some lemons and oranges to bring home.

Willow and Gabriel both performed in their Circus' schools latest show- Clowns vs Ninjas.  It was quite entertaining, and Willow certainly enjoyed the Ninja role.  She likes lego Ninjago, so the Ninja theme appealed to her very much.

Arden was excited to go for his first try at iceskating.  The rink was rather small and quite busy, but with the little people session it was still fairly good for space.

Arden and I have been on a few bird watching nature walks- around King's park, near the River and at Herdsman Lake. 

Observing ripples in a giant puddle.

Down at Herdman Lake.

Journeys

Officially it's school holidays here, but we're working on, this time, since Damien was made redundant a while ago, and whilst having started a new job, has not received his first pay.  It didn't seem worth having holidays yet, so we'll be starting ours mid- Nov which will make for a nice long Summer.

Last week saw us head down to Fremantle for a puppet show at Spare Parts Puppet theatre.  This time they were doing Shaun Tan's book "Tales From Outer Suburbia".  We own and love this book, and it was well worth seeing.  They cleverly made a model size suburbia, which they would zoom into, to tell us the various stories of suburbia.  We had a bit of a wander around Freo, whilst we were there, visiting our favourite book shop and getting fish and chips.  Arden was excited about buying his own fish and chips, as he recently started busking the harmonica, and has been doing quite well at it.

It also happened to be the weekend before the AFL grand final, and Fremantle happened to be in it, so it was covered with purple and white in spots.  This was one of our favourites.

 

This is Gabriel's geometry drawing from last week- an octagon spiral.

 This was from Willow experimenting during geometry.  This week she's moved on to loci.

A previous picture from geometry, beautifully finished.

This weeks painting with Arden.  We were working on "I", and making the fillings for our words using it.  Mill was our word for our painting.
This one is mine.

This is Arden's.

Willow headed down to the show with some friends this week, and had a fabulous time.  Apparently she only spent $3.50, as they had a lot of vouchers for rides, etc.  Mostly she'd really wanted to see the horses.  The weather was beautiful for it, but will be back to rainy tomorrow (I like the rain, but it's been nice to have some warm days again!).  Finally Damien and I took a class in four beat blues, which we are now teaching Gabriel, Willow can already do it quite well.

We've also booked Willow flights to Adelaide- she's saved enough for the first leg of her trip to a homeschool camp at the end of the year.  Now she just needs the second half!  Gabriel's also keen to visit Adelaide, and is saving for a trip to visit family next year.

2012

We have had a very busy month since finishing our homeschool stuff last year, and I think we're all glad to be able to relax and enjoy the rest of our holiday without quite as much business. We had family visit us, during the last two fortnights of December, both on my side and Damien's, so we were out and about doing quite a it of touristy stuff with various family members. Plus there were some homeschooling events to finish the year- we went to Spare Parts Puppet Theatre and saw 'The Arrival' and Willow sang in Christmas Carols at the Quarry Ampitheatre.

Life has returned to normal now, with Damien back at work and us spending lots of time doing interesting things during the holidays. The kids both started busking regularly at Christmas time, so we've been having lots of regular music practises. Gabriel is particularly pleased to be busking, as he has more money for the first time. Even Arden has been getting in and making some money- his first try was shaking a container of nuts- he made $1! Who would have thought shaking a container of food could be so profitable? Second time around he used an instrument and made $4, so he was even more excited! I must admit, I do like busking for children, for getting a sense of making money, and saving and donating, but never expected to have a 4yr old trying it out.

Next week we head to Cottesloe beach, for swimming lessons for the next fortnight. It will be interesting to see how vaccswim compares here. I notice that it still goes for a full fortnight here, unlike SA where it's been getting progressively shorter over the years. It will also be interesting to see how well the kids cope with swimming in the ocean, since it is rougher than St Vincent's Gulf.

We've also been very organised this year, and have done the planning for class 5 and class 7. It's nice to be so prepared, this early. Willow and I have worked out a timetable for her to follow independently, over three days, and we've put together a guide for main lessons, covering blocks in history, geography, music, physics, chemistry, horses, physiology, grammar, perspective and maths. Willow has always loved horses, so we're starting to integrate stuff that is of interest to her in our block planning too. She's planning to make an apron, a doll and slippers in craft.

I used Willow's plans for class 5 to help arrange Gabriel's blocks for the year. However I planning to use JUMP for most of our maths this year- excepting the geometry of course- as the form drawing and geometry is so beautiful in the Waldorf tradition. We are looking at focusing on knitting for this year in craft, starting with something simple to get back into it, then socks and possible a larger item of clothing.

So now I've just got to stock up on resources!

happy 2012!