Winter Term 3

 As covid lockdown receded and we thought about our coming year, we decided to try to continue with a slower pace of life for at least the short term.  Sadly Arden's favourite activity- iceskating - came to an end as our preferred iceskating rink closed during lockdown.  We decided to go and trial an ice hockey session; just after having enrolled to do ten pin bowling.  The ice hockey went down well.  As did the ten pin bowling.  We had enrolled in the teenage class- Irving had said he wasn't interested  in doing ten pin, but by mid term he was part of the teenage class and loving it.

For quite some time we have attended plenty of arts events- Fringe, Festival, Ballets and Operas.  Due to covid we decided to slow down on this and take the year more slowly.  We did still get to a few local gigs, but much fewer classical performances.  Historically it was Willow who had expressed a particular interest in these, and as she had not been home educated for about 3yrs, it seemed to make sense to redirect our time.

Enjoying a piano concert in Government House's gardens.

We had a lot of fun doing chemistry in our kitchen using  "The Wonders of Waldorf Chemistry" as our guide.  It was interesting to try some of the experiments that I didn't get to with the older kids- such as burning sulphur, and also to have some trouble with experiments I expected to work, because we had done them before.
 

Making charcoal.

Attempting to burn charcoal.

Burning some different items-including sulphur, which has the blue flame.

Acids and Bases.

Our reading- King Arthur and the Knights of the Round table by Llancelyn Green, and The King of Ireland's Son by Colum- which we did a series of paintings about.

Paintings by Irving. (All paintings are inspired by the King of Ireland's Son.)

Paintings by Arden.

Arden's painting on the left, and mine on the right.

My paintings.

Our first carrot from our balcony garden.

Cable socks for me.

Repairing Gabriel's satchel with berry coloured velvet.

A new quilted blanket for Gabriel; made from an old cotton blanket, his old comforter and cotton and cotton flannel.

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2025

My socks!  I just finished repairing them to hopefully get them to last  longer.  They look quite pilled now, but they are super warm and comfy.  I also just recently got my leather boots repaired, and we were realising that with inflation to buy an equivalent quality pair, I would now be paying double what I paid in maybe around 2010 to get them.  So with the repairs I had done to them- new zips and soles and a good polish they felt like new and looked amazing.  

I have also been doing some mending repairs on the pillow case cover that went with Gabriel's comforter that had the wizard and dragon.  It is starting to look rejuvenated.

Term 2, Lockdown and Winter Solstice.

Covid lockdown saw us enjoying the restfulness of the city and some of the littler things, such as quiet displays for Autumn.

As Irving was a little confused about our "home school" also turning into "home office" signs were placed on doors, so that he could work out if Dad and Willow (DD20) were free for a chat.  Eventually he worked out their daily flow, and the signs became unnecessary.

Lockdown cooking with Irving- potato scones.

And some German biscuits known as railway tracks.

Me having some fun with decorating my coffee.  :)

Robin Hood with the boys.  Reading together is still one of my favourite family activities.

Working my way gradually through modern history.

Learning about Saints with Irving.

And Arden's rabbit.

Arden has moved onto doing more complex geometry this year, and Irving loves joining in.

Irving working on woven stars.

Arden's star.

Me working with Arden and Irving.

Arden's floral pattern.

The underlying structure for the above design.

Irving having some fun.

Looking at various polyhedrons and the 12 division of the circle.

24 division of a circle.

Preparations for a spiral.

Making progress on perspective.

 Hexa-flexagon's thanks to Vi Hart.

And borromean rings also thanks to Vi Hart.  (Irving made heaps of these, and then later moved onto paper chains.)

Arden finally finished knitting his socks, and since I was required to knit at his pace for this project;so did I.  He was not a fan of knitting the whole way through (we kept having chats about he never needed to knit again if he dislike it, but this skill would enable him to fix his knitted clothes for the rest of his life) and finally after doing the whole thing quite slowly but very competently, he declared knitting was ok and knit a strawberry!

Arden's knitted and wet felted strawberry.

Socks finished for Irving.

Irving's knitting for bilby.

Arden and I started pattern grading these slippers for him- though progress has been a little slow.

Arden working on a bag for his harmonica- he did both machine and hand sewing for this projects.

And he was very pleased when I finally finished this blanket for him.  :)

Hard waste find being re-newed.

Working on string games.

Arden (and I) have been learning Latin using the Lingua Latina series.  (We've also picked up "The Gruffalo" in Latin and Harry Potter- though we're a way off reading them yet!  :D)

Celebrating winter solstice with a fire, sunrise and damper baked in the ashes.

Our Kodaly music teacher suggested this book- so with the help of Willow, who studied at WAAPA (Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts) Irving, Arden and I are working through this.  Both boys have been self-teaching piano with the help of youtube, and this is give some extra structure to their progress.

Finally just because in lockdown all these little moments in nature were so appreciated.  Walking past the bird sanctuary at Alfred Cove at sunset.