Among the trees... » films

Silmarils

Lucy — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 09:29:46 +0000

Listening to an audiobook of The Silmarillion just now while browsing the Atlas of Middle Earth. This follows on from our epic watching of the extended versions of all three Lord of the Rings films in preparation and inspiration for our own mountain quest. Nice to be back in Middle Earth

other jewels: smoothie and brambles. Todays smoothie consisted of LOTS of kale and leaves from the overwintered cabbages which are now huge, LOTS of borage flowers, cleavers, a few black and red currants that are just starting to ripen, bananas, brazil nuts and an apple.

a contrived pic of a smoothie with bramble flowers and honeysuckle

The brambles (blackberries) are growing all through the honeysuckle and produce wonderful big juicy berries in autumn so there is no thought of ‘weeding’… the flowers are very beautiful:

bramble flowers and buds

pink

mellow

beach fun

Aberdeen International Youth Festival

Peregrines

Lucy — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 09:14:48 +0000

Peregrine Wildwatch Centre

Wonderful place this, great home ed group event there

quarry face where the nest is

red squirrel

female peregrine in tree - she was making a lot of noise!

fast

building a hide

impression of a caterpillar called Bob

best friends

a few more pics in our home education set on flickr

and a short video of the squirrels below, much topical talking in background…

he-art

trees

writing

polytunnels and taps

Lucy — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 09:41:31 +0000

Weve had a few spring-like days now, causing me to dig over some ground for the little polytunnel and clean and set up the coldframe to let the ground warm up for salad seeds. Browsing Suttons trying to decide what to plant this year – will have more room with extra raised beds… this really does feel like waking up after winter! The pond is finally unfrozen today so I expect frogly activity soon It’s been like this in varying thickness of ice and pattern for months:

Dance mania continues with ballet, tap, jazz and contemporary being studied :)

Books and films amany dug out to accompany this in fine home educating fashion. The Ballet Companion is a gorgeous book, it’s been to good for me to read that things have come on with problems such as eating disorders and painful pointework (ouch pouches – love them!) being dealt with much more compassionately in general. High quality vegan ballet shoes are even available As for films… oh so many, from White Nights to A Chorus Line, loving them all, also deeply appreciative of friends sharing the enthusiasm and cost of DVD purchase… Had a nice time reading over T.S. Eliot’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats and then watching Cats and boring delighting others with tales of cast members I knew/was taught by or with… same goes for Billy Elliot… ah to be an old “when I was young — fill in with unbelievable sounding fact–” person – it’s great fun!!

Christmas 2008

frog pics

Narnia

lovely herbs and the unintended

Lucy — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 17:25:11 +0000

Cat has a wonderful new website: The Tasty Herbalist - go see

Strange day today where a slight disaster led to us doing totally unintended things such as visiting the Wallace and Gromit exhibition at Satrosphere. It was very good, also being about other animation and techniques etc.

windows to the Druids’ Temple

Slains Castle and Dracula

garden

swan lake

Lucy — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 12:44:43 +0000

There were swans on the loch yesterday

Had a lovely day with friends morphing into a very balletic afternoon which was great fun. It’s been wonderful rediscovering ballet being for enjoyment, rather than an eternal striving (not to mention starving) for perfection. Looked out the old class music etc. I have but it’s all on cassettes – technology moved on a bit fast for me there

Watched Fast Food Nation (quite good trailer there on amazon), fictional film based on the non-fiction book – strong stuff, a round of exploitation to go with the fries… good cast, making it very watchable though gradually more horrifying.

See our ballet designs on t-shirts, mugs, hats and aprons

preserving

how does your garden grow?

climb

little logs

Lucy — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 12:59:45 +0000

recipe here. Go very well with A Muppet Christmas Carol, lots of snow outside and a roaring fire :D

this morning

rabbits, cliffs, cushions and steamed chocolate pu...

stellarium and poppies

getting a bit festive

Lucy — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 21:12:29 +0000

Charlotte’s mince pies and chocolate logs made by a friend… said logs went very well with A Christmas Carol in 3D. Wonderful film, amazing having snow falling all round us like that

lovely things

loud chat and mountains

fairies

ice and woodland Advent

Lucy — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 12:12:41 +0000

Been very cold here!

Here’s a cool and free advent calendar for kids from The Woodland Trust with different outdoor activities for each day

We watched RV: Runaway Vacation with Robin Williams – a great film with a home ed family in it, all really enjoyed it.

and I just have to…

Fruit & Nut Dark Chocolate Wreath

bones and rubble

throwing plants into the equation

google moon and muffins

just when you worry that the world is mad…

Lucy — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 13:57:16 +0000

…with stories of a dinner lady sacked for telling the truth about bullying (I can vouch for such an act being akin to this, though stoning is done with tongues and a twisting of the truth these days in this country) and two policewomen being prevented from looking after each others children by Ofsted…

Worry no more! An article in the Guardian from 2007 gives an interesting insight into how children are prioritised in the household of Yvette Cooper (Childrens’ Secretary) and Ed Balls (Education Minister). So there we are, all is well… we can all go back to being

hmm… could blog mojo be returning?

NB: no offense was intended to sheep in this post. They are commonly misrepresented as being too stupid to think for themselves as is referenced above, but are actually rather good parents and beautiful creatures