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Friday, August 20, 2010

Well, this morning was International Day. The kids had a great time going around collecting stamps for their passports and tasting lovely treats at the different displays and making neat crafts.

Ready to go...
Making passports
After lunch we headed off to do our groceries. Nathan had collected up various recipes this morning and had his eye on making the Coconut Macaroons (and was the only gluten free thing available that he could eat aside from fresh coconut, pineapple and grapes). This was the first recipe that he's completely read, measured and made himself. Mmmmm...

More trampolining (oh, how we're loving those lighter evenings), playing solitaire and watching Master Chef.

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Wednesday

Nathan's contraption...

Danielle's aeroplane ready for passengers...

Danielle's restaurant ready for customers...

Busy reading their menus...
Oops, we forgot about homeschool gym...so we went out for a walk around the big block for 1/2 hr.

And then friends popped over for a play after school...

Lego, reading, computer games, trampoline, painting...

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Today was one of those ambling along and meandering kind of days - we decided to have a home day since every other day this week has something on. So, no plans and no outings. The kids just seem to melt into days like this without "waiting" to go out, or "asking" to do anything more than what we are - it's very in the moment kind of stuff. They just seamlessly moved from one thing to the next. I do still get surprised at the end of the day at how many "different" things they have either discovered or become interested in. I know I shouldn't really, but I do.

The morning involved various games using all the cushions, pillows, duvets and blankets of beds etc.

We then put the finishing touches on our Italy display.

Danielle got out "The Amazing Mammoth Hunt" game for her and Nathan to play. One of them uncovered the Spain picture which was a bull. Nathan started showing Danielle what the bullfighters in Spain do.

We then had a bit of a discussion about this not-very-nice sport and watched a youtube of one. So although neither liked the idea, they did spend a bit of time in the afternoon pretending to be a bull and matador.

While I was on the phone to a friend this afternoon, Danielle got out the paints...
Meanwhile, Nathan was writing me notes...

I pointed out to Nathan that he wrote "she's" correct and he replied "yeah, because if I didn't put that thing in there then it would be talking about lots of shes". LOL, I have no idea how he knew that!
Nathan then moved on to some painting...a bullfight...(the bull won because he only had 2 spears poking out of him).
Earlier on in the day Danielle was interested in reading one of our Dick and Jane books (these books were given to Nathan when he was younger and I personally couldn't stand to read them since they asked for them to be read as a bedtime story). However, I can see how they are giving Danielle confidence in her early stages of reading. When Simon got home she raced off to get the book so she could read to him.
 

Monday, August 16, 2010

Today we got cracking back into our Italy presentation and headed to the stationery shop to buy the display board and get some photos printed to add to it.

The kids then put together a collage of Italian food pictures that we'd cut out that will be the "table cloth" part of the display.

We then decided on how to display all the different sheets of information that have been put together. Nathan potted up the bowl of herbs for the Herb Garden part of the display. We're pretty much done now!

After lunch Danielle got stuck into some Lego and wanted to measure it out to see that her house would be the right size for Polar Bear.
There was trampolining, playing with a ball of string (again!), watching a DVD....

Then off to Keas. We were helping out the Dept of Conservation today by planting some trees in a wetland area they are trying to repopulate with birds.
As I was getting something out of the freezer for dinner I discovered a bottle of water that we'd put in last week to observe how much the water rose when it was frozen. It was then given a the bash with a hammer...

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Our Winter Holiday

DAY 1 - VISIT TO THE SNOW
DAY 2 - A LONG DRIVE AHEAD WITH A STOP-OFF AT THE HAMILTON GARDENS (AWESOME) FOR LUNCH BEFORE HEADING ON
DAY 3 - A VISIT TO THE WWII TUNNELS AT NORTH HEAD

LUNCH AT THE BEACH MAKING SOME VITAMIN D
DAY 4 - A MORNING VISIT WITH SOME LONG-TIME INTERNET FRIENDS BEFORE HEADING TO THE ZOO FOR THE AFTERNOON

We loved this little fella and his sack. The kids spent ages when we got home playing with pillow cases (climbing in and out and flinging it around) and pretending to be baby orangutans lol.
DAY 5 - A VISIT TO A TIBETAN BUDDHIST MONASTERY
THE AFTERNOON WAS EXPLORING THE PROPERTY THAT WE WERE STAYING ON
DAY 6 - THE LONG DRIVE HOME

I now have a bunch of questions to follow up on volcanoes, the depth of Lake Taupo and how it was formed, what happens to the earth if volcanoes keep erupting around the world and where does more and more magma keep coming from...