Summer is Creeping In

This post has been a little slow making it out in the world.  We have had a fairly busy term with outings and various things going on, and so I got this half here, and then life happened….

Games Workshop miniature by Gabriel.

Some early ideas and brainstorming for Gabriel’s yr. 11 next year.

Beautiful evening in Fremantle enjoying the start of Summer, and getting some rock climbing in.

Taking a look about Perth’s Heritage buildings.  We really enjoyed seeing the change in this building, which was once the Gas and Electric building, but which we remembered as an ugly (maybe 1980s) bank.

Inklette loom arrived in the post, didn’t take long to assemble and get started.

A small cross stitch project by Arden.

Science experiment with ice.

My crafting…making some bags

Learning pattern drafting

And a guest….a red wattlebird come to visit our balcony.

Part 2

Everyone is feeling great about having finished off their projects.

Here’s the work.

Willow’s horse looking stunning.

Gabriel’s cushion.

We’ve also been working on a play of Brynhild and Sigurd to perform for the family, and finishing off our physics experiments with a week of electricity. There’s been lots of other things happening this week, so we’ve kept it rather low key with school work. Granny is coming to visit this week, plus there’s been Willow’s singing concert, the pageant and Arden’s birthday.

Finishing off geometry we looked at spirals.

The logarithmic or equiangular spiral.

And the Archemidean spiral (this is my version- need to take another picture of Willow’s).

I made a soaked grain swiss roll for Arden’s birthday. I wasn’t sure it would work, but it was fabulous, and everyone loved it.

Loose Ends

We’ve returned to physics this week, with a week on magnets. There were loads of great experiments, but everyone was most taken with the floating magnet.

Craft projects are nearing competion, and are looking fabulous.

Willow’s horse, with some extra detailing.

Gabriel’s cross- stitch finished and just needing to be made into a cushion.

We also had our homeschool review this week, and got through it all ok, so that was a relief. It’s always nice to have that done for another year.

Title-less

Due to some issues with resources (I’ve been having difficulty finding lodestone/magnetite)- we’ve stepped away from physics from a few weeks- and Willow is doing a block on medieval history. The block has been very interesting so far- we’ve been using Charles Kovac’s book ‘The Age of Discovery’ for the basis of the lesson. There’s been a progression through the stories of Jesus based off the progression of Rome and monks creating beautiful works telling Jesus’ story.

This is Willow’s painting of Jesus’ birth.

And her illuminated letter.

Gabriel thought he’d have a try too.

A castle design.

This week we progressed onto Islam and Judaism, and did some Islamic patterns.

Willow also did some writing- both creative and factual- she’s currently working on a story about viking times, and she also wrote a page about Albert the Great.

Gabriel has just come to the end of a block on ratios and fractions, and will be doing his final block of the year, on the Norse myths. We are planning a play for our final week, which will be fun, as we haven’t done a play in quite a while.

Gabriel has also progressed nicely through his cushion and should be finishing the lion soon.

We’ve been a bit disappointed to find this week that The Herdsman has closed it city shop, due to lack of popularity. It seems good quality food hasn’t really taken off here quite that much. Seems like it’s a good decade behind Adelaide- I’ve been quite surprised by how progressive Adelaide’s food culture is by comparison. I will have to get out to Organic on Charles more often over the summer.

Some Recent Work

Willow’s swan poem.

Gabriel’s Eagle poem.

Gabriel’s celtic knot sword picture.

Gabriel is progressing through his cushion.

My pin cushion is finally finished!

Cushion Design and Horses

Gabriel’s cushion design.

Willow’s drawings…..

Recent Work and Events

I visited the anthroposophical shop last week to stock up on work books, get a gift for someone and get modelling wax (largely this was due to Arden being co-operative whilst we were there). We are heading to Perth to live in a few weeks, and I have no idea if they have an anthroposophical shop there, so stocking up on basics before leaving seemed like a good move, plus I really like the lady the manages the shop at present, so it was nice to have a chat to her about our plans and homeschooling.

Gabriel has started on his next cross-stitch project. He designed his first one based around animals and crystals, and his second design was on knights and dragons. He’d like to sew both of them by the end of the year- at this stage it seems like a lot of work, but he’s getting much more consistent with his sewing. He has started on the first part of his animal cushion, which consists of four panels with different images.

Willow is still working at her stuffed toy project, and at this stage is drawing lots of horses, her drawing has improved immensely over the last few weeks, and I think after a few more weeks of drawing it may be time for her to move onto planning how she will make her toy horse.

Willow had her final singing lesson tonight with her choir before we move, and has one final flute lesson and a flute concert this weekend. Her singing concert was a couple of weekends ago, and as usual was a success. This time Willow had a shared ‘solo’ part which was exciting for her. She loves singing on stage, and was really pleased to get the shared part in singing ‘Maria’ from ‘The Sound of Music’.

Both kids have been doing a block on maths- Willow business maths and Gabriel fractions. But our usual bookwork, has fallen to the side this week, as the kids had a visit to Mt Gambier to see their cousins there. They had a fabulous time and have been talking non-stop about wrestling, basketball, frogs, computer games, and goats amongst other highlights of their stay.

There’s quite a bit to do round here, with getting ready for the move, but gradually things are getting done. We’ve got a couple more things to sell, or throw out, and boxes are getting packed – so that’s good, we need to find a home there and catch up with friends before we go. I’ve already contacted their homeschool community and on first impression they seem very friendly, but my plan at this stage is to have a rather low key term so that we can get to know Perth at a more relaxed pace.

Craft Projects

Our main craft projects are currently underway, and we have all been very busy. Gabriel has started his first cross stitch project for the year- a pin cushion. He was bursting to go straight into a larger project (as Usual) but after this smaller one, we will look at designing a cushion cover for him to cross-stitch.

First stage of designing

Second stage designs- and the one outlined in red, is the cross-stitch pattern

Gabriel’s project in progress

My design for a pin cushion.

Meanwhile Willow is into the early stages of her planning for making a stuffed toy. She’s busy modelling wax horses, working on getting a good sense of shape for the horses she’s making and developing her skills of observation. It’s also interesting for her (and me) in that I’m largely leaving the project to her. I’ve discussed the goal (making a realistic 3d soft toy animal), and given guidance as required, but I’m leaving her to direct the project and what she does during her craft session.

Here is some of her work so far- all of these have been made in one afternoon.

Nearly the End

We’ve been so busy the last few weeks, but mostly it has been fun. There’s been a few unpleasant bits- house inspections and the sort but activity wise, but we’ve all been really enjoying this end of the year.

Willow had being doing some cross-stitch, and doing a beautiful job. She planned her picture using graph paper and has been sewing onto her aida cloth. Gabriel has been giving it a bit of a try too. Initially he found it a little tricky, but after some other sewing felt he would like to have another try, and slowly it’s starting to come together.

We made angels at our Waldorf co-op recently, and that was great fun too! Lots of beautiful work by everyone.

We also got out to a circus skills workshop. The people running it were fabulous, and the kids had an amazing time. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but it’s taught them some great balancing skills, and I suspect also how to trust and be more confident. And within that theme they had their end of year performance with Young Adelaide Voices. Again the confidence is amazing- coping beautifully with being up in front of a large crowd- and it was really evident how much they’ve both grown up this year to see their performances. Last year Gabriel was still very dreamy, and this year he’s definately settled into his roots.

We’re up to our last chapter in The Children of Odin by Paudric Collum. Tomorrow we’re up to Ragnarok- the Twilight of the Gods. It’s sad to come to the end of the block, but exciting too. It’s been fascinating learning about runes, and how to draw celtic knots and all about the different gods and goddesses. But class five looks challenging in different ways for Willow and me. Woodwork is meant to be more serious next year, and then we need to look at a few different ancient cultures- Egypt, Greek and some others. Plus our form drawing is now heading into geometry. Quite exciting stuff. Of course I’ll still be doing form drawing as Gabriel is still doing that next year, but it is really becoming evident that we’re heading into more advanced study and that feels good.

This week were finishing with a nature block- hopefully some cooking tomorrow, and maybe a couple of outings, and a concert for Damien on our last day. I am looking forward to the end of year, a good rest, and a new start of class 3 and 5 next year.

Returning

It’s been a very long time since I’ve posted on this blog, but since I’m now starting another blog on making money, I decided to reconnect to this one and make more of an effort.

We moved house and are now living on top of a hill! But still very near to Adelaide. The move was a bit mad, but it has been worth it- living in North Adelaide is much more community orientated than Unley. It has been nice to find somewhere to live in Adelaide, that I like, since our return from Europe. I had been struggling a bit to appreciate the place since returning. And recently another market has opened, the community market at Grange is lovely, and a great place to spend this time of the year at, if one heads to the beach too.

We’ve had quite a busy year with our homeschooling activities, and amazingly it’s heading towards the end. We’ve nearly finished class 4 and class 2. Our craft activities have been all quite successful. We all made fabulous wooden swords, and I am feeling much more confident in our ability to do woodcarving. Willow has nearly finished knitting one sock (with second to follow next year). Hopefully she may finish the sock now rather than reading my post! 😉 But perhaps she’s too busy giggling. So in the course of Willow knitting socks, I also have learnt to knit socks and am currently up to my third pair- one for each child.

Gabriel learnt to purl this year, and next year will see his first real knitting project. Quite an exciting step forward! Our final selection of craft for the year is cross stitch, which is being enjoyed by all presently.

Activity wise has seen lots of interesting things happen here. We’ve started our own Waldorf Co-op, which meets fortnightly, and is looking for a few more people but establishing itself gradually. Willow went for a sail on the One and All, which was fabulous apparently and took a year to occur. It was a beautiful mild day for it, which was great considering the last cancellation was due to excessively hot weather. Willow and Gabriel can both swim reasonably well now, after 6months worth of lessons with Ken Richter, who is an amazing swimming teacher and currently everyone is back to Young Adelaide Voices for singing- with the Pageant coming up soon. There is not quite as much excitement as last year about the Pageant singing performance, but everyone is still looking forward to it.

We also headed to Melbourne for a holiday and had a great time. Our first holiday away since returning to Adelaide. We flew with Tiger airways and whilst the flight was fine, the terminus in Melbourne was quite amusing. It was basically a gigantic padlocked carport. Very odd indeed. We had a few eating destinations requested by the kids, which we headed to. One was Wagamama, we ate there regularly in Glasgow, and Fifteen. The guys had been watching Jamie at Home and decided it would be good to go to his restaurant in Australia. We all had a bar meal. It was really good, and has inspired Willow and Gabriel with their cooking.

And now it looks like Summer is here, so things are starting to wind down and yet get busier at the same time. Lots of fun end of year Christmassy things to happen!