warm, cosy, homeschool

Cold, windy, rainy weather today.  I remember going to school on days like this; my school had no heaters and it was often chilly and a bit miserable.

 

Today I was so glad to be home educating; my children snug, happy and warm here at home.

 

At the last minute I decided to throw together a chicken noodle soup to have with freshly baked bread as a warming winter lunch.  

 Some stock, pasta and chopped left-over roast chicken went into the pot, boiling for as long as the pasta took to cook. Almost instant warm lunch!

What quick, warm lunches do you make in winter?

Red

Joining in with Evi again for the colour of the week: Red.

Once again I was delighted to sit with my cup of tea and browse through my photo archives.  The children are so small in some of these photos!

 A shiny red bike for Christmas...

 ...a red crown for Nana on baby Lili's first Christmas...

 ...red reindeer ears for a cheeky girl...

 

...warm woolly jumpers on the beach in winter...

 

 

...a boy set for action!

 

 

...an old red bus...

 

I do like red!

Highlights from our homeschool week...

 Lili has continued to take off with her reading and writing. She loves it and can't get enough! In these pics she is creating a story from the sight words she has learnt (the white ones) and words made from sounds she has learnt how to blend (red/orange words).

 Lili loves to tell stories and it is marvelous to see her joy at being able to put words together to communicate.  After composing the sentences she wrote them in her book.

We made animals from recycled materials. Some giraffe-like creatures...

 ...an elephant...

 ...and a crab.

 Nathan went for an abstract creation he called a "Thingy-mabob."

 Lili had ballet and jazz early in the week, and then it was Amy's turn mid-week. The photos aren't that great! I so enjoy watching Amy dance, she does her ballet beautifully.

 

 We enjoyed a trip to the Museum. The kids especially liked the hands-on science area.

The exhibition about Coal, Steel and Newcastle was great and also had some hands-on elements...

The girls did not enjoy the light and sound show about BHP- too scary! We had to leave part way through.

 

 

The old Newcastle tram was wonderful...

 

 After that it was time for gymnastics again.

 

We finished off the week with a bit of a road trip to deliver three of the guinea pig babies to some friends.  The kids had a great time catching up and playing with their friends and it was a nice way to finish off our school week.

Pink

Today I'm joining in with Evi with her colour of the week photos.  What a great reason to go through old photos and reminisce :)  Thanks for the idea  Evi!

This week: Pink.

Pink to me is all about my two daughters.

 

Above is Lili as a very young baby, and below at about age 2.  

Pretty in Pink, always.

 Then along came beautiful Amy...

From an early age she has been inseparable from "Bed Ted" who is quite possibly the World's Most Important Teddy.  He is not quite so pink these days.

 Here they are together a few years ago....

 These days the girls are branching out with their colour choices, but they will always be my pink ones :D

Weekend Baking...and eating :)

After a bit of a sleep-in this morning and because I am not feeling completely well, I had a slow start to the day and didn't achieve much. Sometime after lunch, my desire to eat something yummier than some plain rice crackers (all I could find to snack on) overtook my desire to sit around and do not much more than read the newspaper.

I dug out the cookbooks for inspiration and, happily, gathered some momentum as I measured and mixed.  First up was an oat and choc chip slice, especially for the kids.  I have switched from using packaged choc chips and now use sweetened cacao nibs instead.

 Next a recipe for Butterscotch Curls in my Womens Weekly Old Fashioned Favourites cookbook took my fancy.  It calls for copious amounts of butter and sugar and so seemed completely appropriate for a cold and windy Saturday afternoon.

Here is the pan prepared with butter, sugar and pecans...

The dough rolled out ready to be smothered in more butter and sugar.

  

Cut into rounds and placed on top of the prepared base.

 

Ready to eat with a cup of tea :)

Weekend baking wouldn't be complete without some music to cook to and I was listening to Sometimes the Stars by The Audreys.

 

I may still quickly throw together a batch of vanilla icecream for the kids.  This is my easy recipe:

Blend 1/3 cup water, 2/3 cups sugar and 1 cup powdered milk in a blender.

Add 1 egg, approx 150ml cream, 1 teaspoon vanilla essence and enough milk to bring it up to 1 litre. Blend well.

Place in a sealed container and freeze for 30 minutes. Stir and pour into an icecream maker. Process in icecream maker for 30 minutes then return it to the freezer.

From the vege patch today...

We have only just got our vege patch back up and running after a long time of being without one. We had limited success with the last patch becuase of some large gum trees that were too close.


The new vege patch is in raised beds and gets sunshine most of the day.


The rocket is growing well.

  

The sugar snap peas have started to grow.  I had quite a few attempts to get the seeds to shoot, with this last lot successful. Can't wait for them to grow, they are one of my favourite veges :)

Pak choy gone to seed - it's so pretty I'm leaving it there, and hoping the flowers attract some predatory insects to help take care of the caterpillars.

 Pak choy and shallots picked and washed ready for tonights dinner of noodle and vege stirfry.

I also picked rocket ready to have for lunch with some scrambled eggs, tomato chutney and this yummy bread we made this morning.

What are you eating from the vege patch today?