Edith Nesbit - Enchanted Castle

We all loved The Railway Children by Edith Nesbit, so were excited to start reading this book together. The chapters are quite long, but the children love all the themes of magic and fairytales.

Ancient Greece - Myth of Andromeda

The sea monster from the Greek myth of Andromeda by Eden.

The Horse of Troy - Story

Eden's story of the Trojan Horse.

Ancient Greece - The Horse of Troy

Eden's drawing.
Niamh's drawing.

Eden's drawing of girls in elaborate outfits

Gingerbread girl

Niamh's very creative gingerbread girl - worthy of a blog entry we thought.

Van Gogh

We have been studying Van Gogh and his paintings, "Sunflowers" is the favourite of all of us children. We were surprised to hear that he cut off his ear one day when he lost his temper. We hope to go to the gallery in London soon, to see the real painting.

Robin Hood

We are reading Robin Hood together as a family - we try to choose classics to read as a family together at night. So far our favourite by far is "Tom Sawyer".

Scripture Memorization

We memorize scripture by drawing a picture that shows what the verse means to us, this get attached to the verse, laminated and stuck on the bathroom wall (next to the toilet where we can all read it a few times a day :-). After we know the verse, it gets stuck in one of the other bedrooms as a piece of artwork !

Tree study

Tree Poem

Eden gets her Grade 1 Recorder

Science Experiment - Flowers drinking up water

We put this flower in blue water to show how the flowers sucks water up to the leaves and petals. Both the leaves and petals had blue in them after a few hours.

Science Experiment - learning about water and air pressure in syphoning

Put a pipe into a bottle filled with water, and fill the tube with water by sucking the water through.
The air pressure and the water sucking through brings all the water into the second bottle.
And do it again the other way - this was fun.

Jude's under the sea theme

A wall display of Jude's craft for his under-the-sea theme.

Hama bead craze

We have enjoyed making these penguins from hama beads, we make the design and then mom irons them so that they melt and stick together. We have made so many, because we wanted to have a penguin wedding.

Eden's recorder exam - Polka

Eden's recorder exam - Spring Song

Releasing the butterflies

It was a lovely sunny day when we set them free, and they can fly for hundreds of miles in search for food, so no need to worry about them.

No guesses for who is going the be an actress one day (Eden was extremely happy to see them set free though).

The Butterflies have emerged - 10 days later

The red liquid is meconium - left over colouring from the wings and unneeded tissues.

All 5 of the caterpillars have now changed into beautiful Painted Lady Butterflies - we all agreed that God is truly an awesome creator and artist.

Niamh reading the poem "What is pink ?"

What is Pink?
Christina Rossetti

What is pink? a rose is pink
By the fountain's brink.
What is red? a poppy's red
In its barley bed.
What is blue? the sky is blue
Where the clouds float thro'.
What is white? a swan is white
Sailing in the light.
What is yellow? pears are yellow,
Rich and ripe and mellow.
What is green? the grass is green,
With small flowers between.
What is violet? clouds are violet
In the summer twilight.
What is orange? why, an orange,
Just an orange!

Caterpillars - 3 weeks

All the caterpillars have turned into chrysalises now, Eden says the butterflies are going to be orange because you can see some orange colouring through the chrysalis.
We transferred them to the butterfly habitat for when they turn into butterflies.

Egyptian art - watercolour

Mural found on the wall of Tutankhamen's tomb. (Eden)
Ankh - egyptian hieroglyphic meaning life. Niamh

Caterpillars - two weeks

The caterpillars have now attached themselves to the top of the cup - ready to turn into a chrysalis.

A writing milestone for Jude

Jude traces his own name.

Niamh doing a kick over

Niamh has just learned this move - she makes it look so easy.

Siya and the Ancient Tomb - A story by Niamh

Siya is a girl who is 7 years old. Her Mom and Dad were born in Egypt, but they had moved to England. Siya was born in England. Now the family has gone back to Egypt, because it was beautiful there.

One day Siya went out of her house to dig. She found pieces of gold in the sand, and everytime she dug, she found more gold. Then she found a hole, in it was a map on papyrus with hieroglyphic writing on. Her mommy and daddy had taught her how to read hieroglyphics. The map was to an ancient pharoah's tomb. The map showed her the way to two sand hills, and she had to move two boulders out of the way to get to the tomb. She went home and called her Mom and Dad, and they came back to the tomb with her. They went into the tomb and found precious jewellery. Her mommy and daddy then said, "It's nearly night time, we have to go back home Siya." But Siya stayed in the tomb, she had two lamps. Then Siya went into the place where the coffin was. She opened the coffin and she found the mummy. She took the mask off his head, and the mummy came alive and he said to her, "Come on, let's get out of here - I've been here for thousands of years." Siya collected all the gold and went home with the mummy. Siya's mom said, "Siya, what have you been doing ?", and Siya said, " Mom, I have made a new friend called Ramses." Ramses then built a new house next to Siya, and they became great friends.

Mom says - Niamh has long been the storyteller in the house, and she is often telling her siblings stories at bedtime, in the morning in bed and at the breakfast table. I overheard this one, so I asked her to narrate it to me.

Books I'm reading - Eden

Making biscuits.

Here is Jude making fish and starfish biscuits for the under-the-sea theme he is doing.

Caterpillars

We ordered these caterpillars, and they came in a cup with their food on the bottom(the ones we take out of the garden somehow always die). This is a picture of them when they arrived.
This is what they look like 5 days later. They have gotten so big so quickly.

Learning about Egypt

The hieroglyphics spell Eden, Niamh and Jude.

Royal girls

My Recipe box

Mom has bought me a recipe box, so I am going to collect all my favourite recipes and put them in my box - here is an example of one of the recipe cards that goes into the box.

Art lesson with Daddy

Daddy and I are painting a Kingfisher.

Cool Pattern

Niamh came up with this cool pattern when playing with our maths pattern blocks.

Ducklings

We were very happy to see these Mallard ducklings on a bird watching outing in Bushy Park.

Goose flying - watercolour

I painted this goose after watching the film "Fly Away Home".

Making Bird Cake

Mix Lard, Raisins, Cheese and Bird seed together.
Put it all in an empty yoghurt pot.
Hang up in a tree.