Posted in Family, friends and Church
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I haven't blogged for ages... too much to say!
Right now I'm not sure of the connection I have, or whether pages are loading reliably, so here's a summary:
J has a new job. He was working p/t at a supermarket (who kept changing his hours) and p/t as a school cleaner. Now he has an apprenticeship in admin with the Council and seems to be enjoying it.
L has also changed her work: she has more hours at the Body Shop, though these vary. She's also got a Council cleaning job though as it's relief hours only, it's variable. She started by cleaning at the school where J worked (which H goes to), and this week has some hours at the library - where N works!
Small town ;-)
L has officially finished with school until she gets her GCSE results. If things go well there she will probably go to the sixth form.
She was the reason I started this blog, some years ago when I taught her at home. I would have liked to continue longer but she felt able to go back to school and decided for herself to go. I've since offered H some homeschooling, but he looked bemused and refused me! Interestingly, he seems to suit school better than either of the others did.
Well, it's summer holidays (grey and rainy) and we are soon going away to Norfolk for a few days so I had better go and get on with some housework - namely the perennial task of sorting the sock bag! L paused to look at the lines of socks arrayed on the living room floor, as she was on her way out to the gym just now. She pointed out three bright, fluffy oddments and told me to put them in her sock drawer: 'They haven't got partners, and they're Charlotte's!'
I asked whether she had the partners, whether Charlotte had the partners...?
No, nobody had them. they are just three random bright socks belonging to Charlotte, which is why they are now in a bundle in L's sock drawer, waiting, I suppose, for whichever of L's and Charlotte's friends has the partner socks to lend them to L some day. The oddments will then hang around in my sock bag for weeks or months until L sees them and reunites them with their other halves. Goodness knows whether they will even match by then - depends how often each has been worn! I wonder whether any will ever return to Charlotte, and whether she will remember them if they do?
I'm not going to worry about them. In the throw-away attitude this generation has acquired, there is no value on a pair of socks. In my teens, I seemed to be forever mending socks or creating garters because they fell down! My father, growing up in the Great Depression, remembers going by train to Liverpool and seeing barefoot children running alongside. Things change. |
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I'm not abandoning this blog, but I'm starting another: someonesthyroxinediary. I've just started taking thyroxine as my body is, in the words of the doctor, 'struggling to use' the thyroxine I produce naturally. It's likely I've had the condition a long time but it's getting worse and a blood test for something else showed it. Before this I had suspected I had a bit of a tendency to an underactive thyroid gland, but didn't think it was enough to be medically significant, which just goes to show I should take more notice of myself.  It's not cureable but it is treatable, if you see what I mean. All that has to happen is for the doctor to work out just how much of the hormone to replace, and prescribe the tablets. Voila. As the thyroid controls the speed of the metabolism, someone with an underactive thyroid (or who, like me, produces enough thyroxine but can't use it properly) will slow down in one or more ways. I happen to have lots of the symptoms although my deficiency isn't too severe. The new blog is to see what happens to the symptoms as I settle into treatment - hopefully it will save my friends from being bored by all the latest developments! I'm also hoping it will serve as an encouragement to me to see what progress I make and not lose sight of the huge blessing of not feeling wiped out by very ordinary activity. If I can remember how, I'll add a link somewhere it can be found easily. could be useful if I lose the notebook with the URL in! |
Posted in Family, friends and Church
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We had an interesting talk at church this morning - by the way I was at New Life - and a quotation stuck in my mind. The speaker was talking about how as Christians we can 'box God in', limiting what we allow him to do in us and through us. This has been a big theme recently and this speaker, from the opposite end of the country, was saying what has been said in sermons and prophecy from members of the local church recently. Towards the end of the talk he mentioned someone has said that after the Sunday morning meeting has ended, that's when the service begins. Of course he wasn't talking about chatting over coffee afterwards. He was talking about when we get home, when we interact with others, go to work or whatever comes up all the other hours of the week. A full church building which has no impact on the wider community is missing the boat. This is quite a challenge, but so true. It's hardest to walk the walk when we are with those who know us best, our families probably. In addition, outside church we may be in situations where we are the only person of faith and in that case, it's up to us to live the Kingdom in that situation and be the channel through which God can flow to others. Otherwise the real service just isn't happening. |
Posted in Musings
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Nothing special to report, just a lot of Bank Holiday traditions: After a couple of warm, sunny months with perhaps two slightly rainy days, the weather has become wet and cool - just right for Bank Holiday! In fact it was so cold and grey this morning that hardly anybody turned up for the Allertonshire Car Boot Sale, and those hardy souls who did wore jackets and huddled in the shelter of their cars quite a bit. N bought a picture but on researching it, isn't keen. H and I didn't buy much, though I got a small book of Indian recipes for L's new favourite taste. This caused amusement when the 'recipe' for onion bhajis listed the ingredients as '1/2 packet of onion bhaji mix, water', and H got some fun out of a gust of wind that rattled the sales tables, threatening to send things scuttering. J and L stayed at home - another Bank Holiday morning tradition. And yes, we have had a traditional Bank Holiday afternoon: trip to B&Q for paint, then N and H have nearly finished painting the hall. It's the colour of orange juice, which is really, if you think about it, yellow, so that substituted nicely for sunshine. The poor rabbits stayed in their hutches most of the day, out of the cold. L has gone down to the May Fair with E and E (her best friend and her boyfriend), but J must be gettingolder - he declared the fair 'too expensive' and spent the money on seeing Derren Brown instead. Now if you think I have missed the other great British Bank Holiday tradition of Doing Things To The Garden, admittedly I haven't managed more than a smidgeon today but I've bought a host of plants over the past couple of weeks (from Bedale Car Boot Sale, highly recommended) and I'm slowly finding homes for these new treasures: a Bleeding Heart (Dicentra spectabilis), a primula Vialii, some ox-eye daisies, my first ever auricula ("Gold Lace"), some runner beans, 35 leek seedlings, a tree lupin, some sweet peas and a plant with red flowers that I can't think of the name of, and lastly, I took pity on some freesia and Dutch Lily bulbs being sold off in B&Q. I like rescuing plants. Add to these the sprouting of some butternut squash seeds I planted last week, and I have... a shortage of space. Happy May Bank Holiday! |
Posted in Musings
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There seem to be a couple of trains of thought in the house at the moment. L and J have both come home from school with versions of the same one. "They say we're all going to get flu", said L, looking at me with a sad frown. H, typically, asked questions: "What is this 'swine flu'?" he asked; "They say it's like flu but horribly painful"; "They say you drown in mucus". We have talked to them and tried to put the spread of swine flu into context, explaining that things have moved on a long way since the terrible Spanish flu of 1918, both in terms of medication and in terms of understanding. Back in 1918, people didn't even understand what caused it, let alone have a drug to use. What I haven't majored on, though I think I mentioned it, is that nowadays we have air travel, so it has the opportunity to spread a lot more quickly. Between ourselves, N & I, and in conversation with a neighbour, conversation took a different turn. In amongst our usual subjects - plants and paintings - two separate conversations turned to the flu. We are all old enough and far enough from immediate danger to be philosophical, at least for now. We have seen illness come and go. We're still here. We all look out at the world from our small corner, though, and wonder where it's going, and those two of us with history degrees see the pattern over the centuries: something always comes along to regulate population, whether it be war or plague or simply economics. Today, when the UK is withdrawing from six years of war, the economy is still looking like a burst balloon and news broadcasts track the unremitting spread of swine flu. In one sentence we have three of the main ways the boiling pan of population is brought back to a sustainable bubble. Naturally, we don't want it to happen. Just as we don't want war and are glad when, in Dorothy Sayers' memorable words, it makes 'a noise like a hoop and roll(s) away', so there are scientists making strenuous efforts to outwit the long-awaited pandemic. Similarly there are economists, politicians, bankers, lots of us little people all trying to get the economy back on track in whatever way or on whatever scale we can. If we are in a position to make policy, we make it. If we have jobs, we hang on to them. If we are in the media, it seems we try to get people to grow vegetables. Now if that last one seems a digression, I should explain that N and I were talking about this tonight. Why the current trend to grow our own veg? For most people, I imagine the amount generated won't be enough to make a significant dint in our supermarket bills. If it were, there would be pressure groups worrying about the effect on market gardening. It may, for those who take part, be a health booster, providing exercise, fresh air, sunlight, a source of social input and even, if it all goes right, healthy food. That's undeniable - but how many people have access to enough land to make much of a difference? The UK is a land-poor country with a lot of people to support. If the trend has some effect in reversing the concreting of the nation's gardens it will be a good thing - even in our small plot we see the change in drainage since houses were built behind us and that land can no longer absorb as much water as it did a few years ago - but again - people are taught that their garden is in effect another room, and rooms 'need' solid floors. So why the big drive to dig? I think it's to make us feel we have some power over our well-being. Having said all this, I come to the 'pennies' of the title, the small changes we actually do make to our lifestyles and the effects they could have. For us, today, not close enough to war to have the relief it is abating, not under any immediate threat to our livelihoods although we have seen the effect of price increases, and not having been to Mexico or being near to a current outbreak of the flu, the ripples are still small. Here they are, then, at the end of an unusually long pontification: two small delights that aren't going to rock the world but may save a few pennies. Firstly, we had spicy lentil soup for tea. Secondly, there are three fat pots in the garden containing 35 seedling leeks which, in my fond imagination, are going to see us through most of the winter. We shall see. |
Posted in Family, friends and Church
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Yes, amazingly, in just under half an hour J will be an adult! I am saying what parents always seem to say: 'Where did the time go?!' We had a super day today: he wanted a family meal out so the five of us, plus his girlfriend S, my sister, her husband and daughter and N's parents all went to a local pub,The Fox and Hounds, and had dinner. The recent cold gave way in a very timely fashion to glorious warm sunshine and plenty of photo opportunities. We supplied a cake in the shape of a football pitch with a candle which unexpectedly played 'Happy Birthday' loud and long until J skewered it with a fork and restored peace. After the meal we came back home and the younger ones sunned themselves on the trampoline, we made a start on the football pitch and my sister took some group shots. Lovely day - and tomorrow is The Big One. The table is covered in balloons, cards and presents as we always open presents over a breakfast of croissants. Now it;s time I stacked the dishwasher and took off today's make-up before giving him a 'last hug before you're an adult'! Of course tomorrow I can give him another for being grown up! |
Posted in Musings
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Ever since I heard the aboveline, which if I remember rightly was addressed by William Wordsworth to his sister Dorothy (but I may have forgotten, it was a along time ago!) I have thought of it at about this time of year. As I mentioned a week ago, the weather was due to change last Sunday, and thankfully the forecast was right. It's been getting warmer day by day. Not only have snowdrops come out, but crocuses too (mental note to self - stock up on some new ones at the end of summer: these are looking very weedy now!) Today I spent some time tidying the garden, though there's still a lot to do, but the fantastic thing is, I didn't need a jacket! The sun was shining, birds singing and so forth. I fed a lot of weeds to the rabbits (who only a couple of days ago were lucky to get dried up twiggy bits in addition to their normal food) and got nice and muddy in the process. I found the remains of quite a few clothes pegs beginning to turn into compost, retreived a few tennis balls which probably aren't good for much any more and got a line full of sheets nearly dry. Oh, I love the spring. Shame we don't have all those funky smilies that were around on this site a couple of years ago, I could do with one right now. All in all it's been a positive, energetic day, which is strange because N had to spend the morning in work after the premises were broken into, H was mithering about not being able to afford both the expensive toys he wants and I wasted time on Facebook playing with go-nowhere applications. Wasting time - that would take a whole entry of its own. At least I have something to show for the day. |
Posted in Musings
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I don't know why I set such store by the weather forecast, as it hardly ever reflects what's going on outside my window, but today it was right: snow. In fact, since Christmas we've had I think five weeks of frost, thought there was a lovely day when the temperature went up to about 10 Celcius and my neighbour and I found ourselves tidying the gardens and chatting over the fence. that was a short-lived warmer spell, though. Much of the time there has been frost or snow for day after day, H's school closed for a couple of days (L's didn't, much to her disgust!) and the pavements have been treacherous as trampled snow froze to ice. When it snowed again this morning, I didn't even bother to take photos, yet usually snow is a treat, marked by lots of pictures, such as a whole series taken a few weeks ago of H trampolining in the snow! I have been more worried about walking to work for 7am tomorrow, when I struggled to get as far as the rabbit hutches just by the door this evening... and then it rained! There was a downpour for a while which hasn't managed to wash away the snow but I have hopes that in the morning it will be gone. The worst scenario is for it to freeze tonight, in which case the going will be treacherous. Snow is sufficiently rare in England for most people never to have seen snow tires (I never have), and local roads don't get priority gritting. N has offered to give me a lift to work, bless him, as it means getting up earlier than usual and braving the freezing cold. Having moaned so much, I ought to add that so long as I don't have to battle through it, I like the snow very much, it's very pretty! Anyway, roll on Sunday - the weather forecast says 9 Celcius, and believe me, after having become accustomed to one or two degrees either side of zero, with highs of four or five, for weeks and weeks, it's going to feel wonderful! |
Posted in Musings
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N and I went for a walk this afternoon, unaccompanied by children, who would rather be out with friends or keeping gifts company. It's been a blue-sky day, fairly chilly in contrast to the mild days just before Christmas. We parked near Cotcliffe Woods, which is an escarpment, and, the woods being thick mud, walked up the road and over the hill down to the A19. This road is too busy to cross lightly, even to visit pretty Leeke church, which reminded me, on the one occasion I've been in, of something out of Harry Potter. It's a little country church, which in the UK means it's old, dating from the times when churches were dotted around the countryside and it was a bit of a journey from the farm to get to Sunday morning services, but people went nonetheless. Nowadays churches are urban things, the old country ones - and some town ones too - share a vicar amongst several congregations and some have become defunct as people move out of the countryside into the cities. Leeke church isn't defunct - it's a cosy little place and in the back we found the bit that stuck in my mind as straight out of the imagination of J K Rowling: a little room with a small gothic window, church robes hanging on a peg and, on a counter which memory or fantasy tells me was covered in gingham sticky-back plastic, a kettle. It could have been a Weasley kitchen but for one thing: the Weasleys could never all have fitted in at once. Anyway, we didn't quite get there today. Topping the hill, the noise of the road reaches you suddenly, and the car headlights are already lit by around 3.30. We wandered down to the junction and I found what I thought must have been the original line of the road between a field hedge and a line of trees bordering the road, but N thinks it's part of a long ditch running by the thoroughfare. Someone had lost a wheel-trim so I propped it against a road sign and we made our way back towards the setting sun. There are hedges either side of the narrow road, and occasional trees. As we went along and the sun neared the horizon, the trees showed black against the warm orangey-yellow of the sky. There were copses with the trees tall and very straight, their branches clustered at the top and black against the pale blue of the zenith. There was a little cluster of two short conifers in a wayside garden, a tangle of brush obscured in the darkness beneath them while the brilliance of the yellow sun was fragmented by their trunks and branches. There was a also a lone oak, silhouetted against the empty winter sky as absolutely black, yet when we looked back it was a humble winter tree in muted colours, set in the wide landscape of the valley, lit by that quality of light that is more like gilded water. We met nobody but Boxing Day riders hacking in a leisurely way between local liveries and saw in a field eight sportsmen shooting..what? Probably rabbits judging by the location. The Boxing Day walk is a sort of tradition, borne of necessity after Christmas Dinner. Today's was unusually clear and bright, and the sun had set by the time we reached home and put the animals away for the evening. It will be freezing or below tonight, thanks to that clear sky. And of course, I didn't have my camera. |
Posted in Family, friends and Church
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...I hope you are having a lovely day. It's been great here, I always love Christmas and for once most of us were at home most of the time, which is unusual nowadays! N has a horrible cold and it looks as though H may be getting it too, but apart from that it's been very good. An added blessing is a couple of friends found me on facebook following a mention in our Christmas newsletter. And before I go... please give to someone who really needs it by clicking on the Hunger Site and friends. It's free to click on the 'button' that appears to the right of the photo and sponsors contribute to the causes mentioned. There are more tabs along the top of the page to allow access to click in support of the rainforest, child health, literacy, breast cancer and animals. Merry Christmas! |
Posted in Visits to Mum
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I've tried to update before but had modem problems then an entry I've just written disappeared... (sigh). Here goes again Mum is doing much better and has managed to fend off a trip to hospital. She now has the District Nurse coming to dress the infected foot, which is excellent as it means one or two more visits when Mum would otherwise have been on her own. We are also planning to visit both her and N's parents, and to have a visit from my sister and her family. Now I'm going to attempt to post this QUICKLY before I lose it yet again! Happy Christmas! |
.Posted in Visits to Mum
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Mum has become ill again - it looks like a fresh occurrance of cellulitis but I'm not sure. I went over when I became concerned about her, and now she's in hospital on antibiotics. I am just glad to be back, and in time for H's 13th. birthday, but am fighting anxiety. I can understand that anxiety is a tool of the devil and the opposite of faith, but it's very hard not to be anxious. Urgh, I need some good quality sleep, not to stay up on the computer, but I'm not resting quite well enough just now. Still we watched a film Harry got for his birthday this evening and it was excellent - if you haven't read or seen Eragon, I'd recommend it. (I read somewhere that the author is home educated, too). By the way, who is 'anonymous' who commented on my last entry?! Come and say hi again! Yes, they don't 'arf grow up quick! |
Posted in Family, friends and Church
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I knew I'd not blogged for ages, but it's been two and a half months! I'm just touching base to say what's going on, but it's been so long I don't know what's already written. J is working for a new supermarket that's opened in town and - the bit you won't have heard - has passed his driving test and bought a car! I think he would have done this at the age of about 18 months if the option had been open to him, but now, although I'm happy for him to gain experience, I do tend to stay up late to make sure he's back in one piece. L has a Saturday job which is going well and is, as ever, busy with things after school every day - oh, and over lunchtimes too, I think. She had two GCSEs in the last couple of weeks, the aim being to get two out of the way before the main onslaught next summer. Tonight she and N are at an open evening for a 6th Form College she is considering, and last week we went to one for her present school. In addition she's practising for dance and gymnastics shows to do with school. H has the Scouting/camping bug good and proper. On the first frosty night this autumn, he and a friend were trying out a new tent on our back lawn! I crept out a little before midnight to find them sound asleep, and added a couple of wrapped hot water bottles to the tent. Then an hour later I was out there again to check they were okay, which they were - though there was ice on the outside of the tent. The next day a neighbour told me how he had been camping in frosty conditions as a lad and the next morning had been very giggly, which he later found out is a first sign of hypothermia! I haven't verified this, but I don't want them sleeping out in such cold again! Other than that... not all that much going on really. |
Posted in Musings
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One of my rabbits is named Sable, a name I chose because it is an archaic word for 'black'. She's jet black and beautiful, and incidentally the only rabbit I've ever known to be able to walk backwards several steps on her hind legs. I didn't teach her this: she just does it. My Mum's cat, Peter, is another black animal. I suspect he has ambitions to be a panther - he's the right colour and approaching the right size! He's unusually sociable for a cat, and intelligent too. He is able to alert Mum when someone comes to the door, as she can't hear. The reason I mention these two is that I have just come across a moving but fascinating web site about black rescue dogs. Did you know that black dogs stay longer at rescue centres than dogs of other colours? Apparently people in general just aren't inclined to take black animals. That's very sad. My experience tells me they can be marvellous pets, and surely people can see past the 'black dog' images of fiction? That isn't the Hound of the Baskervilles in that rescue cage, it's another pooch in need of a family! They do present one difficulty, though - have you ever tried to photograph a black animal?! The web site above gives some useful-looking hints such as using morning or evening light rather than bright sun, which I will have to try with Sable some time. Nearly all my photos of her so far appear to be of a fluffy black blob with no features except - if I'm lucky - an enormous eye! Sable?! Are you in there? Give me a sign!
Oh, that's a relief!
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Posted in Educating Mum
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I came across this very clever piece of English the other day and thought I'd pass it on. It's all the more remarkable when you consider it was written by a Dutch man (or woman?), who must have had remarkable perseverance and a well-exercised brain to have such a command of such a perplexing language. If you can read the whole thing with understanding and without hesitation, you are doing better than I did. I stumbled over those words which I would guess originally came from the Greek but I think that if you can pronounce 'Hermione' (her-my-own-ee) then you should get those too even if, like me, you've never even heard of them before. Oh, and it has to be read in an English accent! Have fun! This Phonetic Labyrinth The following verses were written during the war by a Hollander whose knowledge of English, it will be noted, was extensive. They were published in
Dearest creature in creation, Studying English pronunciation, I will teach you in my verse Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse. I will keep you, Susy, busy, Make your head with heat grow dizzy Tear in eye, your dress you’ll tear. So shall I! Oh, hear my prayer Pray console your loving poet, Make my coat look new, dear, sew it! Just compare heart, beard and heard, Dies, diet, lord and word. Sword and sward, retain and (Mind the latter, how it’s written). Made has not the sound of bade: Say-said: pay-paid: laid, but plaid. Now I surely will not plague you With such words and vague and ague. But be careful how you speak, Say break and steak, but bleak and streak: Previous, precious, fuchsia, via Pipe, snipe, recipe, choir, Cloven, oven: how and low: Script, receipt, shoe, poem, toe. Hear me say, devoid of trickery, Daughter, laughter and Terpsichore, Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles, Exiles, similes, reviles: Wholly, holly, signal, signing: Themes, examining, combining: Scholar, vicar and cigar. Solar, mica, war and far. From desire, desirable: admirable from admire. Lumber, plumber: bier but brier: From knowledge: done, but gone and tone: One anemone: Balmoral: Kitchen, lichen: laundry, laurel: Gertrude, German: wind and mind: Scene, Melpomene, mankind: Tortoise, turquoise, chamois-leather, This phonetic labyrinth Gives moss, gross, brook, brooch, ninth and plinth. Billet does not sound like ballet: Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet: Blood and flood are not like food. Nor is mould like should and would. Banquet gives no clue to parquet. Which is said to rhyme with darky. Viscous, viscount: load and broad: Toward, to forward, to reward. Your pronunciation’s okay When you say, correctly, croquet: Rounded, wounded: live and grieve: Friend and fiend: alive and sleeve: Rachel, ache, moustache: eleven. We say hallowed but allowed: People, leopard: towed, but vowed. Mark the difference, moreover, ‘Twixt mover, plover, and then Leeches, breeches: wise, precise: Chalice, but police and lice: Camel, constable, unstable: Principle, disciple: label: Petal, penal and canal: Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal: Suit, suite, ruin: circuit, conduit, Rhyme with “shirk it” and beyond it”. But it’s very hard to tell Why it’s pall mall, but Muscle, muscular: gaol, iron Timber, climber: bullion, lion: Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair: Senator, spectator, mayor: Ivy, privy: famous, clamour And enamour rhyme with hammer. Pussy, hussy, and possess: Desert, dessert, and address. Golf, wolf: countenance: lieutenants: Hoist, in lieu of flags, left pennants. River, rival: tomb, bomb, comb. Doll and roll and some and home. Stranger does not sound like anger. Neither does devour like clangour. Soul but foul, and gaunt but aunt: Font, front, wont: want, grand and grant: Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger, Then say singer, ginger, linger Real and zeal: mauve, gauze and gauge: Marriage, foliage, mirage, age. Query does not rhyme with very. Nor does fury sound like bury. Dost, lost, post: doth, cloth and loth. Job, job: blossom, bosom: oath. Though the difference seems little, We say actual but victual: Seat and sweat, chaste, paste and caste: Leigh and eight and freight and height: Put, nut: granite and unite. Feoffer does not rhyme with heifer. Nor does reefer rhyme with zephyr. Dull, bull: Geoffrey, George: ate, late. Hint, pint, senate and sedate. Scenic, phrenic, and pacific: Science, conscience: scientific: Tour, but our: and succour, four: Core provides a rhyme for door. Gas, alas and pass, and was Dickens started off as “Boz”. Sea, idea, guinea, area: Psalm and charm: Maria, malaria: Youth, south, southern: cleanse and clean: Doctrine, turpentine, marine: Look up alien and Italian: Dandelion and battalion. Sallied, allied, yea and ye – Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, key, quay! Say over, but ever, fever. Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver. Never guess – it is not safe: We say calves, valves, half, but Ralph. Heron, granary, canary. Crevice, and device and eyrie: Face, but preface and efface Phlegm, phlegmatic: ass, glass, bass, Large, but target: gin, give, verging, Ought, out, joust and scour and urging. Ear but earn: and wear and tear Do not rhyme with here but there. Seven is right and so is even Hyphen, roughen, nephew, Stephen. Monkey, donkey, clerk and jerk. Asp, grasp, wasp: and cork and work. Tunnel surely rhymes with funnel? Yes it does – and so does gunwale. Islington and Housewife, verdict and indict. Aren’t you mixed up, reader, rather, Saying lather, bather, father? Finally, what rhymes with tough – Though, through, plough or cough? Enough! Hiccough has the sound of “cup” – My advice is – give it up!
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I haven't been officially home educating for the last couple of years and I'm still missing it. I'm therefore officially pleased as L comes up to taking her GCSEs next summer and the workload is increasing, as she will need parental backup. Her school is pretty good with accomodating dyslexia but it's evident she learns much better from chatting about a subject than from reading about it, and doesn't necessarily pick up meanings without a specific explanation being given. The other day we sat down and had a go at her German homework, preparatory to school restarting in September. I don't speak German so there wasn'ty a question of me doing it for her! However it helped her to have someone talking through each stage with her. Apart from actually getting words onto paper, I think it helped her feel it was 'do-able'. She's very good with putting in extra hours in those subjects that need a lot of time (Art and Textiles in particular) but she has had almost an academic year less of German than other students so she will need that much extra to get through. Anyway, better go, - I've promised J next go on the computer. |
Posted in Musings
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I'm not much of a techie so I don't know why our computer does certain things, but they can be interesting. For instance, why did the items below come up as suggestions when I started to write this post?! One I think must have been mine from the moneysavingexpert.com forum but the others are probably J, the Boro fan. Question is, why these? Why not N looking at works of art? Why not H researching games? Why not L from the strange world of Bebo? For that matter, why not me on a Flylady group? I can only conclude that there is some deep affinity between homeschoolblogger.com and Middlesbrough Football Club. Emnes/Digard out to emulate Ronaldo/Gerrard Official: Gary O'Neil to stay with Boro Just seeing if you're okay? Miss No More Activity In The Transfer Market? Your SOA |
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We had a week in France - fab! I was worn out after a few days of translating - thankfully this was spread over quite a number of lovely people or the recipients would have been worn out too - my French leaves more than a little to be desired, but I'm soooo pleased that I have actually spoken to real French people and made myself understood! The mental effort, however, is pretty tiring. I will say again, though, that people were great - they made every effort to understand and make sure I also understood, and they were pleasant and cheerful. Normandy is just gorgeous. There are endless miles of cornfields and little woodlands, a coast line of tall white cliffs and pale green sea, and plenty of attractive seaside towns which I would love to explore further. We also went inland, to Yvetot (? spelling) and Rouen, both of which I enjoyed too. The architecture is distinctive and different from England in a couple of important ways. The majority of houses in the area we visited seem to be half-timbered, but in brown and cream rather than the black and white of most English half-timbered houses. Older town centre buildings are remarkably colourful, while modern ones are very inventive, some with curving roof-lines. Everywhere there are red geraniums in window boxes, whether in a thatched counrty cottage or three storeys up above a shop in town. Well, that's a whistle-stop tour for you. I hope to go back some day and have a more leisurely visit! |
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Oh, it's been sooooo long since I posted. Of course the longer I leave it the more there is to say and the more I out it off so here goes: I am in the throes of starting a new job. Yes, my days as a Word Processor Operator have come to an end: I saw a very likely-looking job advertised in my original field, as a Support Worker, and here I am, on my third week of it and it's going well so far, though working shifts is a strange experience after office hours! Most of the time so far the hours have been cushy but as of next week I start sleep-ins (one a week, plus one daytime). Today was exhausting, not because of the actual work but because I got to sleep around half past 12 last night, woke at 3.30 feeling hungry and thirsty, had a snack and was drfiting off to sleep when some wretched crow cawed laudly outside and woke me... I only got about 4 hours in all, then worked from 7a.m. to 4 p.m. So I'm a bit weary! Tomorrow is that wonderful thing, a day off! And it's Sunday, one of our Sundays at New Life, which I look forward to. And that's it for now. :) |
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I tried to post and entry and it longed me out, gave me a blank page other than spaces which looked as though they were intended for login and password, then lost my post. Grrr. |
