It's lovely weather at the moment, and with the Covid19 goings on, things are being left where they'd normally be cut or controlled. Here is the lovely wildflowers (& a happy bee) on the Tynwald Fairfield:
I was in St. John's to take this picture as continue to have miseries with the internet at home with my work computer. The office is a strange place to be on my own - I find myself looking to chat to people, or to get a biscuit, but there's none of that. So I come home early and happily.
At home school went to the new regime; writing and maths, with the school's task in the morning, then project-like stuff in the afternoon. (There would be reading too, but they do that on their own anyway).
Here is some of today's writing - a story by Finn:
The usual otherwise.
Tuesday 28 April
The start of the day had me with the kids, as Cori took over the try and fix the computer which was not fixed by the trip into work:
Definitely a Cori job & not a James job!
(The problem wasn't fixed, if you're wondering!)
The school work is still working on clocks at the moment, so Finn had some tricky clock maths questions. Orry isn't so good at clocks, so he got on with his maths book instead:
The big thing for Finn today was having a video lesson/get-together with his teacher and much of his class:
Finn was delighted to get a chance to chat to everybody! It seemed to go well for the teacher/class otherwise, so it's to continue. It is a good way to keep the kids speaking and thinking in Manx.
Finn's diary tells us that the second week of Finn's magazine arrived, much to Finn's delight.
(Finn did it up with me in the Home Office, to be quiet and away from everyone younger, and also as he still needed someone to manage the getting connected etc.)
During Oshin's nap, Cori started sewing a new short for Oshin, with diggers on...
The Big Thing for today was Cori moving on from the scallops of last week to lobsters this week:
(Finn was delighted that we got lobsters, and rubber bands and a bag free too!)
As per last time, they came straight from the fisherman, so they were still very much alive. This made everyone rather nervous, except for Oshin, who didn't seem too bothered by them:
Killing living things is not really something we do very often, and it is certainly only Cori who would do it in this household. She read up how best to do it, consulted with friends to ready her, and committed....!
She was very proud of herself!
Unlike last time, the meal which came from it for Cori might not have looked as swanky, but it still was tasty:
Finn was not happy though. He hadn't really understood that they were for eating, so when they were cooking, Finn grew upset. He had a bit of a cry and then he and Orry started drawing memorial posters for Snappy and Claw.
Happily, they'd forgotten about it within a day or so.
The only other thing to report from Finn's diary was that his magazine arrived today (a day later than expected) - Finn was very happy.
Wednesday 29 April
The morning's work in writing was how to use 'because', 'but' and 'so' in sentences. This was from school for Finn, so it he did it very well in Manx...
... but Orry did his in English, rather typically to Orry:
The maths was working on times tables, for which Cori drew them some lovely flowers to put them in:
During Oshin's nap, Cori finished off his shirt, which looks good:
Oshin liked it too, as you can (perhaps) tell by his dancing around in it:
The afternoon activity was shadow puppets:
It was a long-promised idea, which inevitably demanded a lot of Cori's time and attention, but it came out fun, for what it was worth!
Now that Cori is getting through her To Do list, she even fixed the keyboard, whose plug has been broken for a long time.
Finn is under the impression that he is going to learn the piano, and that this was the only thing stopping him. So he was pleased to have it fixed.
... It didn't stop them announcing the working status of the thing and pressing the Demo button immediately, causing Cori and I groans of misery at that tune we'd now suffered for months!
(In case you're wondering, we'd love Finn to learn the piano, or any instrument, and we'll try and teach him it, but he clearly has no genuine interest in playing it!).
My, Oshin & Finn's walk out to Kick the Rock at the end of the promenade was as lovely as ever:
Once back, we watched a spot of BBC Teach on the computer, starting the history playlist - hence the bones on the screen here:
Thursday 30 April
Things started slowly today, as Finn as emotional yesterday and so no one disturbed his long sleeping in in the morning. Work waited for him, and went on better than the day before (for him anyway - Orry is always a different story!)
Being the last day of April, today was Oie Voaldyn, which meant that we needed to be off to make our crosh cuirns and gather yellow flowers.
Having gained some hours through the podcast recording last weekend, I claimed some back to finish work early and set to it. I met the kids on the beach though, which inevitably took longer to leave than we'd perhaps anticipated...
Then, even once we were off the sand, the puddles were there!
I eventually went to get the car, which was a good thing as it was soon raining! But it was soon over, allowing us to go and gather our Oie Voaldyn things...
Fully-equipped, we returned home and everyone made a crosh cuirn, ready to protect the luck of the home. I filmed my home for work, which probably gives you a good idea of how it's done, if you don't know already:
These were put up over the door, and over a window or two, and the kids strew the flowers over the doorstep, to me even more sure that no one was going to steal our luck:
Safe!
Friday 1 May
Before the school day started, the boys, as ever, played with Duplo, and Orry was delighted to create a cake stand, which he was very happy to try out:
We don't seem to have a picture of Orry modelling them properly, but he's wearing his new onesie which Cori made for him in this picture. Another marvellous Cori creation!
Cori was amazed with Finn today when he received a very tricky maths problem from the teacher. It was set as a very difficult problem, which she knew everyone would struggle with.
It was a problem about lighthouses flashing at different speeds, so one every 4 minutes, and another every 5 minutes. The question was of how many minutes it would take for them to flash together. And then again if there was a third lighthouse, which flashed every 6 minutes.
Having had the lead-in of Cori telling him not to get upset if he didn't understand or couldn't see a way through it, she read the question, he went silent a moment and then said that he didn't need any further explanation and he knew how to work it out. He then explained that it was when the three-times-table matched the five-times-table, then he went quiet, and then reported that it was 20 minutes for the first part of the question. With a little more thought, he got that the second question was 60.
Job done - Cori was very impressed!
Oshin has recently started delighting in drawing:
This delight in drawing has meant that Oshin surprised us all in mastering a new work; he walked over to the paper drawer, pointed to the drawer, and said 'paper'.
We were all delighted. Inevitably, we didn't really get it on film, but here's the best we managed:
Today, at long last, the grandparents' Easter gift box arrived from America. (The America post is awful at the best of times, but these Covid19 days seem to have made it even more awful!)
This meant sweets, fun activities and new clothes for everyone (even if they weren't wearing them right!):
The Joe Wicks exercise is still happening, though almost exclusively just Finn and I now. However, since Friday is fancy dress, Orry still joins in. This week be was very pleased to show off his Buzz Lightyear outfit:
We tend to do a bit of maths over dinner each night. This is just to keep the kids at the table as we wait for someone or other to finish their food. We recently introduced brackets to Orry's sums, which he took in his stride without any problems. It makes for sums (and answers) which look very impressive!
Saturday 2 May
We didn't do much with our Saturday. After weeks of being very pro-active about doing things with the kids, we were very lax today. But, on the flip-side, the boys were very happy to not be doing anything as they entertained themselves most of the day. Of course, most of this was with Duplo, but there was also a lot of reading, mostly in the dens they created for themselves:
Orry finished his books in the morning so I suggested he started Finn's Harry Potter (since Finn's onto the second book). He happily started it, but slowly, and not reading much at any time.
I'm regretting it now, as he is enjoying it, but he's not being absorbed by it and it's unclear how much of it he's getting. - We should have kept him off it for another couple of years before he could get more from it.
Once Oshin was up in the afternoon, we went out to record the video of Cori's singing the Manx National Anthem, as a part of a project I have at work (with lots of people singing the anthem).
Over the harbour from the castle was a nice place to be filming, and not needing the audio was ok to then have Oshin shouting about in the background:
We were delighted to bump into Oshin's Ramsey uncle, aunt & one of his cousins, who had made a very rare trip to Peel. Obviously, in these strange Corona Virus days, we'd not seen them for over a month, so it was nice to chat, even if briefly and at a distance!
Then Cori felt inspired to do another bit of filming for my work, presenting something on the Bronze Age Round Mound that is up in the hill. I've yet to edit it, so you'll have to wait for that, but here is Oshin and I as we returned from the hill having shown Cori where the site is:
The older boys had built up their den even more by the time we were back, so they wanted to sleep there. The den was sufficiently fantastic that it was ok by us:
(Oshin did not sleep in the den, but he did have a snack there. The older boys successfully slept there the whole night without getting scared halfway through, as would have been the case a few months ago).
Sunday 3 May
We had determined to do better at getting out today, so we were off at Spooyt Vane in the morning:
We hadn't planned for it to be so warm, but Orry soon adapted:
The water was still perishingly cold though, so no one was tempted to get in the water, but we knew that we weren't too far off that time of year.
There was another family, a few metres down the stream, and someone else photographing the waterfall. It was strange to be there with other people, watching our distance and nervous of each other so.
Oshin was growing grouchy - a sign of needing a nap - so he needed to get home and get some lunch in him. But since it was such marvellous weather, I treated myself to walking back from there (Glen Mooar, close to Kirk Michael) along the old railway line to Peel. It was marvellous:
I went without a jumper, nervously, but it was windless, sunny and warm. The first real summer day of the year. Amazing!
I got back elated about being out, so we were soon out again, with some ice-lollies around the back of Peel Castle:
The tide was unusually low, so we went down to admire the water:
But, of course, everyone was made very nervous and stressed, especially with Oshin, so Cori went home with him, leaving everyone else to clamber over the rocks. The boys had the best time ever (according to Finn, and Orry):
It was indeed a lovely time, letting them clamber about, in a place that actually wasn't very dangerous, but which really felt like an Adventure.
Then home for tea and the conclusion of a lovely week at the start of summer.
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