just another morning here

So this week we have mainly been playing games I’ve completed Viva Pinata: Pocket Paradise bar 2 certificates that I’m still working on. Only 2-3 weeks of completely engrossed play - thank goodness it wasn’t in real time like Animal Crossing!

A while back Steve started writing some reviews for a friend’s gaming site, Game People, and this week the rest of us have been joining in. We may yet get a page up that the children can contribute to (it’s in the pipeline), they have enjoyed having some demo games to play with this week and there are more to come

My articles are in there in various places, attributed to other people, but that’s ok, because it means there’s less pressure to write anything regularly. It is fairly obvious which ones I’ve written, if you know what I’ve been playing and where to look - after all, who else would title a piece ‘I Heart Animal Crossing‘!

We’ve also seen a bit of my family who’ve been around this week, had friends round for a takeaway and official wedding photo viewing last night, but generally not doing a lot, which is the whole point of half term, so I’m happy.

As an aside, I love the Wordpress Automatic Upgrade plugin, it is awesome. I used to dread upgrading my WP but now it’s a few clicks away and all done for me, woo hoo.

I haven’t been, but this morning I am … nothing at all to do with having smashed some tetris scores

Not much to report really, hence the silence here. Everyone is just getting on with life and enjoying it mainly I think.

Josiah’s having a bit of a stress over violin - but this is nothing new The boy can’t make his mind up, one minute it’s the worst thing ever and anyone who suggests any practice is evil so a tantrum must be thrown, and the next minute he realises he’s grown out of his quarter size violin and could really have a half size, actually he’d really like one and he doesn’t want to give up after all.

Orchestra was a bit of a problem this week because there was not just one, but three changes during the section rehearsal (new tutor, different and bigger group of children, different room) and he just doesn’t do change well at all, so that was a tough one to get through. I am absolutely worried stiff about his Suzuki graduation concert next weekend as I’m really not sure how best to prepare him. It’s never ever the actual violin playing that is the problem, put it like that.

Joe’s really enjoying his new Tae Kwon Do classes though. These have (thankfully) stayed with the same teacher, in the same room, with a small group of children!

Abbie is fabulous She cleaned out the guinea pigs on her own yesterday (well, Joe was meant to be helping but I’m not sure he did really!), and is generally just good at getting on with things. She’s really happy with her new teacher this year which is great as I suspect she might end up with the same teacher next year as well.

Anna, meanwhile, seems to think that high school is the ticket to everything … and naturally, that means that she can act like a 16 year old even though she is still only 11! Hmm. She joined the choir at school this week which I think was a good move, she’ll enjoy that. She’s also planning to stay on at the primary school choir as their accompanist which will be good for her as well, but that doesn’t start up again until after half term.
Homework etc. doesn’t seem to have been too strenuous yet, neither have the lessons themselves. They spent one whole day last week doing Cognitive Ability Tests (as if they didn’t test the Y6s enough last term!), quite what the purpose of that was, I don’t know, as Anna says they’re already in groups for subjects, but there we go.
Apart from school, Anna’s particularly enjoying the church youth group which she started going to a couple of weeks ago.

Work for Steve and me just plodding along I think. Steve is sort of waiting for the ‘credit crunch’ thing to hit the garage but so far, other than actual car prices going down significantly, business itself doesn’t seem to have been too badly affected. Only time will tell.

My school had parents’ evenings this week which I opted to stay for because I am so nosey. No, seriously, it helps you to be able to support the children better if you have an idea of their family life, not to mention what it is that their parents want for them. All the children come to school on county transport, so we never get to meet the parents otherwise! I enjoyed taking my class out to Gym Club in the week too, and another highlight was spending an afternoon in a different class, just helping out as we had less children than usual and they were a member of staff down.

Still umming and aahing over this blog. A couple of blog-friends have stopped recently and I guess I have sympathy with the reasons for stopping a public blog, so watch this space. I might write more behind the safety of a password!

These are worth a mention here as well I think. I don’t do half as much browsing of blogs etc. as I used to, but there are a couple that I’ve been following recently and are going to get added to my links list.

Nurtured by Love is the first - one I came across via a Suzuki violin email list, but they are also an unschooling family and I love some of the posts about general education. Quite inspirational. Also induces the green-eyed monster in me as I think I would love to live in the Canadian mountains!

Behind the Child is the second. Can’t remember how I found it, I think I’d read an article about a book (When the Bough Breaks) which linked to it. Anyway, it is a blog written by an adoptive and foster mum of special needs children - entertainingly written, and I like it for all sorts of other reasons too, especially now given my sphere of interest at work.

And now I must get up, the open air orchestra concert has been cancelled due to the heavy showers forecast for today, but that means we have a rehearsal as usual …

In more ways than one, it’s felt a very long week. I’ve done a number of training courses at work, one ‘Twilight Session’ around Person Centred Reviews that went on until 8pm, an emergency First Aid session, and then another that was two days of Team Teach - all good and necessary but pretty tiring.

The rest of the time it’s been work and family life as happily but manically as usual, or perhaps even more than usual due to various things - but anyway, I feel extremely glad to have made it to the weekend. We’re all fairly tired here, so very much looking forward to a break over half term.

The blog itself was down for a few days; I lost a post over the weekend but it wasn’t very interesting anyway; mainly about Saturday’s musical activities. In far fewer words: Orchestra in the morning, which Josiah had second thoughts about … then a Suzuki group lesson in the afternoon which I dreaded but actually turned out really well, when we couldn’t go into the building so had the al fresco version.

Then if I’d had a blog I would have written about Sunday’s hillclimb; Steve came 2nd in his class again

So due to the blog issues, I’ve ended up with a Wordpress upgrade, I have to say that so far I quite like the new version. Does seem very different but I think it’s ok. Everything seems to be working now, at least, which is nice

I think I like this theme. And I think that most things I’m bothered about having working are working now, so that’s enough tinkering for the moment anyway.

We finally got our new shelves up in the lounge yesterday so I have my work cut out in sorting the resultant changes out through the rest of the house. The shelves are fantastic, they look great, and have given us loads more storage space in the front room. We still have some space left to fill with something pretty, haven’t decided what yet though.

I think everyone has had an ok week in their various places. Probably just ok and not great, but there we go. The younger two children in particular have seemed quite tired at times, and therefore not coping brilliantly with life in general, but hopefully a good weekend will sort them out.

The girls both had parents’ evenings at school this week; I went to Abbie’s with her, and Steve took Anna to hers. Josiah escaped due to having not been at school long enough to make it worthwhile. He’s settled in well though, according to his teacher, and he seems really happy and talkative when he comes home, so that’s good. They’ve all started learning Christmas songs so that’s adding to the musical melee in our household

Can’t think what else there is to report, other than all the usual stuff. We didn’t do anything for Bonfire night, other than watch a few fireworks from the window. I’ve not done very much at all - no nursery work, very little garage work, the bare minimum of housework … but I have completed Sonic Rush Adventure, done some Christmas shopping, and - there must be something else nope - that’s about it. Next week will be more productive though, I promise.

So, with huge thanks to the cavalry who came to my rescue when I cocked it up, Wordpress got upgraded today. Which means I’m back to the default template until I sort out which template and plugins are going to work. But, if I’m lucky, the Wordbook plugin should be working already, which will integrate WP and Facebook, which was the whole point of doing the upgrade, sad but true.

Apologies for any state in which you may find the blog over the next couple of days, it will be subject to change, I got bored and I’m fiddling with themes.