However. There were some highlights in the week; particularly (for me) the after school trip that I organised for some of my students to see an open rehearsal of the Exeter Symphony Orchestra. It was a hectic day and quite a feat to get the kids all through their tea and onto the buses in time but we made it with plenty of time to spare, and the students got so much out of it. The whole thing fitted in really well with a unit study we’d done on the orchestra, so that was great – in fact one of the TAs asked whether I’d given the conductor my planning for the unit as it fitted in so well! Some wonderful staff members gave up their own time to make it all happen, a bottle of wine and a box of doughnuts wasn’t really enough thanks!

Steve’s been working hard as ever, and I don’t really know about the children, having not really had much time to talk to them about their weeks, if I’m honest (and of course even if I did ask them how their week had been I’d probably get monosyllabic grunts!).

Yesterday Steve worked all day. The rest of us were busy with various combinations of choir, orchestra, and concerts, so apart from a couple of hours at lunchtime we were all out all day.

Today’s been a day just for catching up with housework etc., around other commitments. Josiah had choir this morning but has played really nicely with his M-Gears set this afternoon. I keep trying to remind him about some homework but he’s playing so well that I feel mean to try and drag him away! Abbie is making me a ‘here’s one I made earlier’ example for artwork at school this week. I’m planning lessons and Steve’s playing guitar then watching the Grand Prix (upstairs, thank goodness). Anna’s out at another SWMS day, on improvisation. While these days are great for her I think she’s going to struggle as she hasn’t really had much downtime this weekend.

That’s about it. Being emotional makes you even more exhausted than you were before, and I’m falling asleep as I write – at only 4pm.

Anyway. A quick clear up after breakfast and we were away – home by 12.30pm. This afternoon Abbie has carved a pumpkin, Josiah has tried and failed to import his game save on SD card so had to start over at the beginning, and Anna lost track of time at a friend’s house.

After a long discussion about which clothes and shoes were suitable, and many changes of clothes accompanied by much foot-stamping, we attended Grandad’s funeral at the crematorium. It went as well as these things go; we were invited back for tea at Steve’s parents’ afterwards which was pleasant. We have his thanksgiving service up in North Devon tomorrow too, which is more of an event to remember him by, but you still have to get through the official necessary bits as well.

Got home just in time to run the girls round for panto rehearsals, and the rest of us are catching up at home tonight. Here probably ends the daily blogging, we’ll be back to weekend posts from now on. I do enjoy having the time to write posts though, it takes me back to the good old days

At home it’s just been busy as usual. We’ve been fairly pre-occupied thinking about Grandad this week. He’s been in and out of hospital since August really, then deteriorated very fast in hospital again this week and eventually died yesterday morning.

In other news … er… oh yes, orchestra – we had a Russian Evening last night – a social open to all the orchestra but in the end mainly attended by those who went to Russia! We brought and shared food and drink, and watched slide shows of everyone’s photos, videos etc. A great night – though it was really late and Josiah was falling asleep on the table by the end of the evening!

Anna’s got a friend to stay, so we’re having a quiet Sunday after that late night yesterday – I’m working, since I have a lesson observation tomorrow I need to be on top of things. Josiah has gone to school for the day so we’re planning to go in to Evensong this afternoon before collecting him.

One week and counting.

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I really would have loved to work at the Apple Store, I’ve talked about it ever since I knew one was opening here, even before Josiah went back to school. I love the products (no comment, Mr P, please), would have loved to learn more about them myself, and I like to think I’m pretty good on the dealing with customers side of things too, so I would have enjoyed it as a whole.

But even more ideal would be a school based job, one that runs to school hours and term times, because it would fit in to our family life better than anything else. Not only that, but it is probably the thing that I would most enjoy, because, funnily enough, having done a degree in education and then had all the home education experience, and generally being quite fond of children, education is probably the best field for me to be in. Admittedly one could argue that demonstrating computers and gadgets to people would be education in a way, but the hours involved in a retail job were always likely to be annoying at one end of the day or the other, or during the school holidays, etc.

So anyway. Over the weekend I noticed a number of posts being advertised at a school where I would really enjoy working. And while I don’t even know if I will get an interview, let alone any of the jobs, I know I’d rather do a school based job than a shop one, even if it is the Apple Store.

So when Apple rang I was completely honest and said I didn’t want to mess them around only a couple of weeks later, so I didn’t accept their job offer. I guess most people would have taken that post and then waited to see what happened, but I couldn’t. Got off the phone and cried for an hour (must be hormonal)! Just hope I’ve done the right thing. I think I have, but it doesn’t feel very nice, as I’m back to square one and left with the choice of housework or the garage for the moment, while praying hard for one of the school jobs I’m holding out for.

The wet night did make the whole site a bit muddy for a couple of days but nothing too terrible on our side of the site anyway. My parents did have a bit of a Kessingland week in their awning though, and ended up throwing their groundsheet away rather than cleaning it! Think swamp mixed with cowpats and you have the general idea, yuk.

We were camped with friends from one of the other churches in the network, which was nice, because we were the only campers there from our own local church, so it meant that the children had friends to play with, I had more hair to braid (!!) and we had friends to laze around and share coffee and wine with

Saw a number of old friends throughout the week which was nice, and we also saw rather a lot of my youngest brother as well, who clearly had too much time on his hands and kept coming back to be clambered on by small girls – lovely to have him around though.

The organised ‘churchy’ activities (for want of a better word!) consisted of various meetings most mornings and in the evenings too, as well as sports and other stuff going on during the afternoon. The children all had groups to go to, which they really enjoyed and got lots out of. I was on a team helping with the 3 and 4 year olds during the morning sessions, which was a lot of fun.

We had a couple of free days as well, where we escaped the site (it was *so* noisy!) and did our own thing. On the first day we went to Herstmonceux Science Centre where we met some of the Screamteam and most of the Monsterteenies, and had a fab day there. (I didn’t ever get my email from the Art Machine by the way, what happened to that I wonder?!)

On our other day off we ended up in Eastbourne visiting Ros & Tony at Bonners Music Superstore. Steve made himself at home immediately and made a long phonecall but for some reason didn’t want me to take a photo Anna made herself at home too We didn’t spend too much money though!

Mooched around Eastbourne for a while, then went swimming again, then ended up at Pevensey Castle on the way back to the campsite. Fab castle with lots of interesting different parts added over the years. Tried desperately to get a picture of all three children looking nice at the same time but after four attempts I gave up!

We spent a fair bit of time enjoying Ashburnham again; it is a gorgeous site. Tried hard to get the camera to do things it isn’t really cut out to do with the lens I was using but the results weren’t too bad, all things considered.

As an aside, my Flickr post bar has miraculously sprung back into life tonight after months of not recognising me as a user – don’t know what happened there but I’m very glad to have it back!

Got a bit of washing done today but generally lazed around as we were fairly exhausted. Our wonderful neighbour(s) had done a fantastic job with the guinea pigs which was an extra blessing.

I am from brown velour sofas, Doctor Who, a Commodore 64 and cassette tapes.

I am from the Old Bakery, the house in the village square where the mobile library used to stop every week, so we always took the librarians cups of tea after school on a Thursday afternoon.

I am from the brambles growing down the lane, and the tree hanging over the stream where we used to cross it and paddle in it. And in the summer, from the woods where we played hide and seek to the soundtrack of trains going past at the bottom of the garden. From lavendar, raspberries, and all sorts of flowers, mixed with the scent of chlorine from the swimming pool.

I am from long drawn out cups of coffee on Christmas morning, and always being right. From Colgate Palmolive, from hand made and embroidered doll’s clothes, Great Danes, and tomato plants.

From ‘sorry means I won’t do it again’, and ‘that’s understandable but inexcusable’.

I am from Cote Baptist Chapel, from the Charismatic movement in the seventies. From Bible verses memorised, from a Christian school, and Psalty the singing songbook. From a strong heritage of faith and my own personal experience of Jesus.

I’m from Oxford, yet a mixture of Liverpool, Wales, France and Belgium thrown in as well. From croissants-aux-amandes, framboisines, baked ham with a crust around it, and toast with cheese and marmite.

From the time the field flooded and froze over in the village, and we all went skating on it, two of us in ice skates and the rest in wellies. From working out exactly how to play Spider and Fly on the morning my sister was born. From excitedly getting up in the early hours of the morning to go on holiday.

I am from a trunk in a garage, boxes that haven’t been opened in 20 years.

Josiah has been really making friends over the past couple of weeks. I am becoming more and more superfluous to requirements in the mornings; we walk to school and he tends to run off ahead, eager to get there. On Monday morning he hooked up with a little friend on the way in, they chatted all the way to the classroom, and he hardly gave me a backwards glance (I have to steal a goodbye kiss if I want one, these days!).

Then after school this little friend of his came out of the classroom first and accosted his mum asking if Joe could go back for tea, so she asked me, and I didn’t have any reason to refuse, so said yes. Little friend went running back into the classroom to tell Joe, who came out in a huge state of excitement, the two of them made their teacher laugh they were so excited. So he went, and had a fabulous time … and he and this little boy have been inseparable this week, so I understand.

Abbie had a big-headed moment yesterday too. She came home bragging about how Mr Cook (her teacher) had said that she should be in Yr 5, and how he’d told the class that if they needed help with maths they should ask her. All this came from some activity or other they were doing with counting blocks, dividing by two. Dividing by two! I am seriously wondering about asking whether she can be stretched a bit more in the classroom, honestly – apart from anything else, it’s the same activity they did last week, according to her! Anyway somehow she ended up having a conversation about square numbers and square roots, which Mr Cook was obviously impressed with. I’m not terribly impressed, for her that’s just normal, but she was very proud of having been singled out in front of everyone.

Abbie’s still loving the friends thing, too. Although I wish she’d learn not to share head lice with her so-called friends

Anna came out of school and met me with a string of verbal diarrhoea about her day on Monday too … measuring in maths, writing stories in literacy, making powerpoint presentations about the river Exe in geography, what she had for lunch, who she sat next to, how her pencil case broke – honestly, for her, this has been the best thing ever. She is loving the variety and the motivation that school gives her, and I’m really pleased for her. It is becoming a logistical nightmare to fit everything in though!

Me. I still miss home education. I miss being the one to see connections being made in their brains and being the one to help them make them. Don’t think I’ll ever feel differently about that.

But they are enjoying themselves so much, they’re loving every minute of it. They’re happy to go, happy while they’re there, and happy when they come home (if a little tired and hungry ). I am irrationally cross with them for being so happy about it, when I miss what we had so much. But there we go, I have to let them get on with being the people they want to become – I know they could have done that either way, but actually in some respects they couldn’t. So yeah, it’s a compromise of my ideals, a compromise academically, but if I have happy thriving children then I’m not complaining. At least we always know we have a choice.

Meanwhile, the workshop has been rushed off its feet – we only opened a month ago and we’re already chock-a-block, with literally hardly any advertising. The sales garage had its best month ever in February and this month isn’t looking too bad. So there’s plenty going on.

As a counter to school and the busyness of work we are working to getting weekends freed up again, with no lessons/activities in them unless absolutely necessary – then every weekend that Steve isn’t working we’re going to take the van and go away with kids/bikes etc, and really make the most of weekends.

Oh, and we had a new carpet fitted in the lounge yesterday, hurrah. Things are all wired in, now all we need is some furniture