An empty Victorian lock

We went on a day trip to Braunston Lock near Daventry to see a stretch of the canal which has been drained. There was a Victorian lock which had been cleaned out and you could see all the original brickwork. It was pretty cool to see how deep the lock was and all of the original design. 

We listened to two representatives from the Canal and River Trust (CRT) give two short talks on the history of the lock and what reconstructive work they were doing. 

The boys had a play with some rusted up cogs. 

We all laughed our heads off at this funny duck, trying to walk on top of the frozen canal. It kept slipping which looked hilarious. 

Our boat on a stop at a marina. 

The kids also stayed at their friend's house where they had a massive minecraft-session and made their own pizzas, which were completely scoffed! Here they are getting flour...

They are passed their pizza dough. 

Miles is kneading his dough. 

Caden sprinkles his cheese and these are the finished pizzas! 

Art class this week saw Caden produce some lovely work which promptly went up on the wall in the boat. He made these from cut out shapes and sticking.  

Here are some photos from a project we worked on together where we coloured in knights and castle magnets. 

The finished project. 

We have been watching quite a bit of the French DVD at home this week and the boys are really looking forward to spending a month in France from this coming weekend. We are going to stay with a family near Limoges who have a dairy farm and three children. I am hoping that the boys will learn French quickly while they are surrounded by the language. If it works well and they pick French up at a good rate then I am sure I will do more of this kind of thing with them. 

Caden learns to swim and a Town planning workshop

Scouts is going well, this week they decorated cupcakes blindfolded and Caden made a friend (they were holding hands in the class - sweet!)

The boys attended the monthly home educator's early years group. We are playing a game of  'guess the animal' here. The questions had to be closed questions and this prompted question about the classification of animal, whether amphibious and so on and its diet and habits. 

The boys attended a workshop from a woman who works for MK Council about town planning. It was good, they enjoyed it. Firstly she asked the kids to put flowers and animals in a park area, then add playground equipment. She talked about being safe in play areas. Then she got the kids to add litter and graffiti and talked to them about what that would mean for the play area and the enjoyment of the children who went there. It was a nice little introduction into environmental awareness and quite age appropriate I thought. 

Miles always loves these events.

Caden wasn't feeling as sociable as Miles today so he practised his art and drew loads of Pokemon. 

I took them swimming to Aylesbury Vale pool. It is a fantastic pool with loads of cool stuff for kids. There is a little kids area with slides and a boat which is very shallow, in addition to water slides, rapids and a lovely warm new outdoor bit. They had an AMAZING time. I was fed up before they were... The best thing out of this particular trip is that Caden and Miles borrowed their friend's goggles and Caden tentatively put his head in the water and kept pushing it a little bit more and a little bit more. In the end, he actually had his head under and started swimming. He swam properly for a couple of metres. Then he became really excited when he realised he had put all the learning to swim together and managed it. Then he was like a child possessed, he kept pushing it and pushing it once he realised he could. The last swim before we left he did a proper swim with his head out of the water. He did it! Now he has done it he is so enthusiastic. We are clearly going to be swimming a lot more from now on. I don't think I have a choice about it. What an achievement, I am so happy for him! Miles also had a great time. He can swim around easily with his armbands on, it is just a matter of time. He will see Caden doing it though and want to do it himself. I think he will be swimming quite soon! It was such a wonderful parenting moment!

Here they are walking to the pool carrying their 'equipment'. I always prefer them to carry something to help me out, good practise I think ;) 

A frozen canal and the properties of metals

The weather really turned cold this week but there have been some really beautiful Winter days to take advantage of. 

One morning the boys and I went out about 8am and gathered loads of sticks to make a den. Here is Miles in the den, overexposed. 

Caden insisted on being photographed in it too.  We all really enjoyed this. It still needs finishing. 

Caden feels an affinity with a Robin he was watching from the narrowboat when our friend hung up some fat in a coconut shell for the birds to eat. Since then he feels that 'his' Robin is hanging out waiting for him and that it is quite tame. It's very sweet. The Robin was allowing the boys to get close.

The canal properly froze over one night. This was the first time we have experienced it. I could really feel the temperature go down overnight that night. It was very beautiful in the morning. 

The boys both had fun throwing sticks onto the ice and listening to the metallic ping as the sound reverberated around the ice. 

They adore their £2 hats which we got from Bletchley. 

Caden was asking about metals. He was reading about them in the car and telling me the properties of them. We decided to do a project where we would look for metals being used in our environment and try to identify them. We talked about alloys, Caden knows now about what an alloy is and what stainless steel is made from. He also knows what applications many metals have for industry, just things like he knows that aeroplanes need to be made of aluminium, for the same reason that his Robin has hollow bones, so it has less weight/density. We also learned that some metals are highly toxic - lead and mercury, and that some metals are essential for us to be healthy - zinc and copper. Miles was involved in this project and will be taking it all in too. We all had a bit of fun looking for metals that are used in everyday life. 

We found the buckle on my handbag, a screw holding a wooden table together, the clasp on Caden's shark tooth, a door lock, a radiator and the car too. 

Then we talked about money and how old coins used to be part actual silver. 

We have all been having some wonderfully relaxed times together on evenings. It is sooo relaxing on the boat with music on, the boys playing on their iPads or we are all reading a story. We cuddle together on the couch, we are close and talking on and off. In the other houses we have lived in, there was so much space that I felt I was always drawn away from them to do other jobs. It is a huge benefit to me and the boys to have this lovely relaxed aspect in our lives now. I am very grateful for it and they love it!! 

Caden some good work in his art class. This is on one side and I can't rotate it but you can see he has drawn fruit on a tree and made a dinosaur (which he apparently drew with no help at all). You can see the circles drawn where the joints are for the moving parts. Very cool! Also he has been colouring in the lines and using two colours to show where the light goes. 

Some more art work from this week. He has also practised drawing shapes. He loved his art class again. I think it is the highlight of his week. Miles and I used the hour respectively to study and mine! Miles is so good with the computer, I am beginning to wonder if I should encourage him towards that side of things early... I might try him with some coding too. 

Photography and Code Academy

This last couple of days have been fairly relaxed. I have been running errands and we have all been chilling out after a busy day at the zoo and a lot of stress lately. 

Caden attended Beaver Scouts with his uniform for the first time and came out with a neck scarf and yellow woggle. He proudly told me he was on the yellow team. He was given a disposable camera to take any photos he likes and bring the camera back next week. That was our Friday project. 

We have been watching lots of family films while it has been dark and cold outside, all three of us have enjoyed just cuddling up and enjoying the films. It's really cool that even Miles gets some of the funny bits so we can all enjoy some of the humour in the films. 

Our neighbour put a fat filled coconut shell in the hedge outside our lounge window. Caden spent some time watching a little Robin pecking the food out earlier. There was a Jay and a Thrush that we saw too. A little bit of narrow boat twitching. 

Lots of hanging out together. Miles is loving his toys right now, he loves to explore all the little things in the boxes that we have brought on board. He likes to set them up carefully in whatever game he is playing inside his head. Woe betide you if you step on one or move one slightly! 

Caden took photos of the boat, inside and out. He also photographed swans, a woman on a kayak and the canal itself in both directions. I had to stop him from taking photos of bums! I don't think that would have gone down well in scouts. I am not entirely convinced there are none on the film. I will brace myself when we go back to scouts in case I get taken to one side.... 

He really enjoyed the camera anyway and learned how disposable cameras work. It's funny to think that we always did things this way not too long ago. Technology moves so quickly. 

And.... Caden sat down and had his hair cut without a whinge or a complaint. All hell normally breaks loose so this is real progress. He looks the business now and most importantly he is really happy with his hair. 

We started Code Adademy this week. We started on Python but after a long chat with Caden's Dad (who is into programming) we agreed to do HTML. We have started and learned about hypertext. We put a little bit of code in and the process has begun. I hope we can do a little bit each time we sit down. 

I have renewed the Maths subscription but it doesnt start until the end of Feb so I will be leaving formal maths until then and then caning the maths for a while. 

Whipsnade Zoo

 Firstly I should comment about Caden's art class. He had been actually looking forward to this one as opposed to most others where he would rather play on his iPad. As some of you know, he calls himself an 'artist' and practises his drawing all the time. The teacher was awesome, she is an excellent artist. Her studio is in her house and there are various pieces of her work around the house. She is extraordinarily talented. Caden was impressed and asked me how she manages to get the painting to look exactly like a photo. He is inspired and wants to learn.

Having Miles in the class didn't work. Miles just mucked about with paper. I took him out after 30 minutes. Caden however, was engaged with the artist. He listened, told her about the things he enjoyed drawing, namely dinosaurs and dragons. He practised drawing with charcoal and watercolours. The teacher showed him how to draw an outline and then fill in the space and he listened and did what he was shown. He drew this little fellow. It might seem fairly basic but this is a new skill that he can take away with him and he does want to practise it. After the lesson he told me that he thought the lesson was great and will take his dinosaur pictures next time. I have decided that we will commit to an hour a week as he loves it so much and he can practise at home. It is a great outlet for him and whether it ends up being a vocation or not, it really doesn't matter. Having a creative outlet is so important and if he can learn how to do it well I am sure he will get a lot of pleasure out of it in his life. So it was a great start. 

We took a day trip out to Whipsnade Zoo with some friends for a birthday day out. We saw their new three week old baby pygmy hippo. Major cuteness! It is being shielded by Mum hippo here... 

I was eaten alive, headfirst to Caden's amusement!

The friends all played together, all day. They are talking about the relative sizes of the common hippo to the pygmy hippo here. 

We went to the cheetah enclosure, it was such a clear and sunny day, we were very lucky although it was freezing cold. 

The boys both said that the lions (and the tarantulas) were their favourite animals of the day, we compared the lion's mane to men's beards. 

Lion cubs.

Miles had chosen an enormous strawberry eclair earlier at the bakery, he was SO delighted to open it up and eat it at lunch time. He was covered in strawberry cream. Thank you baby wipes. 

Caden loved the outdoor play area. The kids had a blast together. They also spent a good hour just chasing each other and playing in the indoor play area after their picnic lunch. 

We went into the discovery centre and they had a lot of fun spotting the lizards, insects and snakes in their enclosures. 

Afterwards the kids all had a massive play of 'Sardines' and 'Hide and Seek'. They had so much fun that they didn't want to leave. We have some material to discuss later this week between us now about deforestation and the impact on wildlife.