October flowers, Trentham, sculptures, new hats, problem solving and Big Biology Day...

OIt was chilly and misty here this morning and the boys were a little slow to surface and achy after their jujitsu course yesterday. We had a quiet start and offered to take them to a few places in the afternoon because the sun was breaking through.

They decided they wanted to go the Trentham gardens ..so off we went. It was a little cold so Owen bought himself a cosy hat.

We found lovely shiny 'conkernuts'.

Went to the play area

Rolled down hills

Did a barefoot walk ( brrrr) 

Checked out the still copious amounts of Wild flowers

Admired the new sculptures 

Hiding

And leaned over the bridge across the river watching lots of rainbow trout leisurely gliding by.

A great afternoon out..now home for tea!

Sam decided to play Uno after breakfast.

Owen came in and joined us before he ate...that's keen! Then whilst he was eating we learnt about honey badgers.

Sam and I emailed the person who runs our server course because we are having a few issues connecting and weren't able to iron them out. We decided to carry on with the rest of the course work, until we receive a response. Then on doing so we realised why we couldn't sign in and corrected our rookie error.

We then learned how to set up groups, including donator , member and owner ranks. Following on from that we found out how to input permissions and colour code. This was quite intense , additionally so because Owen wanted to always race ahead. I finally managed to explain the need for a process when he wiped all our coding. After that he paced himself more and learnt the virtue of saving his work...he needed a little lie down first to calm himself. *eek*

Concentrating on how to install the different types of plugin files where.

Sam inputting essential command permissions..we needed lots of concentration but soon got the hang of it.

I even remembered how to check YML and it was correct...thankfully.

The boys are still having trouble remembering it's a process, where all things have to be in turn and link together. Having a couple of issues to solve today, underlined the need to progress steadily, although it's nice they are so eager for it to be set up fully. At least they can play on it in its basic form with friends today. We finished up just before lunch but were pleased with how much we had done.

In the afternoon it was free play at home because they have their jujitsu class tonight. They happily went to jujitsu where Owen was sparring with his nemesis. Then we had to herd them into the shower and into bed...which wasn't an easy job as they are always rather hyper after class.

Owen wanted to make a Hama bead design at 6:30am ...so that's what we did. He finds sorting the colours hard unless they are in a separate bag , so I helped him with that. He nows seems to need no other input from me about building his designs...I just have to do the ironing job at the end.

Sam wanted to do some Khan academy and I managed to persuade him to try a new set of problems. He made the usual noises about new things but when I gave him and example of division and decimals he quickly got it. Hopefully he won't be so anxious about it next time.

In the morning I needed to do some jobs around the house. Both sets of grand parents were coming to visit , at different times and Blokey and I had a busy day ahead. Thankfully the boys were up early. Owen at 6am , so he breakfasted and did his activities first. These included making a Ghost and some maths problems.

As both boys read copious amounts of their books every day and type message and check spellings in their day to day play for the sheer joy of it, I have no need to plan any specific activities for this. 

Sam got up soon after Owen had finished and wanted to watch some wildlife programmes and work on some Khan academy. I then cracked on with jobs until my parents arrived to look after the boys. 

Blokey came home from work at lunchtime because we had an appointment with Sam's Peadiatric consultant to discuss his ADHD issues. This is the 2nd time we have met up and it was an hour long consultation, where she went through all our options and what treatments are on offer, risks, benefits etc. It was very informative and due to her personal experience and interest in children like Sam, Dr Jones is just perfect for us. We are very happy with the care she has shown us and she knows how much of a balancing act it is both as parents and treatment wise. It was lovely not to be criticised as a parent and for her to 'get' us all, our strengths and issues . I was initially nervous but came away feeling more at ease about everything. I once again we felt glad we had her onboard.

Whilst we were at Leamington Spa seeing Dr J, the children played scrabble and I spy with my parents. They were also taken out to lunch and played at the park. After my parents left ( looking tired), we had a sandwiches and waited for Blokeys parents to arrive because we were going with Shadow to dog training. 

Whilst we were out the boys played chess and watched a film with their grand parents. The boys then carried on reading their books. Sam is currently on Harry Potter and the Goblet of fire and Owen has a new Wimpy Kid book, The Long Haul.

Such a busy day yesterday has left me tired. Pain management is proving tough again. Owen was up at 6 am and keen to make another Hamma bead ghost, he wants to do a whole Pacman series. So far we have an orange and red one..I forget the names.

He then worked on some maths problems 

Whilst I waited for Sam to surface I responded to emails and did some planning. One email is a lively conversation with the young guy who designed the server course. Over the last two days we have been chatting about what sort of games the children would like to see developed...he's a game designer and was home educated himself. So ideas are flying back and forth between us..it's fun and one of those great interactions the Internet can spark. I really enjoy this sort of happy occurrence and the boys take a great interest in what Justin has to say.

After watching Wildlife programmes and eating breakfast, Sam wanted to do more of our server building course.

This morning he was making users kits for different level players on our server, the idea being some are free to all members , some have to be bought. So we discussed what people may be enticed into buying and what they should have free. I had to remind him a few times that everything he decided to use had to be typed and listed fully in the config files because he was getting a bit carried away ..so funny. Being a generous child, he wanted to give everybody 'all the things', he's such a sweetheart.

Justin the guy I mentioned above, gave us tips on how to work more efficiently when setting this up..which really helped Sam stay focused one this part of the process. I am finding that watching the tutorials before the boys is helping me flow the information they need better and makes it less frustrating. I can explain what's going on and follow the steps more fluidly, which makes it easier for them to process.

We got in to the next stage but are having issues with one of the plugins glitching out. Sam was incredibly patient as we tried for two hours to sort the problem...but to no avail. We decided to have a break for today and email Justin later to see what he can suggest. It's a shame because we figured out all the next steps and were ready to edit the config files, thankfully I saw the issue before Sam had done all the edits...that would have been a lot of wasted work otherwise ...phew!

More server work this morning. We got everything working , edited the files, made kits and ran tests. It all worked and the children were so happy. There are more things we can tweak but they wanted to try out the various features they had installed and do some builds etc. 

I took my chance to get in the garden and they ran in and out, calling me back to see their work. It was nice to see them excited by what they had made, especially as they had worked so hard all week.

We also had this little chap visit the garden..I was pretty sure it was a Nuthatch so we doubled checked to confirm. So happy as we've never seen one before.

By this point it was lunch time and I needed to get some food in the hungry boys..where has the morning gone??

There was a Biology Day at Stafford University, so we asked the boys if they wanted to go and visit. They were keen so left early to avoid the crowds as much as possible. It was a truly fantastic experience.

We made 'animal cell' biscuits and admired the students cake entrys 

Dug for Bobs bones  and looked at many insects..we also dressed up as Mosquitoes to see how diseases can be spread.

Talked about parasites and looked at them through the microscope

Learnt all about bees, dressed up as a beekeeper, tasted honey from the hive and whatched a waggle dance bee lady.

Sam was brave and fell in love with the Milk Snake. He also, after hanging back, touched the Python and became much less fearful. The rest of us got a chance to meet and greet the snakes too.

We tested soil, hair and fingerprints at a 'crime scene' to work out who the murderer was. It was a fair cop.

Owen fell in love with huge millipedes and cockroaches and kept going back for more. 

We saw a huge pair of inflatable lungs, but the children we slightly disappointed it wasn't a bouncy castle.

All the time there were many questions about how Universities work, what subjects could they take and how old they needed to be to go. We have often said that University is very different to school and this event really cemented this in their heads. On the way home Owen announced he wanted to be an entomologist and Sam a 'mad scientist'. 

After the University we went to the shops , grabbed some food and looked at some possible ideas to boost the capacity of Sam's PC.

Swimming this morning....Sam bombs up and down the length of the pool and Owen did a lot of diving practice. Back home we all had oatcakes for lunch and settled into our own interests. We seem to have crammed a lot in this week and children have coped really well...however Owen is a bit strung out today, as he had a tough night..so we have got him relaxing in front of the TV.