Building materials and tools.
It's hard to imagine that what we can see today, is only a very small part of the original city..it's was huge.
Sam inspects the bath.
Parts of the walls are left exposed, so you can compare the methods used.
What's in here then?
They were worried about the fake meat bless them.
But chopping your brothers head off is nothing to be squeamish about ..apparently.
We loved the hanging with all the animals too.
A quick rest before spending your denarius in the gift shop.
Afterwards we popped in to see my parents and played in their garden. Owen enjoyed using his Roman catapult to fire at targets his grandad had set up for him.
Sam enjoyed chats and the shade.
When we got home the boys played outside in their bikes and with the Roman catapult.
Sam did more coding this morning. Whilst he was working away , Owen and I did some artwork.
He is pointing to his favourite one.
Blokey made us a pin board out of a charity shop frame, so Owen was keen to get some of his creations on there and gurn for the camera.
Next we spent quite a bit of time sorting through Owens room. We managed to clear all his broken and no longer needed toys, he was really great about letting them go. He had decided he couldn't find the stuff he did want because there was 'just too much of everything everywhere'. We also managed to tidy his clothes and sort out which ones no longer fitted him. We can give those to a friend, which makes it easier for Owen to part with some old favourites.He then helped Sam sort somethings whilst I organised the resource cupboard and activity basket.
The boys then decided they wanted to go for a walk, 'to inspect how the building works are progressing'. So we had a little pootle round the estate in the sunshine. Sam walked ( OK ran back and forth) with me , whilst Owen rode his bike.
Unless there is something specific they want help with. We tend to have free play in the afternoons on Tuesday because they have their Jujitsu class in the evening. This evening they had to take their Jo staffs and nunchucks to practice ..their Sensi has nerves of steel.
Rather a tricky start today and a few squabbles to deal with. Once everyone was calm Sam carried on with his coding lessons, he really seems to have an aptitude for it and afterwards went into the files on the server we host and managed to add some plugins. We are still trying to figure out how to add Java script to our Bukkit files so he can use the mods he's coded,...no luck so far but I am hoping Blokey may be able to help.
Later we went out to meet up with some of our other home ed friends, afterwards we ordered pizza for tea.
The Great British Bee Count started today, so I installed the app and we headed out across the fields to bee spot. We managed a few but it was less than we hoped. There are 43 days left, so we will keep our eyes peeled and we logged the types we had managed to see. I reminded Sam and Owen that we had planted wild flower seeds and that was one of the suggestions from the website.
We also spent time in the garden making a bee hotel.
https://www.foe.co.uk/sites/default/files/downloads/bee-bee-info-pack-46760.pdf
We spent the morning cutting up bamboo, running the edges smooth with sand paper and hollowing the sticks out with a skewer.
Gathering what we needed.
The boys found it particularly satisfying if they could get the skewer all the way through the sticks.
Making sure the ends were smooth,as our instruction pack informs us that Bees avoid sharp sticks. The boys were very keen to get this just right.
Finding a sheltered but warm place to hang our B&B
I even managed to sit in the cafe and watch though the window for a while without them panicking. Afterwards they both managed in the changing rooms and showers with minimal stress...minimal by our standards anyway. Sam had noticed each cubicle door had a black dot drawn on it. This really threw him for a while.
The next day I was feeling fragile but had chores to catch up on. The boys and I went to the shops to buy some food to cook outside. Back home they worked together making videos and playing games with each other and some local friends, who were also online. In the afternoon we took some wood we had collected in March, which was now lovely dry kindling and built a fire in our outside oven/grill. The children managed to light the oven using their steels and cotton wool pads. Then we cooked some tofu and aubergine, which was for another meal. When knew Blokey was on his way home, we started to cook our evening meal outside with the food we had bought in the morning. We collected some home grown salad from the garden and the boys played a bit of footie whilst we waited for their Dad to get back from work. We were really happy that Blokey had managed to find a patio set for the garden, as we have been looking at them for a while. The children and I had seen them in Aldi but it was too big for us to carry, so Blokey had stopped off on his way home and bought one for us.
The boys were happy to test it out.
The next day we decided to travel over to Manchester and visit friends ..I was still feeling fragile and the rain was pelting down. It was great to see our everyone and their new addition to the family.
They have slightly older boys, so Sarah had very kindly sorted out some clothes the children might like. They liked pretty much everything on offer, so we drove home with a large bag of clothes. As it was getting late, in the way back we stopped off for charcoal grilled kebabs, chicken for Sam, lamb for Blokey, beef for Owen and veggie for myself. He children decided , yes they definitely liked kebabs!
The following morning all of us were up bright and early to go swimming. Since taking Owen to lessons he has become much happier about visiting the local baths. His confidence is growing , so I will continue to book another 10 lessons at the swimming centre with Rob. It can sometimes be tricky getting Owen to stay at the public pool for more than 20 mins but today he was raring to get there and amazed Blokey by enthusiastically swimming a very presentable length of front crawl. I love watching Sam swim, his technique is so smooth and he is a pleasure to watch as he flies through the water.
Owen and I played with the diving toys I have bought and he is getting better and better, testing himself by throwing the weights deeper and further away until he was in the deepest part of the pool. Bless him he didn't want to leave! Blokey was really impressed at seeing such a difference in both boys and the fact that Owen had gained so much more confidence in his abilities was lovely to see.
After getting supplies from the pet shop, we collected some eggs from the farm and headed home for lunch which the boys enjoyed outside in the sunshine. Blokey fixed Sam's bike ( again) , I caught up with some paperwork, planted seedlings in the raised beds and baked bread.
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