The Ds are our feathered neighbors who seem to view us as their main food source. They come by at regular intervals to beg for food and lay siege to the boat if they don't get it. The dogs get very excited when they come by and rouge especially would like to get to know them better.
Friday, May 15, 2009
Mrs. D. on the roof!
Here is Mrs. D laying siege to the boat. She and Mr. D are our constant companions and are very demanding. Mrs. D has been known to climb in the hatch if we aren't feeding her as often as she would like.
schoolwork in the sunshine
Schoolwork is much more fun on boat-it is so warm and sunny ( on nice days) that it is almost like being outside. We are doing the Incas at the moment and here is sam voluntarily reading the Incredible Incas from the Horrible Histories series. He enjoys the series as it covers the gorey bits of history.
madame looking cute
Miko looking cute and fluffy-the dogs enjoy being on the boat, especially when the ducks come to visit!
playing with an electromagnet
This week at home ed group we had a 'bring a science experiment' session. Joe and his dad brought materials for everyone to make their own electromagnet. Here is sam with his creation picking up washers. He was delighted with his magnet and spent the rest of the day trying to pick up things!
Sam as never seen before!
Here is the monster as never seen before-all dressed up in a suit. He looked so smart and was very good about keeping his hands out of his pockets.
Monday, May 11, 2009
A May Bug-Taken by Sam
This little guy came visiting our veggie patch last night . Sam looked him up and discovered that it is a May Bug which is a type of beetle.
The Boys at Easter
A cute pic of sam and rogue at easter. Rogue tolerates sam's rough housing with puppy like enthusiasm.
A sunny day on boudica
Boudica is a real suntrap so on nice days we open the forward doors, and soak up the sunshine. Here are the boys enjoying the warm weather.
Cookie anyone?
Sam and his cousin benjamin at the bake sale sam organized for Blue Peter. All in all he made £16 and worked very hard.
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
Today's science lesson-the food chain up close and personal..
While out with the dogs today we witnessed not only the food chain in action but also how cruel nature can be. As I may have mentioned spring, in the form of cute ducklings has come to the marina in a big way. We have enjoyed watching the various families and were pleased when the duck we call Mrs. D (the one who keeps coming in the hatch) had finally produced a duckling. She and the very ducking waddled over to say hello as we went to our car. She let us get amazingly close and seemed very proud of her chick. We got in the car and were about to pull away when we noticed a rook swoop down. Mrs. D did a very good job of fending it off at first but she turned her back at one point and grabbed the chick. I lept out of the car and ran toward the rook shouting and waving my arms, it landed twice but I couldn't get close enough to save the chick, it finally flew off boyond the horizon. I was gutted and poor sam was dumbfounded. We all know that this is how the food chain works but to see it like this wasn't very nice-poor Mrs. D was making a huge fuss at me as if to berate me for not saving the chick. She seems to have recovered though because she was back at the boat begging by the time we got back from the gym. Thank goodness life isn't like that for us humans, being a parent is worrying enough but to always have the fear of loosing a child to a predator must be awful. I know I am projecting my feelings on to the duck and that she has probably forgotten all about the chick, but I remember and feel bad on her behalf.
Apart from that real life science lesson we are having a good week. Saturday sam and I went to see monsters vs. aliens-which was better than I expected. Alot of the jokes went over sam's head and I am sure the jokes about fresno and modesto meant nothing to the english audience. We had a nice wander around lincoln after the movies and both ended up getting a pair of shoes. Sam needed really tennis shoes forthe gym, while I fell in love with a red pair of sketcher like shoes. I justified buying them because they were children's shoes therefore cheaper than adult shoes. It is nice to know that I can fit into girl's shoes-children's feet must be getting bigger though because I have an average size foot for a grown up.
Apart from that real life science lesson we are having a good week. Saturday sam and I went to see monsters vs. aliens-which was better than I expected. Alot of the jokes went over sam's head and I am sure the jokes about fresno and modesto meant nothing to the english audience. We had a nice wander around lincoln after the movies and both ended up getting a pair of shoes. Sam needed really tennis shoes forthe gym, while I fell in love with a red pair of sketcher like shoes. I justified buying them because they were children's shoes therefore cheaper than adult shoes. It is nice to know that I can fit into girl's shoes-children's feet must be getting bigger though because I have an average size foot for a grown up.
Friday, May 01, 2009
Where to begin..?
Sorry about the silence for the last month, thankfully it wasn't due to anything bad happening just lots of time spent a float and a boy who hogs my laptop! Whether at home or on the boat the first thing sam does in the morning is have computer time, which is fine except that it is usually on my laptop as it is the one that the games are loaded on and if he should accidently do something to it it is not as big a deal as if he were to hurt daddy's macbook. Add to that he is no longer sleeping in as late as he used to and the fact that my laptop is used as a dvd player on the boat (have to get our nightly buffy fix somehow) and it all equals less computer time for mom! I have started so many blogs in my head this last month but haven't had the chance to write them down. Have managed to sneak some time this morning, got up a little earlier and sam is shattered after a 2 mile hike with cubs last night so hopefully he will sleep a little longer.
Things are busy here, we are spending more and more time on the boat and as a consequence really getting to know lincoln. The more we see the more we like and look forward to moving there once the market picks up and we can put the house on the market. Our mornings on the boat ususally start with a duck invasion-there is one particular mrs. duck who walks up and down the roof and pecks on windows begging for food. If the hatch is open she will march right in and demand breakfast. Most of the other ducks are more polite and just congregate around the hatch waiting for sam's toast crusts. They have started to bring their ducklings who are so cute and getting bigger by the day. There are also lots of fish in the marina and sam is determined to catch one with his fishing net. No luck so far mainly due to the fact that he talks at the top of his voice non stop while fishing, thus scaring away all the fish. Once fishing season starts he and matt are going to recondition the rods and try to catch some fish for real. They had best throw back what they catch because there is no way that I am skining and gutting a smelly old fish!!
Schoolwise things are moving along, we have started basic geometry and sam is really enjoying it. He has grasped the concepts quite quickly and seems eager for more. Makes a change from his usual opinion of math! He has also been enjoying the verbal and non-verbal reasoning work books that I bought recently. He has surprised himself by being better at the verbal reasoning than the non-verbal, not really a surprise to me as he is one of the most verbal children that I know! He is getting more pe than ever as he goes to the children's club at the gym at least twice a week. This week he did basketball and a supervised gym session, it was very disconcerting when he suddenly popped up on the treadmill next to me!
We have started working on the house in a big way. Last weekend we gave the backyard a make over using two tons of slate! It looks a lot better and the slate hides the fact that the dogs have destroyed most of the grass. We have created a new veggie patch and hope that some of the plants survive the large slug population that inhabits our yard. We have put down all natural slug pellets and coffee grounds so hopefully that will keep them away.
Have a sunny day!!!
Things are busy here, we are spending more and more time on the boat and as a consequence really getting to know lincoln. The more we see the more we like and look forward to moving there once the market picks up and we can put the house on the market. Our mornings on the boat ususally start with a duck invasion-there is one particular mrs. duck who walks up and down the roof and pecks on windows begging for food. If the hatch is open she will march right in and demand breakfast. Most of the other ducks are more polite and just congregate around the hatch waiting for sam's toast crusts. They have started to bring their ducklings who are so cute and getting bigger by the day. There are also lots of fish in the marina and sam is determined to catch one with his fishing net. No luck so far mainly due to the fact that he talks at the top of his voice non stop while fishing, thus scaring away all the fish. Once fishing season starts he and matt are going to recondition the rods and try to catch some fish for real. They had best throw back what they catch because there is no way that I am skining and gutting a smelly old fish!!
Schoolwise things are moving along, we have started basic geometry and sam is really enjoying it. He has grasped the concepts quite quickly and seems eager for more. Makes a change from his usual opinion of math! He has also been enjoying the verbal and non-verbal reasoning work books that I bought recently. He has surprised himself by being better at the verbal reasoning than the non-verbal, not really a surprise to me as he is one of the most verbal children that I know! He is getting more pe than ever as he goes to the children's club at the gym at least twice a week. This week he did basketball and a supervised gym session, it was very disconcerting when he suddenly popped up on the treadmill next to me!
We have started working on the house in a big way. Last weekend we gave the backyard a make over using two tons of slate! It looks a lot better and the slate hides the fact that the dogs have destroyed most of the grass. We have created a new veggie patch and hope that some of the plants survive the large slug population that inhabits our yard. We have put down all natural slug pellets and coffee grounds so hopefully that will keep them away.
Have a sunny day!!!
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