Just Jo!

So little to blog about!
It’s a case of, drop Olivia off, meet friends (sans children!), pick Olivia up, come home.
Except yesterday was a bit different in that I rushed home to make a whole load of sosmix rolls and then went out to meet me friend.
Today’s different as well because Adam had another early morning dental appointment and then went straight to work. So that meant there was no one in the house at all. Except Maisy. Who’s not exactly ‘in your face’. And tends to just open one eye to look at me before rolling over to get more comfortable. But anyway, I repeat, the house is empty!! Completely and utterly so!! (Except for Maisy)
Oh what to do with myself??
So I’ve had me bath and now I’ve got the tedious task of trying to amuse myself for the rest of the afternoon. Olivia doesn’t finish ’til 7 tonight (dress rehearsals, dahling), so I’ve got over six hours on me tod!
Do I go and read in the garden?
Or do I go upstairs to watch a film?
Ooh, decisions, decisions….

Nice sunset last night by the way….
Olivia saw it and wanted to get a photo of it. I told her no. Because she’s doing the photo prompts every morning and I haven’t taken a photo in days.

Yes, I know they look identical. But they’re not. Perhaps I should do some kind of Spot The Difference Competition? How many differences can you spot?

Updated to add….
I ended up doing a bit of both. I read in the garden ’til it got too hot ( ) then cooled off upstairs watching a film. Memento. One of those that I’m going to have to watch again because my sun addled brain kept drifting away.

….and a little bit from last night.

Maisy wasn’t that impressed with me cutting up an old duvet cover apparently. She made her feelings crystal clear in fact….

So I gave up on that and had a cuddle with her instead.

This morning we had another late start. There was a free art workshop at the museum today, but I’d already said to Olivia last night that we’d give it a miss. She was very grateful at the point and fully agreed, amidst all the tears of illness and disease.
This morning, she woke up, full of beans, “I’m feeling great! Absolutely fine! Can we go??”
I said no, we’ll go to the one tomorrow. Slightly different, but still art at the museum.
So today has been finishing cutting a 70’s duvet into hundreds of pieces. Then cutting some of those squares into even smaller squares so that Olivia can make a quilt for her teddy. Who’s called Ted. She was only 18 months when she finally got around to naming him, her imagination wasn’t fully developed.
Anyways, the final quilt design has been decided upon. Eventually. But it took much longer than you would believe humanly possible, so no actual sewing of anything has happened yet.
The rest of the afternoon has been spent making cards. We have a grand total of…..6. Yes, 6. About three hours to make six cards. Six. Six cards in three hours. Not exactly the production line we had going at Christmas. I haven’t taken a photo of them yet, so you’ll have to imagine them as being the absolute, very best, most incredible cards you have ever seen in your entire life. And times that by ten, just to make sure.
Or not….

We popped to the shop, after clearing the detritus craft stuff away. We bumped into Natalie, Adam’s girlfriend, whilst there. Oh what an interesting little chat we had….
Eye-opening even….
Me: “Hello!”
Natalie: “Hello!”
M: “How are you?”
(It gets better, trust me.)
N: “Fine, Adam’s gone kick-boxing tonight, hasn’t he?”
M: “Yes, he’s just left, with his split lip.”
N: “That was really bad, wasn’t it?”
M: “Yes, so what actually happened?”
N:……(Well, let’s just say that her version bears absolutely no relation to Adam’s.)
M: “Really? He said…..”
N:….. (A very loyal girlfriend, who is very quick thinking!)
M:…..(Grinning) “I won’t tell him I heard it from you!”
N: “Thanks!”
M: “You could ask him why he lies to his mother though.”
N:(Grinning) “OK!”

I will save the information for a rainy day!

Right….dinner, bath and bed.
I think Olivia’s planning on watching her DVD of Robin Hood while I’m wallowing.

And it will be a mega wallow. I’ve had the radio playing through the ‘puter all day. Every ten minutes we get the Big Brother theme tune, and the latest gossip about the house, who’s going into the house, etc. All speculation at this point. All complete crap nonsense at this point. From this point to eternity in fact. I’ve had enough already. I gave up watching TV because of crap nonsense like that. D’you get the impression I’m not a fan??
Adam’s just come back from kick-boxing, “You watching Big Brother tonight?”
“Take a wild guess!”
Olivia’s whispering in my ear, “Are you going to tell Adam what we know?”
“Shhh!!! Not yet!!”

So it’s CDs only for the next however many months Big Crap Brother is on. And if Yahoo starts flashing up Big Crap Brother headlines at every opportunity, you may not be seeing me for the foreseeable future as I do my best to avoid it.
Now I really must go and put a gag on Olivia. She’s asked Adam if Natalie is coming round tonight.
(Whispering to me) “Mum! She’s coming round!”
(Loudly to Adam) “What time’s she coming round?”
(Whispering to me) “Mum! She’s coming at….”
(Me hissing) “Will you shut up?!”
We still have the pile of fabric on the floor, a gag shouldn’t be that hard….

….and composting….and more planting….and more washing….

Yesterday morning, I finally got the washing in. Yay! Olivia helped and she went out there first….”Eewww!! What’s THAT??!!”
“Hedgehog poo.” I said.
“How d’you know??!!”
“You have to know these things when you’re a home-educating mother. It’s essential!”
“Ohhh….”
Not that I am really knowledgeable in wildlife dropping identification. I just happened to have read it in a book we got a few days ago, we’d seen a hedgehog scuffling into our garden the night we returned in the early hours of the morning and I put the two together. But Olivia is now fully convinced of my far superior genius levels and is in total awe. Which is just the way I like it!
Jo, from the organic arts thingy that we’re doing soon, picked us up about 10 for the risk assessment visit at the farm. Always weird meeting another ‘Jo’, no idea why though….
I obviously kept quiet about my anti-car rants.
Although during the conversation it did come up that we walk, cycle or use public transport a lot (because I can’t keep my mouth shut completely….) and she agreed it was much better to do that (the not using a car thing).
We had a walk around the areas of the farm we’ll be using. Jo pointing out any obvious dangers and what will be done about them, ie turning off the electric fences. Always a good start….
Olivia made friends with Rugg, the farm dog, and had a game of football with her.

I’m racking my brains trying to remember what we did in the afternoon….I think Olivia did some of her English workbook….um….hang on….just got to ask Olivia.

Aha! We went to Lidl’s to do a bit of shopping and came back with a compost bin….like you do. A collapsible one, although it was very tempting to get a big one, but we just couldn’t get it on the bus with all the shopping as well. Yes, we got the bus home. It’s just down the road I know, but we had a lot of shopping. And it’s uphill. And I’m starting to flag.
Got home, set up the bin (which means we got it out of the bag), re-read Backyard Composting and started filling it.
Then it was time to get changed for our date with Adam. You read right! Adam had agreed last week to be seen with us out in public!
We went to one of the new restaurants in town, La Tasca. Adam chose the venue as it was the only way he’d go out with us.
He will very grudgingly go to a veggie restaurant only if it’s one of our birthdays. But we always have to sit right at the back, just on the off-chance someone he knows might walk past. Anyway, La Tasca was good. More ‘Spanish’ than a lot of the Spanish places we’ve been, so I’m not sure if that makes it a truly authentic Spanish experience or not. The only downside was Adam texting. A lot.

Adam even tackled some of his salad garnish, but moaned as it kept falling off his fork, “See! This is why I don’t eat leaves!”
The texting was all to arrange to meet up with some old school friends (girls!) to go clubbing. But he’d left his ID at home, so he got the bus back with us to pick it up. We also discovered that the pebbly bench things in the new city centre development light up at night! We both went “Oooohhh!!!” Adam just rolled his eyes at us….

Adam actually played briefly with Maisy when we got home. More surprising, to all of us, was that Maisy played along with Adam….

So surprising in fact, that I neglected to get Maisy in the photo. But as Adam was in such a good mood, I even managed to get another photo of him!

He wasn’t drunk either! He’d only had a pint!!

So today, we’ve been busy in the garden. Despite my plans of not doing anything, well, I got bored.
We got around to digging over the vegetable patch. It’s been covered with weed control fabric since last summer so it was nice and easy to dig. I did most of it, but Olivia gave it a good go too, finding loads of cockle shells, some still with both halves joined, most bizarre….

It’s not a huge great plot, but it’s Olivia’s project, and she already has a bed at the community garden, and a bit of Di’s allotment. So in consideration, it’s plenty big enough! She’s planted some more broad beans, some of the cucumbers were big enough to plant out and she’s planted a few potatoes. There will also be sweetcorn and a pumpkin when they’ve grown a bit more.
She hasn’t done a whole lot of ‘proper’ work lately, but my thinking is that reading and following instructions on seed packets counts as English. Along with all the wildlife and nature books she’s demolishing. Maths will be measuring of distances in the planting, and science is the general growingness (our new word!) of things, plus getting the right mix in the composter. Well, it all counts doesn’t it?
The weed control fabric has been moved over to the future pond site, just to subdue the greenery there until we can make a start on it. While she was there, she found a skeleton. Of a bird I hasten to add. Not human remains. So that was a bit more biological type science as she worked out where the bones went and why they were so light.

Slight blonde moment when she identified one of the bones as a ’shoulder pad’….
“Ummm….it’s probably a shoulder blade. Birds don’t have much need for shoulder pads….”

Another load of washing got done and hung out. Hold on to your hats! It’s already back in!
I didn’t bring it in, that was Olivia. You may be thinking what a very helpful daughter I must have…. Nope. She is just desperate to get a bonfire going. All the hedge cuttings that are too woody for the compost bin.
So I must be off now to supervise my beloved little girly in her arsonist tendencies. Even though something in the garden today is getting right up my nose and I’ve been doing nothing but sneeze all day.

We were all fighting for the bathroom at eight in the morning!
Adam because he wanted to go into town for a haircut first thing. More of a head shave really. He has no hair to speak of….
He’s off to Newquay for the weekend with a bunch of friends again. Someone else’s 18th this time.
Us two were going to A La Ronde, a National Trust property near Exmouth, for general Easter shenanigans.
First thing was an Easter Egg Trail around the hay meadow (”Please keep to the designated path!”). The eggs were all from native British birds that Olivia had to find in a wordsearch at different posts around the meadow.

We kept to the ‘designated path’, except for one of Olivia’s feet that sort of escaped. We don’t think anyone noticed.
We enjoyed the lovely hazy views over the Exe estuary and around the garden….

Then we got back to the craft tent and Olivia made a Fabergé egg.

We’d already googled images of Fabergé eggs so she had some idea of what was on the agenda. We took along a printout of a few, which we nearly lost to the volunteer staff who were very impressed that we were so organised.
She made a little basket, then we had a quick lunch before going into the house itself.

The last time we went, I think Olivia was about 5 or 6. Those few years have made such a difference! All the way round she was agog, “WOW!! OOH! LOOK!”
So many of the volunteers were very informative and spent ages with Olivia, it was lovely. There was stuff that I didn’t remember from the last time. I’m sure we didn’t see the bathroom before, but my memory has been known to play evil little tricks on me.

We picked up Olivia’s egg and basket and got the bus home. We would have got home about 15 minutes earlier, but I asked to see Olivia’s egg again. As we looked up, the bus went whizzing past us. “We’ll get the next bus then shall we?!”

We spent the rest of the afternoon in the garden. Olivia swept up and cleared the back patio. I supplied helpful suggestions from where I was sitting. Then Olivia realised I had my feet up and wasn’t actually doing anything at all.

I did cut back some of the dead Russian vine, moved the big picnic table for her to sweep under and took some more photos of the garden.

We have a Japanese Maple that was given to us by my mum when she moved to Spain. Every winter, I’m convinced it’s died and am left holding my breath ’til it starts showing signs of life again.

It seems to have taken longer this year….I am somewhat breathless, but today I saw this….

Yay!! It lives!!!
I have also been pleased to see new buds on the French lavender….

….the geraniums….

and a fresh crop of bluebells.

Talking of bells….

They hang from the parasol (which has survived the winter outdoors, because I was far too lazy to put it away last year….) and have a wonderful patina to them now….in anybody else’s books it might possibly be called ‘rust’, but ‘patina’ sounds much posher, so I’ll stick with that!
Maisy was sulking. She’s recovering from her flea allergy. Her fur is starting to grow back, but she still has a naked bum. Until she is suitably clad and is showing a little more decorum, she’s confined indoors. She’s not happy. She swore at us while we were having fun in the garden….

But we’ve cuddled her lots since we’ve been in so she’s forgiven us. Sort of. Maybe. Perhaps. I think the jury’s still out actually….
Olivia is gathering bits and pieces for things she wants to do tomorrow, so I shall go and get on with dinner now.

(Update at 19:57: Cambridge won….pah! And double pah!! I usually watch the boat race, the only tie being that I was born in Oxford, but I missed it this year….b****y Cambridge!! Off to watch The Third Man now….the latest from Lovefilm.)

….and let’s hope he’ll manage to keep it on for a bit longer this time! Slightly careless to have lost it so quickly in the first place methinks.
Olivia started a new maths workbook this morning….in addition to the two others she’s got on the go. (Algebra and fractions, decimals & percentages.)
I did something around the house, but can’t remember what now….most odd….
We went into town, extravagantly catching the bus. I knew we had a big shopping day ahead and there was no way we’d cope on the bikes.
Rymans was the first stop for more ‘puter ink. The assistant asked if Olivia had the day off school…. “No, she’s home-educated.”
“Oooh! How’s that going then?” Cue a very nice chat about it all while building up a fairly impressive queue behind us. Hurrah!
Next stop was the library. No fines this week. Hurrah!! And another, “Have the school’s broken up already?”
“No, she’s home-educated.”
“Oh wow!” Another nice chat about it all. Hurrah! Mind you, the librarian is tattooed everywhere, so I’m guessing she’s quite open-minded about things.
I’m not a big fan of tattoos, but she looks good. And she lives a few doors down from us, but not actually said “Helloooo!” to her in civvy street yet….
Then the arts centre to book Olivia in for a Saturday morning art club, based around using some of the exhibitions they’ve had as inspiration. We asked if there were any spaces left, yes, just the one! Even more hurrahs!!!
Where next? The museum! Olivia spotted Marcus/Mark as soon as we walked in, so grabbed him before he disappeared to give him some of the cards he needed. The bloke he was with (some official type person), smiled indulgently as the two of them discussed the cards. Both of them impressed with Olivia’s laminated idea, especially as it was the first time either of them had seen the full set of cards together. And Marcus/Mark only needs two to complete his set now, so he’s well chuffed. Olivia is too, because she’s got a bit of a crush on him. But I never said that.
Olivia did the Egyptian worksheet today, so I treated her to an Egyptian necklace in the gift shop. I know we’re supposed to be saving money for all our April trips, but it was only £1.50.

As we were leaving, we remembered why we’d gone to the museum today, ie to look at the portrait of Olaudah Equiano. So we headed back upstairs again. Then found out that although it was first credited as being him, it’s probably not Equiano after all, but Ignatius Sancho. So we’ll have to read all about him now as well.
Olivia wanted a postcard of the portrait, but they’ve sold out and it doesn’t look like they’ll be getting any more reprints done.
We checked out the menu for one of the new restaurants in the fancy new half built shopping centre. The tapas bar. We like tapas. A lot. But I resisted all temptation and paid the phone bill instead.
Food shopping was next, and Olivia now has everything (except pitta bread and cinnamon) for her Biblical feast, which looks like it’ll be on Thursday. Which gives her time to get some kind of a costume ready. She likes loves with a passion getting dressed up for things. I consider myself fortunate that I haven’t been begged to make a costume for over a year now.
While we were in town, we picked up a Hunt the Easter Egg Game from The Works. It’s a really simple idea and I could have very easily made one myself, but for £1.99….what would be the point??! She also got National Geographic Kids, issue 6. Issue 6?? How have we missed this?? How have I missed anything that has Olivia rapt and quiet and speechless and quiet and sitting quietly on the sofa and quiet???!! I think it may be worth investing in a subscription….
Yes, it’s been one of those scrummy kind of days, where things have been nice’n'easy. Maisy got a new flea collar, a glittery gold one, Olivia got a new bell for her bike. Me? I’ve got to wait ’til Friday when Adam gets paid. ‘Cos then he’s getting me the rest of my Mother’s Day pressie, Lush and wine. Notice the priority I place on things? Oh yes….Lush comes first!!!
Dinner now….we’re having Balmoral Pie, from Lucy’s, we’ve got garlic and herb cream cheese to mash into the potatoes….not to ice a parsnip cake with….

(Gnnnhhh! Completely forgot it was Bangladeshi National Day today….I’ve remembered now….at 10:37….too late to get Olivia up to ‘do something’…. )

Last night must have been the quickest Lush bath ever….the hot water ran out.
But I didn’t realise until the bath was nearly half full. Not being a wasteful person, especially when it comes to Lush, sod the water shortage in the summer, I still got in. It felt quite warmish to the touch, but actually sitting in it was an entirely different matter….

Fortunately, I don’t have blokey bits, but I did feel a certain empathy….soon got over that though!
We are also up to the Victorians (much to someone’s joy) in Our Island Story. The film last night was Paint Your Wagon, obviously ticked the wrong box on LoveFilm. Still, it meant I got to sing “I was born unner a wandrin’ star” in the most annoying way possible….

Chinese New Year!
Yes! We did things!
We made a lantern from what may be one of our mostest favouritest books ever….

But it’s not quite finished yet….patience is a virtue, except we have none and couldn’t wait for the glue to dry so we ended up taping it together.
Olivia did another scrapbook page (had a go at teabag folding too)….

And did a Chinese inventions wordsearch, coloured in some chinese patterns to be laminated into bookmarks (how many bookmarks does one household need??), and we both made some scrolls in a Chinese style.

Lunch was beans on toast. I hear a resounding “So?!?” I mention it because it was not your average beans on toast. A tin of Sainsbury’s mixed bean salad drained, a tablespoon (or just over) of vegan mayonnaise stirred in, then all piled up on top of warmed garlic and herb naan bread. Easy! Bloomin’ lovely it was. There would have been a photo, but it was gone too darn quick….maybe next time….

Sunday being our newly designated paper model making day, we also made a pig, far too easy though, and a couple of origami pigs, but then I got bored looking for paper pig things….

All accompanied by our wondrous Chinese CD….eleventh time round and I’m ready to frisbee it down the road to meet a hideous death under any passing lorry….
“Can we play it again mum?”

What else?
Maisy chucked her guts up, or as Olivia so delicately put it, “Ooh my! Maisy’s regurgitated herself!”
But she cleaned it all up….I’m not very good with bodily functions of that nature….and Olivia wants to look after animals when she’s older anyway, so it’s all good practice.

Olivia’s having her Lush moment now, I’m blogging, Adam’s in bed after a hard day at work on the checkouts….Our Island Story *will* be finished tonight, then I think we’re watching Il Postino.
Thankfully, Chinese New Year goes on for a while, so we have plenty of time to finish everything. I just need to find somewhere to put it all….I’ll go and ask Adam when he’s moving out….

I managed to stay awake through all of Spirited Away last night. I was right (and everyone who recommended it!), despite falling asleep on previous occasions, it is a lovely film. Olivia still prefers Howl’s Moving Castle though.
Threw Olivia into her pit after so that I could have a Blackberry Bath Bomb, ooh, forgot to mention that Saturday was a Bathos night.
That brings me up to today….
This morning, it suddenly struck me that Olivia is home-educated (gosh!), so it may, perhaps, be a good idea to actually open the odd workbook every now and then. So that’s what she did….english, maths and science. She’s getting a bit bored with just fractions at the moment, so in addition (see that maths terminology there!) to that one, she picked out another maths workbook to do as well.
In between explaining things to her, I ‘putered a bit more….admittedly, I was looking for funnies, but I found something educational quite by accident!
“Child! Stop doing that maths! Do this maths instead!”
She got out graph paper, pencils, scissors….
It kept us both quiet and pondering for longer than I care to admit….me not being a mathmetician….

Wha…? How?!
Answers on a postcard please!

Then Olivia asked what was for dinner. I looked in the cupboard…. “Um…”
As I couldn’t convince her that, as long as you’ve got water, you can actually survive without food much longer than you’d think, we had to go into town.
I opened the door, it was raining, “Aha!” I thought, “That’ll be why we haven’t been able to prise Maisy from the back of the chair all morning.” Cats, generally, not being nearly as stoopid as dogs….

We got the bus, I thought it’d be safer. With all the coughing and sneezing fits I’m having, I’d either fall off my bike or crash into something.
We only really went in for food, but made a detour to see if Art of Knitting was in Smiths yet. It’s not, but Olivia got distracted by a display of cute and cuddly beavers….
Now, I can be honest with myself and hold my hands up to the fact that I can be a little immature and smutty at times….But….???
The display had cards of said beavers with slogans such as ‘Nice Beaver’, ‘Wet Beaver’, ‘Hairy Beaver’ and ‘Brazilian Beaver’…
“What??!!” says I, “They can’t do that! That’s so rude!!”
“What?”
“They can’t say that!”
“Why?”
“Because it’s ruude!”
“Why?”
(This was the point that my ‘Small Child Alert’ button went off)
“Because….because…..Aha! Because of the implication!”
“The what?!”
“Exactly!” I said, hoping to confuse her into silence (It’s never worked yet, but I live in hope!)
“Ahhh! Look at this one!” Olivia held up one of the cuddly beavers, “It’s got a little sign. It says, ‘If you can read this, you’re too close to my beaver’ That’s so cute!”
“B****y not!” says I spluttering, as I drag her out of Smiths.
“But why’s it rude?”
“One day, I promise, I will mature enough to be able to explain ‘things’ to you without giggling. Promise. Cross my heart. Now, what d’you want for dinner?”

She’s playing with a calculator now, while I think about cooking dinner. I know we have food, ‘cos I just bought some….

Adam’s a little perplexed at the moment….he came home and couldn’t understand why we had loads of kidney beans all over the path. They’ve been there since Saturday’s bean-scattering….  And why have we got a glass of water on top of the microwave? It’s Olivia’s latest experiment (and has been there even longer!) to see how ‘hard’ our water is. We looked at each other, bearing in mind the area we live….trust me, the water is well ‘ard!

We didn’t go to Di’s last week, the plan was to meet on Thursday instead. Right up until I remembered that we had a zoo trip planned….

After a morning of more maths, english and science workbooks (no grotty tantrums I’m pleased to report!), then lunch, we rode over to Di’s. ‘Twas a bit nippy to say the least….

And….this is for car drivers….if you’re driving along the road, looking for somewhere to park and there happens to be a narrow green lane running alongside the road….you know the ones, they quite often have a little white bike painted in them….try NOT to park there!!! The reason they have bikes painted in them is because they are….repeat with me….BIKE lanes!!! It is where BIKES go….It is NOT a convenient place to park for lazy, inconsiderate drivers so they can nip into the shop! Trust me, I really do not like having to pull out into a stream of traffic. It is not one of my favourite activities! Rant over….I do apologise….deep breaths…. 

Olivia drew a couple of pictures at Di’s, and she’s brought her box home to finish decorating it here. Have no idea why, but it meant we could have even more tea, cake and chat than usual! 

I got myself another book at the library and we rode home again.

It started to rain.

And it was rush hour.

We stopped at Lisa’s for a cuppa!

As we were leaving, I got a call from Adam….

"Where are you?? Have you seen the news??"

Turns out that all afternoon, there has been some kind of armed siege going on, and half our road had been cordoned off. I still haven’t seen the news yet, so Adam may well be exaggerating….three children and a policeman were held hostage by a woman, she stabbed the policeman in the neck, then cut her wrists….

(Update….I’ve just heard the news….no children were involved and nobody got injured….b****y Adam! Winding Olivia up like that! I’m going to get him!!)

I may have mentioned before that we live on a grotty council estate….

The road was open again by the time we got home, but there was still a lot of police activity. Olivia’s quite freaked out, and is worried that Maisy might have got hurt…

We’re going to have dinner now, then drink hot chocolate, watching Howl’s Moving Castle cuddled up in bed….

….could a woodchuck chuck, if a woodchuck could chuck wood??
Yep, it’s Groundhog Day today!!!
We tried to persuade Maisy to play the part of Punxsutawney Phil this morning but she was having none of it.
I dunno….we feed her (well, Olivia does), we give her fresh water every day (well, Olivia does), we clean out her tray every day (well, Olivia does), we brush her a few times a week (well, Olivia does) and we pay her vet’s bills (AHA! That’s the bit I do!). I think we should get a little something in return. A little more than the disdain we usually get. Believe me, if cats could roll their eyes, Maisy would. They would have rolled out of her head and down the road a very long time ago.
You’d think she’d play along….but ohhh no! Getting dressed up as a rodent is obviously something any self-respecting cat just can’t bring herself to do….
So….um….what did we actually *do* for Groundhog Day then?? Um….we found a picture in a book. And looked at it.
“Yes. That’s a groundhog. Sometimes called a woodchuck. It’s a mammal. And it’s a rodent.”
We had a look at Youtube (can you tell we quite like youtube?!). We found baby groundhogs, a friendly one, and some bizarre singing ones.
Then we got a bit more serious about the whole thing….yeah, right!!
Olivia made a little pop-up groundhog….

She’s also been busy finishing some questions from yesterday’s worksheets, and adding to her scrapbook, two pages on the trip to the zoo and one on Groundhog Day. We were going to round off the day watching the film, but Amazon’s taking it’s time. I ordered it on Monday, it was despatched on Wednesday, it’s Friday now….
I’ve spent most of today finishing the square from The Throw. It took all of….ooh, let’s see now? Half an hour? Three quarters maybe?
And gathering all resources together for tomorrow, it being Setsuban. It sounds like I actually have a plan for what we’re going to do….I’m off to track down some origami paper and see how dinner’s getting on!
Happy Groundhog Day to you all! That’ll be my bad vegan moment for the day then!