Great Weekend Part 3

Several things to be grateful for on Sunday :-)

There are only 2 children who attend the church we go to (and they're both ours!) BUT a new family have joined us and their daughter attended the service for the first time on Sunday so our daughter was pleased :-) They are the same age and have a lot in common!

We had guests for lunch and all enjoyed their company very much. One of our visitors is a talented pianist, composer and music therapist. She spent some time with both children improvising on the piano. It was music to my ears (literally!)

Our son (who is 7) can be rather 'heavy handed' on the piano to the say the least, he acts much younger than his years in most areas. However to hear him 'plink plonking' with a professional musician doing a 'duet' it sounded like real music. I found it very moving. Her husband whispered to me 'this is what she does in therapy, she is following him'. It was wonderful!

http://www.bamt.org/
 http://www.austmta.org.au/
 http://www.musictherapy.org/


All in all a fruitful and stimulating weekend......next weekend will be too I expect but more anon :-)

Great Weekend Part 2

After the rainy walk, DH and 2 children decided to have a look inside the church which was near where the car was parked.

It turned out that a training session was about to start...training for volunteers who serve teas and are often asked about the history of the church. 'Come on in!' they said. They watched an interesting slide show and were not allowed to leave until they'd had tea and cake :-)

Here is the entry for the church on the Geograph website

http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1755119

('The Geograph^® Britain and Ireland project aims to collect geographically representative photographs and information for every square kilometre of Great Britain and Ireland, and you can be part of it.')

Great Weekend Part 1

On Saturday I attended a Gideons Ladies' Day (for wives of Gideons..or rather 'auxiliaries' as we are properly called). It was a very encouraging day and I enjoyed a 'day off'.

Meanwhile back at the ranch, DH took our 2 youngest and Katie the dog for a very rainy walk....it was younger daughter's idea (which I was surprised about!) and she chose the route.

Theres a similar walk to the one they did in one of the 'KiddiWalks' Books

Publishers website is here

http://www.countrysidebooks.co.uk

20% discount on all books ordered online

Also you can download individual walks...what a great idea!

Info from website below

Here are 690 individual circular walks that you can download as PDF files from 42 of our Pocket Pub Walks and Footpaths for Fitness series. Each PDF walking download will cost £1.50 for up to 5 walks. Thereafter, the price drops to £1.00 each.

Cerebra

Received Cerebra email newsletter today.

'Cerebra is a unique charity set up to help improve the lives of children with brain related conditions through research, education and directly supporting the children and their carers.' (quote from their website)

'Brain related conditions' includes the effects of  neglect and trauma on the brains of babies and young children. The majority of children in care, or children adopted from care, in the U.K. have suffered some form of early trauma (not to mention damaging experiences in utero).

 Cerebra is free to join and has a postal library service, and many other resources and services.

 http://www.cerebra.org.uk 







 

They grow up so fast!!

Time lapse photography...birth to 12 years 2 minutes 45 seconds.

What a wonderful idea :-)

http://vimeo.com/40448182

Aquila Magazine

Just renewed younger daughter's subscription to Aquila Magazine (aimed at 8-13 year olds). If you have not come across it, its well worth subscribing to :-)
http://www.aquila.co.uk/

Visit to Lacock

Recently we visited Lacock in Wiltshire.....idyllic village owned by the National Trust and location for the filming of Cranford. We identified Miss Matty's house (Central character Miss Matty was played by Judi Dench in the series).I haven't read any of Elizabeth Gaskell's novels but my daughters and I loved the BBC version of Cranford.

Found this on another blog, which is well worth a look...I've got a lot to learn :-)

http://www.karenbarclay.com/?s=cranford

While we were in Lacock we visited a shop selling recycled/upcycled stuff.....I bought some bunting and a pencil/paintbrush holder made from an old record, softened and moulded into shape.

I tried that with a group of teenagers once but we didn't have much success :-(
We tried heating the records up in hot water as per the instructions in a book I'd read.

Apparently this is how to do it properly....

http://www.wikihow.com/Make-Bowls-out-of-Vinyl-Records

And here's a link for the Wiltshire Scrapstore, based in Lacock, with link to their online shop

 http://www.wiltsplay.org.uk/

Cats

I'm not sure whether I'm a dog person or a cat person, but cats certainly outnumber dogs in our household at the moment. 1 dog, 2 cats and 2 foster cats (we foster for Cats Protection) http://www.cats.org.uk/

Here's one of our foster cats, unimaginatively named Blackie but nicknamed Scarface Claw by DH and me (after a cat in the wonderful children's books by Lynley Dodd).

Welcome to my blog!

I've never blogged before so any hints and tips welcome :-)

I suppose I need to buy myself a copy of 'Blogging for Dummies' or somesuch.

Philantha means 'lover of flowers' so I've posted an appropriate photo taken by my elder daughter.

I hope this blog will become an encouragement to all who visit. On the other hand, I may find, like a friend of mine who started a blog, that I 'have absolutely nothing to say'...now that *would* be a new experience!