So, the end of another week!

Where does the time go? We managed to finish off quite a bit of outstanding "work" this week. B has proudly finished his Star Wars project, printing it out and drawing a lovely cover for it. K continues with her Red Pepper story and has asked to keep it going as an on-going novel! She's signed up to do the Young NaNoWriMo, first discovered on Qualballah's blog. Well, sort of signed up! I registered K under me, as a homeschooler, rather than do it as an under 12 and send off a permission form all the way to the great US of A. Thinking this would be easier, I've now had two emails, with different wording, but both requesting a list of members in my class, their ages and whether I've received their parent consent forms! Hoping K will be properly signed up by 1st November, when it all starts. Anyway, she's busy planning her characters and drawing them, and has an idea of a story line, so she's pretty much set. The NaNoWriMo is for those wishing to write a novel in just one complete month. There are no prizes, just pride in yourself once you've achieved the 50,000 words in the time limit! For youngsters you can set a workable word limit, we've set 10,000 words for K!

Yesterday, getting cabin fever due to rather unsettled weather, we headed out to the local museum to view an exhibition that was finishing this weekend. It was named "Pictoplasma: Characters at War" and was basically about cartoon characters. Lots of large cardboard cut outs of cartoons lined the entrance, but we only recognised a few (B was pleased to see "Mario" there). Inside the actual exhibition we found lots of grafetti style cartoon characters all over the wall. It seems they'd had a workshop and the children had been allowed to draw their own cartoons! Further on we found more wall drawings in lovely patterns, all cartoons again, and a large film screen showing short films of modern day cartoons. This seemed to appeal to the teenagers who seemed to have set up shop on the sofas together with packets of sweets and drinks, etc., etc.! Got them out of the rain anyway! We watched a little video about children making quick films using plastacine, just like B and K had done. B instantly asked to do more film making, and he also drew a Mr Key cartoon character! We didn't wander round the main part of the museum, but we did visit two more exhibitions, one about Victorians with lots of interactive things (B put on a short Punch and Judy show for us), and another wonderful exhibition of crafts. K and I were mighty impressed with the array of beautiful pictures produced using silks, cottons, wools, crafts items, dolls faces - you name it, it was there. Such imagination! We picked up lots of ideas anyway and B said it was time we all made more canvas paintings for our hall wall. Too right, I've been promising P more masterpieces since we moved to this home 3 years ago! When the kids were much younger, we each did a canvas using paint and craft materials. They are in our bedroom now and I always look at them first thing when waking up. B must have been 3 when he did his and it's really very artisitic.

Today we started to make mini Egyptian mummies using clay and Plaster of Paris. Great fun! Haven't used this before and it warns you not to pour any down the drains ("unless you want a happy plumber" it said!) Once we were happy with our mummies, we left them to set, which didn't take long at all. We'll paint them on Monday. The children really enjoyed all this, so B made a small tea-light holder using clay and P of P, and K followed instructions to made a lighthouse scene using the same two mediums.

Managed to get back to the plot this afternoon and did a good couple of hours clearing. We've cleared one small section now and covered it with cardboard, including the Battle of Hastings collage, just to brighten up the area a bit! K and B helped again today, although K soon decided that reading her Pony magazine was more fun. After a short wander round the allotments, K and B headed off to play in the brook and had great fun (they were soaked afterwards)!

First lot of weeding done, lots more to go!

Water was clear when they went in!