Tuesday 18 May 2010

Green House Photos

I thought this deserved a blog entry all of it's own because I'm so pleased with it :o)
In the first photo you can see the 3 tier shelves my hubby made, this is were I sow and plant because it has a wire rack top so the soil just falls straight through and back into the bag. We have a grape vine or should I say stick in the far right corner and hope for great things there and you can just make out my metal shelves from my plastic covered green house.

Below gives you a better view of the automatic windows, as you can see it was a very hot day so they were open fully, even so the greenhouse was still stifling so I had to open the door too.


Above shows the tomato seedlings which we planted and have had on the windowsill for a few weeks now. Some have been potted on and are having their first night out in the greenhouse tonight... I feel like an anxious parent on the first time a child stays away from home at night.

Above are my fabulous first time Tulips, the colour is so magnificent and striking, I'll certainly keep them and let them flower again next year. I might even plant some in the garden beds.

A Lovely Summer's Day

We've had a really good day today, the fact that it was really sunny certainly helped, but yes, we've had a lovely relaxed day and even though it was relaxed we got lots done.

My youngest started off with MEP Maths, then fed and watered her animals (too many to list). After this we started to sow seeds, a little late but my greenhouse is up and ready now, then we moved into the front garden to dehead the daffodils and do a bit of weeding. We baked chapatti bread for lunch and then my youngest started reading about 'money' from a good little book I bought here. She did this out in the garden sun bathing with her big sis, whilst her brother was sunbathing too but of course he was on the laptop at the same time :o) He's currently working on a few websites and more updates for the DigiLapbook.

I bought this book too because the other book gives the basics but it really spends alot of time on the American Bank and money system whereas this one is on about the English pound and pence so they can learn about them both for good measure :o)

Eventually I hope to do this nifty little lapbook about money from Homeschool Helper or maybe combine it with 'Living with Less' by Hands of a child, I'm not sure yet.

When the sun started to fade we turned in and my youngest started doing photoshop and editing again, leaving me free to do this, where or where would we be without computers...

Monday 17 May 2010

Proud mum alert :o)

Just a really quick post to tell you about my daughter's website. She's made most of it herself and the rest with her brother's help :o) She is really getting into the whole photo editing thing, I'm not sure I understand the point in it all but the finished product does look rather good.

The website contains her portfolio and tutorials to help other would be editers (is that the word used in the editing world?) My daughter has completed these herself and is currently teaching herself photoshop Cs3 as she goes along. I am totally amazed because she's gone from being almost computer phobic (other than emails) to my not being able to get her off the thing! Just goes to show that once something captures their interests, there's no stopping them.



Wednesday 12 May 2010

Mother's Day 'Week' Deals

Don't forget to go over to Currclick to get your freebies for Mother's Day, meant to post this on Monday but we've been a bit busy so had to get it in here first so that I didn't forget ;o)

There seems to be a glut of good programs on at the moment so lots of our time has being spent watching the tv. A few we are watching are The Story of Science , Blitz Street, Modern Masters and The Edible Garden.
We are enjoying all of them but consequently not getting much academic work done, although we have started reading Animal Farm by George Orwell.

We've also been busy going to Dr's appt, Dentist appt, Hospital appt, so all in all we've had a fully packed week so far... roll on Saturday so I can have a rest :o)

Saturday 8 May 2010

New Greenhouse (well, new to me)

Well, we've had a really good week with hubby being off work. We took a break from academic work purely because non was getting done ;o) instead we worked in the garden, mainly weeding , but the exciting part is that we've been putting up my first ever greenhouse!

After deciding to take the gardening more seriously this year and try to produce more than the few potatoes and peas, which never make it to the table anyway, we would take the plunge and get a greenhouse to start us off with seedlings etc. The only trouble was that they all cost rather more than we had put aside for it :o( so my ever ingenius hubby set about trawling ebay for cheaper second hand ones; they would have had to been really cheap for us to afford one, but alas there was none.

I was down stricken for a while, my dreams of becoming a gardner in tatters when someone offered us their old greenhouse. Their dad had passed away three years before and their mum now felt ready to move on, so we dismantled it, transported it back to our garden and now it is standing in place and at this very moment in time getting some new glass put in; I am sooo excited! I've been out and bought Tomato seeds and have themn planted and growing on my windowsill ready to go in the moment I get the okay.

I've got to say I'm not a jigsaw person at the best of times so a big thank you goes to my hubby for doing this huge 3 dimensional one :o)
Picture will follow soon.

Wednesday 5 May 2010

Digilapbook Finished!

My son has been updating a program he made to allow us to make digilapbooks without it being too technical ;o) I think he's done a great job but then again I'm biased, but here's the link for you to take a look and see what you think. He charges a nominal fee to help cover the cost of hosting as he's moved to a larger host now, I suppose that's the downside of it being used :o)

Here's my daughter's latest digilapbook on dogs. She bought a book from a local charity shop and worked through that. She really enjoyed using the program and found it easy to use. I think she was being used as a guinea pig for my son :o)

My hubby has a one week holiday from work so we are working in the garden putting up a new greenhouse therefore there's not much academic work getting done so once again the work boxes haven't really come into their own yet but I'm sure they will eventually.