This Week.....Getting Christmassy!

 Hannah had an early Christmas present this week, a stable management morning at her riding school. She loved it, grooming, feeding, plaiting, tacking up and a riding lesson. When we arrived to collect her at lunchtime she was hanging out with Coco in his stable!

We decorated the house for Christmas this week as well,

the American Girl dolls got their own mini tree, and Hannah decorated their tree house too.

and tonight we went for a walk around our neighborhood to see some of the outdoor lights.

As it is Saint Lucia day Hannah had a little celebration and lit some candles with her doll Lanie.

 It's been a good week!

Fishers Farm

This week we had our first visit to Fishers Farm when Hannah was invited by her friend to celebrate her birthday with her there.

What a great place, I can't believe we've never been before!

Hannah loved all the animals, and spent lots of time visiting them with her friend J, they even had a pony ride each.

There was a climbing wall, trampolines, donut toboggans, inflated jumping pillows, tractor and trailer ride, ghost train, go karts, so much stuff to do as well as all the animals. the children all had a fantastic time.

Donutting!

Hannah and S

On the go-kart track

                                         Hannah and J on the trampolines

Hannah and J on the inflated pillows

J - pig whisperer!

 Hannah and J at the pony rides.

Big, big thanks to S for inviting us to her birthday, we had a lovely day :-)

The November 'American Girl Club' Session From CurrClick.

Every month Hannah joins in an online American Girl club for homeschoolers through CurrClick. It's late here by the time the class is on, so she often joins in in her pj's - last night she did two sessions online as she enjoyed the first one so much, and didn't finish until 11pm!! 

The book they studied was Kirsten's Surprise.

Since Hannah doesn't have a Kirsten doll she dressed Lanie up in Kirsten style.

 On screen club chat! 

The teacher who runs the class is great and includes all the girls in the discussions. Last night they talked about Christmas traditions, Christmas for the pioneers, the history of Christmas decorations and compared Kirsten's Swedish Christmases to her American Christmas in the book.

There was a recipe for Swedish apple pie posted in advance so we made that for Hannah to have during class, and the craft activity was making a Christmas wreath.

A few craft accessories found their way all over the bed! 

The apple pie was really good!

Hannah's wreath.

The wreath turned out beautifully, and inspired, Hannah made a St Lucia crown in the same way for Lanie.

The American Girl Club can be found here , and here is the main CurrClick site for anyone who is interested in joining in. Hannah has chosen a few other classes she would like to try in the new year as well.

Lessons

Every Thursday since September Hannah has been going to English, math and art classes at the local homeschooling group. She has really been enjoying going, and meeting new people, and has loved the English and art classes. The math class just didn't click with her though, and she started to lose confidence in her ability. The teacher was lovely, and really tried to help, but this week Hannah decided she wanted to try something else instead. She tried biology and was so excited after the class that she just had to swap!

So, now Hannah is doing math at home with me, and English, biology and art with the homeschool group.

Today we did multiplication, number factors and prime and composite numbers.

We are using the spectrum books which seem to suit Hannah's style of learning very well.

Today she also did her biology homework. In class they were learning about the function of the lungs and made a lung model, and she had two worksheets about the lungs as homework.

She also checked over her English class work and finished it for homework.

Where Did The Daylight Go?

Yesterday we went to the park at 4pm,

It was cold!

Hannah discovered that wellies don't slide!

so she abandoned them, which meant I had to carry her back to the top (that didn't last long!)

By 4.30 pm the moon was up, and a little while later it was dark!

I do love the winter with the dark cosy evenings and frosty mornings, but we could do with a couple more hours of daylight to get all the playing done!

Fun At The Farm

This week we also managed a trip to Staunton with some friends that we hadn't seen for a while. It was lovely to catch up, and Hannah had a really fun time with her friend Finn. These two have know each other for most of their lives ( they are 9 and 11 now) and Hannah always says that Finn is like the brother she never had - I love that :-)