Holidays and learning to play the guitar begin

Wednesday 14th: Last night Little Miss kept taking her kitten to Hezekiah's bedroom (at around 10pm when we go to sleep and she normally heads off herself). So I just helped her and took the whole lot of them down there. She has always enjoyed sleeping on the beds at night - so she obviously misses that. When I came in this morning I didn't see any at the bottom of his bed, so said something like "the kittens were on your bed last night" and he quickly sat up and said "they are still here". They were all right up there with him. What a happy boy he was.

Last year the girls got some extra Christmas decorations from the Champion Centre (from extra that they had been given). Included in that stash, was this smaller tree. It ended up being a perfect size for our side board. All the cards could go around it and the children's decorations could go on it. So from not having a tree up for a couple of years, we now have two up.

The schools close at different times through this week, so the Champion Centre was still open this week. Hannah had asked if she could come with us. So she got to enjoy the fun glitter playdough this morning.
Her creations.










Asher loves the little coasters that they have in their little "kitchen". So Emma took photos of them and made matching cards. Asher had fun playing with them this morning.
Nothing really new with the painting except that we worked on getting her to say the colour, using two words "pink paint" or "green paint". She would focus and take a good bit of time to process it, but when given the time, she would repeat the words (with a gap in between as she processes). Great that she is willing to try new things with her speech. It was a very clear reminder for me though on how much extra time she does need to process it though.
This was our last day with these therapists. She will have a new group of teachers in the new year when she moves to the transition group (transition to school for the 4 year olds).

These three have been so used to swimming in cold water with the school over the last weeks, that they were thrilled when I asked if they wanted to go and swim.

Hezekiah showing me how he goes on the side of the pool. The girls having fun under the water. Great to have Hannah quickly overcome her fear of going under. No issue this year.

Hezekiah glowing bubbles. Rachel is going to buy him some goggles for Christmas. Hopefully that will help him get his face under too.

Once we were home I took over with Asher and Brendon headed out to get the hedge done. It was rather bushy.

It always looks so nice and smart when it's done. It looks even better from the inside.

We had a lovely surprise this afternoon when Brendon got this 2kg box of huge cherries from one of the companies that provide straw to the farm. Brendon doesn't eat cherries, but the rest of the family was thrilled.

I managed to get a guitar for Ruth for just $20, which I picked up today on the way home from town. Rachel quickly asked if she could use my guitar and they quickly got learning C and G7. I gave them a bit of help working out the strumming and they were excited about finding as many songs as they could that worked with just the two cords.

Thursday 15th: Ruth got some Christmas activities from her Guide leader and had fun this afternoon making a Christmas cracker for her friend. She had made a special friendship bracelet for her over the last couple of days, and this worked as a nice way to wrap it up.
For their class's "secret Santa" Ruth got some oil pastels. She did this drawing which she gave to her friend too.

Ruth got back to the guitar today and found a load more songs that worked with the two chords she is learning. I am sure it's from her great skill at harmonising that she is just able to find songs in her head that work.

Playing with the kittens. We tried having the kittens in the lounge but that didn't work all that well and they moved back to next to the fireplace in the dinning room.

This bead toy has not been played with by the children for a while. When I was doing a toy clean out a few months ago I knew it didn't need to be kept for them, but I kept it for the kittens. I know the previous kittens loved playing with it so much.

So it was fun to see this new lot of kittens starting to have fun with it too. It's not only fun to chase the beads, it's also a great teething ring. :-)