Hope is not an Effective Financial Strategy

Suffolk_lass

Wow - you did loads. I just made cake. Lots of cake. All going in to the local hospital except three oat biscuits that DH snaffled with a cup of tea mid-afternoon

shangaijimmy

Home made oat biscuits sound amazing with a cup of tea after a dog walk in weather like this. We've had a lot of rain up here in the North but thankfully we're in an area that doesn't flood. Watching the news this morning my heart goes out to all those that get affected.

Kids are hard at it, I've checked on e-mails and at this stage other than a 30min briefing at 6pm it looks like my day is pretty clear. My new regime of working 'properly' from 4pm is making life so much more manageable for me, for now anyway.

Bin and recycling day today. With my house reclamation quest our bin is overflowing. I forced as much down as I could to shut the lid and then had to do the naughty job of putting a bag in someone else's half full bin!! I was wary of having our partly open so that the wind wouldn't blow everything everywhere! Naturally I did it when it was dark and most people would be in bed!! Anyway the good news about bin day, is that I can start looking for other things to dispose of 

I'm going to give DD's carpet a clean this afternoon. It's only a small room and will take less than an hour, I just need to time it around home schooling and Mrs SJ's meetings due to the noise of it, and the extra noise of the dog trying to attack the hoover constantly!

Moneywise we're in a the 'dead zone'...payday is Monday so it's a case of trying to spend nothing until then, other than food shop which is already accounted for.

Suffolk_lass

We are very fortunate that the Village Hall is opposite our place - so we have a reciprocal bin arrangement - we use theirs when we need to and when there is (was) a quiz night and 70 cardboard fish and chip boxes to dispose of, they use ours!

Your reference to the dog attacking the vacuum reminds me we had a dog that did that when I was a kid - she hated brooms more and used to really savage them. We think she had been teased when she was a puppy. Do say if you want the recipe - it is a tiny step up from twinks hobnobs (on here) and I can say I just line a tray and make sort of flapjacks to save messing about.

I've just popped down and left one of those large "tins" that had Jacobs cracker selection in (the 5" deep ones you can't get now) full of lemon cake, brownies and oat biscuits, to go in with him tomorrow. My neighbour's son took them. I had some spares in 1L ice cream pots so I took the opportunity to give him them and say they were for him and the family if they wanted them. His Mum died a while ago and I am guessing with Grandma stuck on the south coast this might be one of the things they don't regularly get. Anyway, he looked very happy when I left.

South_coast

You need communal bins SJ, you can chuck what you want when you want and no-one can attribute anything to you 😀 We even have a refuse chute at our place, so I don't even have to go outside with it!

bubblycrazy

Your 8 year old sounds just like mine! I may try letting him jump around in between each question and see if it makes a difference. He also likes to be fiddling with things whilst listening to videos but I wonder if he's taking it all in that way.
I agree with you in not knowing how much work they should be doing too! 

shangaijimmy

Suffolk_lass said:

Your reference to the dog attacking the vacuum reminds me we had a dog that did that when I was a kid - she hated brooms more and used to really savage them. We think she had been teased when she was a puppy. Do say if you want the recipe - it is a tiny step up from twinks hobnobs (on here) and I can say I just line a tray and make sort of flapjacks to save messing about.

Thankfully Mrs SJ is a fantastic cook, and loves doing it. Ranging from home made curries, to calzones, to banana and white chocolate muffins! I consider myself very spoiled. Furthermore it is very much frowned upon for me to get involved in the cooking paraphernalia...other than cereal, sandwiches, wraps and toast, which as I'm often informed do not count!

South_coast said:

You need communal bins SJ, you can chuck what you want when you want and no-one can attribute anything to you 😀 We even have a refuse chute at our place, so I don't even have to go outside with it!

In my mind they are communal bins, well when mine is full and I need some spare! I would have no objection to a neighbour using ours if needed...that's my neighbourly community spirit. A chute sounds much more fun, and would be a great way to get the kids involved with helping with the rubbish!!!!

bubblycrazy said:

Your 8 year old sounds just like mine! I may try letting him jump around in between each question and see if it makes a difference. He also likes to be fiddling with things whilst listening to videos but I wonder if he's taking it all in that way.
I agree with you in not knowing how much work they should be doing too! 

I remember when DS2 was in reception I got beckoning finger of doom from the teacher after a few weeks. Making that walk of shame imagining the whisperings of "so thats naughty *****'s Dad!" I was praying that he hadn't wee'd in the grid again (that happened many times in nursery and I'd hoped we were past it). His teacher, or maybe teaching assistant wanted to tell me that "he just won't stand still when they're lining up"... I think my reply was along the lines of "You are kidding me??" with a look of astonishment and bewilderment not doubt! "He's 4, and only just 4!" A bit of a 'conversation' ensued where we established that; he lines up when told, he stays in line, he didn't talk when he needed to be quiet...he just cant stand still. "Remind me again, what problem does my 4yr old have?" I hope that I was civil, though I expect my tone would have said it all...

As for the work, I'll look at my 8yr olds maths paper and see how much he does and think wow thats a lot. Then he'll do a writing exercise and comes up with 5 lines in 30mins, and its hard to see the comparison to the volume of work in other subjects. We're all doing the best we can, and after all we're not professional teachers. I wouldn't expect to give a teacher a few sheets of paper and tell them to crack on with my job for 6 weeks with a few hours notice, whilst doing their own job at the same time.

shangaijimmy

I had a go at cleaning the carpet to see how it comes out before i decorate. As ever I was amazed at how much dirt came up, and looks to be drying really well. There's just one little patch that hasn't fully cleaned but that will end up being underneath some furniture once we've rearranged. So we'll have a look in the daylight and it should save us having to buy a new one until the next decoration! In all honesty we'll also be less bothered when she does what 5yr olds do, which is spill things and colour over the edge of the paper by mistake and so on...

Tomorrow's job is nip and pick up the paint etc... And then leisurely prepare the room, so finish emptying, take the curtains down, fill in any cracks etc... That way I can dive straight into on Saturday morning!

Karmacat

Great news about the carpet, Jimmy.  Also wanted to thank you for writing in detail about the day to day issues around the homeschooling, it's a real eye opener for me.

badmemory

shangaijimmy said:

As for the work, I'll look at my 8yr olds maths paper and see how much he does and think wow thats a lot. Then he'll do a writing exercise and comes up with 5 lines in 30mins, and its hard to see the comparison to the volume of work in other subjects.

DS2 has my sympathy & recognition.  He got 5 whole lines done!  I used to struggle to get 2.  I'd got all the info there but just couldn't managed to waffle for a whole page.  I actually still don't get why waffling on for ages about nothing extra is a good thing.  In grammar school (yes I'm that old) my maths teacher actually told me not to do the homework set but to concentrate on something else!!

So I guess your challenge is to figure out how to teach him to "waffle"/pad it out.  Maybe find something that he can get indignant about.

Does he have very definite opinions of right & wrong?  Beyond the usual stealing is wrong etc.  If so maybe you can use that.

Maths is easy/straightforward, there is only one answer, english or history etc is different & maybe DS2 struggles with with the indefinite.

shangaijimmy

Thank you badmemory, I am also very much in the not waffling category. When he's finished, he's finished (after a prod to see if there's anymore in there)! We take a picture and email/upload every piece of wok that he does. We're also quite measured on the 'help' that we give him, as I'm conscious of 2 things. Initially I don't want to teach him a totally different method to how schools teach them, so as not to confuse him further down the school years. And then I'm adamant that after a bit of guidance if he still doesn't know then we leave it blank, as the teachers need to know what he knows, what he doesn't know and what knowledge gaps that he has. And they definitely do not need to know what I know! At first he didn't like it but I've repeated to him that the key thing isn't getting every single thing correct.

And you've just poked the nest over homework...I really don't think its right to be setting homework at the moment when everything they're doing is at home. There is no way we are letting school take over our home. School are on a mini invasion at the moment and we need to repel it!