Mainly pics tonight as we ease back into our usual homeschooling and family life blog. Those of you who have stuck around—I think you for your patience. Now, on with the show! Instead of being dinosaurs for the umpteenth time, this year the boys were struck by an 11th hour inspiration: Willy Wonka and Charlie, [...]
This afternoon the boys and I took advantage of this sunny fall holiday (it is Canadian Thanksgiving today), and went for a long nature walk at the Inglewood Bird Sanctuary. This gave Jim a quiet house in which to get some recording work done—and I am choosing to be grateful that he has so much [...]
This past weekend the family took part in one of many free “Alberta Arts Days’ celebrations around the province. We were at the Louise Riley branch of the library, where Calgary’s own ‘Birdman’, Andrew Stiles, put on a workshop. (You can read more about him at his blog here.) It was fantastic! He began with [...]
We’ve been in a real Roald Dahl phase here lately, so imagine our delight to find out today is Roald Dahl Day! Over the past few weeks Jim read the boys Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and on the weekend we watched the 2005 Johnny Depp version of the movie as a family. The boys [...]
Over the weekend we took a short family break and headed to Brooks, Alberta, about 2 hours SE of Calgary—this was in lieu of a birthday party for Daegan (each year we give the boys a choice between a short family trip or a party). We visited a few nearby sites (more tomorrow), including Dinosaur [...]
Yesterday our eldest turned 9! Yes, halfway to adulthood; last of the single-digits. Where does the time go? We did several things to make the day special for him. First, we headed off to buy some Pokemon cards, which Gareth decided would be his gift to Daegan. Gareth got a pack for himself too—paying for [...]
Today is International Waffle Day, or Vaffeldagen. It apparently started in Sweden and marks the beginning of spring—which, when I look out my window at “the winter that never ends”, seems rather ironic. But no matter; in our house, any excuse to make waffles is well-received! So this afternoon I headed to the store and [...]
In honour of the day, I tried making a grasshopper pie—a mint-chocolate cream pie, that is, no grasshoppers involved! Not bad for a first attempt at veganizing, just need to add a bit more cornstarch to the pie itself and bake longer so it thickens a bit more. Nonetheless, everyone’s plate was licked clean. Here’s [...]
Did you celebrate Pi Day today? We did a few things. We began the day with an elaborate breakfast, in which we tried a new curried cauliflower frittata pie, along with “watermelon pie” (I just but the pieces and arranged on a plate like a pie) and “pancake pie” (we cut our pancakes in pie [...]
We began our day by having a look at some scientist Valentines that someone had posted on one of the homeschooling lists I am on. You can find the images here. They are quite clever and ‘punny’, and the boys—particularly Daegan—have enough science background to get some of jokes. Their clear favourite was the Charles [...]