First Day of School

What?  A new post so soon?  I make no promises for future diligence.  

So what is the occasion of the new post?  A new school year!  Well, for the boys.  The girls are carrying on at home with the work they've been doing.  Schools here start in January and run until the end of November.  All you northern hemisphere people don't forget that our seasons are opposite so we've just come off summer break.  And yes, I'd like to remind you once again that we were basking in the sunshine by the pool while it was freezing in the U.S. last week.  You're welcome.

Look how big my boys are getting!  

Liam is in grade 2 and Henry is in Reception.  

It was a cloudy morning and when it's cloudy here you're actually in the cloud.  This is the new school hall and you can't see it, but there is a mountain in the background.  

When the girls and I got home the house was SO QUIET.  We're going to be able to get so much done this year, but we will miss the boys during the day.  

Liam was so very happy after school.  He had so much fun and was so excited about everything (including homework!).  It's so nice to see him so happy.  Henry was very happy, too…and extremely tired.  Perfect!  

2014 Plans

It's a new year and a new post is long overdue.  What have we been up to?  Oh dear, I was too busy to blog about it then and I'm afraid it would take too much time to write about it now!  So…onward to the future.

January finds us at the end of our summer break and this week things are getting back to their busy normal. We started the kids in a lot of sports and lessons last year in an attempt to help the kids make friends.  That hoped-for result didn't materialise, but they have really enjoyed themselves.  They take swim, horse riding, tennis, cricket, and karate lessons.  The girls have Afrikaans lessons and art lessons.  Rosie is still studying violin, Charlotte has started playing the recorder, and Liam has started playing piano.  

As 2013 wore on it became clear that Liam was unhappy.  He talked/talks constantly about the friends he had in America and how they used to play together.  He has yet to make a friend here.  It is mainly for this reason that we decided to have him go back to school in 2014.  The private school they attended last year has made many changes, the biggest being that they are now a Cambridge school.  The three oldest kids were tested in reading and maths as part of the process of putting Liam back in (the principle was curious about the girls) and all scored very well.  It made me feel good as a parent to know that the kids are learning as they should.  

The girls will continue to be home schooled for now.  Both adamantly do not want to go back and both are thriving academically and socially at home.  We will continue to do some schooling at home with the boys because the school does not teach all that I want them to learn.  

I look forward to more study this year as I prepare to teach the kids.  I think constantly about how and what I will teach them.  And…there is still so much out there that I want to learn!  This year I want to mainly focus on languages, especially Afrikaans and Venda.  I haven't yet applied myself to a systematic study of either language but I can understand a good bit of each.  I also plan on reading more in Spanish as I have no one here to speak it to, and I plan to continue studying Latin.  I know…that's a lot of languages.  But why not?  Anything I accomplish or gain will be more than I started with.  

Another goal for 2014 is to make a bunch of these squares:  I'm doing a CAL with some ladies in Cape Town all year where we make one day.  My personal goal is actually 5 a week. I've crocheted since I was 9 and imagine my surprise when someone came over and remarked that my (probably-vintage-by-now) chevron afghans were fashionable.  It's nice to see some of my "early work" being appreciated by others.  I've enjoyed them all along.  (I've also heard that  selfies are popular these days…does this count?)