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I love spring days out as a family. Exploring places and enjoying each others company. Over the Spring and summer we try to ensure that we spend one day at the weekend out as a family. The thing is that the boys love being out and about as much as me and MadDad do and we spent Sunday pottering in the garden and the weekend was pretty screen free for all of us.
We are really focussing on trying to encourage our boys to move away from the electronic and take up more tactile pursuits! I gave you some ideas for encouraging writing earlier in the week, but I wanted to concentrate on recording holiday memories this time. When I was younger one of the most exciting aspects of any family holiday was receiving the developed film back from the chemist and putting together an album of the photographs and writing the name of the holiday in the inside page.
In todays digital world I find that my images stay on my PC, phone and on the digital photo frame we have and that made me sad, so I decided to encourage Maxi to make a scrapbook of our recent Orlando visit. This was made even easier as we were gifted a whole host of scrapbooking things in a travel theme from
Whilst we were in Orlando Maxi made sure that he took maps, leaflets and keep all his tickets in to the theme parks, so in addition to any pictures I printed out he could also keep all this memorabilia and have a wonderful physical memory of our holiday.
Firstly we sat at the PC and decided which images to print. In future I think that I would send them off to an online provider to print, that way we could have a better quality print.
Then we cut all the photographs out using the guillotine and then I let Maxi lose with the glue and a pen!
As much as I wanted everything to be neat and in a certain way, I knew that it was best that I just stayed on the sideline and let him fill the scrapbook in how he wanted it to be. Afterall this is his holiday memories we are recording.
Encouraging writing in Boys – Scrapbooking holiday memories Read More »
o hands, one for each of my children. I still take joy in the fact that at eight and nearly seven the boys want to hold my hands when we go places.
Two hands, to hold on tight to the man of my dreams
Two hands that love to get dirty with bread, paint, glue and glitter (not all at the same time mind you)
Two hands, one to hold the book and one to turn the pages as I read the bedtime story
Two hands that love to gently stroke my children as they sleep.
Two hands that tippy tap away on the keyboard letting the words flow from brain to blog
Two hands that hold the camera capturing the moments to make the memories
But mostly my two hands help, they help my children learn to make their own way in the world
more important to us both.
I am his loyal wife. I trust him with my life and the life of my children and he trusts me too. We work hard at making sure that we remain steadfast together and are not only husband and wife, but friends, companions and more.
So when I was asked to tell you about the fact that E.ON are giving you the chance to reward someone close to you, someone who has been with you through thick and thin, or who has just done something nice for you recently with a treat, I jumped at the chance. E.ON are giving away 4 fabulous experience days for two plus 70 pairs of cinema tickets. I know that MadDad and I would love a pair of cinema tickets at the moment as the last film we saw together was Star Trek and the new one is due out at any time. So why not visit the E.ON Facebook Page before 28 April and let them know who you’d reward and why. You can also find the full terms and conditions of this competition on the E.ON Facebook page.
You see E.ON believes you should get something back for your loyalty and if you’ve been with them for a year or more, they’d like to say thank you. So they are giving rewards to their customers. You can either get money off your bills or Tesco Clubcard points – it’s up to you. All you need to do is change to one of E.ON’s tariffs with rewards.
If you are anything like me this last week of spring like weather will have you packing away the winter wear and getting our the spring summer clothes. Being the organised Mum and Thrifty Mum I am. Each year I but the boys summer clothes in the previous years sales and have them all packed away for
thinking of the Personal Statement a good deal in advance, and how you might help your child to connect their extra-curricular interests, achievements and hobbies with their academic pathway of choice, you can steal a march on all of the rest of the university applicants.
Karen Martin, from the Admissions & Student Recruitment Department at the University of Dundee, explains: “Remember that your Personal Statement is the only piece of written work we will see when selecting the best applicants.”
Pretty crucial, then.
None of this is of course a direct substitute for quality academic performance but, done well and properly, the Personal Statement is often the deciding factor between so many applications of equal weight.
Outlined at the outset on the Personal Statement, there need to be cast-iron reasons for why your child has chosen that particular subject, that university and why exactly they want to go to continue in Higher Education in general. This is the Personal Statement bread and butter.
But, the essentials aside, what other ingredients can you think about in advance that could help boost your child’s application and save you all a whole world of heartache at a later, more stressful date?
Volunteering
Turbo-Boosting Your Child’s UCAS Personal Statement Read More »
Normally on a Sunday I do my ironing whilst watching One Born Every Minute on catch up. But alas the series had ended, so I decided to watch Paul Hollywood instead and you know what I managed to get the ironing done in that time. Now those of you in the know, will understand this statement, but for the uninitiated OBEM is an hour long, whereas Paul Hollywood’s Bread is only 30 minutes long. So I managed to halve my ironing time. Which delighted me. OK this week wasn’t the week that I do our bedding, which is super kingsize and yes before you ask I ironing my own bedding because I love getting in to clean laundered and ironed sheets, but still it was a lot faster than usual.
The Tefal Pr Express has lots of positives, you can fill it up at the tap, large water tank, anti calc spoon for hard water areas, safety catch (so you can store the hot iron) and an auto off facility too. I do, however, need to get a new ironing board with somewhere to put the steam generator.
The thing that got me thinking about how old I was when I learned to iron was the fact the iron is a lot lighter than a traditional steam iron as it doesn’t have to have a tank to hold the water.
So when is the right time to teach my boys how to iron? When did you teach your children?
An Ironing Revolution – When Should Kids Learn to Iron? Read More »
We love books in The Mad House and one of my favorite times of the day is when we read to each other. As the boys are growing up I still feel it is important to read to them and I am aware that sometimes the length of books is daunting to younger children if they want to read them themselves,
With the onslaught of electronics in todays lifestyle writing can sometimes take a backseat and I for one am keep to encouraging writing in my boys. I think the fact that Maxi is both a reluctant reader and writer makes me more determined to find ways to encourage this skill. Mini who is nearly seven loves to read and write and can often be found with a notebook and pencil in hand and is keen to improve his handwriting as he wants to get awarded a handwriting pen at school.
Over the summer holidays last year we focussed a lot on writing and pen skills including making our own books, creating a writing centre and making memory stones.
One of the things that I discovered was that good quality writing equipment was key in helping both the boys Triangular and wide pencils were easier for them to grip[ and paper with lines on made it easier too. Good quality paper that they can press on without ripping is essential. I also found that providing them with notebooks and letter writing stationery or their own choice helped to encourage them.
Journaling
Now the boys are a little older (eight and nearly seven) we have moved on and they are currently filling in a Q&A a day for children journal each night before bed. These are brilliant journals, which asks a simple question each night and your child completes it. It is only a sentence, so fast and simple to do before bed. I want the boys to get in to the habit of writing and feel this is a fantastic way to do that,m plus a good way of recording how their answers change each year.
Maxi is also putting together a scrapbook style journal of our recent trip to Orlando (more about that in the near future).
Penpals
Both the boys also have a penpal that they write too. This is a great way of encouraging writing, penmanship and also communication skills. They choose their own stationery and learn the joy of sending and receiving letters. We have even been collecting stamps to make a display with. I know that the boys are excited to use the special edition Dr Who Royal Mail stamps (released to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who this year) on their next letters.
