crafty things

I have lots to say on here, so will start off with something simple to make sure I finish this soon!

Here are a few crafty bits and pieces from over the past few months...

VALENTINES DAY

Valentines and photos from cousins and friends.

Cards the children made in Primary when we went to Kidderminster for Nanny's farewell sacrament talk. Valentines Day for everyone else was Christmas Day at Nanny's. :o)

Hearts we made to hang up for valenines day. There were others around the house on bedroom doors too.


WEAVING

Hannah weaving (with some packing materials that brought something in the mail to us) and tissue paper.



EASTER

We kept Easter simple as Daddy was away for a week, and lots else going on besides, and just coloured some boiled eggs. You can see lots of lovely Easter designs there.

One of Hannah's, showing all the colours of love, from an Easter story we read on Easter Sunday for our family home evening, followed by colouring the eggs.


While we had our egg hunt on the Monday, Samuel enjoyed a sleep with Gramps, as he and Granma had come to visit for a couple of days.





Here they all are with their treasures.
They had a treasure hunt first around the house and found a few other easter gifts.

The fruit was in felted eggs that we had made during the previous week, and they were each searching for their own wgg creations plus a couple of other eggy shaped things.

Our nature/seasons ring had changed too to tell the Easter story. We had:
- a crotcheted cup to represent the last supper
- a wooden stick cross to represent the crucifixion
- a felted tomb with round stone to represent Jesus coming to life again
- a fish to represent a couple of stories from after he rose from the dead
(eating fish and honeycomb with the disciples to show he wasn't a spirit,
and cooking a meal of fish on the seashore which he ate with the disciples)
- some small felted coloured eggs
- a red heart in the centre to represent Jesus' love for us in giving his life for each of us


Well there are a few other things but I don't seem to have any photos, so will leave it there for now, and be back soon with some birthdays. etc.

All upside down

Peter has a habit right now of enjoying life to the full through turning our house upside down. The most regular places are his bedroom (with a little or sometimes a lot of help from all of the interesting things he finds in the storeroom), and the living room, although now that the weather is starting to not get quite so cold, and he wants to be outside much of the time, the shed and garden are also places that are great for experimentation and making things just the way he likes them. The living room just the way he likes it ALWAYS involves pulling all four cushions off our one sofa and either laying them out as crash mats for doing super jumps and dives onto, piling them up high to scramble over assault course style, or making houses tents and any other imaginable thing out of them. The other children don't tend to mind in the least, unless some of us are trying to use the space for something else, like sitting on the chairs to read (Rachel can get pretty upset when she is sat on that brown sofa and Peter gets behind the cushion and tries to encourage her off with a little collapsing and pushing! He often says he doesn't want to have our devotional in the living room (sometimes it's sat around the dining table), and it is normally because that means he's not free to create some sort of chaos, I mean imaginative scene, in there.

Here they all are on one of the days when he and Rebekah (often his side-kick) had created a little house with a tunnel to go through to get in and out. Or rather out, as he had great fun climbing over the arm of the chair to get inside then diving through the tunnel on exit. Everyone thought it was a great idea. :o)



Another occasion when they build a sort or rabbit warren, complete with various living areas, cupboards for storing food, and cubby holes.



Rachel happily sporting one area.



Peter soon had her out of there as he wanted to go and eat his stash of grapes in there that he had raided from the fridge, as he does.



Sarah caught happily playing the piano.



Rachel doing her beloved piano practise and Hannah typing something up onto the computer.



Then another afternoon shortly after the other pictures, where several new homes were created (this time by all), many imainative stories created and acted out and a lot of fun had by all (Samuel included, who suddenly had a whole lot more things to stand holding onto and to peer into to see what was going on inside).

Horses, horses, and .... more horses!

I ended up parking in Stanmer Park for a short time on Thursday morning, and was surprised to see that field where we flew the kites packed full of cars, caravans, and horse boxes. There were caravans all over the place, and people going past in traps (carriages) pulled by horses. So I ended up finding someone to ask what was going on. They were all setting up for a horse driving competition starting on Friday. The man I first asked was helping to set out a series of gates for the competition on Saturday, and only mentioned Saturday's events to me. Michael took the children there late afternoon on Thursday though for an hour to see all the horses, and luckily some ladies they met told them about the Friday as well.

These ladies had called them over to their stables, saying they were in a hurry, but they could come and see the horses for a minute if they wanted. Rachel and Hannah ended up happily holding the lead ropes of the two horses, Jack and Joe, while they munched on grass in the field, and the two ladies took advantage of the extra hands and both set to work mucking out the stables etc.

So Friday morning, Michael went off to uni, and we went off to watch the Dressage competition. We walked there rather than driving, and it rained on us all the way there, so it took us half an hour or so. We just missed seeing Jack and Joe do their bit in the morning, but stayed until about 4.30pm and watched an awful lot of horses, and Rachel, Hannah and Sarah got some more time with Jack and Joe, and some other horses around them that they were getting to know.

If you don't care much for horses, you probably won't be bothered by all of these pictures, but if you're anything like my children, you could look at them for hours. In fact, they could stand and pet a pony for a whole day quite happily, which it turned out is all they wanted to go back for! So here you go .. some very smart looking horses...



We had watched a lot of teams taking their turns without the camera, before Michael went home to get the camera (he was there for a little while with us in the afternoon before his last lecture at 4pm). Mostly they'd been wearing their rain hats and coats because of the cold, wet weather. It was lovely once it was dry enough for them to take those off - everyone looked so smart! There was an especially wonderful looking team that we watched right before Michael arrived with the camera.





We watched a lot of teams with four horses in the morning in one arena, and doubles in the second arena. There were single horses pulling lots of carriages too.
I noticed these two horses had their tails plaited too beforehand. You can just see in the second picture that they unplaited them just before their turn. I guess it was to keep them tidy, maybe with all of the wind that day (?), but it made them lovely and wavy - just like my girls like to do before church sometimes. :o) The driver isn't really about to whip the horses by the way in that picture, although it does look like it! They used them ever so gently to just touch the horses on one side or the other when needed.








Rachel loving some time with Jack...



Sarah and Hannah with Joe...




They had very fancy portable stables! They folded out from the side of their horse van (lorry really!) The other stables weren't quite that big, there's were a bit like a meccano set to put together rather than just opening out from the van, but it gave the horses more space which was nice. The other side of the van opened out too - they were using that for a place for them to sit and eat etc., then they lived in the main part of the lorry. I guess the main back part was for the horses to travel in.



One of the smart buggies / carriages ...



Rachel befriending a horse across the way ...



A couple of teams with four horses:





The children all thought it was especially clever that the horses were able to back up the carriages.



We were back this morning in time to see Jack and Joe take part in the marathon. It was better weather today - no need for rain coats and extra warmth from the wind. (I managed to burn both days whatever the weather!) Yesterday though, all of their lovely foliage was forever being blown over, and people's hats flying away in the wind and having to be chased down.

The marathon was a 20 min (ish) course around much of Stanmer Park, including 7 sets of gates. Each set of gates had to be gone round in the correct order, and the teams were times at each point. Some were very careful, some extremely quick, and a few managed both. One single horse carriage we hated watching as the poor horse was being whipped so much and spoken to so harshly, and not surprisingly wasn't responding very well at all. The rest of them were a lot of fun to watch, and the drivers were much kinder in how they called out to the horses. Hannah was impressed that the horses understood the verbal calls of 'left' and 'right' as well as a few other things.





This is Joe and Jack pulling Sue (driver) and her friend (groom - I never got her name, but a very friendly lady!)





Sue, and Lady Braybourne (below), were the only two drivers with tandem carriages (front and back like a tandem bike or pushchair). It seemed a lot harder that way. They did really well, but both of them seemed to find it hard some of the corners, and weren't nearly as fast as some of the double and single carriages.



A four-horse team.



Our friendly team - nearly done.



There were some lovely children there to watch too. :o)
Running like horses,



rolling down hills,




just being happy,





of course, spending time with some very clever horses,




watching other teams get ready to go for their turn,



and waiting for their sisters who could not bear to leave the stables and horses behind!



There was another event - cones - which we didn't go to as it was on the Sunday. Saturday was a lovely relaxing day (when I was allowed to stay still!) Walking wasn't so easy, but nice to go all together and just be there for a few hours without doing too much. We made up for it mid-afternoon though when we dragged Rachel and Hannah away and went home to get a few things done before Sunday and a very busy week next week.