We've had a busy day today, our first day of Propah edoookayshun in weeks ;-)
Which, despite being hard work has calmed my frazzled nerves, even just because they spent the day engaged in doing something instead of playing, annoying each other and fighting!

We decided to make use of the books on the human body which arrived a week ago from the Book people and spent time looking at Leonardo Da vinci and his studies of the human form, discussed his use of dissection to improve his art and produce more realistic works.
Then they moved onto worksheets from enchanted learning, colouring in Da Vincis "Proportions of the Human figure" and completing a sheet labelling the different areas of the brain and their purpose. This led onto an interesting discussion about Their Dyslexia, Dyspraxia and related difficulties( such as speech and language problems) and FIL's Alzheimers and how some people have brains which work differently and what happens when you get a disease or have an accident which affects your brain(they idolise Richard Hammond and Ive just read his book).
I printed off some sheets on Cells but they were quite complicated and so we decided to tackle those another day.

Theyve both spent time reading today, Sophie is tackling Harry Potter and the philosophers Stone for a unit study I downloaded from https://www.homeschoolestore.com Without any incentive to read she wouldnt pick up a book but shes decided since she has things to complete there is a point to it and is now enjoying it. Despite being american the site does have some really good bits and pieces on it( and the favourable exchange rate makes it very reasonable!). Ive also bought a Romans lapbook pack from there as we want to venture to the Roman Fortress at Caerleon as soon as the weather improves http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/caerleon/

Connor is enjoying his book "The Very Fishy Battle" by Jeremy strong and is thrilled there is an appropriate ( and funny) book he can manage which isnt a 'reading book' or a baby book as he likes to call them. I guess at 9 their content is pretty dire whichever early readers you choose! He's read twice today aloud at his request so I was really pleased with his enthusiasm for it :)

We'd decided to spend some time after lunch playing our new Golden compass DVD game which we'd bought just after Christmas. After spending what seemed like an age setting it up the instructions were less than helpful on how you actually play it, we tried regardless and all wound up frustrated and annoyed so decided to pack up and see if Dad could figure it out( he thinks differently and enjoys these sort of challenges!) Its a co-operative board game which is why it appealed but between us we were still stumped!

They decided to spend some time doing a little of their maths books( and yes I did almost faint with shock) Connor managed to do a page of fractions by drawing little pizzas and 'cutting' them complete with drawings of puddles of what turned out to be puke... " well you would if you'd eaten 2 1/4 pizzas eh mum?" and Sophie spent an hour looking at probabilty and predictions and completing an investigation using a dice before they spent a while creating some new SIMS.
Connor said he was too tired for Boys Brigade and took himself off for a bath, Sophie followed him and now they are both tucked up in bed watching High School musical 2 (out of my earshot thankfully!)

Chloe went back to school yesterday after being free of illness for 48 hours and promptly threw up before bedtime!Fortunately the houseparents were very understanding and kept an eye on her for the night before ringing me, she'd decided she wanted to go into school this morning and seemed fine so they'd let her go. It turns out she's staying this weekend( hence the phone call) so many full boarders have gone home ill they have spare tickets for the panto so asked if she would like to stay this weekend and go. Im sure she will be thrilled, Im awaiting an excited phone call now, she loves Panto.

The rest of the night I think I will devote to having a soak in the bath and putting my feet up!