The Mud-ieval Faire

Today was opening day for The Hoggetown Medieval Faire. It poured rain, but that didn't stop us from going and having a great time.



There are advantages to going to the Faire in the rain. There are no lines to stand in and, for once, I didn't get sun burned.

The hem of my skirt tried to wick up all the water in the faire grounds, but there ended up being plenty left for everyone else, too.



I wore the same costume I wear every year, but Blaze went as a pirate this year.









Fire in the rain.


Poor sad soggy horse.




Watching the living chess board:


There were some indoor places to go when it rained very hard. There were lots of merchants' tents ( the real reason I love going to the Faire) , entertainment tents, and a dining tent.





The middle-ages was not the only time period represented at the faire, nor was Earth the only planet.



Leaving the faire proved to be a bit problematic. We were the 9th car to get stuck in the mud and have to be towed out, but the tow truck driver assured us that we had made it farther than anyone else before getting stuck. The 10th car was already stuck, long before we were towed out.




The Faire will be continuing tomorrow and next weekend, with a special day next Friday for school kids.

Corner View: Favorite Hang Out

This week's topic for Corner View is "Favorite Hang out". At first I didn't think there was anything I could post. I don't have a special restaurant or coffee shop where I go to hang out with friends, but then I realized I do have a favorite hang out, it's just a bit unusual to think of it that way. Once a week I spend two hours sitting in the waiting room at Shands Rehab for Kids , talking to other parents and grandparents while our children are in therapy. It's a great chance for people with special needs children to talk about our kids, learn from each other, and vent about schools, work, and family. The waiting room is like therapy for the parents. Until just recently, I had been spending about 5 hours every week in that waiting room ( Blaze's speech therapist recently left and he is on a waiting list for a new one), so that really is my hang out. When I'm not talking, which isn't often, I also sit there and read or hand-sew.

To hang out with more Corner View Participants, please visit Spain Daily

Blaze's Sewing Project

Some of you may remember that Blaze asked Santa for a sewing machine this past Christmas, this is the reason why.

Sometime around November, I decided that it was time for Blaze to learn how to do hand-sewing on a wearable project. Both of his sisters were required to do that when they were eight ( Ula made a skirt and Nika made an apron), and Blaze was only a month away from no longer being eight.

He went with me to the fabric store and we picked out a simple pajama bottom pattern and he got to choose the flannel that the pajamas would be made out of.





At first he was excited about this project, but it was very slow moving. He just didn't have the patience or dexterity that his sisters had at that age. This is what motivated him to want a sewing machine of his own.

I've been happy with his new little sewing machine, too. He's been very generous about letting me play with it this past week. It's a small portable that doesn't have a lot of stitches, but it does everything he would need, and sews well, even through some pretty thick layers of fabric ( I was sewing ruffles onto a skirt earlier today). It's light weight and Blaze has already suggested that we could carry it along when traveling.

Sewing with Nancy Sewing Machine

Today, he finished the pajama bottoms. He really likes them and is very proud of himself for making them.

Thomas Edison Cartoon

I love YouTube. I went to the public library specifically looking for this cartoon about Thomas Edison, but our library didn't have it. It took me less than 5 minutes to find it on YouTube:

Part One:



Part Two:



Part Three:



Part Four:



Part Five:



Part Six:

A History of Movies

Blaze has really been enjoying learning about great inventors. He has also found ways to relate to the people we've been learning about. When we were learning about Leonardo Da Vinci, Blaze was very excited to learn that Leonardo was left-handed, just like him. This week, we started learning about Thomas Edison, and when we got to the part of one of our books where it talked about Edison being homeschooled by his mother, Blaze shouted out, "Just like me!"

This week we read the following books:





The second book came with a kit to build a plastic kinetiscope (Edison's first way of showing motion pictures). DH and Blaze put it together, but it doesn't work very well.

A kinetiscope:


We have also been learning about early filmmaking by watching some of the first movies.



The First Motion Picture:



You Tube has several of the short kinetiscope films, which have been preserved by the Library of Congress. Blaze's favorite is the boxing cats:



By 1902, films had become long enough that they could tell stories.

A Trip to the moon, 1902, French:



The Great Train Robbery, 1903, American:

Corner View: My Style

For this week's corner view, we were asked to show our personal style. My style varies quite a bit from day to day, except for the shoes. I usually wear my Teva sandals with everything (or I go barefoot).

If it's warm and I don't have someplace nice to go, I usually wear shorts or jeans with one of my many tourist T-shirts, and a bandanna to hold back my hair.

If I feel like dressing up a bit more, I like full skirts and light airy shirts.

I have a few pairs of cargo pants that I like to wear, but only one pair of dress pants, which are referred to as the "funeral pants".

My most recent clothing purchase was Spring weight jackets for my oldest daughter and me, in different colors, but the same design.

Mine is Khaki:





Ula's is black:



My most recent, completed, sewing project was a flannel patchwork skirt, which kept me nice and warm during our trip up North for Christmas:



The sewing project I just started last night, is to make a long brown tiered bustle skirt, based on this design by Retroscope:



and using this fabric:




To see what other Corner View participants are wearing, don't forget to go visit our host at Spain Daily and the many people around the world who are listed on her sidebar.

Ula's Farewell

Ula has returned to school in Minnesota and we will all miss her terribly, but we tried to make her last day in Florida a good one.

The weather turned nice and warm for the first time since New Years Eve, so we were able to spend some time outside, enjoying the sunshine. We found a way to combine two things that Ula enjoys, mini golf and piracy, by going to Pirate's Cove Adventure Golf on International Drive in Orlando.

















We arrived at the airport at 3 a.m. Saturday morning:



Except for the whole "not getting enough sleep" part, it's actually a good time to be at an airport. There are no crowds or noise.
There are also no employees to check-in the bags. When we arrived at the bag check-in lines, we found several people laying on the floor napping, as they waited for someone to show up to work.



It's always a tearful good-bye.



Comforting Blaze with some frozen yogurt:



We spent the day in Orlando, shopping and eating at places we don't have at home and it was really fun, but about once every hour, Blaze would tell us how sad he was that his sister was gone. There were fewer tears this time, though, so I think he is growing up. I gave Ula her first cellphone for Christmas, so it will be easier for Blaze to talk to her now. He actually got a chance to talk to her again, before we even left Orlando, because she called to let us know that she had arrived safely at her house in Minnesota.

Leonardo and Homemade Paint

We are finishing up our unit on Leonardo Da Vinci this week.

We read the book we purchased at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta:



It is told in the form of a diary, written by a boy who is apprenticed to Leonardo Da Vinci.


We also finally had a chance to build the ornothopter that came as a kit in the back of one of our other books:



We watched an animated movie about Da Vinci that we checked out of the library and then made our own tempera paint.





To Make Homemade Tempera Paint:

1. Place colored chalk in plastic baggies and crush with a hammer.



2. Use a rolling pin to be sure the chalk has all been turned into a fine powder.



3. For each batch of paint, mix one egg yolk with one teaspoon water. Then stir in two heaping spoonfuls of powdered chalk.



4. Paint pretty pictures before this fast drying paint hardens.



Blaze says the title of this new masterpiece is "The Squidinator".

Corner View: Holidays

I hope everyone had good winter holidays!



DH and I returned to work last week and Blaze returned to his homeschooling, but Ula doesn't return to her school in Minnesota until this coming weekend. We had a good winter break, though. Things had gotten so crazy around here, with work, school, and the workmen who are renovating our apartment complex, that it was a much needed change from everyday life.


Blaze got everything he asked for for Christmas (mostly because we were so pleased that he asked for such useful gifts):





We haven't had time to try out the new sewing machine yet, but I hope to make time for that soon.

One of the sweetest gifts anyone got for Christmas was the blanket that my Uncle received from his children, with his Navy picture printed on it. He was so overcome with emotion that he looked like he was about to cry, and the timing couldn't have been better, because his grandchildren had just been asking if he ever had hair ( the picture shows what nice wavy hair he had back then).



Going to my mother's house in Illinois for Christmas, also meant that Blaze got to see snow for the first time in 7 years. It wasn't much snow, but he was very excited about trying to catch it on his tongue .



New Year's Eve was the last warm day we had here in Florida, before this freezing weather hit us. We spent New Year's Eve and New Year's Day in St. Petersburg.






To see how other bloggers around the world celebrated the holidays, please visit our host for Corner View at Spain Daily and all of the other participants listed on her sidebar.