Trying Something New

Utah Beach in Normandy

Hello! We've been on the road again, computer-less and with minimal internet connection. It's been lovely to be so reconnected as to not even be checking my emails, but it's also nice to be back now and reconnecting with people, ideas and the stimulating world of the wide web!

Following on from my post about Learning all the Time, today I'm going to share with you about trying something new. Trying something new can be life-changing, it can be energising and it can be great great fun.

Part of our holiday was a birthday celebration at the amazing outdoor pursuits centre Yenworthy Lodge. We spent one of the best weekends of my life with a group of the most amazing people I've been lucky enough to meet. And I spent an afternoon surfing! (no that's not me in the picture above!).

I have to admit I'd been rather dubious about this activity. Everytime I thought about trying it, I kept imagining all the ways I would make myself look ridiculous by having a go! 

First there was the wetsuit. Now I consider myself to be in not bad shape for a 40 year old mother of 3 but wetsuits are very unforgiving and images of beached whales and heffalumps came to mind.

Me, ready to Kayak

Then there was the looming disgrace of my lack of sporting abilities compared to the rest of my immediate family. Former 110m hurdling champion of Rhone Alps - check. Kids who are literally great at every sport they try - check. Severe awareness of being a little out of shape - check. 

All those things combined to have me pretty much ready to hang out my wetsuit to dry and take up a spectators position. And then I read these words from a friend and other participant, she said,  

"well I'll give it a try and if I'm no good or it's not that much fun, I'll just go chill on the beach". 

What wisdom! So often as adults we take ourselves a bit too seriously, we worry a bit too much about our dignity and in so doing cut ourselves off from trying to many fun things. What a shame for ourselves. And how far from the example we want to model for our children. How can we tell them to give things a go, have a try if we're not prepared to do it ourselves.

Noah preparing to belly slide off a kayak!

I've seen it over and over again with language learners, how they're too afraid to speak because they are so sure they're going to make mistakes or sound stupid. Put your pride away I'd say and give it a go. It's the only way to get better.

Me and my life long friend off to surf!

So I decided to take my own advice, put my own pride away, stopped worrying about my dignity and decided to just have fun. It really helped that I teamed up with my best mate Cath, I couldn't have asked for a better partner.

Maya catches a wave

Lotta surfs in

Oh yeah, I know you're all dying to know how it went... was I as awful as I'd thought I might be? Did my kids and hubbie show me up? Well, yes my Maya and Lotta were natural surfers much to everyone's envy. And yes Frank did not too bad nor Noah before he took an early raincheck. But, yes there's a but, I was actually not bad! 

I was stood up right after!

I managed to ride a wave which was one of the greatest highs I've experienced in a while and even stand up on my board if only for seconds! I cannot begin to describe how happy and content this made me feel. I was not only pleased I'd given it a go, I actually discovered something I really enjoy. What better encouragement for me to get out there and try more new things. 

Today, surfing in Devon, tomorrow the world! 


 

Moments of Magic - One way to make great family memories

Last week Frank and I celebrated our ten year wedding anniversary. As we got married after ten years together it was also a twentieth anniversary celebration. We wanted to do something special so that we'd remember the day for a long time to come. 

It got me thinking about how we make our special occasions stand out. How do we create moments of magic? How do we make great family memories? 

Following on from my previous post Learning all the Time, on Thursday we decided to go somewhere new, to visit a place we've never been. Like this we felt this time spent together would be different. 

The place we chose very last minute, was the Ile de Berder, a tiny island in the Golf du Morbihan (the little sea) which is only accessible at low tide. We checked the tide info and lucky for us the times fit, we would have an hour and a half on the island if we set off quickly. 

We discovered a mysterious, quiet paradise full of amazing trees, beaches, shells and views. We were all quiet as we walked around the island marveling at the beauty we found and feeling privileged to be there. 

Afterwards we all talked excitedly about going back, exploring the wreck we saw, finding more oysters and having more time to spend on the beach. It felt as if we'd made an amazing discovery. Doing something new, something we'd wanted to do for a while but never seemed to find the time for really did make our day special.

Learning All The Time

Making Art in the Art Gallery

Learning all the time is the title of one of my favourite John Holt books on home education. For me it sums up the basic tenet of our home schooling and the cornerstone of my philosophy of life. Learning is not something to be confined to one place or one time, but is as natural to us as breathing.

Learning about Flowers

Henry Ford said,

"Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. He who continues to learn stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young."

And I'm reminded of one of my friend's from our local knitting club. She's in her seventies and still learning all the time. The look of enthusiasm on her face as she told me recently about a botanical outing by our local river said it all. Stay curious, take every opportunity to learn and you will find and enjoy the wonder in the world around you. 

Lys du jardin - spot the visitor!

Experience tells us that as we get older we sadly tend to lose the open eyed view of the world we cherish in our children. Our experiences constantly modify our interpretation of everything we do. The innocent curiosity of childhood is lost to our judgements, knowledge and the tired paths our neurons keep traveling. And time seems to pass faster.

Rambling Rose Albertine and Friend

According to Douwe Draaisma, dutch psychologist and author of Why life speeds up as you get older, that's because as we get older discoveries and novelties tend to become rarer. As a child we are adventurous, big exciting experiences and discoveries are common. First trip in an airplane, first time sleeping in a hotel, first day at school, first time buying the bread all by yourself. 

First time I saw the stamen

But if we're learning all the time, if we make a conscious choice to look at the world with what the Buddhist's call the beginner's mind, then we can stay young of heart and mind.

Pivoine - my wedding flowers - gift for our 10th anniversary

Practically speaking this might mean starting something new, trying a food you've never tried before or taking a walk in silence listening to the noises around you as if you've never heard them before. Or why not reading a new book? I could probably have called this reading all the time and the point would have been the same! Try a new author or a completely new subject. Check out the wonderful brainpickings.org for new ideas. You could even join their weekly newsletter? 

Fly on the Hortensia - spotting the tiny things!

I suppose above all what I'm getting at is a quality of attention. The same quality I try to bring to listening to my children. The same quality I bring to my photography (alongside practice - see Observe, practice, be grateful). The same quality I seek when I'm writing poetry. And the same quality I hope my children will foster throughout their lives, not just to stay young but to stay filled with wonder at this wonderful world we are so lucky to live in!

P.S. If you do try something or read something new, please share with me, I'd love to hear about it!

Coming Soon... How botanical drawing fosters mindfulness and scientific observation! 

Raindrops on Maple Leaves

On the Road

Yes we've been on the road recently, hence the online silence. Somehow I never seem to be able to travel, take photos and get round to uploading them and writing blog posts all at once. 

In fact generally I'm not that great a multi-tasker. I put it down to my mindfulness practice, all that when knitting just knit, when washing up just wash up has kind of cured me from doing lots of things at once. 

So we've been out and about on the road in Great Britain, France and Holland! Well that last one was only me, but hey solo trips are fantastic right? They really recharge the parenting, home educating batteries like nothing else. 

So here's some eye candy for you from our fun times. As usual we combined family, friends and some educational visits along the way. Home schooling never stops not even for holidays! We really believe in learning all the time just like our man John Holt said.

Celebrating 12 with her grandparents!

Bird watching at the amazing Rutland Waters

Catching up with British cousins

And French cousins

The Eiffel Tower

 

The Louvre

The Louvre encore

Copying hieroglyphs

Cousins drawing together

Amsterdam crochet and bikes of course!

Amsterdam, city of bicycles

 

Observe, Practice, Be Grateful!

Observation

With all that talk about observation I thought it would be nice to share a few photos. Photography has always been a way for me to record some of what I see around me. I take a lot of nature photos.I love tree bark, lichen, moss and blossom. As well as birds, flowers and the ocean.

 

 

Practice

Someone asked me last year, how I took such good pictures of flowers and things. I replied, practice, practice, practice! I honestly believe it's because I've taken a lot that I've started to take a few good ones. I'll often take multiple pictures of the same subject from different angles. The above shots of what we thought were barnacles is a great example of this. As the one below is of serendipity, just being there in the right place at the right time with the camera ready!

Gratitude

I also take and share photos as part of my gratitude practice as I've mentioned before. Nature is a great comfort to me. Noticing small things in each and every day is one of the ways I remind myself to feel grateful and in turn happy each and every day. 

Lava Lamps : The Ultimate Kids Science Experiment

Lava Lamps have to be one of the funnest science experiments we've ever done. Seriously, if you want to know how to make science fun for kids and encourage their sense of wonder you can't look much further than this.

Experiment - check, there are fluids and solids involved and  scientific gear required. Hands on - check, lots of pouring, mixing, shaking. Relevant - check, who doesn't think a funky lamp like this would be a great addition to any kid's room? Can be supported by interesting documentaries - check, and books - check.

So on to the details.  

Bubbling Beauty - Lava Lamp

Lava Lamps

 

Materials

• Clear glass or plastic bottle
• Vegetable Oil (liquid)
• Water (liquid)
• Food Colouring (liquid)
• Alka Seltzer tablets(solid)

 

What we did

• First we poured the vegetable oil into a tall glass jar.

• Then we used a dropper to drip water into the oil This meant the kids could see how the water didn't mix with the oil but sank through it to pool at the bottom. I prompted their observations by asking them to watch what happened and describe it to me. We then talked about how this was because the water was denser than the oil. If you look closely at the picture below you can see the water droplets beginning to cluster at the bottom of the jar.

Dripping water into the oil

• We did the same with the food colouring and again observed how it passed through the oil and then mixed with the water.

Passing through the oil

Mixing with the water

•  We took half an alka-seltzer tablet and dropped it into the jar and watched what happened.

Watching the Reaction

• We asked ourselves what else we could experiment with? What would happen if we put the lid on or dropped in a whole alka seltzer tablet? We also added some blue food colouring to the red to see what that would do. And then we got out our biggest torch and put it underneath the bottle.

Watching to see what happens!

Lovely Shades of Purple

• And just for good measure, we made some more! Three children often means three experiments. We began this together but luckily I had just enough oil and alka seltzer for them to do it again in smaller jars. This time they each worked by themselves and tried out some things differently to see what happened. Shaking happened, tipping upside down happened, adding differing quantities than the first time happened. And a lot of smiling and delight in the magic bubbles each and every time.

Lotta (5)

Noah (8)

Maya (11)

Best for...

Our sense of wonder. If you had to ask me what was the single thing that made this the ultimate kids science experiment for me so far, it would have to be the sheer delight on my kid's faces every time those bubbles appeared. With such simple and easily obtainable ingredients we did something really special.  There is something amazing about Lava Lamps. They reveal the beauty and wonder of chemical reactions between liquids, solids and gases in a very peaceful and stunning way. 

Watching the Lava Bubble

 
In conclusion, we had great fun with this experiment. It allowed us to continue exploring states of matter (check out our other experiments here) as well as the concept of density. As usual we wrote the experiment up on paper (more about how that works for kids of different ages next week) and talked about the science. We also learned about how real lava lamps are made by watching this documentary as well as reading about chemical reactions in our science books.