Cello, icy ponds and Beavers

It has been a good weekend. Harry had his first cello class and ensemble session at The Sage yesterday morning. He was a bit rusty and we have some new interesting things to practise so we will be doing that every day this week.

I had a hair cut yesterday afternoon and the boys stayed at home with Stuart and had a lovely afternoon of Lego and garden play. Harry read really well at bedtime, sharing the reading of Mr Tall with me with hardly any pauses.

We were surprised to see a thick frost this morning and Harry was excited so he quickly got dressed and went outside to see. He took his remote control car for a drive around too. Peter wisely stayed in his pyjamas with me, watching from the window! 

We went for a walk around the Washington Wetland Centre today too and the winter view was stunning. Harry loved scraping frost from all the fences and they both spent a lot of time throwing stones and frozen mud onto the ice-covered ponds and watching them slide over the surface. They played in the garden for an hour at home too, so they have spent a lot of time outdoors today. They warmed up under blankets watching The Snowman and The Snowdog, recorded from Christmas.

Harry finished listening to The Silver Chair at bedtime tonight, book 6 of The Chronicles of Narnia. He has been enthralled by these books and we are both really looking forward to The Last Battle. I think he will listen to and read them several times in the future.

Just after he went to bed, I read my emails and discovered that Harry has a place at a local Beavers group and can start tomorrow night. He has been looking forward to this and likes the idea of earning badges. One of the boys from our Tuesday home ed group session attends the same group so it will be good for Harry to already have a friend there. He has quite a busy week as he already has gymnastics and enjoy-a-ball classes on a Tuesday and Friday tea time but he is very keen to continue with them all so hopefully he will cope with the extra activity.