Strangeface

A few of us went to see a weird and wonderful play last night at the Universal_Hall in Findhorn. 'The Last Resort' by a company called Strangeface. The actors all used masks for the performance, and there were also puppets such as the fantastic devil below.
The masks were quite unnerving to begin with (have a look at the link for some examples), but were very effective. And an interesting storyline about human nature/failings, and redemption. We weren't sure before we went whether it was aimed at kids or adults, and I'm still not sure, but I think we all enjoyed it equally (our group ranged in age from 9 - 84).
After the show the audience were all invited to look around the set and play with the masks and puppets - a great idea, we had to drag the kids away in the end!


Its been a fairly quiet couple of weeks, colder weather has meant a lot more of this:

which is keeping us nice and cosy, in the front room anyway!

We've managed to get into a bit of a routine with some maths and English every day, not always workbooks, we decide day by day what we want to do, but focusing on those subjects.

Since we got back from our holiday A has shown much more interest in the computer (although not her blog! She is intending to blog again soon though, so she says...). I think this is a direct influence from her cousin, who gave her web addresses to some games sites. Consequently, I have become addicted to this bloody annoying game which is driving me mad! I have wasted far too much time on it lately. A is more drawn to the dress-up/make-up type games, although has tried a few others.

I'm kind of in two minds about this increased use of the computer, it was always very much frowned upon by her (Steiner) school, as they have a strong belief that TV and computer games are damaging to children. I felt it was a good idea to limit these things when A was younger, but the older she gets the more I feel she needs to decide things for herself. To be honest I would be very unhappy with her sitting at the computer for hours on end (not least because when I've done that with studying I end up with really bad headaches) but she doesn't seem to want to do that, at the moment anyway. I certainly think its good for her reading skills - she's still not too interested in reading books - as she is reading a lot of instructions for different games.

We've also been on a home ed group outing to Smarty_Art in Grantown, where we painted some pottery. Afterwards we came home and watched Chaplin's The_Great_Dictator, I'd forgotten how much I love this film - we both laughed a lot, and A also learnt a bit about WW2 through discussions about the film.

A has mentioned that she's missing her school friends, I think the long holiday without seeing them, and then a cancelled sleepover she had really been looking forward to have brought it home a bit. She did see all her old classmates at a birthday party last week, and on one level she had a great time seeing them all, but on another it highlights how they are still a group and she is now an outsider. Its difficult as there's nothing I can do really, but she doesn't seem too upset, and is still enjoying HE and insisting she doesn't want to go to the local school.