bribes and pipe cleaners

Masha'Allaah Dd(8) really pleased me today, she went on Whizz Maths and one of the lessons was on counting money, I suggested again that she try counting on, for example there was a 10p,and two 2pence's, so I told her to say the 10 and then count the 2p and then the other 2p, which broke it down for her, and she found it quite easy, ok, ok, I'll let you in on something, it wasn't that easy for me to get her to do it, I had to actually bribe her with a chocolate, lol, I don't like to do that, but anything for her to at least try it! Anyway it worked, so we'll just have to see if she tries this by herself next time.

Dd(8) and Ds(6)decided to make a few things from pipe cleaners today, Dd(8)made bracelets, and Ds(6) made dinosaurs, he's crazy about them! masha'Allaah. Dd(8) took the photo of them, and asked me kindly if I would put them on my blog, so here they are:

(Dd(8) made the purple dinosaur.

I've been thinking today about handicrafts, I read that Charlotte Mason included these in her teaching, these are not just art and crafts as we know today, but crafts which will support a child into adulthood, such as sewing,knitting,pottery,oil painting etc... I would love them to try pottery insha Allaah, I did try it a long time ago, and made quite a mess, that's the picture I had in my mind earlier when thinking of introducing it, but I think it would be fun.
When I was a teen I remember I used to love making things from dough and baking it in the oven until it was hard, I would then paint it and glaze it. I had a book, which I found at my mum's house last year, which I used to copy ideas from, I was so happy when I found it, but unfortunately never ended up bringing it back home for some reason, hopefully my mum hasn't got rid of it, I would love to do that with them also, you can make so many things.

Oh, today, the baby took his first few steps masha'Allaah, he's been practicing balancing for days now, it's so cute masha'Allah, he'll let go of whatever he's holding and just stand there, with his hands in front of him as if he's saying ''hey, look at me! no hands!'' lol, so today I was encouraging him to take some steps, he was loving it. So probably wont be long now before he's running wild with the rest of them insha Allaah.