My Tooth Came Out

I have had a loose tooth for a long time. I couldn't get it out.

Then one day one I was reading one of my favourite books: The Penderwicks. I started to play with my tooth then I heard a crack of the root I turned it around and then it came out.

I ran to tell Mum I just could not wait to hear what she would say. But Mum was on the phone so I went in search of Imogen to tell her what had happened. I just could not keep it to myself.

When Mum got of the phone she gave me $2 for my tooth. I do not believe in the tooth fairy. Do you?

As soon as Dad got home I told him all about it. Dinner was so much better tasting now that I did not have a tooth to get in the way and bleed.  

Fun with Maths

Mum was on the internet, "Look what I found," said Mum and we all came running.

It was a math's site named Manga high. There were lots of maths games but Mum knew just which one she wanted to play. It was an Algebra game called Algebra Melt Down. To play the game you had to place the right atoms to make the right answers to give to the the right scientist. We all like it very much. So Mum went and made us an account.

There were a lot of games and we spent ages just finding a game to play. Some are a bit too hard for me to play but most of them I can play.

Manga high is not like all the other maths sites I have ever played. I have not lost interest in it and I don't think that I will. There are so many maths games and so little time to play them in.

.

The second day when I signed in there was a new maths game. It was a game about angles.

I soon found out that there were more than games on the site. There were also prodigi. Prodigi are maths quizzes where we can practise our maths skills.

I love maths now.

So Many Different Sophies

I went to picnik to see if I could do with a photo of me, what Mum did with a photo of herself, on her new blog Sue Elvis Writes Notes

Nomal Sophie

Black and White Sophie

 Sepia Sophie

1960s Sophie

Gritty Sophie

Pencil Sketch Sophie

That's all. I hope you like the photos as much as I do.http://www.picnik.com/app

Christmas Cards for Everyone

There are so many things to do and so little time before Christmas. Don't you think the same?
We are making our own cards for Christmas this year. I think that home made cards are so much prettier than shop bought ones.

First we got out lots of pens, pencils and paper. We drew some pictures and wrote Merry Christmas on some of them. Then we coloured them and inked them. The cards were beautiful but Mum had another brilliant idea. Her idea was that we should make little tags to go on the Christmas tree to go with them.
Mum found some nice holy pictures in a book and scanned them. Imogen was in charge of our job. Our job was to cut out pieces of card and stick them to the pictures.

Charlotte went on the computer and printed off some little pieces of paper saying 'Merry Christmas from Sue, Andy, Duncan, Callum, Imogen, Charlotte, Sophie, Gemma-Rose'. It was all in different fonts.
We are almost finished with the cards and tags.

Making things for Christmas is a lot of fun.

The First Sunday in Advent

Yesterday was the first Sunday in advent. The night before we found the advent wreath and the nativity scenes. We have two nativity scenes.

We had to get up very early on the Sunday because we had to go to Mass. Mass was lovely just like it always is. Then we went home for a big breakfast.

After breakfast Mum and Dad went out to buy some candles for the advent wreath. Mum made the advent wreath 12 years ago out of salt dough and it is still just as good as it was when she made it.
The colours of the candles we got were three purple and one rose. The purple candles our for penance and the rose candle is for Gaudete Sunday. Gaudete Sunday is the third Sunday in advent.At dinner Dad lit the first candle on the wreath and we all sang an advent hymn.

Gemma-Rose and I could not wait to find the three wise men. Mum hides the felt three wise men in all sorts of places in the house. She moves the three wise men when every one has found them. She will let them join the nativity scene on Epiphany.

I love advent but I love Christmas even better.

My Blog Banner

Yesterday I thought that my blog would look nice with a blog banner.

I got to work finding pictures to go on it. I soon had some nice photos.then I went to a place on the internet called Picnik. There I found a nice colour for the banner and found some pictures of butterflies and put them on it too. Soon my banner was done. I got Mum to help put it on my blog because she has one on her blog Sue Elvis Writes.

When it was on I thought it was a very good banner but the background blog colour was not right so I went and got a plain purple background. It looked great.

I had a great time making my banner and I hope you like looking at it.

From now on I am going write more blog posts and I will not bother about how many people look at my blog. Just like my Mum I am blogging for fun not followers.

I hope you enjoy reading.

Gemma-Rose the best sister ever

Gemma-Rose is the best sister ever. If we get into fights she always will forgive me.

She will play board games even if she does not like them.

One day when I was out shopping with Mum, she did all the weekend jobs without me. She even did under the bed.

I am so glad that I have Gemma-Rose as my little sister instead of anyone else.

I am glad I share a room with Gemma-Rose. We can do anything together that way.

Even though she was getting bored of me reading out my story to her she listened to me until I had finished. I try to be patient with Gemma-Rose but I lose my temper way too often.

I think that the way to be a good sister is to be kind and to forgive. From now on I will try to be a better sister to Gemma-Rose.

We're Going on Holiday

We're going on a beach holiday. Mum's has booked a lovely beach cottage by 'Swan Lake.' The cottage is called 'Swan Lake Cottage'. Four years ago we went on another beach holiday.

"Swan Lake Cottage" has three bedrooms. They all have queen beds. One bedrooms bunk beds as well. On our last holiday there were four bedrooms, with two queen beds, one set of bunks, and three single beds. The house was much bigger with two storeys, three bathrooms, and two living areas. this house is small and cosy.

"Swan Lake Cottage comes with six bikes and a canoe. I want to learn how to canoe. Dad knows how to canoe so maybe he'll help me. On our last holiday the boys went kayaking.

"Swan Lake' has black swans living round it. It's right next to the sea. In spring, whales and dolphins come to the coast. There's no jellyfish in the lake. There's really nice sand and the water is shallow and clear, just right for swimming.

I'm so excited about this holiday. I'm looking forwards to learning how to canoe, sleeping in a queen sized be with Gemma-Rose, and buying souvenirs. I'm going to take lots of photos and write a diary every day.

After our last beach holiday we made a scrapbook of all our diary pages, postcards, photos, and stamps. For this holiday we want to do the same.

Herbs or Spices?

It was Sunday and the dinner was almost cooked. I I decided to make a dessert. After flipping though a cook book I found one at last. It was called Bread and Sultana Custard.

I asked Mum  if I could try and make it. Mum said yes. I love to make new desserts on my own.

I got all the ingredients out then got to work. I soon had it finished and in the oven.

When dinner time came we all had a big helping of my dessert

 Imogen asked, "What is in this dessert?"

I answered "Bread. milk, sugar  and mixed herbs."

"I dont think that you mean mixed herbs but mixed spices." said Mum. "There would be green bits in it if it was mixed herbs."

"There are green bits in it," Imogen said. "Mum I think these are mixed herbs, not mixed spices"

I said "Oh no! I put the wrong thing in it."

"Oh well it tastes nice anyway," said Charlotte. "Just don't tell Duncan and he will never know".

If you want to make this dessert here it is:

Ingredients:

15ml/1 tbsp low-fat spread

3 thin slices of bread, crusts removed

475ml/16fl oz/2 cups skimmed milk

2.5ml/1/2 tsp mixed spice

45ml/3 tbsp white sugar

2 eggs, whisked

75g/3 oz/1/2 cup sultanas

freshly grated nutmeg

a little icing sugar, for dusting

Serves 4

1 Preheat the oven to 180 C/ 350 F/ and lightly grease an oven proof dish.

Spread the bread with low-fat spread and cut into small pieces.

2 Place the bread in several layers in the prepared dish.

3 Whisk together the skimmed milk, mixed spice, demerara sugar and eggs in a mixing bowl. pour the mixture over the bread, covering it all. Sprinkle over the sultanas and leave to stand for 30 minutes.

4 Grate a little nutmeg over the top bake for 30-40 minutesuntil the custard is set and golden. Serve spinkled with icing sugar.

I did not take any photos of the dessert so I can not put any in.

Nifty Notebooks

I was trying to think of some craft to do. Then I came up with the idea of making little notebooks.

Gemma-Rose and I found the things we needed for it. We found scrapbooking paper with beautiful patterns, brightly coloured paper and pastel coloured paper. We also found curling ribbon.

Then we got to work. We cut pieces of paper in half to make double pages. Then we took another piece of paper and cut out a rectangle slightly bigger than the pages. We glued one of the double pages inside the cover to make it thicker. Then we folded down the edges of the cover that stuck out beyond the pages and glued them down inside.

After that we punched holes in the pages and in the cover for the binding. We tied curling ribbon through the holes to hold the pages and cover together. Then we decorated the covers. We cut out flowers from the patterned scrapbooking paper. We were done!

I made one notebook for me and one for my friend. Mine was purple, which is my favourite colour, and the other was pink, which is my friend’s favourite colour.

I enjoyed making the notebook because we could experiment with the paper and glue and work things out for ourselves. 

Making Monsters

From the library I got a book that had these really cute toys in it. I wanted to make some monsters with wibbly wobbly arms. So that night I got out my knitting needles and wool and started to knit.

I didn't notice the time going by, and suddenly it was bed time and I had to stop knitting. So I put away my knitting needles for the night and went to bed.


The next morning I got straight back to work. I worked all day and by afternoon tea time I had finished the monster. Then I wanted to make a smaller one so I did a little bit of maths to work out how.

The little one was finished very soon. I gave it to Dad who was very pleased with it. When he found Mum he said, “Look what I got”. I was very pleased with the toys too. I named my one Mackintosh.

If you would like to make one yourself here is the pattern:

The big monster

The body:

Cast on 16 stitches and knit 72 rows.
Cast off


Arm (make 2):

Cast on 5 stitches and knit 26 rows.
Cast off

Leg(make 2):

Cast on 5 stitches and knit 40 rows.
Cast off

Sew it up and you are done

The little one

The body:

Cast on 8 stitches and knit 37 rows.
Cast off

Arm (make 2):

Cast on 2 stitches and knit 13 rows.
Cast off

Leg (make2):

Cast on 3 stitches and knit 20 rows.
Cast off

Sew it up.

For the face you can sew on buttons for eyes or you can do what I did with Dads toy and sew on wool eyes. Sew on the mouth with wool.


You can also make hats for the monsters.

A hat for the big monster:

Cast on 54 stiches knit 20 rows.

Fold in half and sew up.

Hat for the little monster:

Cast on 29 stiches knit 10 rows.

Fold in half and sew up.

I Received the Holy Spirit

The day of my confirmation came at last. The time before it had past so slowly.

I got up at six thirty. Nothing was much different than a normal Saturday. When all the jobs were done I put on my confirmation dress. It was very pretty. It was made of white satin, with white beads in flower shapes on the front.

Then it was time to get in the van for the long trip. On the way to the confirmation  I listened to my mp3 player, I read one of my favourite books, and I counted trucks.

When we got there two of my friends showed me the church. They were also going to be confirmed. When we got into the church we had a run though of what we had to do.

Then the Confirmation started. I was nervous and excited at the same time but when the bishop winked at me I felt better. I was the first one to be confirmed.
  
After the confirmation I had my photo taken with the bishop outside the church.

In the hall there was a very nice lunch or afternoon tea, I couldn't tell which . Everyone who had been confirmed were photographed together. Another photo was taken of us all standing around the cake. In the photo around the cake I was at the back and could not be seen so Mum took a photo of me with the cake. Then the cake was cut. I got a piece of cake and went outside with my best friend.

When we got home we had a movie dinner and then the best cake I had ever seen. It had twelve fruits on top and it was an white chocolate cake. Dad, Gemma-Rose and I had made all the fruits out of icing. There was a huge pineapple in the middle and the rest of the fruits like the apple and pear and tomato were grouped round it.

My wish came true

For as long as I can remember I have wanted to have my confirmation and on Sunday my wish came true. It was after Mass we had just got out of the church and Mum went to our priest and asked if I could have my confirmation with some other homeschoolers on the last Saturday of the holidays. I could not believe my ears on the way to the car. Mum asked me what I thought. I was so pleased that I could have jumped up and down if I was not in the car and the roof was so low that I could not even stand straight.

When we got home I tried to think of a confirmation saint. Mum said “How about St John Vianney. He came from about the same time as your other saint Sophie Madeleine”. So I asked about his life. Mum told me that he was a miracle maker. When I heard this I wanted to hear more about him so me and Mum went to the bookcase and tried to find out a bit about him. After a lot of looking we found one. When I had read it I loved the story so much that I just had to have him. So now he will be my Confirmation saint. I shall be Sophie Madeleine Jean-Marie-Baptiste.

Imogen is going to be my confirmation sponsor. She is no one else's sponsor.


My dress is a lovely white dress. It has embroidery and beads on the front. It is made out of silky material. It took me a long time to decide which dress I wanted to wear because I had four dresses to choose from and they were all pretty.


Imogen also wrote a post about my confirmation on her blog, Dancing With Dragonflies.


I'm going in three weeks time. I can't wait!

Meet the Limes

I am writing a story about a homeschooling family called 'The Limes." They have four children: Liz, Kate, John, and Tom. I drew some pictures of them. I like my picture of Kate best.

This is Mr Lime. He is a primary school teacher and is very funny. He loves to spend time with his family. He likes to play board games and cricket. He also likes to watch cricket. His favourite food is chocolate.

This is Mrs Lime. She is a very pretty lady. She's very kind too. She has a lot of work to do looking after the house and children. She likes to knit cardigans for the children and watch saints movies. Her favourite food is Pavlova.

This is Tom. He is ten. He likes to play indoor soccer with his friends. He's the best in team.He also likes to read adventure stories. He wants to go camping someday. His favourite food is oranges.

This is Kate. She eight and is very thin, tall and pretty, just like her mum. She loves to read saint books,  Enid Blyton stories and princess stories. She also likes to write stories and cook cakes and dinners. Her favourite food is chocolate cake.

 This is Liz. She is six. She loves to play with her dolls Amy, Sunny, Jonathon and Peach. She also likes to watch movies. Her favourite movies are: Inspector Gadget, Barbie, especially A Fairy Secret, and Herbie. Her favourite food is yogurt. Her favourite flavour is strawberry.

This is John. He is three. he likes to get messy by playing with mud and playdough. He likes to make playdough farms. He also love to have his dad read him bedtime stories. And most of all he likes to be loved. His favourite food is mandarins.

Famous Mary Poppins Secret in Narnia with Little Women

I have a lot of books that I love to read. There is so much to read and so much to learn that I do not know where to start.

Some of my favourite books are The Secret Seven, The Famous Five, Narnia, Mary Poppins and Little Women they are all great books. I like a lot other books to but I do not remember them right now.

I remember when I was learning to read and Mum asked, “Do you think that you will be like the big girls and always read books instead of playing with Gemma-Rose?”

I said no but I was wrong. Now I love to read more than to play.

I got the complete Mary Poppins for my birthday and I am already up to chapter five. What I like about books is that if you get a good book you can just picture it in your mind. I think that the world would be boring if we did not have books.

Two weeks ago there was a Mary Poppins day in a park in Bowral. Bowral was said to be the birth place of P.L Travers who wrote Mary Poppins. There were a lot of people and everyone had an umbrella. In fact there was so many people there that they got into the Guinness book of records.

Birthday Bears

We all have birthday teddies that we got on the day that we were born. Thomas has a lot of birthday teddies.

My birthday teddy is named Honey. I love her a lot. She sleeps on the end of my bed. She is very patient. Once when it was very noisy and I was trying to get to sleep I put her on my head and when I woke up I was lying on top of her.

Gemma-Rose has a bear named Elizabeth. She is very pretty.

Charlotte did not get her bear on the day she was born but she got it on one of her birthdays. She did get a teddy on the day she was born. In fact she got two teddies on the day she was born but they were not big like everyone else’s teddies. Her big teddy’s name is Bernadette.

Imogen’s teddy’s name is Barney Bear. Once when she let me play with it I got tomato sauce on him. It took a long to get it out of his fur.

Thomas gets a teddy every birthday and every Christmas for presents and Mum puts them in her room. He died the day after he was born so he can’t play with them.

I do not know the names of Felicity’s teddy or Duncan’s teddy or Callum’s teddy. All I know is that Felicity and Duncan gave their bears to me and Gemma-Rose.

Mum has also written a post about Thomas’s Teddies at Sue Elvis Writes.