{a day to check in with a 9 yr old’s doings}
- Congratulations to Ms. Duende Bloo! She passed her qualifying review for the homeskool portfolio! YAY!! I didn’t know if she was into it, but she seems to be kind of excited to be considered a 5th grader (really? 5th?! unbelievable). Her teacher (who she’s been reviewed by since the beginning and who runs the homeskool trips) is great with her – she has 3 of her own ‘freeschooled’ girls and so knows the tricks. Though this year was a different scenario doing the review on Zoom instead of hauling our cookies all the way down to the Gorham library.
- What are the interests this week? Carving tiny effigies of witches with hats and cauldrons out of dry thick bark. She’s really getting into her ‘witchy’ persona. She gathered all kinds of dry ‘hay’ from the sundial garden, straightened it, bound it, and made a broom for herself. Plenty of witch pictures being drawn lately.
- There’s also been some domino toppling designs, a return to lincoln logs and rainbow block cities (with appropriate corralled lifestock figures and herding dogs) but also fortresses with boobytraps (there are always boobytraps in her designs).
- The mining of rocks – she’s picked a deep corner at the back of the garage to dig and collect rocks she is interested in – she got a little lesson from JB (who I believe has a degree in Geology) the other day on different kinds, we’ll have to bust out the Rocks & Minerals guide for her so they can have a real conversation one of these days. She’s very jazzed about the iron, the slate, and especially the quartz she finds (she’s convinced we’ll be rich someday from all the quartz).
- Josh was cleaning out the garage the other day and organized all the garden supplies. She found the bin of tubes and connectors for the little bed greenhouses and started putting them together all crazy – like a life size erector set. I never thought of them that way, what a brilliant idea! ha!
- She’s designed events for such things as ‘the christening of the new laundry line’ with carved talisman, a swinging hay bale, and ceremony. And a court scenario when Josh threw out some of her crafts and didn’t see – she made me be the judge and we had a trial (I deemed the whole thing accidental).
- Duende has been planning a birthday surprise for me for months. Saved up her own money doing chores, did some sly questioning and research on things I like to collect/have/want, decided where to purchase (the potter neighbor across the street) and saw different designs/negotiated a price, and bought me the loveliest creamer (I do love creamers!) – isn’t she the sweetest? What a peach, I think we should keep her.
- She’s also been drawing mazes (which are hilarious), little love notes to us, and reading her Bink & Gollie, and Dog Man comics…
- What’s in store for her this week? The magick of weeding – yes, the strawberry beds need some serious weeding and our gal does not like to be directed. I’m sure this will be a painful process but there’s nothing like weeding as a chore to set you against parental authority – ha! But she can also dig up and plan out her own little garden this year – I can’t wait to see what she’ll grow!
Happy Duendesday!
Rock Bottom Homestead 