A LIFE WORTH LIVING....: Ripon

Tuesday 29 June 2010

Ripon - The finale...

I forgot to mention that on the Tuesday night we walked into town to meet Alan and Emily (they had been off to the Park and a walk along the river) .At nine every night the Hornblower does his thing.

Pretending to be Gargoyles at the Market cross:-)

The Hornblower talking to the crowds and telling us the Story of this historic event.

It was very interesting and he was very good and entertaining.It was then that a couple of women who had had a little too much to drink decided it would be a good time to have a domestic!! Milly said it was a pity- because he was a good storyteller- but we couldn't hear all he said:-(

Thursday and the plan was that Alan would take the girls to Lightwater valley (Tesco Vouchers came in handy again to pay to go in) and I would take the opportunity to recoup! I put a towel on the grass and took my book out.I lay there from about 11- till they returned at 4.30 ish.The Cathedral bells came in handy as I just rotated every quarter of an hour so I was nicely cooked on all sides:-))

Milly had requested potato salad instead of sandwiches for her picnic lunch and I had made enough for two, so my lunch was all ready and took no time at all - Perfect !

Milly loves theme parks but has never really wanted to go on the bigger rides.She went on a couple here and I think a thrill seeker has emerged :-))

A good day for all!

Friday was the day to travel home...We had had a fabulous time and had packed a lot in,I was very sad to leave.

We took some flowers to my Nana's grave and then headed to Fountains Abbey.I had taken out a years National Trust membership last June and thought it had expired at the beginning of the month - it just said June as the expiry date - so I had thought we would just go for a walk in the grounds of the Deer Park that were accessible free.Alan said I should check it out just in case.Twas a good job I listened to him on this occasion:-) The lady at the gate was lovely - although you are supposed to book ahead when you use the Home educators pass - she allowed us to go in.We had a lovely walk.

Lynn with a map!

Alan found this amusing considering how many times my navigational skills had let me down. Good job Millie had already checked out where we were going and I just had to follow ;-)

Posers... us ?

We sat and played around with my camera whilst the girls went of to investigate another Temple.

Then it was time to head back to the car for lunch before setting off home...

A fabulous holiday made possible by the generosity of my Aunt and Uncle allowing us to stay in their home while they were away.

Millie it was a pleasure to have you with us and we hope College won't mean this will be the last time:-)

3 comments:

MillieMadHatter said...: In the temple with me and Emily, we were being Goddess's. I was being Artemis and I think Emily was being Aphrodite :) Can I have all the photos please?; 30 June 2010 at 08:34
Shosannah said...: What a lovely time beautifully captured in words and pictures!
Thanks for sharing :); 1 July 2010 at 11:25
dawn said...: what a fantastic time , you all look so happy :-) xx; 6 July 2010 at 14:36

This is me.....

There comes a time when you have to stand up and shout: This is me damn it! I look the way I look, think the way I think, feel the way I feel, love the way I love! I am a whole complex package. Take me... or leave me. Accept me - or walk away! Do not try to make me feel like less of a person, just because I don't fit your idea of who I should be and don't try to change me to fit your mold. If I need to change, I alone will make that decision.When you are strong enough to love yourself 100%, good and bad - you will be amazed at the opportunities that life presents you.” Stacey Charter.

Why we Home educate

( Slightly edited from a blog post I did when we started out) In the end the actual decision to take Emily out only took a matter of days but before that it had been around a year and a half of talking about ti and reading books, Free range education by Terri Dowty, Educating your child at home by Jane Lowe and Alan Thomas were two that had a real impact for different reasons. Free range education has lots of examples of real life home educators and I think I can say that it was this one that convinced me the most that we could do it. We are two very average people ,neither of us left school with many qualifications, we went on to do quite well in our chosen professions and had no need to think about the education system at all until Emily came along.

I knew about home education and when Emily was born considered it as an optionbut always felt my lack of education would be a problem and that I wouldn't be capable of providing her with what she would need.Looking back with hindsight it is easy to see how wrong I was!!

School never really suited Emily......After the nursery year at a very highly rated, high achieving school we knew that particular School wasn't for us and took her out. We enrolled her in a lovely village school with only 70 children in the whole school .The ethos of the school was totally different, the children didn't wear uniforms and there was much more emphasis on the children being individuals.The head was a sensitive and principled man who wanted the best for the children. We thought we had struck gold.Over the reception and year 1 Emily gained confidence and really started to bloom. It was at this time she was diagnosed with dyspraxia( we had had to go down the diagnosis route as our observations of Emily's difficulties were not enough to enable the teachers to tailor things so she was helped and given less work in class) but she managed quite well in the more relaxed play orientated early years.Year 2 with more emphasis on academic activities got progressively harder for her. She is very sensitive and it wasn't just the academic side it was the embarassment of having to put her hand up for the toilet,seeing others being told off and worrying in case she did something wrong and got the same treatment, panicking because she couldn't do the work and the teacher never had time to sit with her (alot of this did not come out until she had left school) her behaviour at home became worse and worse she was so angry and obviously stressed . At this time we began to seriously consider taking her out but held back because of my lack of confidence in my ability to provide her with an adequate education ,my health being so poor was also a major stumbling block.

Then in year three it became blatantly obvious that something needed to change .She was struggling on all levels and we couldn't allow the school system to damage our daughter anymore.She became ill with a bug that was doing the rounds and she was off for two weeks , during that time I had a conversation with a friend who home educates her two children and I was so upset I couldn't make a decision and she said just go with whats in your heart and that really helped me to shift my thinking and stop worrying about what I couldn't give her and focus on what I could give her.

We never sent her back.I still get emotional when I think of that time , the look on Emily's face when we told her she would never have to go back to school was priceless,the immense sense of relief that we were off the treadmill of school life and the excitement of the time ahead and to be honest the fear of the unknown......

So here we are four years on and a lot of reading and researching later I feel comfortable with what we are doing . The changes that have happened so far have been helped along the way by the many wonderful blogs out there.They are so varied and there are so many different approaches , I have found ones that I can identify with and have read a lot of archive material that has been written in each and found answers to so many of the questions I have had that they have helped me to sort out what will work best for us .As much as I wish we had done this earlier and saved Emily from the distress that she went through I do believe things happen for a reason and that the time was right for us to take her out and that looking on the bright side one of the benefits is that at least she has had a taste of school and now we all know without a doubt that it is not for us !!!!

It is very liberating to be making decisions based on what works best for us as a family and not what society expects.

Let your child be a child.

No child was ever spoiled by too much love.

Be authentic with your child.

Listen openly to your child’s needs.

Believe in your child’s good intentions.

Find the humour.

Look past the behaviour… what is your child feeling?

Have fun with your child today!

“There is no reason why we cannot say ‘No’ to children in just as kind a way as we say ‘Yes’.” - John Holt

“Play is really the work of childhood.” - Fred Rogers

“The best way to make children good is to make them happy.” - Oscar Wilde

Children thrive in a peaceful and loving environment.

A child needs love most when things go wrong.

Children reflect the treatment they receive.

A few qoutes I like....

Life shouldn't be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in, broadside, thouroughly used up, totally worn out and loudly shouting, 'WOW'.... Beth Moore

The perpetual testing of public school children is like a gardener constantly pulling his plants up by the roots to see if they are growing....(unknown)

Children require guidance and sympathy far more than instuction...Helen Kellers teacher

I hear and I forget I see and I remember I do and I understand...Confusious