Catch up - halloween, fireworks, capoeira, and other stuff!

Ok, ok, so I haven't blogged for AGES (smacked hand, naughty naughty).

Which means

ta ta ta da da da daa daaaaah...

I'm due one of those mammoth catch up posts. I posted the photos a few days ago, but didn't get around to writing the blurb. So, here goes:

HALLOWEEN

(Me, looking gorgeous):

FIREWORKS

(Cub fireworks night)

Too noisy!

CAPOEIRA BATIZADO

An annual event when ds1 and ds2 play Capoeira with Brazilian masters to earn their next belt.

THINGS WE MADE

Dd sewing felt teddy bears:

Dd helping me make candles with our freebie candle-making set from the Swap Shop:

(Guess what eveyone's getting for Christmas this year?)

Ds2 finally finished his James Watt steam engine. If you look closely you'll see that it's held together with double sided tape and pins and a few (non-religious) prayers.

Now we just have the Viking settlement and medieval town to start (remind me not to buy any more of these cut out cardboard kits in future...arghhh!)

Dd1 has been making loads of films on his camera and creating all sorts of interesting items for his warhammer scenery (most of which are part assembled on my conservatory table...). He doesn't really play warhammer, but likes making the scenery.

And ds2 showing off his natural ability with technology again, while his mother disappears down the other end of the hall and feigns complete ignorance...well actually I didn't need to feign it :)

Badman is a badman indeed...Badman and Nektus

Ok, so we were under no illusions that Badman was at all independent, but some interesting revelations are revealed in the 'Freedom in education under threat' blog
here for more)

"During the review process, Home Educators have obviously been very interested in finding out what professional interests Mr Badman holds, especially given that we have been told time and again that he, and therefore his review, are *independent*. Many home educators were surprised to find that an independent review into Home Education could be carried out by a former teacher, former head of children's services, and current chair of BECTA. Whilst looking into Mr Badman's professional interests, it was discovered that he was listed as the director of an Education Management company by the name of Nektus..."

Truth is stranger than fiction

Don't you just love weird news..?

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/5/20091105/tod-back-from-the-dead-man-attends-own-f-870a197.html

Back From The Dead: Man Attends Own Funeral

A bricklayer who was thought to have been killed in a car crash shocked his grieving family by showing up alive at his own funeral.

Relatives of Brazilian Ademir Jorge Goncalves, 59, had identified him as the victim of a Sunday night car crash in the southern state of Parana, police said.

As is customary there, the funeral was held the following day, which happened to be the holiday of Finados, when Brazilians visit cemeteries to honour the dead.

What family members did not know was that Mr Goncalves had spent the night at a lorry park talking to friends over drinks of a sugarcane liquor known as cachaca, his niece Rosa Sampaio revealed later.

He did not get word about his own funeral until it was already happening Monday morning.

The bricklayer then rushed to the funeral to let family members know he was not dead, a police spokesman in the town of Santo Antonio da Platina said.
"The corpse was badly disfigured, but dressed in similar clothing," said the police spokesman.
"People are afraid to look for very long when they identify bodies, and I think that is what happened in this case."
Mr Goncalves' niece added that some family members were not sure the body was that of the bricklayer.

"My two uncles and I had doubts about the identification," she said.

"But an aunt and four of his friends identified the body, so what were we to do? We went ahead with the funeral."

The body was correctly identified later Monday, the police spokesman said, and has already been buried in another state.