Some crafting

It's been very quiet on the homeschool front over here. Somehow we've been busy with other things or then haven't done much at all. Yesterday however was the day of Finnish culture. So what's with the cars and the Barbies?!? We actually cut out pictures that have something to do with Finland and glued them on a Finland-shaped piece of cardboard. That however has been somehow misplaced (I'm suspecting little brother has something to do with that...) so I didn't get a picture here. The kids were really excited about using glue and about all the pictures of cars and Barbies they found in the magazines so we decided to make these too. Princess already has her Barbie poster in the room and little brother wanted to take his car poster to school in order to show it to his teacher. I convinced him it wasn't a good idea but instead we'll have it up on his wall and he was happy with that.

Lucas himsef

This (and many more shots) happened when I forgot the camera on the bed and he found it. He usually presses all possible buttons and messes up all the settings if he manages to get his hands on the camera. This time he managed to take some pictures of himself as well.

A really hot day

The last couple of days have been really hot and humid. The sun is burning hot and all of a sudden rain pours down. After the rain it's steaming humid, the way I always imagined the air in the Amazon basin. Thankfully it's really not like that all the time, just at times during the rainy season.

This afternoon the kids had fun playing in the mud in the backyard.

A part from these sleeping babes there were plenty of other things in our weekend. We walked to grandparents' house, little brother's ear infection was detected (and medicated), we attended a wedding (see a few pictures in here), ate ice cream...


... I "made" a bed for princess' baby doll. This is just a cardboard box that I covered with self adhesive plastic. The left overs I had were exactly enough to cover the box! Baby doll is now jealously watched and we all have to be quiet a lot because she's sleeping.

Another birthday

This time it was my friend's daughter and Luana's classmate who turned 4 and held a party in the school together with another friend.
Here's the party table à la Brazil.

The princess cake.

Birthday girl with her parents.

My little ones in the party.

And finally Luana with her teacher.

Beautiful quilting

We just got another parcel from Finland. This was a surprise one from my step-mum and she sent us all sorts of goodies including notebooks and pencils for the kids, tea, salt licorice and some sweets for us all and then some wonderful quilted pieces she's made.

We received some of her art works for Christmas too and I've been meaning to post a picture of them for ages. Now I finally took all the beautiful things outside and took a few pictures of them. Isn't she incredibly talented!

The angel on the left is for hanging on the wall. Below it two Christmas decorations. The brown star is for the kitchen and the white piece behind it is a little bag you can hang on the wall and use for storing postcards or obviously anything you like. And the one on the right is for the dolls' bed.
Isn't this a delight!

Thank you!

I can't believe I just got my first ever award! And I even managed to display it on the sidebar (almost as amazing as the actual fact of having received it...).

Thank you so much Dawn!!!

Now I still have to figure out who to pass it on to. That'll have to wait a bit because I really need to hang some laundry, do the dishes and get some lunch done before my babes get back from school.

The day of the sportsman

is what we had yesterday in Brazil. So in honour of all sportsmen we wore our trainers and walked to grandparents' house. On the way the kids saw some beautiful flowers they took to grandma.

Singing in the rain

The weekend went really quickly. Saturday was spent at home doing nothing particular. It poured down in the afternoon and the kids took a shower outside. They loved it! It was especially fun as their daddy decided to join in and ran around the front yard in his undies (no picture of that displayed here though...). I baked a Zucchini bread with a recipe from here and it was yummy. I'd call it a cake though instead of bread :)

On Sunday morning we had a friendship party at Sunday School. I had asked the kids to invite friends and a few new kids came. We talked about how Jesus is the best friend ever and in the end we ate some cake and other party foods. It was also the farewell party of the other teacher of the group as she's heading to another state in order to do her MA. So now I'm on my own with the group. I really enjoy the challenge though. I love planning for the Sunday mornings and I feel so good after each lesson.
I got these pretty flowers from one of the girls on Sunday morning. I didn't even know that a flower like this exist. Then again, we live in the Amazon basin, I guess there are many more flowers I didn't even dream existed...

Gift for Lucas

The small children are asked to take a cushion to school so it's more comfy for them to sit on the floor. As Luana got a new schoolbag (see picture here) I made this for Lucas. In all truth my mum had already sewn the cover and I just decorated it yesterday with figures cut out of felt. The little guy seemed very pleased with his new cushion.

More Valentine's day

Valentine's day ended up as a nice family day for us. I usually do the crafting, painting, homeschooling etc. with the kids and hubby does the running around, playing, tickling and building stuff. However last night he suggested some crafting with the kids using natural ingredients. I was well impressed and the kids just loved it. The three of them sat by the backdoor and started building things with sticks, toothpicks, yarn etc.

They finally came up with a little swing. The kids loved it!

And Luana made what she called "the National Baptist" (our church is called Batista Nacional...) as well as that beautiful necklace.

Lucas was also a busy bee with important work involving sticks and toothpicks and requiring a lot of concentration.

And it all ended up with some delicious chocolate cake. The picture was taken when most of it was already eaten :)

Valentines for the school

Celebrating Valentine's day doesn't seem to be a big hit over here. It's actually strange because usually any excuse is used for selling stuff (I've seen fridges and sofas being sold for Children's day...). I anyway decided to make a little something for the kids' classmates. The tiny bags have raisins in them (I'm probably considered the most boring and non-Brazilian mama ever for not providing sweets but raisins...). The kids painted on cardboard (cut simply from a box) with watercolours and I cut their paintings into little hearts. The teachers received some teabags (see previous post).

First Valentine's gift

This was this year's first Valentine's gift to a friend who'll travel today and be away on the 14th. I bought three different kinds of herbal tea and replaced the little tags with red hearts. On one side I wrote the flavour of the tea and on the other side a Bible reference. Very easy and quick to make and came out cute. The idea is from here.

New photos

I uploaded some new photos on flickr. There are some pics of our home here. And some from the birthday party on Saturday (plus a few old ones from July) here.

Fun weekend

The weekend was good and I didn't really miss the internet :) On Saturday we had the parents' meeting at school. We got the calendars for this year, got to know the prices of the books and were told that school uniforms have to be complete by March 1st, t-shirts aren't enough but the kids have to have uniform shorts as well. So off to the tailor's with the kids it is. The teachers are really happy with our little ones and I heard princess is very bright and is doing well in her group. Little brother has become even more talkative and his teacher told me she really enjoys chatting with him as he always seems to have a story to tell.

During the day there was some massive kitchen cleaning done by hubby. And I baked blueberry muffins (from dried blueberries obviously) as princess specifically asked for them. I had some pink icing left as well as some blueberry sweets (they actually taste like really sweet real blueberries and have the colour right too) to decorate the muffins with the kids.

In the evening we went to a mega Brazilian birthday party. Everything was beautiful but just really exaggerated (in my humble simple Finnish point of view). We were greeted by loads and loads of balloons and a video crew with special portable lights to ensure good quality images. The theme of the party was Strawberry Shortcake and all decoration was red and green. Party food was delicious and I got a few good ideas for our next birthday party (which will surprisingly be a lot simpler, more low key and home made than this party). The girls had a great time and on our way home my friend invited the princess to sleep over at her house. We all agreed and she had a blast (so much so that she only came home on Sunday evening...). We missed her a little and I think her little brother had enough of being the only child for a while. I am however quite proud of her being so outgoing and ready to stay with other people. That said I'm not ready to have her sleep over in other people's houses constantly, she's still mama's little girl!

Closed for the weekend

I've been thinking about the internet and blogging for a while now. I think there are so many great things to be found online and I've truly enjoyed blogging and reading other people's blogs but it's time consuming as well. Or let's say it gets time consuming when you find yet another great blog to follow or someone has one more great link of a website that offers loads of new information that you absolutely need to read. One of the things that really made me think about all this was my husband. Quite late one night as I was on the internet and he almost asleep he mumbled: "You only have time for the internet nowadays..." While that was the comment of a very sleepy hubby there's some truth in it also and it hit home.

Recently I read this post by someone who has decided to stop blogging and continue using the internet only in order to look for some information and send necessary e-mails. I don't even know that person nor had I ever read her blog, I ended up reading the post following a link in another blog (see what I mean about following the links...). I don't pretend to stop blogging but I'll be closed for the weekend. I'll also try to use the computer only once a day preferably in the morning when the kids are at school or after lunch when they're napping. This way it doesn't get on the way of my attention to them.

So have a good weekend all of you. I'll be back on Monday and let you know how the parents' meeting at school went and how much fun we had at the birthday party of one of princess' classmates.

Runeberg day

On February 5th we celebrated Finland's national poet Johan Ludvig Runeberg (1804-1877). He's the author of several books and also the lyrics of the national anthemn. His wife used to make these little tarts and they're always eaten on Feb 5th. I made a simplified version I found on the internet and it goes like this:

150 g butter or margarine
1 ½ dl sugar
2 tbs syrup
1-2 tsp cinnamon and cloves (finely ground)
1-2 tsp cardamom (finely ground)
2 eggs
1 ½ dl milk or cream
80-100 g finely ground almonds
3 dl flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder

Mix well the margarine and the sugar. Beat in the eggs one by one. Mix together flour, baking powder and the spices and combine with the margarine mix. Add the milk and the almonds and mix. This amount made exactly 12 fairly large muffins using two silocone forms. Bake in 175 Celcius for about 25 minutes. While still warm poke a small round hole about 0,5 cm deep in the middle of each one. Let them cool. When cool fill the holes with raspberry marmalade (I used strawberry as we had that at home) and decorate with a ring of icing (caster sugar and water).

Wedding gift

Yesterday got better as hubby came home and cheered me up by just being himself. In the evening we had a very small (as in 6 guests and the bride and groom) wedding to attend and I prepared a small gift for the newlyweds.


I bought two mugs,some good local coffee and some nice herbal tea as well as chocolates, put them all in a box, wrapped it in silvery paper and decorated it with fabric-cardboard hearts. We made several of these hearts a few days ago with the princess. I actually got the idea from a blog but I can't remember where it was... Anyway you just take some cardboard and cover one side with different kinds of fabrics glued on. Then you use a heart shape and cut hearts out of the cardboard.

No more drawing?

Today started off with a bit of a surprise as we were all dressed and ready to go to school but my friend who usually picks the kids up didn't show up. They travelled this weekend so I'm guessing something happened and they just didn't get back in time. I'd call her but my cell phone is out of credit so I guess I'll just visit her later on today to see if everything's OK. First I thought I'd just take a taxi and get the kids to school but then I realised I'd have to do the same to get them home so I decided to just keep them at home today. Needless to say they weren't pleased as they were really looking forward to going to school after the long weekend.

We got on somehow and I let them watch some Finnish children's programs on the internet and they really enjoyed that. They've also done some colouring and played with the modelling clay. However there seems to be a cloud of discontentment looming over our house. Maybe it's my frustration over how the day is turning out (I had some things I had to do outside the house and I'm not getting them done now), maybe it's the kids' dissapointment over not going to school after all. I made an effort of choosing to be happy and just improvise the day, I made bread and sweet bread doughs and decided to make pumpkin soup for lunch but still I'm feeling somehow heavy.

However the bubble really burst when I discovered tons of new drawings on the walls. It seems that yesterday or today the kids (I'm guessing mainly the little brother) have gone crazy with crayons and the white walls. I got really really really upset as this is something I've been explaining to them so many times. I understand that most kids draw on the walls at some point but mine just do it constantly despite being told that it's forbidden. I would love them to have a crafting corner where they could cut, glue, draw etc. whenever they felt like it. As that corner hasn't been set up yet I've left the crayons, colour pencils and some paper always available and they've made good use of them. I tried letting scissors available too but the little one will cut anything he sees so that doesn't work.

I made them collect all crayons and pencils and hand them over. From now on they will have to ask me if they want to draw anything. I feel so frustrated and sad about the situation. Of course it isn't just the drawing on the walls that makes me feel like this. The kids are so disobedient these days that it drives me crazy. Absolutely nothing can be done without a quarrel or me asking them to do it a million times. They also repeatedly do all of the things they know they're not allowed. Maybe it's a phase and I'm hoping it would pass soon as it makes the daily life really tiring.

Homeschool February

The kids seem to play together more and more every day, which is really nice. They come up with great things that involve bringing all of their toys to the living room, dressing up, dressing the dolls with strips of paper, emptying their toy boxes so that they can be used as beds, planes, ships etc. And then today they completely surprised me by playing around with modelling clay for almost an hour without a single quarrel while I was preparing lunch. That hasn't happened for a good while! Are they growing up? Was camping all they needed? I don't know but I'm planning to enjoy this while it lasts and not interfere when they're really into a good play.

So today I sat down and planned some homeschooling for this month. I don't want to make rigid plans but I've discovered that some planning ahead makes my daily life easier. I looked up Finnish and Brazilian special dates for February and kind of made my plans around them. There are great Brazilian special days such as the day of the sportsman or the day of the librarian. And then tomorrow is Finnish laskiainen (the day before the beginning of Lent) that involves some yummy eating. In the end of February we still have the day of Finnish culture. Oh, and did I mention the day of the founding of IBAMA (The Brazilian Institute of Environment and Natural Resources), which should give us several days of nature stuff to do. The beginnig of the month will however be spent with valentines related things. In Finland it's called the day of friendship so we'll make some little pressies for friends.

I'm planning to continue our nature notebook and to start a cooking notebook. That should give us a chance to cook together and look at some numbers with the princess as they go through them at school as well. I will also sit down with them twice a week and make a few exercises in English. We started doing that during the summer vacation but then stopped. Just the other day princess was asking me what happened to learning English. So I'll take that up again for as long as they find it fun.

I guess all of this didn't sound very organised at all but believe you me it does look so on paper :)

We're at home again

We came home already on Sunday evening as the people who drove us wanted to return early. We didn't find anyone else to come back with on Monday so we agreed. We had a great time though and the kids really enjoyed themselves. It had been a while since we spent such a lot of time (= all of the time) outdoors and I thought it was fantastic. The kids slept really well and thought it was well exciting to sleep in a tent. We went there expecting to spend time together as a family as well as hearing what God wanted to speak to us and we truly enjoyed it. We got to walk, swim, run around, play football (or soccer if you like), eat well, get to know some new people, see some gorgeous horses in the ranch and hear from a visiting pastor from Minas Gerais. You can see some of our pictures here.

Camping until Monday

We're off camping today! The tent has been up in the livingroom since morning (so we can clean it and check everything's OK) and the kids are going hyper. They haven't actually ever slept in a tent so they're well excited.

I'm looking forward to a fun weekend with the kids and also some time concentrating on God's word. The church organises a yearly camp always during carnival weekend as Monday and Tuesday are bank holidays and most people don't work. So hopefully lots of outdoor activities, no rain and bonding with old and new friends.