Ezra goes back to school

This week all P1-P3 children in N.I. went back to school for the first time since Christmas. Out of our four kids it is Ezra who I felt was missing out the most by not being at school. He has a wonderful teacher and he loves school and P1 feels like such a foundation year for learning phonics and beginning to read. He is a bright little spark and thankfully picks things up easily but he did not like structured reading and writing with me.

World Book Day

 Without a doubt, Ezra’s favourite book is ‘Where’s Wally?’. He loves an activity based book much more than a story book. So of course we had to turn a potato into Wally for WBD.

I sent Calvin to choose his favourite book, he, unlike Ezra, loves story books and every day we read the same ones over and over until I can bear it no longer and introduce a new one. So it was no surprise that he choose ‘The night before Christmas’ as his favourite book, which we are still reading regularly in March!

Great Uncle George

 

I started this post back in late December when my Great Uncle George passed away but with all the home schooling going on and completely forgetting about keeping my blog up to date it stayed in the ‘drafts’ folder.

My childhood home is one field, as the crow flies, from where Uncle George lived. My childhood is full of memories of this quiet and endearing man. Often on a Saturday he would arrive in our kitchen, stand at the kitchen window looking out over his field of sheep, commenting now and again on what the weather was going to be like which depended on how the sheep were behaving or the smell in the air. He would then join us for a ‘scupful’ of soup at the kitchen table, slicing the butter like cheese and placing it on his wheaten bread. 

As I look back over his life, it is only now as an adult I realise how difficult his life must have been. His wife died of cancer when his third child, a son, was very young, leaving him with three young children to care for. His Son in law and granddaughter were killed in a car accident and his second daughter also died of cancer. 

As attending his wake and funeral due to Covid-19 was forbidden, his extended family and friends stood at the end of their lanes or driveways as his hearse slowly drove past. Then some of us got into our cars and followed the hearse to his local village church where he was buried. It was quite beautiful to see his country friends paying their respects as they stood by their farms or houses. 

As a note of sympathy to his family I did a sketch of his house, a house that was so familiar to me as a child and where Uncle George lived his whole life.