LiAM woke up feeling much better yesterday which is a huge relief. While I don't like that he is on so much medication, the alternative is constantly struggling to breathe, so I am grateful that the medicine is available and affordable and helps him so effectively.
After our late night the night before and a big week just gone, and lots of things coming up this week, we decided to stay home for a rest day. Millie played Minecraft and experimented with different ways of spelling 'Rudolph' as she has a reindeer skin now and wanted to name it. LiAM watched TV and played his monster game and some Minecraft. Caitlin played dexterity games on her iPad mini and is getting really good. She got frustrated with one level on Pivvot and asked me to try - I couldn't last more than a couple of seconds, my brain doesn't work that quickly in terms of reacting to obstacles and figuring out which way to go. She also found an online Soduko site and between us we did several Sodukos throughout the day. Millie also helped me with my Spanish lesson.
In the afternoon the kids decided to play Titan, and Tony joined them. The 4 of them played on and off all afternoon - LiAM is getting a good understanding of the strategies involved, Caitlin enjoys growing her legions but doesn't really like battling, and Millie is learning the rules and understanding how it works quite well.
While Tony was cooking tea the girls made a letter box out of cardboard boxes and tubes, and went outside to paint it. The tubes got a bit wet and started to break, so Caitlin came up with a few great ideas to strengthen them - she talked about stuffing them full of paper or something heavier, using sticky tape for support on the outside, strengthening them with a stick inside - she kept working at it and ended up with a letter box that opens at each end and is supported by a pole, and has the little flag on top that lets you know if there is mail inside. She has set it up in the lounge room for us to post letters to each other - she and Millie spent a lot of the rest of the evening writing letters to each other and posting them. Millie also did some drawing and writing on the blackboard - doing a fantastic drawing of a fish and a dolphin and labelling them F and D respectively.
She also read the word dolphin when we were looking a photos later on. She and LiAM we were looking at the map of Australia to see where our friends are in their bus after leaving 2 days ago, and where they've been and where they are going. We then looked at some of the places we'll be going on our trip and how far they are from us, and then a more detailed look at some of them, including the photos on Google maps, particularly Shark Bay/Monkey Mia in Western Australia, where there are lots of dolphins and Millie cannot wait to get there. We also looked close up at some reefs of the west coast, they looked like sting rays from the wide view, but are actually areas of shallow water and rocks and look fascinating however close up or far away they are viewed from.
Caitlin and Tony did some gymnastics outside (they started in the kitchen where there wasn't quite enough room...) - mainly Tony flipping C over his shoulder, it was cool to watch how much easier and more graceful it became for both of them as they practised. Caitlin was then able to flip Millie over her shoulder as well which was pretty cool.
In the evening we watched Looney Tunes then Journey to the Centre of the Earth, which is entertaining but a little far fetched sometimes (apart from the premise, there were things that didn't quite make sense. I do like that the kids can notice these things and we can talk about them, while still really enjoying the movie. For example, it was getting hotter and hotter where they were, well over 40 degrees, but they weren't sweating or moving slower or seeming impacted by the heat in any way). Afterwards we watched a bit of cricket and tennis, then an old episode of Heartland, then Rage - they had the top 20 on so the kids were quite excited, and thanks to Caitlin listening to Nova radio these days, I actually knew most of the songs. Interesting to see some of the video clips and to talk to Caitlin about what she thought of them - again, being able to critically analyse them and think about why they make the videos like that means that she's not going to be influenced by the messages without thinking about them herself first.
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