Leading up to January 21

On Monday, Fina spent some time preparing her Shakespeare play of a Midsummer Night's Dream. She has costumes all ready. She wants to be Hermia, her friend K to by Helena, dad to be Lysander and I'm to be Peter Quince. She still needs a Demetrius, a Puck, a Bottom etc. But she is having a hard time convincing any of her other friends to be a part of it! She asked T, and he said "I can be a part of the audience!" She was not impressed. She is thinking of using stuffies for the rest!

Here she is in her Hermia costume.

On Tuesday, we had our outdoor playgroup. The kids had so much fun. It was cold, but sunny and not at all windy down in the creek and in the forest where we were playing. Fina and her little friend S got "lost" for a while, and they were all quite pleased. S's older brother T and his two friends E and N (all in the 8 and under club) got "lost" looking for Fina and S. N said it was "the best day ever!"  So there you go! They wandered all over and climbed up a steep cliff many times, making an avalanche on their way down.

Don't they look like little rodents in a cross-section of snow?

After being out for about 4 hours with the outdoor playgroup, Fina went out to play directly with her friend K. They played from 4-6pm. It was pitch black by then and the girls love playing in the dark, with their fancy Ikea reflective vests.

All in all, Fina had 6 hours of outdoor play. On a day when we hit a high of minus 14 degrees celsius at 4pm (which is certainly warmer than usual for this time of year here!), I'd say that is a personal best for us. For those of you wanting to keep track of our 1000-hours-outside challenge, which we started on November 1, Fina is at 154 hours outside.  For obvious reasons, December, January and February are our slowest months. I'm sure we can reach our goal by the end of October!

All I can say is that she certainly slept well that night!!!

On Wednesday, we had some friends over for a visit. Little A is 3 years old and gives Fina lots of practice at being kind and considerate to little ones (she has some work to do in that area!). They played nicely with their 18-inch dolls and lots of other things.

Fina also got out to play for three hours with her little friend K. They even wandered into K's neighbour's yard. I love living in a small town where a couple of 5 and 6 year olds can play outside for hours!

Fina pulled her all the way to the far end of the park.

Yes, the filled the sled up with snow and then proceeded to pull it up a fairly large hill!

We continue to read the Bible at supper (most nights), and we are moving along in our current free read, The Red Fairy Book. Fina continues to recite her four Shakespeare passages. Soon, we will start the next one.

On Thursday, Fina woke up at 6am (oh my, again!) and after breakfast, she wanted to cut some apples for applesauce. We watched a video on kids with knives from http://kidscookrealfood.com/ together and then I set her to it. (The video is free every once in a while. The promotion is now over, but will come again.) She was ok. Not the ideal conditions I would have chosen to embark upon such a journey, but still.

If you ever want to know anything about technique, take a pic and you'll be able to analyze things a bit better. Not the best knife technique, but still! She did it and no cuts! Applesauce is cooking away in the slow cooker!