Civil War History Day...

Our morning was spent in Exeter, attending a Civil War history day with fellow home-edders.  The day started off with a little *eeek* moment, when Joe was asked his name by one of the presenters of the display.  Joe replied, but due to his speech dyspraxia, pronounced the "j" sound with a slight "z".  He was asked to repeat it over and over and I could see Joseph squirming, so I stepped in and said his name for him (something I hate doing, but needs must at times) - the response made Joe feel really self-conscious so it wasn't the best of starts, but it was talked about and laid to rest.  Incidences like this are few and far between now thank goodness, but when it does happen it really does send us back down to earth with a bump.

We still had a great time!

There was a talk about what life was like at that time and it has to be said, I learnt more than a thing or two.

The children were able to touch and hold many objects, including helmets, a musket, pistols, and candles.  Callum did make me giggle a little when the children were asked to be quiet - he turned around to me and whispered "Mum, is this school?" It certainly led to an interesting conversation on the way home.  

After the history lecture, we all ventured outside to become an "army" complete with tall bamboo sticks for weapons...

I am very pleased to report that there were no injuries due to this exercise - I have to admit to being very relieved when the sticks were safely laid back on the floor.  I had many visions of eyeballs on sticks!  The kids loved it though, Callum said that he really enjoyed it.  They were shown how to march, hold their weapons, turn, keep formation, etc, it was all taken very seriously.

At this point, the group was split into two groups for different workshops.  We were in the group that was going to take part in the much less worrying finger braiding.

Sadly, it really wasn't of much interest to my lot, and their concentration levels soon wavered.  They ended up wandering in the park and playground, and I figured it was time to call it a day.  Tiegan did bring her string of yarn home with her though as she really wanted to see if she could learn how to braid via google and youtube.  It seemed we missed out on a pretty good afternoon, with sword-fighting being the pinnacle event of the day.  We were all ready to leave though, and I love that freedom we have as home-edders.  We can choose to dip in and out of what suits us and our children with no pressures.