Day two - so many animals!

And you know, as someone who is highly allergic to almost every animal, i have to say that antihistamines are an amazing invention...

Not all of the animals are allowed on the playground, but some of them are - right now we have two goats, three ponies, a bunch of guinea pigs and a couple of rabits out here - the kids love it! 

We had some heavy rain this morning, but now the sun is out and everything is awesome :-)

The kids are really getting the
free range treatment here - they run around as much as they want and basically come to us for food - this time there are more families here on vacaton and all the kids can play together.

We're here!

We have arrived at the Kerndlerhof for our farm vacation. The kids felt at home right away - i don't think we'll see much of them for the next eight days...

I plan to keep you updated :-)

vee

Homeschooling? Me?

I contemplated homeschooling my son - in this post i'm exlporing my reasons for it and how everything happened differently than i planned it

Hello there,

It looks like i’m not going to homeschool my son next year.
Let's step back and take a look at what happened and why I, who have NEVER considered homeschooling to be for anyone other than religious fundamentalists, seriously planned to do this in the first place.

1). The situation in viennese Schools isn’t the best overall, but our district is fairly catastrophic. I really don’t care where anyone comes from or where anyones parents come from, but i would like for all first graders to be able to speak the language that is used for teaching, thank you very much. If they don’t, they need to learn the language as quickly as possible to be able to understand their classmates and teachers. Yes, there should be a fund for that, that’s a good thing to spend tax money on. If there are a couple of kids that aren’t fluent in german, that’s no big deal. They will learn the language soon enough. But in the Schools that are closest to our home, there are perhaps two or three kids starting each year that ARE fluent in german, and no teacher in the world can teach 20+ kids in a language they don’t understand.

2). I know my kids need social contacts and the whole peer group thing is important, but i don’t like our district very much and i definetly don’t like its people. Is that really who i want my kids to hang out with and learn from?

3). I’ve seen with a couple of kids that the start of school stopped their fun they had with learning. My son is smart and interested in many things and i’m dreading the time where learning will become a chore for him. I would love for that point in time to be very, very far away. I have an examle of that – my friends daughter is very smart, but impatient and a bit of a wild child. She’s also very exact when it comes to coloring or glueing, so stuff like that takes a long time. The normal classroom situation is just not what she needs. She’s always behind and has to take work home that she didn’t finish in addition to her homework. She’s smart – it’s not like she can’t do the work, everything just takes soooo long because it has to be perfect and then she gets bored and distracted. It takes her two to three hours every day to get that stuff done. That girl is eight years old. She loves reading, but she doesn’t have the time to read much…

So, these were the main reasons for me to consider homeschooling, and i actually started preparing for it. I read so much, mostly things from mothers who homeschool, i had a couple of wonderful conversations with some fantastic people, and i was quite confident that i would be, in fact, able to pull this off. ’ So what changed?

1). I found a school that I actually like. It is fairly close and they have good tutoring programs for kids whose german isn’t too good, they start with english in first grade and they have a model class that i really, really liked. They teach the grades one through four in one classroom, with five to eight kids per grade. The kids have three to five years to finish the first four grades, and a lot of the work is Montessori based and the kids work things out for themselves.

2). My kids will have to learn to get along with all kinds of people, and while i would love to shelter them from all unleasant kids, i can not (and will not) do that. School is a somewhat controlled enviroment to meet these people and if things don’t work, there are grown ups to help.
3). I applied to the school, and even though there are only seven spots this year, we got one of them. My sons best friend is in the same class, she started last fall and their experience has so far been really good. The homework load is minimal and she can work at her own speed. I know my son will be really fast in math and slow when it comes to coloring, cutting or even writing. I hope he will not be judged on his weaknesses but his strengths in this class.
I am extremely happy we got in – but with a little bit of sadness mixed in. It would have been a great opportunity. I loved being there for my kids firsts – and now someone else gets to do this. We will continue our study time, i think – greatly reduced, maybe, but it’s not over completely.
Vee

It wasn't fun, but it had to be done.

I took a look at all of my dolls recently and realized that I had a lot of work to do. In the past week i went through all of my dolls and did the following things:

• dolls that are no longer up to my standards have been taken out of my shop and will be ued for materials
• dolls that are still acceptable, but not quite as good as i would like them to be have either undergone reparative surgery or are severely discounted -go take a look
• most of the dolls have been redressed, many of them with wonderful dresses made by Adria Tate, better known as Belle Fille. You can go visit her etsy shop HERE
• some dolls got beautiful new accessories - I think i crocheted constantly over the past week or so...
• all pictures got a pretty new frame to give my store a pretty cute new look. Now i onoy have to make a new banner to go with it :-)
• several new dolls are coming soon - all new pictures can be marveled at on my facebook page. Veelana's Design on facebook

just thought i'd let you know what i've been up to :-) here is my pretty new store front - see you soon, i still have to show you the awesome customs i made in the last two months.

Keep creating, Vee

lets try this again...

Hello everyone,

i just realized that it has been almost two months since i posted something...

I started november so well with the daily posting and then it went down hill. We were very crafty this december (we have so many great handmade decoratons now!) and my son loved it. the holiday stress didn't catch up with me this year, but we got all the important stuff d.o.ne  anyway - cooki -es, presents, decorations - and we had fun doing this more relaxed approach.

I'll try to post some pictures at some point  because our tree was awesome again this year :-)

January has so far been nice - i have a custom doll order to work on and we have all kinds of stuff to organize. Mr. Turtles starts school in september and the whole application process starts in a week. Also, I'm trying to get organized in my home :-)

Vee

Cutest spooks ever! Niedliche Halloween Gesellschaft

Tweet I took Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, a ghost, a Vampire and Wiich Trick or Treating.
Halloween isn't very popular here, so we had a Party at our apartment and went out after dark to get some candy at my friends house. Fun!
Ich hatte eine kleine Halloween Party mit Darth Vader und Luke Skywalker, einer Hexe, einem Geist und einem Vampir.  Nachdem es dunkel war, gingen wir noch im Haus meiner Freundin auf Süssigkeitenjagd...

Yesterday I had a lot to clean up, though - my Mom arrived around noon for a visit. She doesn't see her grandkids that often, so it's nice to have her over for  a week...

Gestern hatte ich dann allerdings jede Menge aufzuräumen - meine Mama kam gegen Mittag an - sie sieht ihre Enkel nicht so oft, deshalb freuen wir uns besonders, dass sie eine ganze Woche bleiben kann :-) 

Greetings from grey Vienna,
Vee

First "Homeschooling" experience

 My son wants to learn. He soaks up anything we teach him like a sponge - and he can only start school in a year. He visits a public Kindergarten very close to home, but Kindergarten means something entirely different in german :-) SoI looked around on the internet to learn about teaching your kids and ended up reading about homeschooling.

Mein Sohn will lernen. Er saugt wissen auf wie ein Schwamm - und er kann erst nächstes Jahr in die Schule kommen. Er besucht einen Kindergarten, aber hier ist das ja was anderes als ein "Kindergarten" im Englischsprachigen Raum. Also hab' ich mich im Internet umgesehen und bin recht schnell auf eineigen Homeschooling blogs gelandet.

Our set up not in use

Homeschooling isn't really the plan for the next years, though - Mr. Noodles will start public school next fall and that will probably be the end of this...

Homeschooling ist nicht unser Plan für die Zukunft - Mr. Noodles kommt nächsten Herbst in die Schule, und das ist dann warscheinlich das Ende...

So, what is it we do? I first started with three boxes filled with items for my son to study and work with  - one box for reading, one for writing, one for math - and we sat at the table literally for three hours. WAYYY too much - this wasn't what I wanted to do at all. I looked around and saw that most homeschoolers say that their kids at that age spend an hour or 90 minutes sitting at a desk, so we where doing something wrong. I scrapped my plan and started again, this time with more boxes - but less stuff per box and it only takes 5-10 minutes per box for him to do. Maybe a bit more if I sneak in something more challenging :-)
Also, was ist es was wir tun? Ich hatte zuerst mit drei Schachteln begonnen, die mit Lernsachen für meinen Sohn gefüllt waren - eine jeweils für Lesen, Schreiben und Mathemathik -  und wir saßen etwa drei Stunden am Tisch. VIEL zu lang - das war wirklich nicht, was ich wollte! Ich habe mich ein bisschen umgeschaut, und festgestellt, daß gleichaltrige Kinder von Homeschoolern eine bis anderthalb Stunden mit Lernen am Tisch verbringen, also machten wir klarerweise etwas falsch. Ich entsorgte meinen Plan und begann nochmal neu, diesmal mit mehr Schachteln - aber weniger Inhalt. Er braucht jetzt 5-10 minuten pro Schachtel, etwas länger, wenn ich etwas besonders Anspruchsvolles hineingebe.

The set up in use

We've been doing this for a little over a week now and so far it works well for both of us.
I set up the boxes either at night when the kids are sleeping or while Mr Noodles is in Kindergarten and we do "study time" sometime in the afternoon. If we end up not doing it that day, we do it the next day - I want to keep everything very low stress after all.

Wir machen das jetzt seit etwas über einer Woche so und es funktioniert ganz gut für uns beide.

Ich mache seine Schachteln fertig wenn die Kinder schlafen oder wenn Mr. Noodles im Kindergarten ist und wir haben am Nachmittag "Lernzeit". Wenn's sich mal zeitlich nicht ausgeht, machen wir's halt am nächsten Tag - es soll ja kein Stress sein.

So, what's in the boxes? This is what was in them on monday:
Also, was ist in den Schacteln? Hier ist unsere Lernzeit vom Montag:

Magnets:
I make an object from our geomag magnets and Mr. Noodles has to build the same thing. This is a very easy shape, we're up to way more advanced stuff already because this is so easy for him.
Teaches: Geometric shapes, magnets, observing closely

Magnete:

Ich baue etwas aus unseren Geomag Magneten und er muss es nachbauen. Das ist noch eine sehr einfache Form, wir sind inzwischen viel weiter, das Nachbauen ist sehr einfach für ihn.

Er lernt: Geometrische Formen/Körper, Magneten, genaues Betrachten

Word finder
I read a story and he has to find and circle some of the words
Comes from the Fall Pack at http://homeschoolcreations.com/preschoolpacks.html but since I translated it, not much of the original was left in that case :-)
Teaches: Word recognition
Wortfinder

Ich lese eine kurze Geschichte vor und Mr. Noodles muss einige Worte darin wiederfinden.Die Geschichte ist aus dem Fall Pack von http://homeschoolcreations.com/preschoolpacks.html, aber weil ich sie übersetzt habe ist nicht mehr viel davon übrig

Er lernt: Worterkennung

Coloring:
I got some very cute clone Wars books from a friend in the US. Mr. Noodles hates coloring and really needs the practice - all of it not an issue whith this book, he likes doing it and does it better than usual...
Teaches: coloring, staying inside the lines, fine motor skills

Ausmalen

Ich hab ein paar sehr nette Clone Wars Malbücher von einer Freundin aus den USA bekommen. Mr Noodles mag garnicht malen, dabei braucht er die Übung wirklich - mit diesem Buch gar kein Problem, es macht ihm Spass und das Ergebnis sieht auch weit besser aus als sonst...

Er lernt: farben, ausmalen, innerhalb der Linien bleiben, Feinmotorik

 Read!Build!Write!
Also from http://homeschoolcreations.com, he gets two words to read, than builds it with alphabet tiles (these are from a top words game), then he gets to write the word down. This is one of the boxes that takes longer than 10 minutes
Teaches: Handwriting, word recognition, letters

Lesen!Bauen!Schreiben 

Auch von http://homeschoolcreations.com bekommt er zwei Worte (zum Thema passend) die er zuerst lesen soll, dann legt er sie mit Topwords Plättchen, zum Schluss schreibt er das wort slebs. Das ist eine der Übungen, die mehr als 10 Minuten dauern.

Er lernt: Handschrift, Buchstaben, Worterkennung

Sommersaults
His favourite box - he gets to do some exercise! He needs this after something challenging - and the Read!Build!Write! exercise is very challenging for him.
Teaches: Gross motor skills, coordination

Purzelbäume

Seine liebste Kiste - er darf ein bisschen Sport machen! Nach so etwas anstrengendem wie dem Lesen!Bauen!Schreiben! braucht er das auch ganz besonders dringend...

Er lernt: Koordination, Grobmotorik

Homework
This is his music class homework - usually a very easy worksheet (circle the wind instruments etc.)

Hausaufgaben

Seine Hausaufgaben für die Musikschule - üblicherweise ein sehr leichtes Arbeitsblatt (alle Blasinstrumente einringeln oder so)

Boardgame
Ligretto Dice is a very fast paced and fun game that I love to play with Mr. Noodles
Teaches: following rules, counting, fine motor skills, fast observation

Brettspiel

Würfel Ligretto ist ein sehr schnelles Würfelspiel, das wir sehr gerne zwischendurch  spielen.

Er lernt: Spielregeln folgen, zählen. Feinmotorik, schnelles Beobachten

Apple count:
He just has to put the right amount of apples on the tree and count them (over 20 is still a little hard for him) This is from http://www.2teachingmommies.com
Teaches: counting

Äpfel zählen

Er muss die richtige Menge "Äpfel" auf den Baum legen und sie zählen - über zwanzig ist er noch etwas wackelig. Das Spiel ist von http://www.2teachingmommies.com

Er lernt: Zählen

 Reading:
We read a story  and I  point out some of the words
Teaches: Word recognition

Lesen

wir lesen zusammen eine Geschichte und ich zeige ihm einige Wörter

Er lernt: Worterkennung

You may have guessed so by now, our topic this week (or rather the past two weeks) was "fall" with some apples and leaves mixed in. We pretty much finished this unit this weekend - I'm not entirely sure what I want to do next. I still have knight stuff for a couple of days (we started that unit but dropped it after we started talking about fall and leaves instead of knights...) that I could finish up or if we should get started with the Halloween stuff and finish that knights at some other time...

Ihr habt es warscheinlich schon erraten, aber unser Thema in den letzten Wochen war eine bunte "Herbst" -Mischung mit Äpfeln, Blättern und Drachensteigen. Wir sind damit jetzt so ziemlich fertig - Ich bin noch  nicht so ganz sicher was wir als Nächstes machen. Ich hab' noch Material für ein paar Tage Ritter (die Einheit haben wir unterbrochen), könnte aber auch gleich mit Halloween anfangen...

Finger print Autumn trees are so much fun! I laminated them afterwards - I haven't told you about my new Laminator yet, but that has to wait for a different blog, this one is too long already :-)

Fingerabdruck-Herbstbäume machen Spass! Ich hab' sie anschließend Laminiert - aber über meinen Laminator schreib ich ein anderes mal :-) 

Vee

How angry birds can help your kids physical fitness - and I'm not talking about their thumbs! Wie angry Birds die Motorik deiner Kinder verbessern kann - und ich meine nicht die Daumen!

Mr. Noodles Birthday cake was
made by the wonderful Lady deWeird

Tweet  Okay, I admit, my five year old plays angry birds on our galaxy tab and he loves it. He is actually very good at this - and not just "good for a five year old".

Na gut, ich geb's ja zu - mein fünfjähriger spielt Angry Birds auf unserem Galaxy tab und liebt es. Er ist richtig gut darin - und ich rede hier nicht von "gut für einen Fünfjährigen"

Now, the leading opinion among parents (at least in Austria) is that preschool kids shouldn't watch TV or use computers and older kids should only use them for learning. Now, I'm not going to open THAT can of worms today (lets just say that I have a different oppinion...).
Also, die allgemeine Meinung unter Eltern (zumindest hier in Österreich) ist ja, daß Kindergartenkinder nicht fernsehen oder Computer spielen sollen und daß auch ältere Kinder Computer nur zum Lernen verwenden sollen. Dieses Büchse der Pandora mag ich jetzt gerade nicht aufmachen (ich bin da anderer Meinung...)

I'm not going to talk about the fact that angry birds teaches my son about slingshots, catapults, trajectories angles and so on.
Ich will auch nicht darüber reden, dass mein Sohn bei Angry Birds eine Menge  über Schleudern, Katapulte, Flugbahnen und Winkel lernt.

So, what is it about? Worum gehts denn dann?

Mr. Noodles Diego in the Jungle

well, my kids love to play what they see on TV. I can't keep count of the times I had to sing "come on, Vamanos" on the way to the supermarket while spinning my kids around or pretend to some animal that they have to rescue...
Angry birds lead to the same thing. Any time we are outside walking for any reason, we play angry birds. It goes like this:
I am the slingshot. each kid grabs one of my hands and pulls them wayyyy back. I start pulling them a little, they start running, release my hands and are off. If he's with us, Dad has to be The Pig. They run until they hit him, going "weeee" while they do it. If there's no pig, they just run for a bit and then we start over again.

Meine Kinder lieben es, alles was sie im Fernsehen sehen nachzuspielen. Ich kann nicht mehr nachzählen, wie oft ich "come on, es geht los" auf dem Weg zum Supermarkt singen musste wärend ich meine Kinder im Kreis drehte oder wie oft ich ein in Not geratenes Tier sein soll, das gerettet werden muss...

Bei Angry Birds ist es genauso. Jedes Mal wenn wir draußen sind spielen wir Angry Birds. Und so functioniert es:

Ich bin die Schleuder. Meine Kinder ziehen meine Arme nach hinten. Ich zieh ein bisschen an, die Kinder rennen los, lassen meine Hände los und "fliegen". Wenn er dabei ist, muss Papa das Schweinchen sein. Sie rennen dann, bis sie ihn fast umrennen. Wenn kein Schweinchen dabei ist, rennen sie einfach ein Stück und dann geht's wieder vom Anfang los.

Awesome, right?

Rachel over at I Heart Crafty Things had a different idea - go check out her post about playing angry birds outside :-) It's awesome and looks like soooo much fun - I would totally do that for a kids birthday party!

 Rachel von I Heart Crafty Things hatte eine andere Idee - schaut Euch ihren post an über Angry Birds im Freien spielen :-) Das ist ein toller post - das Spiel schaut aus als würde es sehr viel Spaß machen. Es ist sicher toll für eine Geburtstagsparty!

Keep creating! Vee from sunny Vienna

I just realized I never showed you this...

Tweet I know the Holidays are wayy behind us, but I just realized that I forgot to show you what I made for my husband! He is the biggest Star Wars Fan I know...

Weihnachten ist zwar schon lange vorbei, aber mir ist gerade aufgefallen, dass ich euch nie gezeigt habe, was ich meinem Mann geschenkt habe! Er ist der größte Star Wars Fan den ich kenne...

I got the fabric from a really cool shop on etsy...

Die Stoffe habe ich auf etsy in einem echt coolen shop gekauft...

http://www.etsy.com/shop/whimsiedots


and the solids are from Ikea
die einfarbigen Stoffe sind von Ikea

This is the first quilt I have ever made :-) I had a blast - I think it took close to 100 hours for me to finish it. I started by cutting up the Star Wars fabric into squares and rectangles in multiple sizes from 5cm to 40cm (all multiples of 5cm) plus half a cm or so all the way around. I arranged the squares/rectangles into 40cm by 40cm squares, filling the gaps with 5cm solid squares.


Das ist der erste Quilt den ich gemacht habe :-) Ich hatte jede Mange Spass - und habe etwa 100 Stunden gebraucht. Ich habe zuerst den Star Wars Stoff in quadrate und Rechtecke geschnitten, die eine Größe von 5-40 cm hatten (alle ein vielfaches von 5cm), ein halber cm Nahtzugabe ringsum. Ich habe die Stücke dann zu großen. 40cm quadraten zusammengesetzt, die Lücken hab' ich mit den Ikea stoffen gefüllt.


I'm going to have a scheduled upload this week! I will upload on Sunday night to my etsy shop - you can follow me on facebook to see a preview as soon as I take the picture!


Ich werde am Sonntag abend neue Puppen in meinen etsy shop stellen - ihr könnt mir auf facebook folgen, um fatas der puppen zu sehen, befor sie in den shop kommen!

I see you - Oe-l nga-ti kam‹ei›e

Tweet Did you like James Cameron's "Avatar"? I sure did - what really stuck with me where the gorgeous colors in the forest at night. At the time I didn't know what to do with it - I was inspired, sure, but I had no idea what to make. When I saw the blue doll skin fabric I immediately knew what I wanted to do.


So, here he is. It took me a long time to finish this one - I actually started him when I made my second bunch of dolls for sale - but I somehow never had the nerve to actually paint his face and body with the blue color. I was so scared I'd ruin all of my work...
Well, I finally did it, and finished his hair and clothing too (the breading and beading was a lot of work - the beads just barely got on the little braids...), so now you get to see him.

My son loves him, too. But that's not really much of a surprise, he loves all my dolls and wants his picture taken with them :-)


Nerdy greetings from cold but sunny Vienna,
Vee


PS. I will, from now on, refrain from using my kids real names on my blog. I don't mind doing it and I don't really see any danger involved - but my husband pointed out that using their names makes them easier to find on google, and that they might not appreciate all the little stories I tell about them once they are older and easily embarrassed :-D


I have yet to find cool pseudonyms - I'll just use son and daughter for now. Do you have any cool ideas?

Behind the scenes: the making of a bunting baby

I thought you all might enjoy a look behind the scenes - I recently made a whole bunch of bunting babies for my etsy shop, but a nice customer decided they wanted a baby with open eyes instead of my usual sleeping babies. I was delighted to make a baby like that - and I have to say that I have NO IDEA what I prefer. What do you think?

To the cutting board... errr ...table! After that, I sew the body and hat with a special, non ripping thread - not the same as the one I use for the shaping of the head, though.
The customer wanted a purple body and hat, blue eyes and brown hair. I love doing custom work because I don't have to come up with all the possible variations - and I always hope that a custom doll will end up being something really special to a customer.

The head is filled with fiber fill to make the doll washable since it is for a little baby and shaped with non ripping thread into the typical waldorf head shape. The nose gets stitched on right after this step.

After the head has been covered with skin fabric, I mark the  face with pins. I had a lot more pictures - but I didn't want to give away all of my little secrets ;-)
Also, this blogpost would  get really, really long!



Once I like what I see, I have another use for the pins - I use one to paint the doll's face. The eyes are painted in several steps with lots of drying time in between - and I love adding the final touches like freckles and the highlights in the eyes. It makes the come alive!


I fill the body and attach the head and the hands. Hair is added to the head and the little hat is stitched on - this may sound like a quick step, but it actually takes quite a long time to get everything right - especially the hair!

At the end, the doll gets a haircut and is ready for shipping! I take a last picture so I can add the doll to my gallery (I promise! I'm working on it!), the doll gets a last hug and a kiss for good luck and it's on her way to the USA.

I hope you'll arrive soon at your new home!

Hugs,
Vee
Want a custom doll, too? check out my etsy shop!