7 quick takes...

05 October

7 quick takes...

Our shop where we can buy bread, soap, not-so-crispy-crisps and sweets.

Good morning! It's quarter past seven, and I am feeling so hot that sweat is dripping down my face. Partly because it's already rather hot but also because I went for a run this morning. The cold shower that I took afterwards to cool down helped only when I was taking it. I guess I'll have to live with the things that bodies naturally do to cool down while I write.
You won't hear me complain about the heat though. I love it. And I love the fact that it will be hot for the next few months. Until rain season comes, we'll swim, eat mango-nice-cream and drink lots of water every day. We get up early to make most of the coolness in the morning, stay indoors during lunch hour and go to bed early because the temperature is exhausting. Around us nature gets browner and dryer. The soil will crack and every part the environment will start to yearn for water. And then... like magic, the first rain comes and everything will turn back to lush and green within days. The people will dance and nature will celebrate. Weather wise, the next months are the most exciting ones in the calendar.
'When I am big. I'll start a shop where I will only sell red, blue and yellow paint. All the other paint is a waste of space and plastic.' This was Sophie's conclusion after a really cool afternoon of learning about colour theory. We watched a few movies where we (I as much as she) learned about where colours come from and how they are mixed. We learned which colours are complimentary and which are analogous. And we saw how you can make a monochromatic paining and how you can use colour to evoke emotions. The most exciting part was making our own colour wheel, starting with red, blue and yellow, and ending with an exciting array of colours. This week we'll put it into practise by analysing how famous artists used colour and by creating photographs where we specifically look at using colour theory. (Did I already say that I love homeschooling?)
Two little feet run through the sand. A few meters ahead are lots of little duck feet running for their life. They don't know that the big danger behind them won't kill and only wants to cuddle. The streets in our village are filled with animals. Cows, goats, chickens and ducks share the space with people and wherever you look you can be sure that you will see animals roaming around. Sophie and Doris love it but always try to catch the animals. They somehow seem to believe that the finders-keepers principle applies to these animals. Last week we went to one of the shops to buy bread and Doris spotted a mother duck with some ducklings. She just could not help herself and tried to follow the ducklings until she could catch one. However, this took longer than she thought and by blindly following the ducks she walked troughs some small alleys and ended up in the backyard of people we did not know. One of the boys who lived in the house caught a duckling for her and Doris was as happy as could be. A few days later we went back to the shop again and within seconds, the boy showed up, carrying a little duckling, that he gave to Doris. He indicated that she could keep it but I didn't think that was the best idea. The duckling was still tiny and it's not as if we don't have enough ducks in our garden already.
I ask the girls what I should write about and Sophie says that I should write about how much she loves drawing. She does. She really likes it and always amazed me with the creative ideas she comes up with. Doris wants me to write about how much she loves card games. Which is true too. She will often already set up a game of quartets and divide the cards and patiently wait until someone is ready to play with her. Even now there is a game waiting for me.
There isn't anything special on our planning this week, apart from a trip to Lilongwe in the weekend because supplies are running low after our failed shopping trip a few weeks ago. Fortunately we can get mangoes for cheap. Yesterday we bought 30 of them for less than 2 Euro. If all goes south, we'll just eat mangoes all week. The girls love it. We can peel as many as we want, they'll always eat it. I can put them in curries, bake with them, make chutney, eat them fresh, make nice cream. The only thing we can't do is make smoothies because the blender that we use several times a day broke . Hopefully we will be able to replace it soon because we are all missing our smoothies.
Time to do other things (like playing a card game with Doris). I wish you all a great week, stay safe!