Shopping in Westfield

Yesterday, our two Airbnb guests took me shopping in Westfield.

The journey to our destination was longer than I expected, but there at no point in the journey did we have any difficulty getting there.

Arriving at Westfield, I was surprised to see that it was twenty times nearer to the tube station than I had expected. On previous visits , I'd always traveled by car, which was why I hadn't known before.

There were two bookshops in Westfield that I went to, but the second one was way better, as it contained more story books than notebooks, and was bigger. Before I go on, I need to say that I'd read the first two books in a trilogy and only a few days ago, my friend had told me that there was a third book coming out soon; I'd kept an eye out, but hadn't spotted it in the libraries I'd been to. Anyway, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the book in the second bookshop we went to. I spent the last of my pocket money on the book. When I asked the shopkeeper what month it had come out in, he replied that the official day was tomorrow! As the paperback hadn't yet been published,  I finished the book, "Missing Me", in two days. I'm gonna review it soon.

We went to, "The Bodyshop" and I tried out some hand creams. One of our guests surprised me by buying me my favourite one, made out of hemp. I love the smell of it.

We looked at one or two perfume shops as well, and I helped the lady who bought me hand cream  choose a dress, but it wasn't just because she bought me hand cream. The dress was black and it suited her perfectly. It wasn't just me who helped choose it though; it the other lady who we were with did as well.

For lunch we stopped at a tapas place and ordered a Spanish Omelette, some sweet chicken in filo pastry, and tostadas. I loved everything. Afterwards the lady who helped choose the dress bought some mini pancakes with Nutella for us to share. Then we walked around a bit more before buying a milkshake and chips from Mcdonalds.

I hope I can go to Westfield again soon.

Learning song lyrics

My sister and I have been learning song lyrics lately. I used to learn songs at the school I went to, but it's better at home because my sister and I get to choose which ones to learn. Right now we're learning "Grenade" by Bruno Mars. It's not the best song ever, but the tune is a good one and easy to remember. I typed, "Grenade song lyrics" into youtube and there was an option for a music video with lyrics. The words are really badly done because they aren't accurate, but they still help.
I'm thinking of learning the words to the song, "Mamma Mia" because it has a really catchy tune. My sister likes it too and says she also wants to learn the words.

When we learnt songs in assembly, in school, we had to do these long boring warm ups before we started learning the songs. Also it took so long because we had to wait for certain classes to join us before we could begin, and because we had to wait for people to be told off before we could  continue. Plus, we couldn't leave to go to play 'til we were told because the classes had to go one by one.
Okay, that's enough moaning for now.

I've been drawing a lot lately

Since being given a new sketchbook at WEHEC, I've been drawing more than I usually do, which is a good habit to get into. I try to take the sketch book wherever I go in case there is something interesting that I want to draw. I'm confident that my drawings aren't childish and scribbly, which pleases me, but still, I'd like to make them a bit more accurate. I find it hard to draw things quickly and neatly at the same time, so that's something I need a little more practice  on. 

When we went to Camden market (Which is one of my favourite places in London) I brought my sketchbook with me to see if there was anything interesting and easy enough to draw. There wasn't much, but on the way  I stopped to draw a shoe in the window of a charity shop. Having taken a whole fifteen minutes to draw the shoe, I'm not terribly pleased with what was achieved, but at least it looks something like what it was meant to be. 

At the market, there were a few pictures that I did, but they were of colourful patterns, not detailed sketches (No, they weren't scribbles; they were abstract).

Only when we got home did I draw something that I'd seen at Camden, which was one of the metal, hanging optical illusions. It's ok, not terrible, not great. I'm more pleased with my other drawings in the book which include one of a yurt and one of a car, which are probably my favourites.

I'll definitely keep on drawing to practice getting my speed up, and to fill my sketchbook as I'm about halfway through.

The herb walk

At WEHEC, mum and I went on a herb walk with a herbalist called Nikki, who I heard someone calling Nikki the witch as a joke because she is a herbalist.

Before the herb walk I knew that you could touch nettles lightly and eat them raw without being stung, but Nikki said that some people like her could touch nettles quite hard, and even pick them without hurting themselves. She said that different people could touch the nettle in different ways depending on their hands. I knew she wasn't lying because she demonstrated.

Nikki the witch also said that you could make a mouthwash out of strawberry leaves! She says you have to make a tea from the leaves to do so, which is easier than making a syrup or ointment.

Along the walk, I learnt how to recognise a plant called navelwort, which is a small, round green leaf that you can eat raw in salads. It tastes a little bit like a cross between lettuce on a good day, and cucumber. It is very tasty. Navelwort is a bit sour, and is supposed to give you arthritis when you're old if you eat too much of it because it has a high quantity of acid, but it is very unlikely that you'll eat enough of it to wear down your bones. Also, if you balance your diet correctly, it probably won't do you any harm if you eat a lot of navelwort.

The route that we walked through is called Merlin's walk and there were musical instruments that anyone could play along the way. There were wind chimes too, and benches with pictures and messages that children carved a few years ago, to make the benches look nicer and not as graffiti. Nikki said that most of the things along Merlin's walk was designed by kids. She said that they were going to make a live climbing frame out of Willow vines, but the trees weren't growing well enough.

Merlin's walk is a beautiful place, but I think they should do more to keep the plants healthy and look after the place because a few of the plants weren't doing very well.

WEHEC

Yesterday my family and I came back from a homeschool camp in Wales.

The camp, WEHEC (Wales Environmental Home Education Camp), didn't really have talks about homeschooling like I thought it would, but most of the people there were homeschoolers. There were lots of activities instead, like making sock monkeys, which I regret not doing; art workshops with painting, drawing and sculpting; going on swingboats and finally, circus skills. There were other activities, too, but I didn't do all of them, so my favourite is the art workshops. The instructor was stressed, because  it was her first time running the art activities, but I liked her because she was enthusiastic all the time.

Last year we went to a Unicorn camp, also in Wales, and we made friends with a toddler who is really sweet and can talk extremely well for her age. Anyway, because we were in Wales, we decided to meet up with her family, so we went to their house. When we saw the girl, she was so much bigger than she had been before, and she could talk way more. I was really surprised at how much she had grown and I was very happy to see her. We played hide and seek with her, and helped her dad pick potatoes. We also bought a few things from her mum's shop.

In the evenings we sat by the fire chatting. We talked with one woman who revealed a Derren Brown trick to us, but I'm not going to write down how to do it on this blog because it's a secret. We also talked to two boys, and one of them said he spoke Welsh with his mum at home, which surprised me because I didn't know people still spoke it. The boys taught us a rude word in Welsh, which he said he looked up in the dictionary when we asked him how we knew it.

At WEHEC I made some bracelets out of inner tubes from cars. I'm wearing two of them now and trying to remember how I made them. I know the method is difficult, but I think that if I can remember how to do it, I can practice and be really good.

On the last night we watched a performance made by some of the"big kids", which basically means the kids aged ten and over. It was soooo good, and I think that if we go to WEHEC next year, I'd like to participate in the big kids' play.  This year it was about children being turned into zombies and forced to make trainers for a company called Madidas.

I hope we go to WEHEC next year. I prefer it to Unicorn camp 'cos it's smaller, so you get to know more people, and also because there aren't activities every second of the day that you feel like you have to attend so you get loads of free time.