Penguin Games (2014-01-27)

Whilst we waited for everyone to arrive some adventurous souls got out the ropes, after we had asked the head mistress if it was OK. Two benches were arranged in parallel and people swung from one to the other. Next time we will work harder on turn taking and sharing.

We held our Circle News: Flora had a horse riding assessment; Connie is performing a dance with her group; Milly's godmother went to India and brought her back some glass bangles which she showed us; Debbie is going to be Keeper of the Fire on Hostel and has finished knitting a stylish hat; Tessa has discovered that her grandfather was famous as he had an obituary in the paper; Iona made a robot at school where they held a robot parade; Zoe went to a hotel for the weekend; Jay has a jelly cat; Molly also was in the Robot Parade at school; Izzy was seven last Wednesday; Rayan played pass the parcel and other games at Izzy's party; Lena too went to Izzy's party and then home for chocolate; Matilda has a German book to go with her German course and has read the first few pages; Rafiq recommends Ice Age 3 strongly; Pip sang us a song he has made up about his three headed dragon; Xanthe showed us her bear with a poncho she made at District Camp; Millie-Maye has a very itchy wrist;

Tim told about an incident this morning: Flora was waiting at the cross roads on her bike when a car stopped at the give way, beside her, and the grown up signalled for her to cross the main road. Flora did as the grown up said. This was not the right thing to do, as there might have been a car coming. We talked about polite ways of saying No to grown ups.

We first played Penguins where each child has a chair. One child then stands up and is the penguin, who walks in a penguin way towards the one spare chair. Before the penguin can sit down others need to fill the hole, creating a new hole so the penguin needs to change direction.

We played a quick game of Huddle, where the children pretend to be emperor penguins surviving against the cold. Even without shoes on this didn't work terribly well.

We played a game of Wibble Wobble which we learnt last week.

We held a circle and decided to sing what is fast becoming our favourite: Charlie was a Pigeon, many of the children flew around the circle whilst singing.

We sang our Closing song with much gusto.

Leaders: Tim, Debbie
Helper: Zoe
Elfins: 14

Bird Feeders (2014-01-20)

We played Octopus whilst people arrived.

We held our News Circle: Matilda went to Mia's party on Saturday; Lena's Dad has nearly finished her new room; Izzy will be seven in two days; Nia has just had her party for her seventh birthday; Molly slipped on ice in the playground and hurt her leg; Debbie's interview is tomorrow; Milly lost a tooth; Connie went to see Frozen at the cinema with school; Xanthe went to see Cats, which her lodger is performing in; Milly-Maye went to Xanthe's house and had the giggles; Ivo got his finger trapped in the door; Joe saw a biscuit in his near future; Dylan went to his first latin class at the Iris project where he learnt that the Latin for boy was pronounced pooer; Tim went to the Oxford District Woodcraft Folk Annual General Meeting and learnt three new party games with much laughter.

Tim explained that next Sunday is the Big Garden Bird Watch and so we were going to make bird feeders.

We decided to play a new game before making the feeders: Wibble Wobble. Everyone starts out as a Wibble Wobble. You play Rock, Paper, Scissors with someone else. The winner becomes a Horse, the loser stays a Wibble Wobble. Horses have to find another Horse and if they win the become Royalty, is they lose then they become a Wibble Wobble again. Royalty play against each other, the winner remaining Royalty and the loser becoming a horse again. This games has no natural end, so Tim ended it with the shout of Woodcraft Folk.

We then made Bird Feeders using cocoa nut shells to protect them from the rain. The feeders had two strings onto which were threaded annular cereals (cheerios), cocoa nut slices, baby bells, apple slices and peanuts in their shells.

We lined up with our feeders to a spontaneous outburst of Charlie was a pigeon.

We sang our Closing Song.

Leaders: Tim, Debbie
Helpers: Lizbet
Elfins: 12

Games and Songs (2014-01-13)

We played Octopus whilst people arrived.

We held our Circle News, dominated by Christmas presents: Flora is going to have a horse riding assessment test; Millie-Maye and Xanthe had prepared an illustration of their new skill: foot writing; Ivo has the book of Skylander Spires Adventure; Jay got a bow and arrows for Christmas; Rafiq got Lego Mindstorms; Pip got Skylander Swap Force; Dylan got a microscope; it is nine days until Izzy's birthday; Imogen had no news; Debbie has applied for a new job; Molly went to a water park; Milly has a wand and a soap making kit; Connie got a sewing kit; Rayan had a birthday party which Rana baked a cake for; Matilda went to her first German class and learnt a german song; Lena told us all about Christmas morning leading up to getting a keyboard; Natty can dart like Quicksilver; Tim got a wand making machine and will bring it to camp.

We decided to play a game of Shark Attack, followed by Parachute Ball.

We played a game of Dead Ants.

We held s Song Circle and sang Blue Lake and Rocky Shore, Bumble Bee, Back of the bus, Black and White, Black Socks and Charlie was a Pigeon during which most of the circle began flying around the rest!

We held our Closing Circle and sang our Closing Song.

Leaders: Tim, Debbie, Ranna
Helpers: Patience, Zoe
Elfins: 16