Day 16

Today was the final day of summer scheme!

(All together now "awww"!!)

We got our totem pole up and it was just as fantastic as we expected!

In the afternoon we had a party with a disco, treats to eat and games to play! It was a great was to round off the summer!

Huge thanks to everyone who worked so hard to make the summer scheme such brilliant fun!

Day 15....

We can hardly believe we're at the penultimate day of summer scheme!

This morning we finished our paper tee pees, they're really lovely, much more colourful in real life than in this photo!

We also made headbands with feathers in them to wear at our pow wow tomorrow!

This afternoon we were visited by 'Owl Magic' - at was all about the feathers today!!

David and Colin bought 5 different owl for us to meet! We felt so lucky that we got to be so close to their beautiful birds! We got to hold them on our arm and to stroke them, we couldn't believe how soft they were!

Everyone went home feeling great after a really exciting afternoon, we'd recommend Owl Magic to anyone it was a fantastic experience!

Wig Wam Bam!!!

Here's another sneak preview!

This time it's of our tee pees, we made the sheets of multi coloured tissue on day 13, they'll be dry and ready to roll around a tripod frame next Tuesday.

These pictures were taken in the art cupboard with an LED light inside the tent, imagine how beautiful a village of tee pees will look! Hopefully next week we'll have a picture of that to show you!

Day 14

This morning we made life size Native American figures, we made a Chief, a medicine man and a squaw!

We worked in quite large groups which ment that we had to work hard to cooperate with each other!

Aren't they FAB!!

This afternoon we had a creative writing session. We worked in groups and created poems inspired by Native American writing.

We used percussion instruments to turn our poems into a chant and performed them!

sneak preview...

Shh!!
Don't tell anyone
that you've seen this!!
I couldn't wait
to see how the
totem pole was
going to look!
Now I know
the answer...

AMAZING!!

Day 12

What a busy day we had!

It started with a music and movement group with the fabulous Linda Payne! We alway enjoy Linda's groups and feel really lucky that she comes to work with us! We had a really active session, we worked as part of a group and performed solo! Linda always finishes with time to relax, and usually we need it!!

During the afternoon we contined work on our Native American artwork... we continued painting, we can't wait to see all our individual work combine to make a fantastic group piece!

Day 11

Today we got some paint onto our totem poles, what a difference a bit of colour made! They're starting to look fantastic!

We like the fact that you can see the writing on the box in this picture! It shows that although for a while it appeared to be just a big collection of cardboard there was always going to be a creative outcome!

This afternoon the weather was terrible! We should have had outdoor games, but we had to have a quick rethink!

We played board games and did puzzles, some of also baked. We had lots of really ripe bananas so it made sense to use them up, we could have used recipes from we are cooks. They're in the oven at the minute and they smell DELICIOUS!!!

WE ARE CHILDREN!!!

It's not just been adults who have enjoyed a summer full of activities!
Our Children's Services team have been running a busy, fun filled summer scheme for the last month!
They've done huge amounts of fab things... trips and outings, baking and making, arts and crafts, sports and games to name a few!

Watch this space for more photo's coming soon!


We took advantage of good weather when we got it to play outside. These photo's are of our 'graffiti' drawings inspired by a trip to Kelburn Castle where we saw the graffiti project!

Day 10

This morning we have continued to work on our totem poles!

These photo's were taken of our work drying outside, we joined them together so that we had an idea of how our totem pole might look when it's finished!

This afternoon was quiz time...

Today's victorious team with 69 points were 'The Surviving Bunch'! Well done guys!

Day 9

(We went to Loch Lomond for the day on day 8 in case you're wondering!!)



Today we started work on our 3D totem poles, we are building them using cardboard boxes that Ali has been hoarding forever!

We used wet tissue and all sorts of bits and pieces from the collage box to make raised outline shapes, then we used plaster of paris bandages over the top of them. It was a bit chaotic, nearly 30 people, plus plaster, plus bowls of water could have been a real disaster but we did really well and made it though the session without any mishaps!
We've still got some work to do with the plaster tomorrow, then we'll leave our work to dry out till next week ready for painting! Already we can't wait to see how they're going to look!

This owls beak fell a bit flat first time round so we added another layer of cardboard to make it really stand out!

Day 7

This morning we finalised our totem designs, so next week we'll get onto making them 3D! We can't wait, everyone is ready for a change from drawing!!

This afternoon we had music lead by Adam, it was really loud, nut great fun!! Andrew was an absolute star on the piano!

Day Six

This morning we continued with our totem theme...

We talked about ourselves, about the things that make us all the unique wonderful people we are! We talked about our personalities, our skills etc. We worked as a group to make a huge list and then chose words that were most relevant to us, eventually ending up with the words that best described us! We drew a 'symbol' to represent each of these words. Today's work will help us towards deciding what we're going to put on our 3D totem poles.

This afternoon was B-I-N-G-O!!!!

We love it!! Especially because Kev makes it SOOOOO much fun! He insists that we shout "mansion" for house and "bungalow" for a line!! No one's really sure why he chooses to wear a wig - we just let him get on with it!!!

spot the difference?!?

Today was Kev's last day at the summer scheme, he's leaving us to go to another job... we're all going to miss him terribly and hope that his new job goes well and that he'll keep in touch!

Thanks Kev for all of your hard work, support and encouragement x

Day five

This morning we started working on Totem poles!

As a group we learned that 'totems' are the symbols carved on the poles - that's why they're called "totem poles"!!!

We talked about symbolism, we use symbols to help us sometimes so we understood that Native Americans used pictures to tell stories about themselves and their families.

We used pictures printed from the Internet from this site it's a great source for pictures for work totem poles! (it saved loads of work!!)

After we had coloured the pictures we carefully cut them out and stuck them onto Brown paper poles!

We think they look great!
This is just the start of our Totem work.... watch this space!

This afternoon we split into groups for music! We did two different activities, some of us used the sports hall and played musical games and some of us talked about music and emotion and then worked in groups to compose and perform a short piece of music! At break time we swapped and did the activity we hadn't yet done!

We also had a 21st birthday to celebrate today and we ended the session by having cake and singing Happy Birthday!

It was another great day!

Day four

This morning we finished off our work from yesterday!

This kachina is to represents the rainbow, with lots of bright colours!

This kachina is represents love, safety and security in our families.

We were really proud of our work when it was finished!

This afternoon we had a quiz, we had a lot of fun although it was a very competitive event!!

Summer Scheme Day 3

This morning we continued to work on our Native American project. Today we talked about kachina dolls, to make our 'dolls' we talked about things that are important to us, we discussed essential things, we decided food, water and love came on this list. We also thought about things that make us happy, some of the things on this list were family and friends, but we also included chocolate, lip gloss and holidays!

Some of us worked in teams and some of us worked on our own, we're going to finish our projects tomorrow!

After lunch we split up into teams and enjoyed a raucous afternoon of games!

Highlights included 'chuck the duck' and a giant space hopper relay!

Summer Scheme Day Two!

Today we finished off our Native American Indian pictures and put them up on the wall to represent our summer scheme tribe!


We spent lots of time on our pictures which had to be coloured and then cut out and put back together, it wasn't easy!

After lunch we had drumming workshops with the wonderful Brian Payne! Which was great fun, energetic and VERY LOUD!!!

Summer Scheme!!!

Today is the first day of our adult summer scheme!

The theme for art this year is 'The Wild West'!

Today we talked about the discovery of America and about the fact that to the Native American people it had always been their home.
We coloured a male or female figure to represent us in a collaged tribe, and made up a name for our characters! Sitting Rainbow, Dancing Rabbit and Running Pink Flamingo are just a few examples!


After lunch we played Bingo! It's always a favourite, especially as we play for prizes!


Let's here you all "Two little ducks, 22"
"Quack, Quack!!!"

Memories of last summer...

During the summer months when school and colleges are on holiday we run both children's and adults Summer Schemes.
Last year at the adult scheme talked about life in Medieval times.


As you can see from the picture we made suits of armour, our steads, lances and shields and staged a mock joust on our front lawn!!

There were 4 Knights, each with a herald to announce them (complete with cardboard trumpet and coat of arms) and a squire, we had a crowd of 'peasants' dressed up to watch and cheer!
Our knights had targets on their shields and paint on the end of their lances, we jousted for points!

Our Chief Exec, Operations and service managers were the royal family, we decorated our gazebo as a tent for them to sit in!

We invited our office staff to come and watch,
it was SO much fun,
It's great when something brings everyone together,
so that we remember we're a working 'family'
as well as a business!

The only problem is that next year we have to do something that's just as much fun! We're talking about possible themes at the moment, look out for lots of photo's over the summer months!

Everything was made from recycled stuff... cardboard boxes, fabric remnants from a local curtain shop, old Christmas decorations, mop handles!!!

A couple of takes on a Knights introduction!