LEONARDO: A UNIVERSAL TUSCAN GENIUS

Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, more commonly Leonardo da Vinci (15 April 1452 – 2 May 1519), was a Tuscan polymath whose areas of interest included invention, painting, sculpting, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, writing, history, and cartography. 

He has been variously called the father of palaeontology, ichnology, and architecture, and is widely considered one of the greatest painters of all time. Sometimes credited with the inventions of the parachute, helicopter and tank, his genius epitomized the Renaissance humanist ideal.

Leonardo is the creator of universal works like Mona Lisa, The Last Supper, The Vitruvian Man and Lady with an Ermine.

More information: Love From Tuscany

Learn how to see.
Realize that everything connects to everything else.

Leonardo da Vinci

FLORENCE, LEONARDO & THE HOLMES

Firenze / Florence

Florence / Firenze is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the Metropolitan City of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany.

Florence is famous for its history: a centre of medieval European trade and finance and one of the wealthiest cities of the time. It is considered the birthplace of the Renaissance, and has been called "the Athens of the Middle Ages". A turbulent political history includes periods of rule by the powerful Medici family, and numerous religious and republican revolutions. From 1865 to 1871 the city was the capital of the recently established Kingdom of Italy.

The Historic Centre of Florence [...] was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1982. The city is noted for its culture, Renaissance art and architecture and monuments.

Life offers you a thousand chances,
all you have to do is take one.

Frances Mayes

ROMAN HOLIDAY

Audrey Hepburn & Gregory Peck in Rome

Today, The Holmes have reviewed Future Forms and have taken some information to create a Project about a character.  It’s not a difficult task, especially to this family of hard-workers but it’s laborious and they need to think a lot about the pros and cons.

For other hand, the family is a little tired because of the exhausting travel from Naples to Rome and, today, they’ve decided to relax talking about anecdotes and little stories. This fact is more important because they must start to talk in English and prepare their future speaking.

More information: Comparative Adjectives Exercises

Tonight, they have been walking around the eternal city and they have returned to the hotel to rest and take force because tomorrow morning they’re going to Florence.

I found Rome a city of bricks and left it a city of marble.

Augustus

FUTURE SIMPLE: LIBERTAS PERFUNDET OMNIA LUCE

Coliseum, Imperial Rome

Today, The Holmes have reviewed Future Simple and Comparatives. They have also practised with Social English and have continued creating a marketing campaign.

They've read a little more about Mr. Scrooge in Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol and have been talking about the origins of the security in Europe in the XVIII Century.

Tonight, The Holmes are travelling to Rome, where they’re going to spend two days in the eternal city.

More information: Future Simple & Future Continuous

Homines, dum docent discunt 

Men learn while they teach

Latin Proverb

RESILIENCE VS. VIOLENCE: RESIST OR SERVE

Keep Calm

Today, The Holmes have reviewed Future Continuous, Prepositions of Place and Movement, Enough and Too. It has been an intensive day because they’ve started to create a commercial profile for their new characters.

It’s not easy to find adjectives that describe our skills and our character but they have been working hard and have got some of them.

Finally, we have remembered a horrible fact of our recent History. Today is the 70th anniversary of Auschwitz liberation and we have talked about the disasters of wars. It doesn’t matter when, where or why, a war is always the failure of dialogue, tolerance and respect. We’ve been talking about Winston Churchill and his influence over the British population during the difficult days of war.

For other hand, The Holmes have visited Pompeii and Ercolano and they have climbed Mount Vesuvius up. It has been a great experience. Tomorrow, they are sailing along the coast and they are visiting the Neapolitan islands.

Ruins are remindeds that while time will pass,
memories remind.

  

Anonymous 

FUTURE FORMS (I): PRESENT CONTINUOUS

Scattergories

Today, The Holmes have revised Present Continuous with a future idea. It’s not easy to identify this tense. They have done some exercises about the articles (a/the) and have practised some Social English.

More information: How to write better

It’s turn to write less and speak more and step by step we are going to change writing by oral activities. We have to talk a lot about our new cooperative; chose a name; think a logo and start to work with commercial vocabulary without forgetting grammar.

More information: Write Express

They’ve practised some memo games like the bomb and The Triplets game and they’ve written a little password using only adjectives.

For other hand, the family is still in Naples enjoying its surroundings and its lifestyle. Tomorrow, they’re continuing their travel visiting Pompeii and Ercolano two historical cities.

More information: Comercial & Business English

‘A famma fa ascì ‘o lupo do’ bosco. 

Hunger brings wolf to come out from Wood.

Neapolitan Proverb

FIRST STOP: NAPLES AND SURROUNDINGS

Charles Dickens

Today, The Holmes have started a new book: Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol and have played a little with The Little Prince and his memo.

After talking about the importance of Sant Boi de Llobregat along the history, they’ve listened to a new story about the relation between Via Rubricatus (the Llobregat River) and Via Augusta (the Roman way). Nothing is closed and different theories are accepted nowadays.

Finally, they’ve worked together in the elaboration of an Italian tour. The family is going to travel around this wonderful country with the company of their two horses. Tonight, they’ve arrived to Naples where The Grandma has lots of friends. It will be an intensive week.

By the way, The Grandma is excited because tonight is aired the second part of The X Files season premiere episode. Again, she is with her heroes: Fox Mulder & Dana Scully. Welcome again, friends!

The most important thing in life is to stop saying 'I wish'

and start saying 'I will.'

Consider nothing impossible,

then treat possibilities as probabilities.

Charles Dickens

GOODBYE MÓNICA, THANKS AND GOOD LUCK!

Mónica Holmes

Today, The Holmes have received some news about Mónica. She’s going to leave the family and join to Cirque du Soleil in Paris. All the whole family is enchanted and happy with it and all of them wish good luck and fortune to her.

For other hand, The Holmes have been reviewing some grammar (Present Simple vs. Present Continuous) and have read the last chapter of Oscar Wilde’s The Canterville Ghost.

Moreover, they’ve practised some social English and some activities about telephoning and customer service expressions. The Grandma has explained a story with four guests starring: Marcel Marceau, Charles Chaplin, Charlie Rivel and Totò. They helped lots of people not only offering laughs also helping them to escape from a terrible destiny.

Finally, they’ve played a little to finish this intensive week.

We all want to help one another.

Human beings are like that.

We want to live by each other’s happiness,

Not by each other’s misery.

Charles Chaplin

LOLA: IF YOU REALLY LOVE ME, GET OUT!

Star Wars & Kinder

Today, The Holmes have reviewed some grammar to consolidate their knowledge. They’ve created a sentence based on different connections of various sources. Something difficult to do but they’ve done a great job!

They’ve read another chapter about Oscar Wilde’s The Canterville Ghost. It’s the most important chapter because it contains the cliff-hanger and tomorrow they’re finishing the book.

The family is still in Sicily and today they have talked about how the Mount Etna affected the life of Mediterranean towns in the Middle-Age and how this was the cause of some migrations, in our case, from Balearic Islands to the continent. They have talked about the connections between Majorcan and Andalusian music during this age.

For other hand, they’ve remembered Lola, one of the most powerful artists of the last century. Her force, personality and courage are a source of inspiration for this family, who is working hardly every day to reach their objectives: learn more and more English!

More information: A/The Article

 

Truth always comes out like a drop 
of oil in the glass of water.

Lola Flores 

CARMEN HOLMES & AMIGURUMIS

AMIGURUMI is a Japanese art that consists in knitting in crochet small stuffed objects or toys.

The word AMIGURUMI comes from a combination of two Japanese words: ami (meaning crocheted or knitted) and nuigurumi (that means stuffed doll).

The material, we need to create an AMIGURUMI is: a crochet hook of 2,5 or 3 mm of thickness; cotton or wool yarn in a different colours and a few of synthetic cotton  to fill them (similar at the stuffing of pillows).

AMIGURUMIS are usually worked in spiral rounds, in one or several pieces that then we sew.

This is one of their features. Another is their over-sized round head and a body cylindrical with small extremities.

We start the piece with the magic circle or ring and chain stitch. Then, we crochet increasing and decreasing using the single crochet stitch.

Most popular AMIGURUMIS are animals, but we can do anything we want using this technique: dolls, food, transportation, celebrities....

Internet is plenty of designs and ideas.

The feeling that transmits an AMIGURUMI is affection. They are cute.

Japanese people give a spiritual meaning at this art that takes part of their traditional culture of Kawaii philosophy. They believe these dolls help people to protect their homes. AMIGURUMIS born from the idea of "cheer the heart". The word "kawaii" is a Japanese adjective that can be translated by "beautiful", "sweet" or "lovely".

I can read that AMIGURUMIS also are used as personal amulets, and is super common in Japan seeing them in offices, as an ornament.

You can offer an AMIGURUMI as a toy to children, as a curious gift or as a decoration.

Carmen Holmes @carmenholmes291

Today, The Holmes have worked Present Simple vs. Present Continuous. They’ve continued reading The Canterville Ghost and The Grandma has explained a new bloody story about the relation between legend and real story in the cases of Vlad Țepeș in Transylvania; Jack The Ripper in London, El Chupacabras  in Centre and South America and Enriqueta Martí in Barcelona.

Next, they’ve created a new lullaby taking different themes, mixing them and giving them three important and essential aspects: coherence, cohesion and adaptation. 

"Ninety years ago I was a freak. Today I'm an amateur"

 Jack The Ripper

LULLABIES: PAST, PRESENT & FUTURE

Miguel Hernández Gilabert (30 October 1910 – 28 March 1942) was a 20th-century Spanish language poet and playwright associated with the Generation of '27 movement and the Generation of '36 movement.

Shaped by both Golden Age writers and, like many Spanish poets of his era, by European vanguard movements, notably by surrealism, he joined a generation of socially conscious Spanish authors concerned with workers’ rights. Though Hernández employed novel images and concepts in his verses, he never abandoned classical, popular rhythms and rhymes.

During the Civil War, on the ninth of March in 1937, he married Josefina Manresa, whom he had met in 1933 in Orihuela. His wife inspired him to write most of his romantic work. Their first son, Manuel Ramon, was born on 19 December 1937 but died in infancy on 19 October 1938.

Perhaps Hernández's best known poem is "Nanas de cebolla" ("Onion Lullabies"), a reply in verse to a letter from his wife in which she informed him that she was surviving on bread and onions. In the poem, the poet envisions his son breastfeeding on his mother's onion blood (sangre de cebolla), and uses the child's laughter as a counterpoint to the mother's desperation. In this as in other poems, the poet turns his wife's body into a mythic symbol of desperation and hope, of regenerative power desperately needed in a broken Spain.

More Information: Miguel Hernández Poetry Foundation

Today, The Holmes have worked Present Continuous and Articles 

They’ve talked about using of this continuous form to express future ideas and have created a Lullaby based on Anglo-Saxon model.

Finally, they’ve predicted a “real” future and have invented a short tale joining big and small cards.

By the way, they are still visiting Sicily. Today, they’ve climbed Mount Etna up. As everybody knows, The Grandma is a great fan of volcanoes and they’ve skied in the Etna’s Ski Station. Everyone is fine. There are no broken bones.

More information: Present Continuous

On the cradle of hunger
my baby boy laid.
With onion blood
he was breast-fed.
But it was was your blood,
frosted with sugar,
onion and hunger.

 Miguel Hernández

REVIEWING THE PAST: TAROT & THE GAME OF THE GOOSE

Occitan Flag

Today, The Holmes have reviewed some grammar: some & any compounds, gerunds and imperative. Before this, they had read another chapter of Oscar Wilde’s The Ghost of Canterbury.

For one hand, they’ve listened to a story about the origin of Tarot; the human corridors in the Middle Age and the importance of monasteries like cultural centres and they’ve paid attention to gerunds and infinitives with state verbs.

For other hand, they’ve created a story based on four characters of Tarot.

By the way, The Holmes are in Sicily enjoying the island and its people: Catania, Taormina, Siracusa, Agrigento… the list is endless.

 Á auga de correr e ós cans de ladrar, non llo podes privar.

 Not forbid dog barking or running water.

Galician Proverb

TELEPHONING IN ENGLISH

The Panthocrator of Taüll, Alta Ribagorça

Today, The Holmes have read another new chapter of Oscar Wilde’s The Ghost of Canterville. It seems that the ghost is a little desperate with his new American family.

Next, they’ve listened to a new Grandma’s story. This time it has been about Gypsy Culture and religious symbols like Pantocrator and the Black Virgins.

After that, they’ve gone shopping to practise countable & uncountable. They also have written a shopping list paying attention to money (coins & bills) and numbers (decimals and fractions).

Finally, they’ve started a new manual about Telephoning in English and they have practised some listening.

This weekend, they’re preparing a new journey. They want to go to Italy, from south –Sicily- to north -Milano, Verona, Siena, Pisa, Venice and Florence-, stopping in the way in Naples and Rome.
  

 

  

I have two masters: God and the Devil.
 I work for the Devil until lunch, then I follow the Lord.

 Gypsy Proverb

COUNTABLES & UNCOUNTABLES

Occitan Poetry

Today, The Holmes have practised Countable & Uncountable and have read the third chapter of The Ghost of Canterville.

More info: Countable & Uncountable

They’ve corrected some exercises and played some games of vocabulary. They also have listened to another Grandma’s story about the Catharism and its conception of life and spirituality; the Occitan Poetry and the role of the poets in the court during the Middle-Age.

After that, they’ve talked again about how to create a story paying attention to an important element: Linchpin.

Next, they’ve written a haiku to honour their travel to Japan.

Finally, they’ve created an invented story about Robin Hood and his adventures. It has been a little difficult because it was the first time that they did something like this but they’ve done it very well.

This afternoon, the family has received some news: for one hand, Luisa is fine and she’s resting in the hotel with the rest of the family and her towel; for other hand, The Grandma is sad, again, because Alan and René, two closer friends, have decided to go to a journey without return.

That's it then.
Cancel the kitchen scraps for lepers and orphans, 
no more merciful beheadings,
and call off Christmas.

Sheriff of Nottingham

MAJORCA ISLAND & LUISA'S RESCUE PLAN

Ramon Llull

This Wednesday, The Holmes have had an intensive day.

First, they’ve listened to The Grandma who has talked about the importance of Majorca Island in the Middle-age paying attention to Ramon Llull, Arnau de Vilanova and Abraham Cresques.

Second, they’ve read a new chapter of Oscar Wilde’s The Ghost of Canterbury.

Next, they’ve practised about how to resume a long story and create a plot using the most important information: Who? What? Where? When?

Then, they’ve worked in a rescue plan for Luisa choosing the best options; leaving the worst ones and, the most important, thinking in the inconvenient, dangers and possible problems to avoid all of them and be successful. They must have used some different kind of transport.

  

After that, some members of the family have done some exercises about Present Simple and Social English.

Finally, The Holmes have played together. Scattergories has been the chosen game.

What you don't see with your eyes, 

don't invent with your mouth.

 Jewish Proverb

A GREAT PROJECT: CELLER DE CAPÇANES (PRIORAT)

Origami

This morning, The Holmes have continued their classes.

First, they’ve revised Present Simple doing some exercises.

Second, they’ve listened to a beautiful story about kosher wines in Capçanes, Priorat.

Next, they’ve played a little with a black ball and a bomb.

Then, they’ve learnt something more about the position of the adjectives and about imperative and invocative tenses.

Finally, they’ve made an origami and they’ve described themselves.

This afternoon, they’ve received terrible news: Luisa is missing! 

Now, all The Holmes are elaborating a rescue’s plan managed by Genara. 

Tomorrow, The Holmes are going to rescue her. The plan is going to start at 12:00 am.

As you teach, you learn.

Jewish Proverb