Pink Hair, Audio Drama, Writing Sleepover

Weekend 16th and 17th
Mainly resting as I came down with the Cough of Doom, which I will now have for a few weeks I expect.
On Sunday we went to L's impromptu cafe for Comic Relief. I had soup and cake and a drink and Freya had pizza and cake and played with L. L did well, as it was very short notice, raising over £18. I think we are all Comic Reliefed out now!

Monday 18th
Tried having very restful day to make Cough of Doom go away, didn't work. In the evening I helped Freya practise her pieces for her LAMDA drama (exam coming up end of April). They are doing a Cheshire Cat speech and First Fairy in A Midsummer Night's Dream, she was working on actions mainly.
Tried large nightcap dose of ginger wine against Cough of Doom but CoD won that one too and I only got 2 hours sleep, one at the beginning and one at the end of the night. Ugh.

Tuesday 19th
Took Freya up to LAMDA session, then rushed around town doing errands in feverish state, which gave CoD a tighter grip than ever, also had to talk to people, which CoD thrives on.
Slept on sofa propped up and did actually get about 5 hours sleep.

Wednesday 20th
Freya had Forest School and I was in throes of work and preparation of audio drama with Friday Club. Also had to go up to Post Office to post 2 things that people couldn't wait for me to stop coughing to post. CoD loved that and made a comeback.
In the evening we dyed Freya's hair, which is now pink! (squeeeeeeeeeeeee!)

Thursday 21st
Hadn't slept much again so didn't go to Livewires themed on South America but did send my prepared stuff (crossword mainly on countries, pictures of Nazca lines) and my daughter, courtesy of K. Put audio drama together for Friday. Freya came back happy, having eaten lots of salsa made with a great variety of raw veg and fruit, an idea I like, so decided to adopt and adapt.

Friday 22nd
Friday Club - Audio Drama. 
This was my idea and although the logistics were quite tricky, it worked in the end. I won't add it here to listen to as I haven't asked permission from girls and parents. Basically over the last few weeks they have each produced a character to play in the audio drama, which is set in a bookshop and cafe in a village (I think we're calling it Oddlington!), then this week they all recorded a few lines in character and sent them to me by e-mail or other means. I put them all together and added a few sound effects and other bits and we ended up with the first episode of our (hopefully) long-running drama. The characters they came up with were a teenage girl with dyslexic boyfriend, a very enthusiastic grandmother of a toddler looking for chewy books, a fussy snobbish 'lady of high disposition', a 4-yr old who WANTS ICE-CREAM NOW, a girl who didn't let the bookshop worker get a word in edgewise, a woman struggling with partner in prison and child having issues, a girl looking for a present for her little brother, a stressy in-a-hurry journalist called Alesha Shark, a girl with several dogs who got chucked out of the cafe, but not until the dogs had left a little surprise in a corner and a girl who spotted Jacqueline Wilson and whose mum didn't really understand her. They all worked really hard devising their characters, trying voices and coming up with their recordings, it was fab! Some used smartphones or tablets to record, or dictaphone type things, and I invested in a small USB mic to lend out to others too.
Very good fun, would recommend it, acting without getting worried about people looking at you!

Audio Drama was only the first part of the session, fortunately for my cough, which wouldn't have let me last much longer. They then had lunch and went on to reviewing Friday Club so far, with K. Not sure if we will get feedback from that, will be interested to see what they have enjoyed and what is coming next.

Then to last yoga, as numbers have dwindled below sustainable level. Freya was upset at the end, but not too bad, she doesn't like goodbyes.
Back home I had preparation for Freya's Writing Sleepover to do, and was glad when it got to wine and curry o'clock.

Saturday and Sunday 23rd and 24th
The weekend of Freya's much looked-forward-to Writing Sleepover. She had 3 girls coming to stay the night and meeting up with a few more the next day for geocaching. 
Went to rollerdisco, taking L with us, though not without annoying taxi issues, which notched my stress level up to 11. 
After rollerdisco, came back with L, and L and M arrived. First they hung out in Freya's room for a while, then had pizza with make-your-own-salsa (I supplied pots of finely chopped tomato, peppers, mango, pineapple, cucumber, and a dressing). For pudding I gave them sorbet, ice-cream and warm chocolate fudge sauce. All of which went down really well.
Then they went back up to Freya's room and played Categorically Speaking while J and I had our dinner.
Then a writing workshop that I led (I based it on some that I've attended led by my friend Sharon) - a few games to loosen us up - though children are often ahead of the game there compared with us adult writers - then an extended exercise working on characters using pictures of places and imagining a character there, the sounds and smells, their feelings, etc. We ended up taking 2 characters and making them meet up. They did some great writing, they definitely write pretty freely, trying out different styles. Was impressed by their vocabulary and the complexity of some of what they did. Very focused too! I joined in, so it was nice to do some writing alongside.
Then a game was attempted but didn't quite get going, things got a bit wobbly for Freya, all were tired. Original plan had been to end up watching a film on laptop in Freya's room, but it became apparent that it was getting way too late, so negotiated watching it in the morning downstairs in 3D.
They had a midnight feast and chatted in bed for a while, then asleep about 1:30am.
In the morning they appeared in the living room all completely encased in their sleeping bags like big giggling worms! They watched Madagascar 3 and had croissants. Then there was a turnaround time for geocaching with one going and some arriving and finding out who was coming.
Geocaching - I over-managed it, in dread of someone being upset about not doing one - and still ended up with one child missing out due to time constraints. Lesson for me, you are not a manager, don't do it. Better at going with flow and dealing as it happens, or at least no worse. Still 4 caches were found - I had put writing prompts in them to stay on theme! Bitterly cold day, so ended up at cafe for hot drinks and they did some of their writing there. Four adults got to chat too over coffees, not exactly setting world to rights, but lamenting the wrongs.

Today I'm hoping to just rest and see if I can turn the corner away from the Cough of Doom. So far going OK...

Tough, Old, Sweet and Bold, Pyjamas, Chocolate Ice-Cream and Poo

Thursday 7th

A day at home, we did some still-life drawing and painting practice together, in preparation for next day's Friday Club session. I set up an apple, jar of coffee (why did I include that, impossible!), red pepper and hairbrush all on a plate. Freya did well with it, especially the highlights and shadows I thought. One of the things I wish we managed to find more time for. I loved that Freya captioned her picture "Fictional reality: tough, old, sweet and bold"

Friday 8th

Sponsored pyjama-wearing at Friday Club - Art - still life drawing with pastels and other materials. Lots of concentration by everyone I think, after initial excitement about all meeting up in pyjamas.  

Weekend 9th-10th

Took Fidget in to be checked out at open clinic and she was fine and no more to pay, thank goodness. Later on Saturday took Freya to leisure centre for rollerdisco. Back home we watched Hotel Transylvania, I think, in 3D. Quite fun!
On the Sunday we went to Spring Barn with J's mum and Freya managed to do the drop slide, after about an hour of working up to it, and finally deciding I should push her!

Then a lovely meal at Pizza Express, thanks to J.


Monday 11th

Had lots of paperwork and meeting a financial advisor and all that sort of thing, ugh. Then took Freya to drama/dance, the last session, which is a shame - might start again in September. I had a coffee with M and a good chat, as she had had a particularly productive and exciting morning!


Tuesday 12th

Snow! L came to play. They made some pastry things, though Freya got grumpy about me worrying that shortcrust pastry wouldn't work. I had a lot of work to do and ended up staying up till 4am. At the time I thought the job was worth X amount of Euros, but I didn't get the Purchase Order through till Friday and it turned out to be quite a bit more, which is lucky as March hasn't been that good workwise.
 

Wednesday 13th

Forest School cancelled, me very tired from working night, we both flopped on sofa and watched Tinkerbell films in the afternoon.


Thursday 14th

Freya and I spent 4 hours going around town for her marathon Comic Relief effort, first she did litter-picking along several streets and planting bulbs at the station, with the lovely Community Rail person, Sam.

Then she did offering to tell jokes in shops (her original idea had been litter picking, then I had sounded out our local councillor about areas to pick litter and she had suggested planting, then I think Freya and I together came up with the idea of offering to do a small task in shops). In the event, nobody in shops wanted tasks doing, I think it would have needed longer notice, it's hard to think on the spot of things that someone can do just coming in without any prior experience or knowledge. Anyway, a lot of them opted for a joke and this was the joke that got told about 30 times I think:
Q: What is the difference between chocolate ice-cream and poo?
A: A toddler can turn one into the other but can't seem to manage to do it the other way round.
Which mostly went down very well, and raised £50. Freya had also got about £80 in sponsorship for both the pyjama event and this.


Friday 15th

Friday Club's Red Nose Day cake sale - I sat in at Friday Club for a couple of hours as the girls made cakes and sausage rolls to sell. All wearing deeley boppers, funny to look over into the kitchen and see all these red things swaying around as they worked! I was mending Sleepy Cat (aka Dozy Mog), who was in need of such serious repairage that the stitching needed to be disguised with a new jaunty jacket made from one of Freya's old skirts.
Then we headed up to the High Street and sold our wares, with a little distraction of red hair colour spraying now and then. The children are pretty confident now, having done this a few times, and most of them go off in little groups with trays and tins, returning with money. Freya went off for ages with a group, and they went right up the hill and beyond.

People were very generous - we don't price the cakes but ask for a donation - and the sale raised £307. Added to what had already been raised by Friday Club members, this makes £666, well over K's original target. It was chilly but not as rainy as expected, and nice to see various people joining in.

Starlight Express, Comic Relief, Friendship, Difference

Days have gone to:
A maths paper from Internet for the school year above Freya (she didn't need much help - we don't do them as tests, it's a way to learn some new stuff and practise stuff; she wasn't best pleased that some questions just involved expressing terms a different way, rather than solving the equation);
J doing Sunday overtime;
Freya and I doing some French for the first time, starting with a park scene and a few bits of vocab; will do a woodland scene next I think, I learned a few things not to do;
Other things including dance/drama, Forest School, baking shortbread, tomato bites, apple puffs and lemon/orange cupcakes, other ideas for raising money for Comic Relief in various ways;
Starlight Express on at theatre in Eastbourne, we saw it with a few other home-ed families - not keen on the sexual stereotyping or the plot/characters, but had to admire the energy that went into it, and the lighting was excellent;
Book Club attended by a reduced number of 7 girls and a puppy! Me setting off burglar alarm and not setting off heating (rolls eyes at self). Our theme was Friendship, and books were A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett, Fortune Cookie by Jean Ure, Violet Raines Almost Got Struck By Lightning by Danette Haworth. Lots of really good discussion about the friendships in the books, and other aspects, was a lovely session, so fond of that group. Next book is Wonder by R.J. Palacio and the theme is Difference.
Making charts of numbers of each type of cakes and biscuits sold; 
Forest School, meeting to discuss ways forward, things to improve;
Drama, Creative Writing, Monday Group.
Huge vet's bill.
Have probably forgotten lots of stuff, oops.