Project 52 2025 week 5

I think we’re all sick of the rain by now. It feels like we’ve only had a couple of hours of blue sky in ages, the rest has just been rain, rain and more rain. Rain and potholes. But at least the evenings are getting lights, and we’re counting down to spring. Here’s my week 5 for Project 52.

Sunday – got lots done today. Went to the farmshop for the butchers, then Sainsbury’s and managed to get some trousers I think might be ok for dancing. I get through my jeans so fast, thanks to rubbing thighs if I wear them too much and normal trousers don’t seem to suffer quite as badly. 

I came home to find a dead pheasant hung on the back of the door, and N de-breasting another bird. The joys of living on a farm with a child who likes eating game. 

Did the vacuuming, had more washing put on/folders, dishwasher on (again, it’s never-ending), prepped dinner, then had time to sit down and finish watching the skating from the Euros. N’s got into baking so he can have snacks at school, so he made a chocolate traybake. He’s not usually a big chocolate cake fan, so I was surprised he chose that.

Monday – work was busy as expected. Did a lazy bacon, onion and tomato sauce pasta for tea. Nice and quick to make the sauce then get it in the simmering oven in for the rest of the afternoon. N pan fried his pheasant breast in breadcrumbs to have for his school lunch.

Tuesday – was meant to be working in the office. But around 10am got a call from school saying N had a bad headache, was feeling sick, and was very pale. So packed up and went to get him. He did indeed look pale although by the time I got to him he no longer felt sick, but then spent the rest of the day asleep in bed. He felt better by the evening and was eating ok.

I went dancing in the evening – a good couple of classes. It does surprise me, that considering I’m the new one in the intermediate class, so many of the others sit out dances that I’ve managed to learn without having been taught them (either going away and learning from the stepsheets/online, or picking them up).

Wednesday – Just work, and N was back at school ok. In the evening I went off to my newer venue dancing. They’re a bit more friendly now, just takes a while for them to warm up to new people. I looked like a bit of a pro because 1 dance we learned last week, I’ve already danced twice at other classes, and a new dance I’ve been doing for 3 weeks! Nice to get the extra practice in, but I wanted to try other classes to learn different dances. Obviously they’re all just learning the new popular ones at the moment. 

At the end as I was leaving the first class, the person I tend to sit next to came over and said that the teachers were happy for me to stay for the next class too if I wanted. Nice that they thought I’d be fine with it, but I want to get more comfortable with more intermediate dances before I try their intermediate/advanced class. Plus it’s 1 ½ hours long and the hall is always super hot with the heaters on. So 2 ½ hours of dancing in a sauna would kill me (and probably my tendonitis too!)

Thursday – after dropping N at the bus stop I headed to Sainsbury’s to pick up my new toaster at Argos. Gone are the days where you could turn up and it would be there for you. Now you have to order and even if in stock you have to wait til after 4pm to pick up. The new toaster is very nice – I ordered a Dualit which was super expensive compared to what I’d usually buy. But I used over £70 of Nectar vouchers, plus got 4% off buying an Argos gift card via my work’s discount website we have access too. So I got a bargain. Hopefully it will last as long as people say Dualit toasters do. It’s the first toaster I’ve owned that toasts bread both sides equally!

Dancing in the evening and we had 3 new people come along to class. And another who wanted to check it out and watch first. They seemed to have fun, so it’s getting to be quite a busy class. 

Friday – more rain. Unbelievably tennis didn’t seem to be cancelled, but none of our boys went anyway. Had a chippy tea for a lazy Friday. And I started watching the Winter Olympics. I will mostly be watching that for the next however long whenever I get the chance.

Saturday – early start into town for my hair appointment. Of course it was raining all day. Nipped to get petrol, then off to the bakery near us. They open at 9ish, by just after 10 when I arrived, they had very little left pastry wise. Luckily they had 2 pain au raisins left for us which are a favourite, and surprisingly plenty of baguettes which usually go fast. Obviously the rain meant people stayed near home rather than heading out.

Rest of the day I caught up on the curling (go GB!) and some of the skiing and slopestyle events. I made the mistake of baking our lemon drizzle self saucing pudding in the Aga rather than the oven at the proper temperature. I didn’t cut down the time enough and burnt the top, so had to cut that off. It still worked and tasted fine, it just looked terrible!

Things I’ve enjoyed this week:

• The Winter Olympics – I love big sporting events like this.
• Lots of dancing.
• Choosing some more Kindle books (not that I need anymore, but you know Prime reading means free books!)

Things I’m grateful for:

• a workplace that understands parents sometimes have disasters they have to duck out for
• N was able to sleep off his bad head
• a new toaster – and it’s brilliant (so far)
• homemade (well, on the farm) sausages