Project 52 2019 week 26 – heatwave

Week 26 sees us at half way through the year. It’s been a quieter week at work, although school is ramping up.

On Sunday N played in his first official mini orange matchplay tournament. He and his friend were up against children who’ve been playing orange over the last year, so they did really well. It’s noticeable how much better they play against strong competition and in the larger orange court. They have so much more space to move around and can reach for the ball rather than being cramped when hitting the ball on a red court. It was really hot and muggy, and the kids all did really well playing in it.

On Monday it was the start of sports week at school. They all go in wearing sports gear, and there’s lots of sports based activities and lessons.

Tuesday I spent trying to get N’s tennis rating sorted out. Unfortunately the Sunday matches went on straight away, before the Saturday ones which meant another 2 days to wait for his rating to change online, and the orange matches were then in the wrong order to count against his rating. Eventually the rating did move up to Orange 4, but we were still missing the orange matches. The LTA customer service lady was very good and explained she’d probably have to manually update it.

Wednesday, N’s rating was changed to Orange 3 after they counted the 6 matches he’d played on Sunday. But while they manually changed the rating, they didn’t pushed through the matches so I think his dashboard is now permanently going to be 6 matches behind. Sigh. They also had their whole school photo. It was a new guy so they didn’t have their usual frame to stand on. N had to explain all the ins and outs of who was standing where.

On Thursday I had a relaxed evening as the OH and N went off to get their hair cut. They go a ridiculously long way, and yet again I was only told the day on the Wednesday which meant I’d already paid for after school club.

Friday was a busy day. I picked N up from school, then got him fed before tennis, and got my hair and make up done for our night out. Tennis was a bit on the hot side but it was nice to chat to the other mums. A quick drive back home, changed, and N headed over to the farm where he was staying while we were out. We had a lovely pub meal out for a friend’s birthday. I was grateful there was a delicious chicken burger on the specials board otherwise I was struggling for a main meal choice. Too much fish and steak on the menu and not much else.

Saturday was blisteringly hot – over 30C – I’m glad it’s not going to stay such heatwave weather. Way too hot for me. We did food shopping before swimming so we avoided the worst of the heat.

N’s swimming teacher had them in flippers swim fins which he loves. Lots of butterfly legs and arm practice today. His swimming friend he’s been in classes with since Water Babies is struggling in this group. She moved up to level 5 from the other teacher’s level 4 group, and just doesn’t have the basic skills for butterfly and breast stroke that N’s teacher drummed into her pupils before she’ll move them up. It’s a shame because his friend was at the same level of swimming before level 4 when she changed teacher. Must be so frustrating to have missed the technical teaching. Not sure what’ll happen and whether she’ll have to go down before coming back up again.

She’s not the only one who’s had similar problems – there’s 2 kids in other stages who’ve moved to N’s teacher on moving up a stage, and they’ve struggled too. It’s strange that they’ve one teacher who’s all about technique and the other who’s about just getting them swimming. I’m glad N was always in the class with the technical teacher, however hard it makes it to move up.

I spent the rest of Saturday hiding in the house with the curtains closed. I still had a heat headache, and didn’t feel hungry, but I’m holding on to tomorrow being cooler.