Project 52 2018 week 50 – Brickwork

I’m a day late for this week’s Project 52, week 50 of 2018. I had a horrendous headache so took a day off the laptop.  Here’s the week’s update.

On Sunday N decided he was going off on the farm for the first time in ages. So I made the most of it and headed off to Stratford upon Avon’s Christmas market. I thought it would just be a few stalls by the RSC theatre and river, but it turned out to be stalls down every ones of the streets in the centre. There was a lot of tat as usual at these things, a lot of the traditional items, and some lovely baskets and items that I liked but didn’t really need. The food stalls looked delicious but I couldn’t decide what to eat for lunch.  It was nice to have a mooch even though I didn’t buy anything.

Monday and Tuesday were normal days at work. It’s a bit frantic as January has a big event for my area, plus there’s 3 other external meetings. With Christmas it doesn’t leave much time for prep and getting pre-read out, so we’re trying to get everything done in very little time. I’m also struggling to get a couple more speaker for the event. We’ve been trying for 3 months, so it’s frustrating we can’t find suitable people to speak.

On Wednesday, our work camera club went out for a challenge photo walk. I wasn’t sure whether I had time to go but I’m glad I did. There was about 7 of us, and we took phones only. It was 25 minutes to walk along the canal and take photos, then quick edit and off to Boots to get one printed. So much fun, and nice to see how different everyone’s chosen shots were. It was such a gloomy day, it was just asking for black and white contrasts. I do a lot of photography on my phone but others don’t, and some others rarely edit. So it was a challenge for a few of us. I was pleased with my brickwork shot, and I’d recommend doing a similar challenge sometime.

On Friday I worked from home then had a half flexi day.  I got a few things done, wrote my Christmas cards, and then headed out to watch N’s target assembly. It’s lovely seeing your children getting their certificates, they’re so proud. Although N’s class is so large – his year is over capacity, as as it’s a mixed class with year 4s it’s too big a class to fit across the hall with all of them achieving their bronze certificates. So they had to split them by year group,

N went back to a friend’s house for a playdate after school with another friend. The 3 of them had a ball.  N didn’t go to the village carol service like the other 2 who’re in the school choir. He had the last tennis lesson of the year which was pretty quiet as many were doing the carol service instead.

Saturday was the last swimming session of the term so a fun swim. N’s favourite week. His teacher confirmed he was moved up to the stage 5 group next term. We arrived a bit earlier than normal so he was the only one in the deep end for most of it until some of the older kids arrived from his usual session.  Then it was a rush off to meet the guys on the shoot because he was going off beating with them.  I had the rest of Saturday to myself so did Christmas shopping in the morning, then spent the rest of the afternoon on the sofa because I had an awful headache. My brother popped in fleetingly.

N was dropped off after dinner at the pub while the men stayed out for the evening. It was lovely the 2 of us snuggled under a blanket on the sofa and watched most of the Strictly final together before N’s bedtime. Yay, Stacey and Kevin won, although I’d have been happy if Ashley or Faye had won too.