Project 365 2017 Week 36 Day 246 – 252 The week I became a Great Auntie 🙂

Sunday 3rd September – Day 246

 

We were going to the Christening of the youngest member of our NCT group in the afternoon and the weather wasn’t looking good.  My fashion adviser AKA Monkey gave me his critique on a couple of outfits and we both agreed on this dress that I haven’t worn for ages.

The service was lovely and we got to catch up with friends for the afternoon.

Monday 4th September – Day 247

Monday and Tuesday are inset days here and I’d purposely left them clear in my diary to see how tired Monkey was before school was due to resume.  But I’d spotted a friends post on Facebook and knew that we’d have to take a trip out today.  It was the last day of the Bricks Britannia exhibition at the Bucks County Museum in Aylesbury.  It’s somewhere we’ve had on our list of places to visit for ages as its also home to the Roald Dahl Children’s Gallery.

I killed a few birds with one stone and popped into the local Clarks to get Monkey’s feet measured before the museum opened.  His new school shoes would be fine, but he needed to go up a size in casual shoes.  They only had one paid available in a style I liked so we snapped them up.  I’ll have to look for walking boots now too.

We enjoyed looking round the museum and the Roald Dahl gallery but Monkey kept getting pulled back to Bricks Britannia.  The detail on the steaming Flying Scotsman was wonderful and on one side you could see inside all the carriages. There were exhibits showing a range of aspects of British history from the Battles of Bosworth and Hastings to the Magna Carta as well as Vikings and an Iron Age Village.

Tuesday 5th September – Day 248

I’d sorted out Monkey’s back to school things in the morning and it became clear that he’d need a new PE bag as his trainers and plimsolls now take up so much room.  We headed into town to buy him a new one and got his hair cut in the process.  We were both brave and opted for clippers all over for the first time with a number 5 setting.  We both liked the results but I wouldn’t want him to have it any shorter.

Monkey has wanted to visit the newly re-opened World of Water in Bicester Avenue for a couple of weeks, so we popped in to see the fish and had lunch out at Wyevale.  A quick trip into Hobbycraft caused quite a stir.  We’d watched a James May programme about creating a life-size Airfix model of the Spitfire recently and Monkey wanted to try making the regular size one for himself.  He got straight down to it when we got home, with a little guidance and its going to be his after school project for the week ahead too.

There were tears at bedtime about going back to school tomorrow.

Wednesday 6th September – Day 249

The start of Year Three and with a new teacher after two years with his favourite Miss P.  He went back to bed three times before he finally got up and got dressed.  We finally got some smiles out of him and he walked into his new class without any problems or tears.  Phew.

Time for me to resume my domestic goddess title with some much-needed housework.  The peace was a little hard to get used to, but Brewster certainly enjoyed it.

I was greeted by a smile at school pick up and over the course of the next couple of hours he slowly told me a few things about his day.  Too much writing and the maths is hard.  It’s stupid we don’t have drawers to put our book bags in now, but we can get to win funky rubbers and pencils for good work and behaviour.  He doesn’t like the Key Stage Two toilets because the big boys use them, let’s see what happens there then, I really don’t want him to go back to holding it in all day.  Two highlights (for m anyway) he stood up and told the class he’d been to Spain for his holidays.  I’ve no idea what the volume level was like, but he did it.  Secondly, his best friend is having packed lunches this year, but I’ve paid for Monkey to still have school dinners.  This means they don’t get to sit next to each other at lunchtime.  Where this would have caused an issue last year, or him refusing to have hot dinners, he just mentioned it, said he’d sat next to someone else and had enjoyed ice cream for pudding.

Thursday 7th September – Day 250

The duvet thief has been making regular appearances again over the last few weeks and he was back again to wake me up in the night.  He wrote me a few little love you notes as we were having breakfast this morning.

He came home with a letter last night saying school swimming starts on Monday morning.  It threw us both, as I thought it would start after Easter next year.  As much as Monkey loves the water, he hated swimming lessons so much you may remember I had to cancel them in the end. We had a talk about school swimming and he’s not keen at all, so I have no idea how getting to school on Monday will go.  But we got his swimming bag sorted and everything labelled so he’s ready.  He needs a swimming hat, so I bought one in the school office, its red so hopefully he’ll like it.  He went into class ok again.

I came home and opened the laptop properly for the first time in weeks.  I’ve got so many posts to catch up with.

Friday 8th September – Day 251

I finally got to meet Suzanne from Chickenruby!  Another Project 365er but one who normally lives abroad.  We had a lovely time catching up and I got to show her my photos from Dubai dating back to October 1995 when the Burg al Arab was still being constructed.

Monkey came out of school with a smile, he’s survived the first three days but isn’t impressed by the idea of sharing a talent with his class on Wednesday for his homework.

Saturday 9th September – Day 252

I woke up to the news that my great-niece Amelia was born this morning.  Thrilled.

We love Whipsnade Zoo and every year we meet up there with one of my Dad’s cousins.  It’s something we all look forward to and something we’ve been doing since Monkey was a baby.  The forecast was a little grim, but apart from one small downpour we had sunshine for most of the day.