Monday I went out for a run first thing. I wasn't really feeling it as my skin was pretty sore on my back and my neck - everything was irritating me. But I didn't want to make excuses, so I found the most seamless, comfortable running stuff I could wear and went out. I was so glad I had. There was a heavy mist. I didn't take a picture until after it had already started to lift (by the time I was on my second lap).
As I ran the first lap, I was entranced with the shapes of the branches against the pale white sky. I could see the character and detail of each of the trees I passed. This one having a lumpy appearance, the next polka dotted with short protrusions across the branches, the next spindly and wispy, the next full with inky clumps of pine needles.
I came back, showered, dressed, had breakfast...all that stuff. Then sat down to get on with work.
It was half term and the plan was that I would take afternoons off Monday through to Thursday and that Mark would take Friday off. With that in mind, I was going to work downstairs so that we had clear access to the craft room for the afternoon.
The morning flew by as I had had several meetings booked in for me, and it was less than 4hrs to get through. The plan was that Woo and I would make a start on her caravan lighting after lunch. She came in earlier and sat quietly getting on with making a hat for my Lottie doll character, while I was on my meetings. It was nice to have her around.
Bunnykins had been of a mind that she would get the afternoon to play with Lego if I was going to be busy with Woo. Lego is her favourite activity and on top of that - she doesn't like changing the plan she has in mind. I thought I would still try and see if she wanted to do something together. I was delighted when she agreed that we could work on her 3D jigsaw together. It was of the Burrow from Harry Potter. Grandad had got it for her at Christmas.
It was really nice to work away quietly together. She still listened to her music, but we worked side by side, occasionally asking each other if we had seen such and such a piece or celebrating when we got a section finished.
When all the sections were assembled, I was expelled to leave her to the final construction. But it was about time for me to go put the tea on anyway, so I didn't really mind.
In the evening, we had a UkuleleLand rehearsal. My internet connection had been playing up all day, so that made it a bit difficult. It can mess with the speed of the audio that comes through - not the best for playing along with.
Tuesday I started with a workout. I just stuck to my sports bra and shorts as the skin on my chest and neck was just driving me crazy if it touched anything. It was difficult to get any kind of picture of it.
The particular difficulty was finding clothes to wear. I tend to prefer quite high necks and all my vests are racer backs that come high up on the back. I had one top with a v on the front and back. I had a quick unpick of all the labels. For all my clothes this week it's either been - wear it inside out or take off labels.
My hair was also driving my neck crazy. It's not quite long enough for a proper pony tail so I tried using a scarf. It was successful in getting the hair off my neck, but this wasn't what I would normally wear for work.
In the morning, Woo got the hat finished for my doll. I look very pleased with it...as I rightly should.
I particularly like the distressed vintage look that had been applied.
After lunch and a walk, we tried again with the caravan. Last time we had been working on it, early in the first lockdown or maybe last summer (I can't remember), we had got to the point of needing to add the lights in and wire them up. The instructions had been translated from Chinese so weren't the best. It was all just a bit of a barrier to getting the momentum needed to do it. But I was determined that we would figure it. Tbh, the wiring was of course very simple. I am an engineer - I have studied this stuff even at the most basic level.
Once we started looking at it in seriousness, it turned out to be much simpler that it had seemed. We figured out that the battery pack provided wasn't sufficient. Fortunately we had a separate electronics kit with battery boxes (the kind where you add 4 AAA batteries, or others where you have 6 AA etc.), with a bit of experimentation we figured out what we needed. Our other kit also had better wire, which we decided to use rather than that provided with the caravan.
Woo got on with preparing the wire.
Then we got ready to do the soldering of the joints. It's been a while since she's done soldering, but she did well.
Woo first did soldering back when she was in yr 3 primary I think. She had a project from school and she wanted to add a lighting circuit. Ever keen to encourage this sort of thing, we helped her figure out how to create a basic lighting circuit with some LEDs and a battery. We let her do the soldering. She managed to burn herself. Well that is bad enough, but she burnt herself twice - bad parenting! When she took the project into school we said "whatever you do, don't say you burnt yourself!". She came home and we asked about the project presentation to the class....with a big smile she said "I told them I soldered it myself and that I burnt myself twice!". We weren't taken away by social services and Woo carried on in life without too many mental and physical scars it seems! Anyway, it's good for her to get back in practice ready for STEAM GCSE hopefully.
Wednesday morning was busy as before, can't think of anything particular needs saying about that.
With the soldering all done, the lighting circuit was fixed into place. We needed to order the right size battery box as the ones we had weren't switched, but all the other work was done on the lighting and it was ready to go. Oh yes, I also managed to create a short circuit in the thing by taping two bits of wire together with electrical tape that had bare sections. I realised as soon as we tested it (and it didn't work) what I had done, and then tried to use it as a teaching point 😂😜...Woo did also figure it out and I like to think it helped her learn more about electrical circuits...or at least that what I was telling myself as I undid all the sticky electrical tape.
We got it all to a good point to leave the glue (from placing the lights in position) to dry. Then I went to read my book for half an hour before sorting tea.
The evening felt a lot more relaxed than usual. I guess that is what having a bit of reading time does rather than going straight from the desk to eating supper. I had a good chat with John.
In the afternoon, Woo was getting on with some of the next bits of the caravan crafting, the item below is a teeny tiny whisk she made!
Woo was happily getting on with lots of little accessory creating (like the whisk) and then making and assembling the sink unit.
Sadly something went wrong with the merangues...as I guess it often does. They didn't reach stiff peak state. So I suggested we try to make something else with what we had (another learning experience!!). We added some flour and flavouring which made a very dry...but very fragrant dough. Bunnykins likes cinnamon and nutmeg and vanilla, so it was a very Christmassy scent.
We put it in the oven, and got out something a bit like edible lava rock...quite open texture - but rock solid and flat. It was very sweet and crumbly. We decided it would go well broken up into ice cream for pudding later. I thought the lesson learned would be that you can always rescue ingredients and come up with some way of using them...Bunnykins decided that the lesson learnt was that Mummy is cursed with cooking and that she should never do any baking with me again...
I had to be sanguine about that outcome. I went to read for a while, then made a curry for tea. The pudding was tasty (if a bit hard going on the jaw).
It was of course games night. We had a few rounds of sevens, but Bunnykins wasn't in a sociable mood initially and we were all trying our best to keep her with us. She asked to play Grabbit, which is a basic card game where you have to grab a small rabbit when someone gets 3 of a kind and shouts "Grabbit"...it's kind of musical chairs in card form...with rabbits... I am rubbish at it, I really am. Unless it is actually me who has the 3 of a kind, my brain takes so long to realise that I need to try and get a rabbit, I just end up sitting there smiling at the rest of them in a kind of "sorry what now?" way each time.
So I was soon out, I got to be in charge of adjudicating rabbit, who was making Bunnykins smile, so really it was all good and the atmosphere was becoming more relaxed as there was less fear of someone storming off to their room.
We moved on to a knock-off jenga version we have. This provided great entertainment.
Woo, always ridiculously optimistic about her chances...😂, Mark ruthlessly efficient, me very slow and considered...
And Bunnykins having the most emotional buy-in, great facial expressions, plus screaming!!
In the end Mark decided that he needed ear defenders. At this point, the playability of the game was fully optimised and we carried on playing for ages, all happy with how the evening was going.
Thursday afternoon, Woo and I got on with some more of the caravan.
Then Bunnykins and I played some ukulele together. She chose a hymn "Lord of the Dance". It was just 2 chords, F and C. But this was OK and gave us chance to work on her strum and keeping time.
Friday I was back up to working in the study. I was a bit sad to know I wouldn't have the afternoon off. When I came down at lunchtime, Bunnykins showed me some of the accessories she had been making for Lego Town. She had been using the old instruction booklets and leaflets that come with minifigures to create pictures, like this picture of a group of friends on the bookcase.
Or the tiny rabbit picture in the rabbit room..
Or this school photo on a desk.
Woo had been making more accessories, including a pot of jam.
She had got the sink unit finished and in place.
Saturday I woke up with my chest and neck still feeling irritated. I walked around to the pharmacy and got some better cream to put on it and a bit more advice.
I then grabbed a shower and washed my hair as I wanted it cut. I am usually a bit cautious with cutting it too short, but the objective today was get it off the back of my neck.
Woo wanted to cut it. I was a bit nervous of that...but not as nervous as Woo!
Mark helped with showing her how to do it. She was super careful and patient.
And I think she did a good job.
The battery box had arrived, so after lunch Woo and I got that soldered into place.
Bear was sitting waiting patiently as he needed some buttons sewed back on his chicky-hat.
It worked!
Also in the post, I got a lovely postcard from Stella. She is so thoughtful and it was such a lift.
I didn't do much else with my day. More reading. Ordering a few things in the sales. Eating. Then watching a film with TeamChallis. We went for The Day After Tomorrow, which caused a good bit of discussion about climate change and what from the film was rubbish and what from the film was realistic / useful / interesting.
Mark took them out for a good long hike in the afternoon. It was cold and drizzly but they got a good 10k round the Frome Valley.
Mark had made Borscht in the slow cooker, which was tasty. Bunnykins had convinced us that she should be allowed to watch Hanna. She is funny about what films she can watch. I am getting a good feel for it now. She is quite fine with something that contains unrealistic terror and peril like Lord of the Rings or Hunger Games. Something with real life emotions and more day to day situations that focus just on human interaction (particularly if animals are involved) will get her very upset if the emotions are difficult. So weighing it up, I thought Hanna would be OK. We warned her about the deer at the start. She took that OK as Hanna was respectful to the deer and was going to use the whole thing to survive. She was most delighted when the boy tried to kiss Hanna but instead ended up swiftly in a headlock.
Sunday was a slow day. Mark went off running very early with Jason. I had breakfast, chatted with Ben on WhatsApp a while, then gave some feedback on a CV and job application for Kevan from UkuleleLand. I did some blogging, and that was the morning gone.
I should have done a walking workout, but that "should" was p-ing me off. I get a bit fed up with all the "should"s that get imposed on my head sometimes. I know some activity is a good thing and will make me feel lifted. I may try a walk later....I may not....should can go do one however.
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