Weeknote: 29/9

Knitting:
I haven't done much. I have added a few rows to the sleeve and was pleasantly surprised to find I am quite close to being ready to shape the sleeve cap. It would be great to be finished with it before October half term, so I can start something brand new in my week off.

Going to:
I went to the new Bristol Museum autumn exhibits private viewing on Thursday night with my friend Elaine from work. It was Japanese prints (Elaine used to live in Japan), African fabrics and clowns. Quite an eclectic mixture. Must as when I went to the Frida Kahlo exhibition at the V&A, I was shamed to realise I've never properly been in to the museum to look around. Something to do this winter.

Cardiff, to buy new sofas. Arriving some time in November, with any luck. We got double recliners. I'm so excited about them - when we recline them together it'll like having a sit-up bed in the living room. We had to go to Cardiff because we'd exhausted all the sofa shops in Bristol (and their sales assistants).

They're not this colour. I love this colour but it wouldn't have been right for the floor. Everything has to match the floor now.

Learning:
I'm taking a beginners' ballet course at the moment, so we've been learning various ballet steps with names I haven't a hope of spelling. There was one called a frappe, which seems to involve kicking the floor. This seems unwise; surely you will always come off worse? Anyway, I thought I should go to beginners because I haven't done any ballet in *coughcough* years so I thought I wouldn't remember anything, but it turns out - I remember a lot. Bit like my experience with skiing. Unfortunately my big calves don't want me to turn my feet out and I'm not very good at doing the arms at the same time as the legs, so beginners is probably the best place for me, even though I am a little bit bored.

I've upped my game a bit at work this week, a result of having done that training in the Welsh school last week - it's made me think a bit harder about my lessons. I had my GCSE students making paper boats and mapping journeys. It was fun. Their resulting essays were good, too. Also the teaching assistant taught me the proper way of making paper boats. Mine were apparently just hats.

Entertained by:
Not much TV watching has happened, though I did manage Bake Off. I'm still being haunted by exam work. I keep thinking it's going to finish and then it just doesn't. I am nearly a week late with the last batch. I am so desperately looking forward to not having any more to do.

I've been trying to read some more, but that hasn't happened either. Tiny violin for Sally.

Baking:
We're having a Humanities team Bake Off and I did dessert week. I made this:

It's an apple pie cheesecake. I saw the idea on Tasty but then went with my usual cheesecake recipe with a Biscoff base (this was a stroke of genius) and made up the apple topping, since they used inferior Granny Smiths because Americans don't have Bramleys, poor them. It was quite nice but the cheesecake texture was a bit weird. Probably a result of basically being baked twice.

Feeling:
A cold has been chasing me all week. It's nearly got me. I have been a bit croaky and a bit spacy, especially today (it's Friday....I'm going to Oxford for the day tomorrow. But for the sake of routine, I'm pretending it's Saturday.) I'm hoping that it buggers off soon.