Day 14: The First Last Day of Term

It might sound like a confusing title to this blog post, but there are a number of "Last Day of Term"s in the house this year. Today is the First Last Day of Term as Ginny had her last pupils of 2018 and started her Christmas holidays. She will have another Last Day of Term on Monday when she submits her last university assignment; my Last Day of Term is Tuesday; and poor Clem has to wait until a week today before she can claim her Last Day of Term title!

Picture 1: Given the above, our first picture had to be of Ginny just after she had finished teaching. Orlando seems to believe that any time someone is taking pictures then he should be there and making himself as gorgeous as possible. It turns out it's impossible to explain otherwise to a five-year-old spaniel.

Pictures 2, 3 and 4: You have probably noticed by now that most of our pictures feature Orlando in some way, shape or form. Here he is enjoying a rare trip to the staircase. Of course, this will be a lot less rare in the new year when he gets the run of the place!

Pictures 5 and 6: Today was the PGDE Thurso team Christmas Lunch, which consisted of we three student teachers heading to the Pentland Hotel and eating until we thought we'd burst. It was a fun lunch, and the Banoffee (sp?!) Pie was worth a picture all of its own:

Picture 7: I call this one "Daddy's Worst Nightmare". If you look carefully, you can just see a puppy bum disappearing into Mum and Dad's bedroom...

Picture 8: Today was a day that definitely called for a bath! I love my long Friday soaks! (Actually, I fell asleep in the bath, which meant I missed a lot of dinner, but I couldn't manage anything anyway!)

Picture 9: Our Snowman appeared today, which is just super exciting. The Snowman is a Christmas tradition that comes from Mummy's family. It is full of sweeties and usually makes an appearance shortly before the Christmas Tree and remains an intrinsic part of the Crow Christmas right up until Twelfth Night. This year, he has been joined by a little friend - courtesy of one of the pupils in Clemency's class!

Picture 10: Another Christmas decoration which has sneaked out ahead of the tree is this angel, which was made by Clemency in P4. That is, while she was teaching P4!! I think we've mentioned before that a great thing about being a teacher is that you get to be a child in adult's clothing! (We call this the Donald Trump Angel. Not because any of us think that the real Donald Trump is an angel, I hasten to add! It's the hair!!!)

Picture 11: We missed a picture of the Railway Room yesterday so, for anyone who is following the saga, here's what it looks like at the moment! (Mummy did get slightly distressed that these pictures of the untidy Railway Room were being shared, but I think I have convinced her that it's quite normal for a partly-decorated room to be untidy!)

Picture 12: Dad really wanted us to share a picture of the tube in the hall. He says it's a Smarties tube for Christmas, but that may well be wishful thinking.

Picture 13: Ginny took this sneaky shot tonight out of the landing window. Today, it is nine years since Ginny and I moved in, and one of the first things that struck us was how like Narnia the Square is (just with cars)!

Picture 14: When Mum changed her's and Dad's bedding, she put on the Christmas bedding! Yey!!