I got a lot done yesterday - stuff that needs to be done by the end of term. This is definitely a Good Thing!! Anyway, the biggest thing was sorting out some work that needs sticking into their books. Guess what we will all be doing after play today. Yup . . .
It's nice to be feeling less panicky about the work that needs finishing before the end of term, but regardless of that, there's a high spot each year that takes precedence over all other stuff. That's the KS2 show. This year it was Bugsy Malone, a challenge indeed. It was very good: the usual number of blips, wrong entries, semi-forgotten lines, wonderful dances, excellent props, etc. However, something happened that means it will never be forgotten.
It was obvious from the first dance that the sound system was having problems. We use a secondary school hall (ours is waaaaaaaay too small) and they provide support for miking up, playing the dance music, etc. The problem was that the music kept cutting out. At first and most of the way through the show dances it was only momentarily so apart from a few worried little faces, it was OK. However, that all changed in the final big number, starring the Y6 children. The cut outs became longer so they started humming the tune to keep themselves dancing together. Then it cut out completely so, without any hesitation, the whole kit and caboodle of them rose magnificently to the occasion. They took up the words, la-la-ed the instrumental bits and sang and danced their socks off. I don't think there was a dry eye in the place and I've never heard such cheering in a school production before. The teachers' face were a picture. Proud doesn't even start to describe it!!
Well done, year 6s! Well done, everyone!
I'm getting ambitious in my gardening. Well, ambitious for me, that is. After reading about tayberries in another blog (My Tiny Plot - worth a visit), I googled and bought one. A tayberry is a cross between a raspberry and a blackberry, but much larger than your average raspberry. I gather they are very prolific and long fruiting and dead easy to care for. Most are also very thorny and hard to handle, so I bought a thornless variety that seems to be very highly regarded. And before anyone in the family says 'where on earth will you put it?' let me say that a) they can be grown in a pot and b) once that hedge is down and a fence up, they can be trained along the new fence. You treat them like blackberries - to one side the first year and to the other side the following year and they fruit on the previous year's growth.
When I lived in London, the last house we owned hasd a loganberry patch at the bottom of the garden. Not being much of a gardener and also with two very little children (plus three others who came round fairly regularly), it was dreadfully neglected (the berry patch, not the children), but every year it produced masses and masses of berries, most of which went to waste. I'm ashamed of this now because I gather they would have made wonderful jam/jelly but there you go! I gather the tayberry is a much sweeter version of the loganberry, to which it is closely related.
The only thing that I might have to do is rig up some sort of netting but I will deal with this as necessary! Oh, and maybe protect it over winter.
Anyway, it arrived yesterday. A nice, healthy little plant in a small pot. It will need potting into something bigger and the growth (which will be next year's fruit) will need to be supported until I am able to put it into its final pot destination and train it along the fence (that isn't there yet!).
This is what they look like. Whether mine will remains to be seen! But I reckon it's worth a try.
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