just another morning here

Last week it was Anna’s 15th birthday. It was a fairly non-event, since I had to go back to work, and she’d already opened pretty much all her presents with my family the week before! Steve gave her something she’d been wanting for a while, and Grandma and Grandpa visited with a gift in the evening too.

Her present from us was a set of tickets to see One Direction in Plymouth two days later – so she already knew about that too, obviously. At this point I need to back track and tell the whole story of the One Direction tickets …

Back in October we found out about the concert and she said she’d like to go as a birthday present, but I realised that I wasn’t going to be near a computer or phone when the tickets went on sale. So, I enlisted two kind people to both try and get a set of 4 for us – and they both managed it (I had no problem selling on the 4 I didn’t need!).

Then, to cut a long story short – I have two girls in my class who are also One Direction fans and had got tickets, so I cooked up an idea whereby we could all go to the concert together. Anna was up for sharing her birthday party, so I carried on planning.

Just after half term (in the second week of their half term), Anna and her friends came into my class to meet the other two girls, and they spent an afternoon decorating a banner together for the concert and generally getting to know one another. Then on Thursday we all bundled into one of the school minibuses, along with an extra mum and an enabler, to go down to the concert.

When we arrived they did the whole screaming fan thing together outside the back of the Pavilions, then came back in dribs and drabs to hurriedly eat a packed tea on the bus before heading off again. At this point the groups split up with Anna and her friends going off together and the other two with their carers – they were gutted when their banner was deemed ‘too big’ and not allowed in!

It was absolutely fantastic for the two girls from my class to do something together with a group of teenagers, and I have to say that Anna and her friends were brilliant with them – they were all singing along to the 1D album on the way there, then all chatting about the concert etc. on the way home. And I don’t think they really realised how much of a big deal it was for the two from my class to be included in a trip like that. I was really proud of them

While I was dropping them all off I was given a flier for a free coffee in a cafe opposite, so I sat there with my book for the evening, and was joined by the girls from my class when they came out of the gig a bit early – I was very impressed they made it through as far as they did given how exceedingly loud it was! We waited for the other gang of girls to extract themselves and then drove on home, getting back around 11.30 – not too bad really.

We then had 6 teenagers upstairs while Abbie slept on the sofa They were all asleep by 1am which wasn’t too bad really. The next day was a bit of a blur all round though!

This weekend has been our last ‘holiday’ weekend, with no orchestra or choir commitments, and it has been quite lovely … Steve and I worked a bit in the morning, Anna had a piano masterclass at SWMS, Abbie did homework, Josiah had a Suzuki group lesson, then Steve and I went out to the cinema at teatime to celebrate our anniversary (more chance of me staying awake but I still didn’t quite manage it!). Got the ironing done for the weekend during the evening, so today was quite relaxed too – church for Anna and I, then I went out caching while she finished off her homework; Abbie had a friend round, and Josiah went on a choristers’ panto trip. Not entirely sure what Steve has been up to all day other than trying to plan a summer holiday and getting depressed about how expensive it will be …

Thanks to Emma, who came and stayed over with Abbie and Joe, Steve and I were able to get to Dorset Youth Orchestra’s formal concert last night in Bournemouth. We weren’t going to bother going, we were simply going to attend the informal concert today, but we figured that since Anna had had a bit of a funny start to the week, we’d make the effort. I think she appreciated it – she spent all of the interval sitting on Steve’s lap (don’t tell her I said that ) Funny though, we are so used to her playing the cello that Steve went and chose seats with a great view of the cello section, sat down, then remembered that she was on bassoon. Couldn’t see her at all! But I don’t think we’d have been able to wherever we had positioned ourselves. Ho hum.

Anyway, it was a good concert, then we stayed in a cheap but perfectly nice hotel for the night, ate sandwiches and drank wine bought from the shop on the corner, oh yes, we know how to live it up! We had had lunch out in Exmouth with my parents during the day beforehand though so weren’t hungry enough to eat out again!

Today we were meant to be going to see the car in the recovery depot, but we missed it by 10 minutes. Steve was very disappointed (I wasn’t!). Picked up all our CDs which they’d extracted, bar the one which was in the CD player – Spilt Milk by Jellyfish, luckily looks like it won’t be too expensive to replace!

After that we had some time to spare before going back to Bryanston, so we found a little geocache circle to follow. It was a brilliant set of caches; each container individually made into a different animal/bug, and one of them was really tricky to find – really enjoyed them, they’ll get some favourite points from me. My favourite was the one in the first photo, which was made from a tape measure. Very creative. And then we had lunch

The informal concert was due to be held at Bryanston’s ‘Greek Theatre’, but it was raining, so they moved back into the lobby area of the main school. Some parents sat around in the corridors while others went upstairs and hung over the gallery to watch. I just kept gazing around at the building, I must admit – it is such an awesome place! I wonder in how many schools can you fit an orchestra into the hallway?!! Music was good too, all different sorts today, some solos and small ensembles; Anna played with the Wind Orchestra as well as doing a Samba piece that they’d obviously done as a fun workshop to end the week with. Oh yes, and she did it all in her pyjamas They are musical ones I suppose, but honestly!

Everyone else had had photographs taken in formal concert clothes on Monday morning; Anna was standing on a grass verge taking photos of our wrecked car in hers – the police did wonder what she was doing in a long black dress at 9am on a Monday morning! So, since we didn’t have a posh photo we persuaded her to get her friends together for a photo instead

Anna managed to make a good impression on the Dorset Music Service people despite the dodgy start to the week (which was my fault not hers, of course!), so hopefully she’ll get invited back again another time, she had a whale of a time after that first wobbly evening which was totally understandable after the accident.

We asked her how she felt about cello vs bassoon having just done a week there with on the bassoon and she really struggles to decide … best news of all on the way home though – the bassoon that was in the accident will be mended by tomorrow – for less than the excess on our insurance. Really impressed with Griff who took the job on and sorted it so quickly. Other good news during the week were Anna’s music exam results – two distinctions and a merit – excellent!

Abbie and Joe have done an excellent job of being home alone all day, with the occasional phonecall of support. I’d totally forgotten to book Abbie in for a week at Haven Banks that I’d said she could do (bad mummy), but luckily she phoned up today and there are still places and we can hand forms and payment in on Monday morning! Suzie has kept them busy – she’s currently asleep in a drawer, which is very cute

Just popping this here in case anyone fancies listening. We found out today that if you’ve been on the SWMS feeder scheme and are re-applying for the main scheme, actually you don’t have to send references and recordings, but they didn’t tell us that until it was too late. Oh well. Kind of nice to have decent recordings now and again anyway.

One of these days I’m going to make a digital copy of her first ever attempts at singing …

She thought it went ‘quite well’. I think it could have improved in places. Still jolly proud of her