Gifts from afar attempt 3

Well, I'm starting this post for the second time. I thought I'd show you the lovely stuff Miss 21 brought me back from her epic trip to New Zealand. It's a very long way. 

It all arrived in a beautifully made heavy New Zealand cotton bag ( that's now for knitting projects....)

I'm laughing my head off at the photograph of the rather unfortunate positioning of the Kiwi bird biscuit cutters!!! It's actually a mama and her chick, I think! I'm going to look up an authentic NZ biscuit recipe for their maiden batch - which won't be yet as I'm not eating biscuits and the like in a final attempt to release my inner thinner! 

There's a sweet little pot teabag holder for brew time. She has the same one in her new flat! This brings me comfort knowing we are leaving squeezed out teabags on the side in a similar fashion! 

Last but not least is an absolutely stunning NZ jade necklace. The photos to not do the dark shade of green stone with the odd light flashes in it. I've worn it and it's so warm and smooth. I love it. 

Tried to get a close up - still rubbish! 

Other things I have to tell you... Not much really! 

Just same old same old. Go to work, despair over the impossible task of seeing the children through their SATS, go to Night Owls, home, tea bath and bed and repeat. More about work later. 

Meanwhile back at the ranch....

This is the posh plug socket, on the posh wallpapered wall, reflecting the deep pile posh silver carpet that is now my craft room!! 

There's the posh light shining it's gorgeous reflections into the posh silver linen wall paper of the other wall and the silvery trees of the plug socket wall with matching posh light switch! 

It was, of course, Miss 21's bedroom. 

I didn't take a photo but it has posh floor length silver linen curtains at the window with a posh silver/grey Austrian blind! 

It did have this posh Indian silver topped lantern with posh rattan ball lights in it, but she took that along with the matching mirror!! 

So I've started moving in! This is the gorgeous wardrobe that she wasn't allowed to take. Partly because being solid oak, it nearly killed her Dad carrying it up the stairs, alright, solely because it nearly killed her Dad carrying it up the stairs! It's never ever being moved either. 

Oh you can just see the curtain! 

My sewing patterns are in the little brown box. My crochet hooks, wired knitting needles, cable needles and large stitch holders are in the wee owl box ( that originally had greeting cards in ) next to it. 

My wool and fabric will be stored in the main body of the wardrobe along with mine and the HG's best togs! We are getting new wardrobes ( yanno in about 100 years ) and we have no room! 

I'm going to reuse pour old computer desk as a sewing table and I'll just take a dining chair upstairs for now to use. Eventually we'll put a little double bed settee in, when we find one we like that'll go! But when Miss 21 comes back she'll have to make do with the electric double air bed we have. That, by the way, is in Gateshead on her sparebed! They had to use it on their first night as we weren't bringing her bed and mattress until the day after. They complained it kept going down and that they were freezing cold on it and the sheet kept slipping off. These two young bright people with degrees...hadnt inserted the little nozzle correctly and hadn't realised that the mattress had a shiny plastic side and a warm flocked deep pile side. Hmmmm now which way is up? Because clearly they couldn't read the instructions either!!!! 

They'd been FREEZING! Well yes! You would trying to sleep on cold shiny plastic!!! 

Hilarious! I laughed my head off! 

Anyway...work is one stressy place right now. The teachers ( quite rightly ) are in uproar. The SATs papers are like A Levels. I'm having to watch in agony as my special six cry at having to learn the difference between a co ordinating conjunction and a subordination conjunction. ( Yesterday's Learning Objective ). 

It's not what they are, I was covering yesterday and every child in that room was identifying and writing their own sentences with subordinating conjunctions. It's remembering all these technical terms. And there's shitloads. To be honest, I wouldn't have got 100% on the sample SPAG test they've just done. Only 7 out of 30 actually got 50% or more. We are guessing that that's going to be the pass mark. No threshold have been released yet. 

Fancy having a go yourself? 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/2016-key-stage-2-english-grammar-punctuation-and-spelling-sample-test-materials-mark-scheme-and-test-administration-instructions

I've been having technical issues with the publishing of this. Don't know if it's me or blogger playing up but hopefully it'll work this time. 

Here's the bread I baked yesterday. 3/4 white bread flour 1/4 spelt 

Lots of love from 

Rachel *I think I fixed it* Radiostar X