Photoshoot, School Quiz and Summer Fair

This week has been so busy!  On Monday after school I went with two friends to their wedding venue, about an hours drive from Duisburg, to take some practice photos before I take the real things on their wedding day in August.  Their venue is stunning!  Unfortunately it was torrential rain by the time we got there, which made my first official photo shoot happen under fairly tricky circumstances.  I did take some quite nice ones, that I think the umbrella added to the cute factor of, but i'm still hoping for sunshine on the actual day!  There are definitely some things that I would change about the photos, and there are backgrounds that I would use that we couldn't on Monday because it was too wet/dark, but on the whole i'm quite pleased with the results.

We were all starting to wind down for the summer this week (not actually at work - that was hectic as always.  I had 4 days of cover in year 5, including one very shouty day where they were driving me nuts.  I ended up excluding 6 out of 15 from the afternoon game of rounders.  Turns out this is an EXCELLENT punishment.  They were very upset and were good as gold for the next 2 days!).

On Friday after work it was the teachers quiz.  I won last year, and Matt came third.  Neither of us did very well this year, but at least I still beat Matt, who came last!  There were snacks and beer provided, and after most people had left, it ended up being my team of 6 girls having a bit of a disco in the school hall, with one of the boyfriends DJing cheesy 90s hits.  Lots of fun.  We then all headed to Shanke for a burger and rhubarber schnapps.  It ended up being one of those spontaneous nights out that are really good fun.  Always better than the planned nights out I think.

On Saturday we had to work the school Summer Fair - it chucked it down with rain all day, which is fairly typical summer fair weather.  Everything got moved inside, so it was more like the Christmas one, but it was still good fun.  I was on the bag designing stall, which was popular.

Matt had been voted by the secondary school kids to go into the 'dunk tank'.  It was amazing!  I unfortunately missed my 3 goes, but I ran over and hit the target so he got dunked anyway!  The head teacher got dunked in his suit!  And my head of Lower School, as well as a few other teachers got dunked too.  It was very popular (Matt had the second biggest crowd after the head teacher so he was very pleased.)  The poor teachers did get very cold though.

Matt played in the teachers vs parents match in the afternoon and they won 9-4, which was great news.  All in all, the fair was really nice.  I really don't mind working things like that as it's nice to see the kids outside of a classroom environment.

Today is Matt's last lazy day before he goes to Swaziland for 2 weeks on Friday!  He is busy packing and getting everything ready to go.

Enterprise Week/ Leavers Party

This week has been exhausting.

At school it was enterprise week, which in theory is great fun.  Each year group works together to plan, design, budget and make 3 products.  Each class (3 per year) gets 20 euros to spend on materials, and then they sell them to parents on Friday afternoon.  Sounds fun so far, right?  To be fair, the children absolutely loved it.  The teachers were all knackered though.  I was meant to be floating around my year groups helping out, but I ended up on cover every day!  I was in year 6 on Monday and Tuesday - taking over from the person who organised the whole thing.  Then Wednesday I was a year 5 teacher, and Thursday, Friday I was a different year 5 teacher.  Changing classes so much, and being off time table just felt like complete chaos.  The market place in my year 5 room on Friday was very successful.  The class had decided to make 3 products between the 18 of them - origami mobiles, tea light holders, and 'volcanoes' (bottles full of oil, oil based paint and then add an anti acid tablet, and the paint starts bubbling.  Pretty cool really.  We sold out of mobiles and volcanoes really quickly.  All of our products were priced between 1.50 and 2.50 euros.  We ended up making over 90 euros profit!  The other year 5 classes did similar, so I think year 5 will win the overall competition.

A hard week at work, but fun for the kids, and for me too, maybe.  Just a little bit!

In the evenings this week we've also been quite busy.  Matt was out watching the Euros on Monday evening.  I went to Shanke on Tuesday evening with the girls for a catch up.  Thursday night, Matt's friend came over to watch the football and look at our holiday photos.  Friday night, Matt played football in Cologne against our sister school.  They ended up losing which was a shame, but still went out in Cologne after for a few drinks.  I went to a friend's housewarming party on Friday night, which was nice, and much tamer than last time (no chipped teeth this time!).  On Saturday, we went to Dusseldorf for the leavers party.  It was meant to be a BBQ by the river, but it absolutely chucked it down with rain.  It was sunny when we left so we had shorts and sunglasses.  It started raining and got REALLY cold, not very nice for June.  I  hope the weather sorts itself out soon!  Matt stayed out later than I did, and woke me up at 3am by throwing the cat onto the bed.

Today, we are going for a few drinks later with friends.  It's been a really busy and sociable week!

Tomorrow I am off to my friends wedding venue to have a look around and take some practice photos before I become their official wedding photographer in August - scary stuff!

First Week Back

This week has been hard work for everyone, as the first week back after half term always is.  We've had really hot weather, and some days of torrential rain.  The below picture is what I had to cycle home in on Wednesday afternoon.  It gets to the point where you actually can't physically get any more wet than you already are, and so your misery sort of plateaus.  Of course it stopped 20 minutes after I got home and Matt was completely dry when he walked through the front door!

Everyone is finally back in after 'Mumps-Gate' as it is now known, so I was able to go to a year 7 and year 9 class that I hadn't managed to get into yet.  I loved the year 7 Maths class, which was only 5 students!  They are all kids that I know really well from last year, and the atmosphere in the class is calm and lovely.  The teacher is great too.  I have the same kids, plus 15 more on Tuesday afternoons for Geography, which is more of an organised chaos.  I thought it was a horrendous lesson on Tuesday, as the storm made the kids all a bit jittery and hyper.  The teacher came up to me a few days later and said how much nicer the class were with me in there!  I dread to think what they are normally like!!!  The year 9 class was a mixed bag.  The kids were lovely and very friendly.  I enjoyed meeting them a lot, even though I was nervous because they are so much older than i'm used to.  Kids seem to do all their growing in year 9, so they were gigantic compared to the year 8s I had last term.  The Maths was quite tricky for me (not my strongest area), but I managed OK.  The trouble was that the teacher made a very snide comment in front of the kids when I first arrived about how I was meant to be in the class last half term but hadn't been able to make it.  It was really embarrassing.  The same teacher had made a comment to me in the corridor a few weeks before about how I 'hadn't bothered to show up' (I was covering other classes and let him know every week that I wouldn't be there).  I told my boss and he was so cross that I am no longer going into that class!  A shame, but the kids have exams from now on, so they wouldn't have needed me much anyway.

On Tuesday after school I ended up in the police station around the corner from my house.  Don't panic it wasn't for me or for anything awful!  My friend had her wing mirror knocked off the car that morning, and in Germany you have to report it or it is a criminal offence.  So we spent an hour and a half in the police station.  I went for moral support.

On Friday I covered a year 3 class, which was really nice.  It made a lovely change to be with the younger children for once, and the class are nice and well behaved.  One of the boys was sick in the classroom though, poor lad, so that made the day extra special!

Lots of us went to the pub around the corner from school to celebrate getting through the week, and for some, getting through interviews for the Assistant Head of years 1-6 positions.  Matt joined us after football, and we ended up staying for quite a while, not getting home until 9.30 - a long time to be drinking wine without any dinner!  The cat came to visit after dinner and I took some nice photos of her. Matt was teasing her with a ball of wool which was really funny.

Today we popped into Duisburg for a wander around, and had lunch at LoLu's, a vegetarian restaurant that does amazing falafel wraps. Matt isn't feeling well, I think he is getting a cold, so we're stocked up with vitamin C and honey and lemon, and hopefully he can stay awake for long enough to watch the England game tonight.

Half Term

Not many photos this week (I've done lots of crochet, but all those photos are on http://creative-faye.blogspot.com).

This week has been really horrible weather.  It's been wet, wet and more wet, but also roasting hot and muggy.  So we haven't really wanted to go out in the torrential rain, but it's been too hot in our roof flat too.  Today is actually blazing sunshine, which is nice because Matt is currently away on a 2 night stag party that he organised.  They had lots of outdoor activities planned like paintball and go karting and BBQs, so at least they will get to do those.

We haven't done a huge amount this week, enjoying just staying in and pottering around.  I went into Duisburg for a wander around the shops on Tuesday, went for cocktails (above) on Wednesday with 2 friends.  Matt and I went out for dinner on Thursday, and on Friday I went into Dusseldorf with my friend to find a dress for me to wear to her wedding in August. I found one, but of course it's Tommy Hilfiger and 200 euros.  I need it in my life though.  Will just have to save for a couple of months!

Today, i'm just enjoying having the house to myself for the weekend and doing some more crochet and watching Vampire Diaries.  It's very chilled, just what we needed after our hectic holiday in America 8 weeks ago!