There has been a lot happening in our world lately. Nothing major or earth shattering but just busy, busy, busy.
The SAT for CSC finished last Sunday so here is the progress I have made for the week on my Cotswold design. Obviously the top one is the starting point and the bottom one shows how much I got done. I think I stitched around 3000 stitches for the week this time.
As you may have noticed it was Ash Wednesday this week. The children attend a Catholic school and I work there too so we received the ashes from the priest in a special assembly. Rachael has decided that for Lent she will give up chewing her nails - so far so good. Luke is challenging himself and going for giving up bars of chocolate, fizzy drinks, helping around the house more and behaving better in class. He is brilliant with the chocolate and fizzy drinks so far and refused to have chocolate when it was offered round! Unfortunately, I don't have his willpower. I decided that I would clear my purse out at the end of each day and put all my change in a for JDRF (Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation). Hopefully by Easter there should be a fair bit in it!
One of the jobs that has kept me busy and stopped me stitching this week is an application form. I have decided to apply to Manchester Metropolitan University for the Foundation Degree in Supporting Teaching and Learning. I have already applied to Tameside College for their version of this which is done through Staffordshire College and I'm waiting to hear if I get an interview. The application forms are long winded though. The one for MMU is 9 pages!! It's more thorough than most of the job applications I have filled in!
Rachael got her level 11 in her swimming this week too. Now she only has one more level to complete and she will be done with swimming lessons. Hurray!! She is thoroughly enjoying the swimming club she joined recently though and is making huge progress. Luke is loving it too and is in a small group of about 4 or 5 for teaching. He is really doing himself proud too as most of the others spend more time messing than swimming (you wonder why the parents pay!!) and he is working hard and not allowing himself to be drawn into their silliness. Maybe there is hope for him yet!!
I also received the mount for Colin's Sunday Cricket from Smartart-mounts. I was really pleased with this. They sell on ebay but didn't have what I wanted. However, the guy got back to me with a price for it being custom made which was really good. £6 including packing and postage. Well when it arrived yesterday it was in a jiffy bag with about 2 metres of bubble wrap round it and sandwiched between 2 generous sized pieced of mount to protect it. The mount was absolutely perfect and one piece of mount board packing was easily cut to the right size to lace the design to. I was so pleased with their service!
I told the children to not bother with their homework tonight. Neither of mine have ever handed homework in late so I decided not to worry tonight. For how often we actually get snow, I thought a bit of snow fun was far more important!! We built a snowman and had a few snowball fights, Rachael made a snow angel and so a good time was had by all (and it was much more fun than putting spellings into sentences!) 
One of our cats, Smudge, decided he rather likes snow too and came out for ages. I didn't think he would like it as he hates the wind and I thought that would put him off. Biskey was very funny though. He sat by the patio doors, on the inside, trying to catch the snowflakes but when we opened the doors so he could do it for real, he ran off upstairs. Silly animal!
Oh and on the stitching front, I started and finished a little Mouseloft kit yesterday for February's ornament. I haven't yet finished it as an ornament.
At the moment it is trying its hardest to snow. I keep hoping but not much is happening and the little bit we have is not enough to settle.........grrrrr!