Happy December!

The countdown has begun! I dug into my first dairy free chocolate from my advent calendar this morning; well, half of it because Ryan hasn't bought himself a calendar, doh! Being a teacher, my countdown to Christmas started long before December 1st. We have been practicing our Christmas play since early November! 'Gabriel's Big Break' is a re-telling of the classic nativity story but from Gabriel's perspective. It is quite good actually once you get past the cheesy songs that need to be practiced. Feel free to listen to the snippet of the songs below. I just sang them to Ryan while he was cooking breakfast... he was less than impressed haha :P

Even though we have only dipped our big toe into December, I have pretty much bought all of my Christmas presents. Largely thanks to my Mum who is ridiculously organised... and has time to peruse the shops in Chester with my sister on a Monday afternoon! However my Mum can't help me buy presents for my Secret Santa selections, friends and Ryan's parents. Yesterday I managed to get a few little presents....

Lush Father Christmas Bath Bomb - £3.25

Yankee Candle Christmas Cookie Sampler - £1.80 in Clintons

M&S Sugar Plum Cookies Tin - £4

As hard as I tried not to I also got a few treats for myself ;) With Christmas and a Birthday coming up in December it's iffy territory going shopping for things I like. With the big 22 coming up in just two weeks I should be keeping my spending at a minimum. I really don't think a Big Knit Innocent Smoothie and a Salted Caramel Yankee Sampler will really ruin my Birthday/Christmas surprises though!

To appease my inner shopoholic, I did buy some really cute Christmas wrapping paper from Paperchase. I love making my presents look pretty, even if it just to get ripped off and thrown away. My choices this year however are made from recycled paper so that does make me feel slightly better about the amount of waste paper at Christmas time. Look how cute the trees are!! 

Some of the shop displays this year are so awesome! I love this iced sprout in the window of White Stuff, it makes me chuckle every time I pass it in Harrogate and York. You can actually win a trip to Brussels by entering a sprout competition on their website.. go on, click the link! I took the photo of the advent display a couple of weeks ago and now I can't remember the name of the shop. I thought I'd share it with you anyway because it's so darn cute. I definitely haven't captured how good it actually is with my phone camera! I hope you are all enjoying the festive season, decorating trees and eating mountains of mince pies. I know I am :D

Harrogate Christmas Lights

Tom Gates, Princess Diaries and Hunger Games.

I absolutely love to read. I always have and most certainly always will. I think it probably has something to do with my Dad reading Fantastic Mr Fox and The BFG at bedtime... he made the snozzcumbers come to life.

Over the past couple of days I have been thinking a lot about my reading, past and present. I didn't realise quite how much until I came to write this blog. My new topic to teach in Literacy is 'Authors and Letters' where the children have to share books by their favourite author ready to write a letter to them to say how awesome their stories are. I know that most of my children will want to bring in the latest copy of Tom Gates. Those of you who don't know Tom Gates, it is very much like Diary of a Wimpy Kid and the children LOVE IT. I have been reading them as our class shared story since September using a variety of silly voices and allowing the children to act out the 'Mr Fullerman stare' and 'Norman hyper drumming'. Now most of the children in my class have been bought a copy or it's on their Christmas list! Instilling the love of reading? Take that University! 

There is even a Tom Gates World blog that I recently discovered. It has similar cartoons to the books and all sorts of fun stuff. I might try and sneak a few Tom Gates pictures into my lesson smartboard slides.

BEWARE. If you do read Tom Gates to your class, be prepared for the consequences. The children do think it is hilarious to compare any teachers to Mr Fullerman. He gives them a teacher stare, he is obsessed with homework and he has a loud voice. I've even been drawn pictures of me with Mr Fullerman eyes... but it also said I was the best teacher ever so I let it slide ;)

A couple of weeks ago I asked my Mum to sell all my old Buffy the vampire slayer DVDs to CEX. I now love going there to look for film bargains. The Harrogate and York branches are soooooooo much nicer than the Wolverhampton one I'm used too, sorry guys! I got £23 store credit for a series that I haven't watched for over five years!! So yesterday I dragged Ryan in to check out what they'd got. He did a film degree so he always wants to get all the fancy pancy onces with a good director. However I couldn't help myself buying Princess Diaries for £2.50 :) :) :) :) :)

I think I was probably about ten or eleven when I started reading all of Princess Mia's adventures. There was just something so relate-able about her that I loved all seven of the books and even read them more than once! I love reading books but I also love it when they make GOOD films from the books. Yes I am one of those people that complains about the tiniest incorrect details. I made Ryan watch it yesterday afternoon and I sat chuckling to myself like I was thirteen years old again.. foot popping kiss... HILARIOUS! Watching it again made me realise that I do have more in common with Mia than I first thought, even at twenty-one I am still a Doc marten wearing, hippy, stupidly lanky, geeky, glasses wearing girl. Just minus the crown!

If that wasn't enough of an amazing Saturday, I went to the cinema in the evening to watch the new Hunger games! Catching Fire was UNBELIEVABLE!!!! Again, another one where I sat engrossed in the books one after the other. I started reading them on the coach to my school in Middlesborough during my second year of Uni. Ask anybody, I was the most anti-social person on that coach haha. I remember finishing Catching Fire on my Kindle on the way home and I literally COULD NOT WAIT to get home and download Mocking Jay. 

The film most definitely did not disappoint. I think there were tears in my eyes for the majority of the film, to Ryan's amusement! The new characters were perfect, the arena was exactly how I imagined it and Jennifer Lawrence was as kick-ass as usual!! What was even better about the film was that we got in for free. I was in my own little world daydreaming about something or other, next thing I turn around and Ryan has tickets! Appaently some guy came through the crowd asking if anybody hadn't bought tickets because it had sold out, then gave the last two to Ryan! I know I am just stupidly lucky :P

Graduation Weekend

I have finally Graduated!!!

After spending the Summer months watching old school friends don their cap and gown and stand smiling outside their respective Universities, I was starting to think my Graduation was never going to happen. We have had to wait until November so that we could graduate at the picturesque York Minster. It was beautiful setting, inside and out, especially on a bright and sunny Autumn day.

(Primary Education Group 4 on the steps of the Minster)

My family came up from Wolverhampton and decided to take the whole weekend as holiday so that they could explore around Harrogate too. Lucky for some, I was back at work on Friday in my onsie for Children in Need and practicing songs for the Christmas play. Ryan made an appearance too after work and let us borrow his fancy camera to get some pictures.

We obviously had to take a million and one photos of the day. Who knew graduation was such a big deal?! There were some funny pictures thrown into the mix, including a few of me failing to throw my mortarboard in the air!

I also re-created the first ever picture I had taken outside York St John University. Three and a half years ago on my interview day, with my blonde hair, on the right and then my graduation picture on the left. Not much has changed, other than being brunette and a little smarter I suppose!!

Fountains Abbey

Yesterday I met up with my family again (who had been staying in a local bed and breakfast) and we went to Fountains Abbey and the deer park. It was really enjoyable to take a relaxing walk around the ruins, kicking up some leaves as we went.

Obviously we couldn't help ourselves being big kids as per usual so there were plenty of silly photo opportunities. We dressed up as monks in one of the information rooms, however we got the habits on backwards, doh! Ryan even managed to capture our leaf throwing fun.

I hope you are all enjoying your weekends, whether you are graduating or not!

Busy, busy bee.

Just a quick blog post today just incase you guys thought I'd forgotten again. I had... but then I remembered, yay! After a nice relaxing week off, this weekend has been quite boring and work-focused to be honest. I've spent a lot of time looking at the coming half term and planning all my bits and bobs for our new topic 'We're switched on'.

In other news, Ryan has pretty much moved in now! Only one more week until he is living here with us. On a temporary basis I must add, there are no impending nuptials or anything like that :) His clothes are on top of my wardrobe, cooking things ready to be put away and a MOUNTAIN of climbing things (excuse the pun) is stashed away in the cupboard under the stairs. It's a big scary step, even if it is just for a month!

To be honest, you should probably feel sorry for him. You are reading a blog written by a girl who bought an elephant onsie and dyed some of her hair blue this weekend. Not that I am procrastinating from doing my work or anything ;) Sorry it's been a dreadful post this week but I really have nothing else of interest to tell you, cheerio! :P

Half Term Folly

I am currently sat in bed with some deliciously warm pulled pork, chilli and chipotle soup from Marks and Spencers because I've managed to get a cold while it's half term; rubbish! Despite the coughs and sniffles I have had an awesome half term so far. I should probably knuckle down and get some planning and organising done for school but there is still plenty of chances for adventures.

Last weekend was an exciting one because some of my Uni friends were having a house-warming party in Hitchin (just outside London). Of course this was the perfect excuse to catch up with friends that I haven't seen since May :) AND visit the Harry Potter studio tour which is only an hour away from their house!! Sam came down to Harrogate on Friday night ready for us to embark on our cross country road trip early on Saturday morning. However on Saturday we ended up driving via Wetherby to meet Sam's dad because she had forgotten the tickets... DOH!

Totally unflattering picture on our roadtrip

Our journey was lovely; no traffic, the sun  was shining and there were lots of laughs. On Saturday night it was fantastic to catch up with all the uni girlies, even if we did talk teacher for hours on end! We organised another meet up at mine in Harrogate for February half term; hopefully it will be just as fun :) and it's not to far for the Northerners (Sam and Paige, no excuses!)Sunday morning we packed up my little car again ready to drive to our hotel. 

Sam checked her email for our hotel reservation.

No email.

..... "Jenny, do you remember what our hotel is called?"

Soooooo we ended up calling two hotels in Leavesden thinking we had booked one near the studio tour. I was sat looking at pictures saying it was DEFINITELY that one. Nope, no reservations in that name. Sa, decided to call Superbreak and check what we'd actually booked.... a hotel in St Albans, fantastic organisation! We spent a small chunk of time driving around, most definitely not knowing what we were doing. When we finally found the hotel it was cute and cosy :) although it was a bit of a maze to find our room. 

The Harry Potter studio tour was just as amazing as I remember it, but this time it had some Halloween treats! We started in the gift shop as we had quite a late starting tour. We both decided to buy a deathly hallows t-shirt and wear it around the tour; this amused quite a few members of staff. Last time I went, the tour had only been open a month so it was REALLY busy. This time it was much quieter so we had chance to properly look at all the props and sets. I even made friends with a death eater ;)

 As well as our London adventure, I've had plenty of free time to spend perusing the shops and their christmas stock, spend some time with Ryan and actually get a haircut! Hello fringe :) Even though Christmas is coming up I couldn't help but treat myself to this cosy purple beanie from Blacks and this tartan dress I've seen all over the blogosphere. Especially as it is only £15 from Primark. I did spot these cute and warm looking pyjama bottoms in Fat Face, that my budget won't quite stretch to, so they have been Christmas-listed.

As it's half term, which is technically a holiday right?! I have treated myself to some of my seasonal favourites. I was waiting until November to eat my first mince pie but it's so very difficult when Gregg's have started selling them in packs of six. Gregg's mince pies are my ultimate favourites!! Last week I told you about the salted caramel hot chocolate I tried in Starbucks but I'm afraid Costa has hit the spot as my favourite seasonal drink. They are currently selling a Hot spiced Apple which is GORGEOUS. It is apple juice with cinnamon and star anise; it warms you up without being too sickly or heavy.

If it's not mince pies or hot drinks, it's definitely cute couple-type things that have got me feeling all warm and gooey inside. I found out on twitter at the start of the week that one of my favourite bloggers A Rosie Outlook is now engaged! You can read all about her beautiful proposal with candles in a yurt on her blog. If that news wasn't cute enough, the ultimate cutest of all cute couples have posted this....

I don't often feel soppy or broody but I definitely am this week. I think it's just my love of all things Autumn that has got me feeling this way so no need to worry Ryan... or Mum and Dad!