Mountain Pyjamas

I went into Next the other day to look at plain T-shirts for wearing under things to keep me warm. This may have been a mistake. They had rearranged the shop and had all sorts of lovely, comfy looking pyjamas in. There are three things I'm liking in clothes at the moment...fake tartan (so the design but not the heavy fabric), leopard print and the mountain looking stuff. They had leopard print AND mountain looking pyjamas. The mountain style stuff was REALLY comfy looking though, and snuggly and oh so soft! So I have decided, money provided, that I will get myself some mountain styled pyjamas for the mountains. It is cold up there, and the pyjamas I leave there aren't really that great looking. I like the combinations in the photo above, and was expecting it to be expensive given how nice it all looks BUT depending on which bottoms I want it'll come to either £30 or £35, which for a 3 piece pyjama set is quite good in my books!
In other news it's looking like it might be getting cold around here. (according to my Mac weather forecaster...BBC isn't convinced) It does look pretty cool to see a forecast of snow for the next 6 days. :D

AND AND talking of cozy wear and cold weather doesn't bacon jam just sound amazing? It sounds interesting at the very least. Mmmm...theres a recipe to make your own here. (I also like the way the post is written, very friendly.) :)

I better get working.

Toodles.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SASHA

Happy Birthday Sasha! We sang 'Happy Birthday' to you at midnight, I have written on your little blackboard, and I am sure I'll cave in and write on facebook too...so all that was left was to leave a random, happy, hopefully-will-make-you-smile-and-say-"Katiiiie'-in-that-you're-so-special-and-weird-way post on my blog. :)

I do not have many awesome yet still attractive photos of people on my computer...I do much prefer photos of buildings and plants, but I found a few fun ones that will hopefully make you smile. :) We all love you. Oh and you are SO lucky the skiing pictures are on my hard drive and I am lazy, otherwise there would have been a lot of photos of a distorted body on the snow. :D

I told you it was just a few photos...I don't do the photographing at social events anymore so am seriously lacking people photos!!

Did you like my wrapping skills? Cuz I was really chuffed with them. :D
Happy Birthday you little Princess.

COR

In my lovely Elle Decorations magazine there was an advertisement for the company COR. Since I loved the sofa in the ad I thought I'd have a look...and well their stuff is so lovely and chic, but comfy. I especially love the sofa in the above photo, and the two photos below. It so looks like you could snuggly into it, but it's also so clean and tidy looking.
I also really like the sofa below for it's interesting shape. It looks very modern and cool. (I also love letters on walls...I don't know why, I just think it looks interesting)
My interior design fix for the week. I can definitely dream up the perfect living room revolving around their sofas. :)

Dress day

Dress day today. Feels like forever since I wore a dress...partly due to my interview being on a Thursday and having no appropriate dress, but whatever. :) This is my new buy from Kookai. I love it, so pretty. :D AND omg, those boots don't rub my heels! :O New blister shoes I think. I can now walk outside without excruciating pain to my blisters. Score! (PS: I need to work on my faces in these dress photos!)

In related news it has been brought to my attention that Lanvin is collaborating with H&M. If this means nothing to you thats fine, it meant nothing to me. BUT I had a little looksy and oh my! I am in love with one (or two) or the dresses!
Isn't it just so pretty? They have it in red too...I don't know which I like more. I can't afford it either way, it being about £250 but a girl can dream. (If anyone feels the need to buy me one I'm a size 10/12 :P) They would definitely make the most perfect party dress!
Dress talk done, I should shower and get some work done. Work...yeah...like that will happen!

Long days...

I was hoping to be able to blog more, but have had quite a hectic week or so with school visits and observations, PGCE interviews, basketball matches and cold. I've been so tired.

I have decided that I should carry my camera around with me more. I miss taking photos, maybe I should have tried to keep up with my 365 project. On my walks to the class observations I was doing this week (LONG walks...50mins...was getting up at 7, which was normal in high school, but I am so not used to it now and it's not so fun when your not sleeping well!), but anyways, I saw lots of pretty things on these walks...and really wanted to take photos, but no camera. The cathedral was REALLY pretty, the side I saw had the huge glass work window and new bricks and the morning sun was shining on it, and the sky was blue. So pretty, it must be really nice inside with the sun shining through the window.

Was also REALLY gorgeous on the Tuesday. We had quite a misty day, which started with quite a bit of frost. In the morning though the sun was shining, so with the mist rising from the ground and the sun shining through everything looked so pretty. The school is also situated near a golf course so there was a lot of open fields and prettily placed trees for rays of sun to shine through. Made me think of Keats Ode to Autumn, was so lovely!

Should try and make more time for this. I enjoy it. Take more photos. Update blog more. Sounds so easy! :P

PS: My feet are dead and my legs hurt. Basketball caused massive aching in my legs, which meant I tried to wear flat smart shoes for the school visits...which lead to blisters, which bled because the walk was so long so the rubbing went on for ages...so now I can't wear shoes without making walking hurt. My life!

Hawks!

We had a match last night. We were a little nervous and contemplating not playing since we only had 5 players, all relatively short (remind me why we play basketball again?) up against a large team, height and number, who won their first match by 25points. So basically we had no subs, and they had loads.

We decided to play though, it was so the right decision! Our zone (defence) was AMAZING, and we were keeping up with their team. We scored the first basket, we stayed calm, we had fun. They got increasingly frustrated that our tiny little team was doing this. It was cool. The resorted to a full court press at half time, so basically tried to stop us from getting away from their basket when we got possession of the ball, but that made very little difference. They did win, but by 2 baskets...not much to brag about considering the circumstances. We're very proud of our little team. :D GO HAWKS!
In other news...I have loads of work, and am coping with the stress of it by not doing any work...sometimes the way my brain works confuses me. Hehe. I'll get on top of it eventually. :D

Hello Durham

I had my interview yesterday! Eeeeee. I didn't sleep well the night before, partly due to nerves and partly due to this stupid cold I managed to pick up that day...seriously, my luck! My cold wasn't too bad during the morning though. We got told about the course and what it would include, and then separated into our groups for the "group interview". They basically asked us what we thought made a successful lesson. The other two in my group sounded like they'd really prepared for their interviews coming out with all sorts like preparing for the class, structure, dividing the class based on ability...I started to feel a little useless with my "make it fun" and "get them to learn through play so that they may not even realise they are learning". We then shared our answers with everyone else and moved on to the reading and writing bit. We read a section of the Rose Report on phonics and had to say how we would teach phonics in our class effectively. Whilst doing this they took us out for our individual interviews one at a time.

I felt like my interview went alright...there were points that I think worked for me, but also points that worked against me. They had a set of questions they asked, such as: What did you get out of doing a degree? Do you speak other languages? What did you learn from the placements you did? What kind of teacher do you want to/think you'll be? I hadn't put much thought into those things, so felt like I was repeating myself a lot. I did know what kind of teacher I wanted to be though, and I think she quite liked my answer: a mix of Ms. Honey from Mathilda and Ron Clark: motivation, caring, enthusiasm, creativity and fun. She picked up that those themes ran through most of my answers, and asked if there was an event I had witnessed or been part of that made me feel so strongly about it. I cried...I cry way to much in the Education Department. I think I have only not cried when meeting someone in there...maybe 3 times...thats in the last 2 years. Oh dear! It also seemed to be an issue that I hadn't done any work in a British school, so hadn't had experience with the National Curriculum.

BUT, they have offered me a conditional place, SO none of those things matter! :D Yay!! I will try go into some schools though, just to get a feel before the course starts. :)

So yeah, I should be in Durham again next year! :D Yays!!!

PS: The photo is of the outfit I wore...I felt rather underdressed compared to some others there! But I liked my outfit. :)

In the post.

Look what I have! Eeee. Very excited, oh the prettiness that it contains!

In other news, I visited a Special Needs school this morning as part of a module I am doing this year. It was very interesting. The school was for 'BESD' (Behavioural, Emotional and Social Difficulties) students...although the head teacher doesn't like this term because she thinks it puts too much emphasis on the 'behavioural' part which is really only an effect of the emotional and social difficulties; I would agree with her on this point. Because of the nature of the 'disability' the students seemed pretty normal when we had a look in on the classes, however we did see once child having a fit over something and there was obviously some difficulties for some students having a group of strangers come into the classroom. I think it was a nice experience to have though, and will definitely help with the course. :)

I also got my courses all sorted out! There was a definite miscommunication, but it's been sorted so I should be able to access info for ALL my modules soon! YAY!!

Interview tomorrow, eeeee! The closer is gets the better I feel about it. Just be myself. :)

Up and running.

Decorations! It took me a while to get fully happy with my new laptop, and just sorting out my life in general. So I decided I would wait for a new week and start my little routines over again. Here are the photos of the little decorating I did in the house before my dad arrived...I should have been working, but who wants to work? Not me...which really isn't that great when I worry about how little work I have done. But anyways, photos! And paintings. None of them are things you haven't seen before on here, but they are arranged in a different way. The room feels more homey and tidy, to me anyway, with the decorating. I am happy.
In other news, it's becoming very autumny. The trees are losing their red/orange/yellow leaves, the weather is getting cold (so freezing cold) which means the house is getting cold, so so cold, and we are all scared to turn on the heating because I swear someone kept turning it off last year so I don't want to upset that person! :P BUT there are pretty photos to come from all this. Unfortunately I have been neglecting my camera so have not taken advantage of many of there photo opportunities. I did however get a photo of the lovely reflection in the bin/whatever in out garden. :)
So yeah, 2 socials tonight, and work work work tomorrow. Library is the plan, it's often the plan, but I hope to follow through this time! :P Yes yes, I do need to start getting my act together!

Toodles!

I decorated...

I am trying to post about some cute decorations, interior design or paintings I like on Mondays...BUT I am still setting up my new computer, getting all my files moved across, setting up the printer and all that. This means no cool stuff today, and maybe not for a while til I feel settled. :P

HOWEVER! I did decorate the house a bit on Saturday...procrastination, those articles are never going to be read! And I WILL share lovely photos of it when I get round to it, just so you have a little something to look forward too.

Also, had a very interesting conversation with Sonya about Art today. She's doing something about Post-modernism Art for a module...all very interesting to me, but neither of us are sure what Post-Modernism is, apparently modernism was during the Enlightenment era/stage/years...who knew? Not me. :P So yeah, good chat about art and all that, very lovely and refreshing. :)

I am just rambling now, so I think I'll go see what work needs to be done!

Toodles!

Missing HP...

Unfortunately I was VERY tired on Friday so took a nap...due to being VERY tired this nap lasted 2.5hours and meant I slept through the whole of the Harry Potter module.

I tried reading the lecture notes to see what I have missed, and have learnt that missing lectures is a BAD idea...the slides make no sense without having heard/hearing Mr. R's comments on them, he really does add a whole lot of meaning to his lectures IN the lecture. Lesson learnt, hopefully the thoughts for the Common Room will help me understand a little better. :)

On another note, I HAVE MY NEW LAPTOP! It is so pretty and the battery lasts FORVER! It's amazing, and makes working online seem so much more fun...although I think that may be the novelty of the laptop, hopefully it isn't though! Need to sort a few more things out, like getting Word and connecting to my printer, and then TADA! Working time! :P

Care package.

I got some a care package today with a LOVELY red scarf and mittens in it, AND coffee!! Yum yum yum! :)

Dress Day

Today's dress! I liked it, but unfortunately had to change out of it because it didn't like staying put when I walked. I did wear it until 13:00 though. I think that counts, attended all my lectures in it. :D AND I got a compliment. :)
Definitely think I need to get some more skirts and dresses, don't have much choice at the moment. :) We are going shopping next week, so hopefully I can find something that isn't too expensive. :D

Here is a pretty photo of the autumn-ness around here. :)

Jumpers

I LOVE jumpers, not all jumper, I love big, cuddly, stylish jumpers...those ones that hide a bloated-just-eaten-a-huge-meal-stomach but still make you look skinny. I love snuggling up in them and being cozy. I love cozy stuff, and when it look good too, my favourite! (I am a tough judge on my clothes) I have been doing some internet browsing (as one does when work needs to be done) and have found two really lovely jumpers. One from Kookai and the other from Zara.

I do like those two brands, I tend to buy more from Kookai though because the shop is so much nicer in Geneva, the Zara shop is too full and crowded...although at Gateshead Metrocenter it's very clean and spacious and lovely, so when I do go there on the rare occasion I am very inclined to buy something. :P I want these jumpers!!!

In other news, guess who has an interview to study PGCE Primary at Durham? Me! :D I am excited...need to scrub up on the National Curriculum and other related stuff, but YAY!

Cute Pumpkins.

There is an adorable tutorial for making your own fabric pumpkins here. (Her photos are copyrighted and so I don't want to use them without her consent) BUT I think you should definitely look at the tutorial AND her blog, it's very cute and unique. :)

In other news I have been sorting out a budget for myself because I seem to have used a LOT of money this past month leaving me with very little for fun things, like clothes! I think I have found a budget that won't starve me but will also give me some freedom to buy things other than necessities. :)

AND I think I am getting somewhere with my dissertation idea, and work in general. Who knew having a printer would make me want to work so much? I'm thinking more time in the library this year? Maybe...hehe.

If I get round to it I'll be back tomorrow! :D

Toodles.

HP time

Crest done by Miriam and myself for our Colleges Yule Ball themed Ball.

I have realised that through blogging about this module I am probably going to retain a lot more of the knowledge. I’ve spent some time thinking about whether I should explain all the thoughts that are put forward within the lectures or just the ideas we investigated. I decided that I don’t want to give the lecture to others, so instead will mention some of the broader ideas and any questions to think about.

Today we explored the concept of Houses: looking at the the pros and cons of having school houses, the sorting and the reputations. We were reminded, as I think we will be every week, to avoid the Button Man (I must not have been playing attention the last two years...because I don’t recall this ever being mentioned before) and the Bible Code...in other words try and avoid making up connections that aren’t there.

So, what thought arose from this lecture?

Is the Sorting hat a philosopher? An oracle? A seer?Does the Sorting Hat make mistakes?What do the House colours, animals, common rooms, elements, etc. say about the Houses? Is the idea of four different houses for different traits that farfetched?

Can we compare the Houses of Hogwarts to the Durham Colleges? Maybe, we have all been sorted into different Colleges, Universities, and courses. Do being in any of these groupings make us any better than others?

Are Slytherin bad? As one of the students ‘sorted’ into Slytherin I had to write a ‘parchment’ about the traits of Slytherin, and spent most of it defending Slytherin from it’s bad reputation. It’s traits include things such as ambition and greatness. Some major characters have taken these too far or used them for the wrong cause, but they can be good...and at the end of the books where did their loyalties lie? With Voldemort or with Hogwarts?

We also discussed whether you are born into a house or grow into a house, that common question of nature or nurture. And were left to think about how this idea of Houses and all that comes along with them could be played out in schools...

We have only had two proper lectures so far, but I must say this is probably one of the most interesting and engaging modules I am doing, and I think there really has been a lot of work put into thinking beyond the books. :)

Thursdays is for dresses.

I love the look of dresses, and skirts. I do, however, find jeans and trousers so much more comfortable...mainly because there is no risk of revealing certain parts of yourself unintentionally. SO! I have made Thursdays my dress and skirt days, meaning every Thursday I HAVE to wear a dress or skirt. :)

I've done 3 weeks so far, but have only started taking photos this week. I am enjoying it, and actually starting to like dresses. I tried looking for more, because at the moment I have about 2 that I can wear for daytime, but I am quite picky about styles and sleeve lengths and everything. I think I definitely like strappy sleeves! So I'm getting somewhere! :P

I'll be back next Thursday with picture proof of my dress/skirt wearing. :)

Mattia Bonetti

So, as part of my blogging more I am going to try post about some decorations, interior design or paintings I quite like. Today is the work of Mattia Bonetti. I can't find a website for his stuff particularly, but some of his things were in Elle Decorations and after some searching...well, I found that his stuff is pretty awesome! Very creative.
I love the use of interesting shapes, the way the eye gets drawn towards them. If you google image his name...loads of inspiration. Really nice...man it just draws me in. Seriously seriously cool. I do especially love the broken necklace picture up at the top. :)

As an extra, a photo of my wallpaper up, the new vases and flowers I bought and my green nail-varnish. It wouldn't let me send it to James...so voila. :P
Talk to you later! :)

Sometimes I miss the Mountains

I read my mums blog this morning, she updated about snow! SNOW. In October in the Mountains...and not really the very high mountains, we're talking about 1500m. So I had a little look myself. It's so pretty....sigh...I do love the snowy mountains (if I am in the warmth with a nice fire, a big cup of coffee and friendly chatter).

The weather here is rarely as pretty as in the mountains, I doubt its rarely as cold...but the house...THAT can be cold, so it's nice that the weather doesn't get too cold or else I think we might freeze to death!

Time to do some work on my dissertation...still trying to figure out what exactly I want to focus on. My head is having a hard time doing any work with such an open choice!

Harry Potter and the Age of Illusion

There has been quite a bit of press around this new module. It has mainly been positive, although some think it a waste of time and just seem quite bitter. I thought since there was such an interest in the module (I have had quite a few friends ask me about it) I would blog my experience of the module here...being one of the MANY students taking part. It will be my experience and what I feel about it, so may not match others opinions, but I will try and avoid lying about what went on as some sources have. (The BBC announced the first module had taken place 4 hours before it had, it also mentioned broomsticks...but since they had witnessed something other than the lecture taking place it is no wonder they saw objects which were not present...)

So...the first lecture. We have been told that had they been able to the filming of the Great Hall in the Harry Potter movies would have taken place in the Great Hall of the castle in Durham, unfortunately this meant it being out of use for longer than Durham could allow. However, the Great Hall of Durham Castle provided a great place for our first lecture. Many students (more than I have ever witnessed for an Education module) turned up to the Great Hall...first having to show identity to quite a few Prefects dressed in robes. We had been informed we should wear robes/cloaks and a fair amount of students did, one students had a wizards hat, a Gryffindor scarf and a Hogwarts folder as well (needless to say he was VERY happy to be sorted into Gryffindor later). We all sat down at the looong dinner tables within the hall (Castle students are so lucky to be able to eat in there every day...it's REALLY nice), and sat a little bemused at this extravagant lecture. We were then introduced to the course and the sorting began. Students names were called one by one to come forward and be sorted by the power of the bag of marbles. (Some students are convinced it was really Mr. Richardson deciding where they went...we will never know). There was a lot of clapping and many happy faces...except those perhaps put into Slytherin. There was no booing, but students definitely did not seem to pleased. I myself, however, had hoped to be put into Slytherin so was very pleased to have been sorted there, not least because green looks really good on me!

At the end of the sorting Mr. Richardson's son was sorted too. It was his birthday, and by the fact that he was wearing a cloak and hugging a Hedwig doll (and the fact that in the last two years we have been told numerous times by Mr. Richardson) it was obvious he was a huge fan, and of course was put into Gryffindor.

The sorting was a lot of fun, but also served as a point for thought. How often are we just randomly sorted? Can the houses represent universities? Durham Colleges? What does being a member of a house do to our identity? How do we feel about the sorting? There has obviously been a lot of thought put into this module, and I can see it will be a lot of fun as well as thought provoking. :)

Our first proper lecture discussed whether the module was fit for study...and who should decide. Who do you think should decide what we study? Do you think the module is fit for study?

We'll find out...I better be off now to write about the strengths of my house. :)