living and learning: Mostly K.

It's been rather an eventful week with K, who is now tenty-three (she does not want to be a teenager and therefore has decided not to be one and this is her way of avoiding it). She may not be a teenager, but her independence is definitely developing and she's now comfortable doing things that not that long ago would have been out of the question.

On Wednesday she went for a home ed trip to Nottingham's Galleries of Justice, with the group she goes to each week. She wasn't sure where it was, so we went in to town together on the bus and I left her there and she spent the day with the group, going on for a game of adventure golf afterwards, before getting the bus home on her own later. She and M had previously had one trip into town together, just the two of them, over 18 months ago, but it hadn't happened since.

Since I was in town, I bought a birthday present for a friend's daughter and went to the wonderful Knit Nottingham where I had a lovely chat with the ever helpful Eleanor and spent some of my Christmas money on yarn. In between those two things, I went to try out somewhere that has been recommended to me by a couple of people and treated myself to a hot chocolate at Chocolate Utopia. It was very good and I shall be returning! I had a really good dark hot chocolate and chose a dark chilli chocolate to go with it and had a lovely half hour writing in my bullet journal (I started one a couple of weeks before Christmas and am finding it really rather useful and enjoyable).

On Thursday K had gymnastics as usual, which is the only time she sees P, a friend who she's really hit it off with. Before Christmas she'd asked about meeting up with her sometime, but it wasn't the ideal time of year for that really. After gymnastics she talked about the possibility again, so we discussed options and I suggested that they might like to meet up in town (P lives the opposite side of town from us) as I'm somewhat constrained by the school run to transport K places, but that I would want to at speak to P's mum before anything was arranged. I was quite surprised by how keen K was on this idea, but having spoken to P's mum and confirming that we have very similar ideas and expectations of what's acceptable, we have agreed that they can meet up together in town next Friday!

The girls and A went to Melton Mowbray to do the Park Run there with friends who live opposite, which I got up later and then went to an LLL Toddler meeting. While there, K got lost and although she didn't appear to have been bothered or worried by the incident, other people very definitely were! It happened because one of the marshalls had had to leave early and she took a wrong path at the fork where they had been stationed. Being considerably slower than all the rest of the group, it was only when the tail runner returned and K hadn't that they realised something wasn't quite right. She was found reasonably quickly and all was well. It's good to know that she doesn't panic when lost in any case!

She spent the majority of the rest of the day at the sewing machine, finishing off the costume she has been planning and making since before Christmas, for the girls' friend L's Danger Mouse birthday party. She went as The Princess - and made a top and skirt from a scarf she bought from a charity shop and material found at the scrap store, plus a wig made from purple wool, ears from white socks and wool pompoms and a tiara found at the scrap store and the only thing she had any help with was cutting the words 'Happy New Year' out of the tiara (which I did with a stanley knife and saw). M went as Isambard King-Kong Brunel and I helped her with her costume.