Of all the school holidays, February half term is my least favourite. There’s not much to do, the weather can be pants and its too short to fly to sunnier climes. I now look back on 2020’s shocker of a half term with nostalgia, yes it rained heavily all the time and was so cold, but we had the little luxuries, our family friend came and stayed with us for a few days, we sat in cafes, went to the inflatable session at the local swimming pool, visited a local museum etc.. Such things which now seem alien and showed how little we understood what was about to happen to our lives.

I was a bit worried about how this lockdown half term would go, at least home school gives a structure to days. As I drafted this blog, it struck me that this is one which will actually sound quite jolly and busy but there were times when the drudgery of lockdown life appeared starkly and there was plenty of screen time to keep everyone sane.

In a lockdown holiday, there were lots of walks, we tried a little variety but its still a walk and everyone is so fed up of another walk. However, its the one thing we insist on daily, no walk, no screens. The weather had been quite wet and windy on Monday, and we went out when there was a quick break in the clouds for a walk along the beach. As we passed a local takeaway and saw the lovely array of cakes and pastries I stopped, much to the children’s delight, and bought a little impromptu snack for us all. As we stopped to eat our delicious bakes (cherry and almond croissant for me, which was amazing) the sun broke through the clouds and we felt the warmth on our faces as we watched the surfers doing their thing in the waves, life suddenly seemed a little more hopeful and happy. On another day, we walked up to the local country park, where they had a photography exhibition, entitled Unmasked, portraits from the Covid frontline. One of their buildings is an art gallery and they used its large windows to reverse the display so it could only be seen from outside. The project was simple, nhs workers photographed, accompanied by a short text on their thoughts on working on the Covid frontline. Their thoughts were humbling and inspiring. It was also lovely to see a few familiar faces in the photos, developing the sense of community and togetherness. On another day, we went to a different local beach and could really see the effect of the recent bad weather, parts of the beach had eroded and there was lots of driftwood on the beach.

At the beginning of the week, Mr S was decorating our daughter’s bedroom as virtual learning from her bedroom had delayed this project until the holiday. Its all completed now and looks great, we’ve gone from dreary grey to a more joyful palette of colours with a hint of the tropical. Unfortunately the smell of the paint did leave me feeling quite poorly and we had a couple of lazy afternoons as I tried to shake a headache and nausea.

I managed to read quite a bit this week and Haven’t They Grown was a good page turner of a book. The plot was that a former friend of a main character had by chance seen her after 12 years, but her children had not aged. It was a thriller and kept you gripped by its quite chilling conclusion.

Another little thing I enjoyed this week was a live presentation by Marks and Spencer Archive department on their fashion archives. I came across the event on Twitter and signed up for the broadcast. Oh, the designs, patterns and styles were amazing and it was such an interesting mix of social commentary and fashion. I believe it is now available on You Tube and well worth a watch.

Being a lockdown holiday, we have spent lots of time in the kitchen, either playing family games or cooking. Pancake day was the big highlight and it was lovely that it fell in a holiday. We spent lots of time preparing our fillings and toppings and it became a real event, more than just tossing the pancakes. Little Miss has been learning how to make more meals this holiday. We worked through a vegetable lasagne from scratch this week and it was delicious. She then took her new skills of making a cheese sauce to another night’s dinner where she made it independently for a cauliflower cheese.

Its back to school for Little Man and I on Monday, whilst Little Miss continues home schooling with Mr S. They have a lovely routine going and it has definitely added something to their relationship, they describe themselves as the DAD gang (dad and daughter) Despite this, my daughter is desperately hoping she gets to go back to school on March 8th. I’ve been as honest as we can with the information we have, but until Boris unveils the road map on Monday, we cannot be certain of anything and we have tried to warn her, that it might not be the exact return to school date.

I’m hoping that this has been the last holiday in such severe restrictions, the vaccination programme is rolling out so impressively that I am hopeful. Have a happy week.