I've been baking. Now, there's a thing. I had made Victoria sponges before, but intended taking a couple along to the Thursday-evening 'Freed To Lead' session. I've been involved in this course at the Oaktree Centre, home of Shenley Christian Centre, for the last couple of months and wanted to contribute something in the catering line. I have bought the necessary equipment from Sainsbury's, two cake tins, a pallet knife, cooling rack as well as the ingredients, as suggested by Delia Smith on her website and printed out her recipe from the website. I already have a mechanical set of scales, but when I came to use them, they're not particularly accurate for weighing out metric weight so the cakes I have already made have come out fine but probably would be better if I could weight more accurately, so I have ordered a set from Amazon, made by a reputable manufacturer, Salter, which should, hopefully arrive sometime today. So I will be able to make the second cake once these scales arrive. I'll have to wait and see how things turn out, literally, once I have made the second cake.
I took out Alfie around 6.30 this morning. It was quite mild, no wind blowing, no ice on the car windscreen. The grass in Eaglestone Park has been mown. I wasn't aware yesterday, but I think I heard the mower, but not sure what it was. There's quite an acreage to cover so it must have taken some time, no doubt one of those ride-on mowers. They missed bit, a sort of triangle of grass, but never mind. Only problem with them mowing the grass was that, when I got home I had grass stuck to my shoes. Just annoying. Never mind.
I've been to Camphill this morning. I thought it a good idea to leave the house around 8.30 because I knew the traffic was going to be heavy. I drove round the inner ring road to come out of Eaglestone near the shop and then left onto Chaffron Way where traffic cab build up approaching the Four Bridges roundabout, but it wasn't too bad, fortunately. I then went round the roundabout and headed back towards the Marlborough Street roundabout where the traffic was fairly heavy, but I carried on along Chaffron Way. A large four-by-four insisted on tailgating me until I got to the roundabout just beyond Waitrose at Oakgrove. Can't people think that some people are quite happy driving at a reasonably safe speed, and that it's dangerous to tailgate another car? If you come to close behind and I have to brake suddenly, you will run into the back of my car and cause quite a nasty accident, or don't they see this? Apparently not. They just want the road to themselves and you out the way.
I got to Camphill and parked in the carpark (where else would you park? Crazy really.) I then walked into the office and the lady there took me to the class doing work on computers, because she thought that was where I was meant to be, but after about half an hour another lady came in and said I was going to be working with residents in the theatre, so I was taken there and introduced to the 'actors' who were sitting in a row. I had to give them a sort of introduction to myself and they all introduced themselves. A very talkative inductive bunch. The leader of the group and one other assistant gave me a sort of run-down of what they had been doing; a project which uses the 'Three Little Pigs' as the basis for a play and video to explain 'Stranger Danger.' One of the group wasn't so good at remembering his lines, so they went through them, using what they described as osmosis to retain and learn these lines. As the lines are in verse, it would make it a good deal easier to remember, well, it would if it was me. I wasn't allowed to get away with just observing, I had to join in with them, and the whole group had to repeat the lines. Considering these are guys (and when I say 'guys', I'm referring to both sexes.) who probably don't have good communication skills (but some of them had extremely good communication skills!) it was quite amazing how well they did all this. I worked as a student support assistant at Barnfield College at the Westbourne Centre in Bedford, and I got involved with the drama students and it was really amazing what some of those guys achieved.
Mid-way through the morning, a man who I believe was previously a BBC television producer (forget his name now) and who is a governor of Camphill, came in to start work on the video they are making. He had been editing footage which they had been filming over the past few weeks and he showed the rough footage to us and I was really impressed by what he had done and what the students had achieved. Using a lot of technology, such as green-screen, to create a lot of the effects, such backgrounds. The film/video isn't complete. It needs sound extra work doing on it. Sounds which we helped record, will be added and a voice-over and then it's complete. I'm looking forward to going back next Tuesday to continue working at Camphill.
I had hoped to try out their café at Camphill, but it's closed. The chef/cook/baker who works in the kitchens apparently is in the Himalayas, not sure exactly what she's doing there, climbing a mountain, (not sure whether it's Everest.) so the café is closed at the moment, but hopefully it will be open agin once she returns. I'm really looking forward to trying the bread she makes.
No doubt there will be some paperwork to be completed, stuff like a disclosure (formerly called a C.R.B. check (Criminal Records Bureau) before I can work at Camphill. But a really positive time spent there.
I took out Alfie around 6.30 this morning. It was quite mild, no wind blowing, no ice on the car windscreen. The grass in Eaglestone Park has been mown. I wasn't aware yesterday, but I think I heard the mower, but not sure what it was. There's quite an acreage to cover so it must have taken some time, no doubt one of those ride-on mowers. They missed bit, a sort of triangle of grass, but never mind. Only problem with them mowing the grass was that, when I got home I had grass stuck to my shoes. Just annoying. Never mind.
I've been to Camphill this morning. I thought it a good idea to leave the house around 8.30 because I knew the traffic was going to be heavy. I drove round the inner ring road to come out of Eaglestone near the shop and then left onto Chaffron Way where traffic cab build up approaching the Four Bridges roundabout, but it wasn't too bad, fortunately. I then went round the roundabout and headed back towards the Marlborough Street roundabout where the traffic was fairly heavy, but I carried on along Chaffron Way. A large four-by-four insisted on tailgating me until I got to the roundabout just beyond Waitrose at Oakgrove. Can't people think that some people are quite happy driving at a reasonably safe speed, and that it's dangerous to tailgate another car? If you come to close behind and I have to brake suddenly, you will run into the back of my car and cause quite a nasty accident, or don't they see this? Apparently not. They just want the road to themselves and you out the way.
I got to Camphill and parked in the carpark (where else would you park? Crazy really.) I then walked into the office and the lady there took me to the class doing work on computers, because she thought that was where I was meant to be, but after about half an hour another lady came in and said I was going to be working with residents in the theatre, so I was taken there and introduced to the 'actors' who were sitting in a row. I had to give them a sort of introduction to myself and they all introduced themselves. A very talkative inductive bunch. The leader of the group and one other assistant gave me a sort of run-down of what they had been doing; a project which uses the 'Three Little Pigs' as the basis for a play and video to explain 'Stranger Danger.' One of the group wasn't so good at remembering his lines, so they went through them, using what they described as osmosis to retain and learn these lines. As the lines are in verse, it would make it a good deal easier to remember, well, it would if it was me. I wasn't allowed to get away with just observing, I had to join in with them, and the whole group had to repeat the lines. Considering these are guys (and when I say 'guys', I'm referring to both sexes.) who probably don't have good communication skills (but some of them had extremely good communication skills!) it was quite amazing how well they did all this. I worked as a student support assistant at Barnfield College at the Westbourne Centre in Bedford, and I got involved with the drama students and it was really amazing what some of those guys achieved.
Mid-way through the morning, a man who I believe was previously a BBC television producer (forget his name now) and who is a governor of Camphill, came in to start work on the video they are making. He had been editing footage which they had been filming over the past few weeks and he showed the rough footage to us and I was really impressed by what he had done and what the students had achieved. Using a lot of technology, such as green-screen, to create a lot of the effects, such backgrounds. The film/video isn't complete. It needs sound extra work doing on it. Sounds which we helped record, will be added and a voice-over and then it's complete. I'm looking forward to going back next Tuesday to continue working at Camphill.
I had hoped to try out their café at Camphill, but it's closed. The chef/cook/baker who works in the kitchens apparently is in the Himalayas, not sure exactly what she's doing there, climbing a mountain, (not sure whether it's Everest.) so the café is closed at the moment, but hopefully it will be open agin once she returns. I'm really looking forward to trying the bread she makes.
No doubt there will be some paperwork to be completed, stuff like a disclosure (formerly called a C.R.B. check (Criminal Records Bureau) before I can work at Camphill. But a really positive time spent there.
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