Dancing, hair and Dickens

Elizabeth got her first ever 1st overall trophy today in the intermediate section of a highland dance competition. She came 1st and 2nd in every dance taking 1st overall. She was absolutely thrilled. The trophy is massive and by far the biggest and heaviest one she’s ever got.

I’m still having weekly highland dance lessons too though I’ll never get to Elizabeth’s level but it’s very good exercise and I’m enjoying it.

Recently I watched a YouTube video on how to style your hair like a Victorian in which they demonstrated pinning the hair in loops then leaving it overnight. It’s called pin-curling and I decided to give it a try.

It took me about 15 minutes and 50 bobby pins to do the pin-curling.

It was a bit uncomfortable to sleep like that but I managed and the pins all stayed in. I wrapped a silk scarf around my head which helped.

In the morning I couldn’t wait to pull all the pins out and I was impressed with the curls I got.

The YouTuber, Bernadette Banner, says when she does it her curls last a week. Mine mostly fell out when I went for a run later that same day. I don’t think Victorian women went jogging.

I’ve just finished listening to Great Expectations on Audible and it was fantastic. Charles Dickens Is a superb storyteller. I was hooked the whole way through which is hugely beneficial to me because I listen when I go running and I don’t like running much so the promise of the next instalment gets me out of the house. The characters are rich and detailed and Dickens can make you laugh and cry at the same time. He reminded me a lot of the Irish author, Paul Murray, who has similarly lengthy sagas with well-developed characters and who can combine tragedy with humour. I’m now listening to David Copperfield which I read once as a teenager but have forgotten. It’s brilliant so far and I’m hooked much to the annoyance of my family who try to talk to me only to discover I’ve got headphones in and am deep in Dickens-land. I’m planning to go through the full list of Dickens which should keep me going for a while.