The girls are now firmly settled back into the swing of Toynbee life and it is amazing how time flys by so quickly. I cannot believe we are already in week 3!! It has been an interesting week with the recent weather and we will post some snow pictures later. I thought before the term rushes past too quickly it would be a nice time to share some michaelmas reflections with you from Pippa and Kat.
Michaelmas was an extremely busy term for sport with successes in Steepo and house hockey keeping up the Toynbee morale. Steepo being the first inter house competition of the year, brought along a sense of competitive spirit and determination to our hearts, with the majority of girls taking a very serious approach as we all wanted to do the best we could to beat the Woodard Girls in the year above. This proved to be a very realistic challenge as we found out in the following assembly when it was Toynbee who was announced to have won the winner’s cup, with special recognition to Eva who also won a silver medal. With the majority of the second hockey team being made up of Toynbee girls and six of us being members of the firsts, Saturday morning matches was a very popular event in the house with the girls sometimes having to train over five times a week. This gave us a great chance in House Hockey, which took place in the last week of term and put us all in very high spirits. The Upper Sixth, with their matching tutus and New Zealand inspired dance at the start of the match looked to be a very threatening side and included around nine first team players, all of these elements making us quite nervous. In the end however, Toynbee once again prevailed with clever teamwork and determined defending, helping to end the game with a 2-0 win.
Sports matches weren’t the only competitions that went on during the term, with a very tight head of house race stirring up some difficulty as everyone begun deciding whom they thought could best represent what we were about. It was extremely close with interesting publicity stunts also bringing some humour into the process. After an intense voting session and what seemed like a long wait, it was finally announced that Harriet would be our head with Jess as the deputy. So far they have both been very successful, with the overall ambiance in the house being one of a closely bonded group.
When asked what made Toynbee a special place to live in it normally wasn’t the big events that came up but more often than not the small quieter ones that usually got a mention. Throughout the term we’ve had quite a few movie nights with Miss Wright and Ms Gurd kindly buying us a selection of movies and yummy snacks that were normally gone before anyone had even pressed play. As Christmas came so did the tinsel and more importantly, our very own Toynbee tree, which we spent an evening decorating with angels, snowmen, lights and colourful ornaments while chomping down on some mince pies and fending of the cold with mugs of hot chocolate.
Looking forward to the Lent term..........................Pippa
Toynbee House had a very creating and exciting Christmas term. Academics aside, the day students and boarders have enjoyed a range of fun and competitive after-school activities, such as The House Music competition. Having spent a month rehearsing the house ensemble “Seasons of Love” from the musical ‘Rent’, we were all excited to perform it (and move on). Also, Georgia sang “Beautiful Disaster”, Amanda performed “If He Will Like Me” and the lovely house string quartet of Lucy (the loud violin), Harriet (the cute flute), Jenny (and her famous oboe) and Amelia (with her cello…) performed “Pachabel’s Canon”. Great thanks should go to all our music scholars: Harriet, Jenny, Hannah, Lucy and Amelia and especially Amanda, who has organized all the rehearsals and was very enthusiastic in making the house sing! (And she succeeded in the end!) Unfortunately, we didn’t win, but it’s the taking part that counts J
One of the fun Saturday nights were spent preparing and setting up for Casino Night and later enjoying it. It was lovely to see many day students come in on the weekend and join with the entertainment; I personally learnt how to play Texas Holdem and certainly bonded with people from my year. Emma thought that the Casino Night was “a really cool way to spend my Saturday”. There are a lot of unforgettable memories from the night, and I think we’ll be coming back to those quite often!
Then there was the Christmas Meal at a Chinese restaurant “Days”. For most boarders, that is enough said, though I shall explain a bit further. Miss Wright came up with the idea to take everyone to “Days” in Brighton , which is an all-you-can-eat buffet. Knowing how much we love food, Toynbee House really enjoyed that and we even had some food celebrities. Harriet, Steph and Hannah came to the restaurant with a mission- eat as much as one can hold in. On their full fifth plate of Chinese food, they thought they were doing well. But then they saw that Sharon
Finally, it is fair to say that most of the second half of Michaelmas term was spent rehearsing for the school musical, Cabaret. The cast had many time-consuming rehearsals that were both productive and tiring. Sometimes the lack of sleep made a few members angry and frustrated, but it was worth it in the end as the 4 nights of the show received the best possible feedback. Georgia (Sally Bowles night 1 and 3) faced a challenge on her last night, as she was performing in front of Dame Judy Dench, who was the first Sally in England. But Georgia
It was a wonderful term and a huge Thank You should go to Miss Gurd, Miss Wright, Matron and all the House Tutors, for making this term memorable and enjoyable!
Bring on the Lent term........................Kat
No comments:
Post a Comment