Hilary and I drove down to Stickney (near Boston) to help them celebrate their school’s 150th anniversary by giving the children a taste of Victorian education – in short, our regular schoolroom workshop within their own school setting. The weather smiled on us, and the drive down the county – first across the wolds and then through the fens – was truly beautiful, and – being Lincolnshire and too early in the year to be stuck behind heavy farm machinery – there was hardly any traffic.

In the morning we were somewhat dismayed to discover that we had 49 year 3 and 4 pupils; the year three pupils were squashed tight on to gym forms and they were sharing one slate and pencil between two – so that was very realistic. In the afternoon we had 27 year 6s followed by 20 year 5s who were more comfortably spaced and supplied.

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The school is a good Victorian building with a number of additions in the last ten years which have been very well and sympathetically done to blend in with the original in their scale and window shapes. The children were well behaved, and clearly enjoyed their day. I wish we had an infant class workshop to offer, but this will presumably come to pass later this year when the Wilderspin school in Barton opens. (See my Heritage Open Days 3 blog on 9th September 2007)

There was one little girl - not so little actually as she was one of those 11 year old girls who are suddenly women - who came up and talked to me afterwards (having been the first with her hand up both as a Victorian and in the pleniary session) who is quite clearly a reader, an historian and an actress. I really warmed to her.

It being Ash Wednesday Joe and I went to church in Grasby in the evening. It was a simple said communion service with no anointing with ashes. Afterwards Joe felt it necessary to come back with me to rescue his cream-cake from our fridge where he had left it after gorging himself on Tuesday. I have a feeling that he may just very slightly be missing the point and that the symbolical giving up of sweets and/or cakes and/or alcohol for Lent should be there to serve as a constant reminder of deeper spiritual matters.