O Caledonia! stern and wild,
Meet nurse for a poetic child!
Land of brown heath and shaggy wood,
Land of the mountain and the flood,
Land of my sires! what mortal hand
Can e’er untie the filial band
That knits me thy rugged strand!
(The Lay of the Last Minstrel, Sir Walter Scott)
After dancing (easier routine today) and Italian we launched into a Burn’s/Scotland appreciation day. Studied Tam O Shanter and listened to Malcolm Arnold’s music on this CD, which provided nice backing for our supper too. Davie read A Red Red rose, (also listened to song version), I read To A Mouse and the kids chose favoured bits from Tam. I went first and was followed by what I took to be a stunned, possibly horrified silence. Charlotte reassured me – “no mum, were just in awe” 
Dug out my Granny’s crystal decanter, which has lived in cupboards for years – how silly…
Cranachan recipe can be found here
This was the only Scottish thing we could find for a tablecloth. Sadly both Scottish flags have become rather racist symbols in Scotland now, a sort of ‘go back home, English people’ thing – we do not share these sentiments and use it in it’s traditional, Scotland-loving sense
and we finished with Auld Lang Syne on the treble recorder 
amazing language, wonderful poems
a beautiful ballet book.
