During the summer holidays in 1935 we began building again. Two dormitories and a bathroom and lavatory were built over the enlarged schoolroom we had had made overlooking the pond garden in 1932. In addition to Joy, Isabel and Shena who were our three regular boarders we had also had several day children who had spent a few days or a few weeks or a whole term with us.

Mile Girrebeuk left to return to Brittany in July 1934. She had made some wonderful head dresses for Goblin Market, the play by Christina Rossetti which we were expecting to perform at the end of term entertainment.

A music club was started in the autumn term with Miss Wyatt as President and Gillian as secretary. In November a party again went to one of Robert Mayer's Children's Concerts at Central Hall Westminster. That year we had our first Christmas play in the new gym. A portable stage was erected at the end nearest the library which served as a dressing room and we had stage curtains and special lighting arrangements. The play was called 'The Children's Heritage' which I had written especially for them with incidental music arranged by Miss Wyatt. Every child took part and every notable country of the world ancient and modern was represented.

The League of Pity entertainment took place on Friday July 12th. A nature play called All the Year Round was acted in the spinney, the little chestnut wood on a raised bank between the house and the lawn which was where all the summer plays took place and made a natural setting for them. The elder children impersonated the four seasons with flowers appropriate to each, and woodland animals -rabbits, a squirrel, a robin and a dragon-fly, the dances being arranged by Mrs Cooper.

In August that summer Eleanor and I joined the City of London Vacation Course and spent a fortnight in London attending lectures and meeting a number of teachers from various parts of the world. The secretary asked me to write an account of the Course and I told him about the play we had acted. It was published in the Teachers World under the heading 'The best nature play ever written for schools'. My brother was stationed in China at the time and the Army Education Officer showed him a copy and asked if the writer was any relation!

The summer of 1935 saw the Silver Jubilee of King George V. Those who were boarders at The Spinney at that time will no doubt remember that they went with Miss Eleanor and me to the United Service at Great Bookham Recreation Ground and after dark we all went in the car to the Hogs Back above Guildford to see the bonfire and a chain of beacons lighted at 10 o'clock all round the country. We had also listened in the morning to the Jubilee Procession and the service at St Paul's Cathedral. At 8 o'clock in the evening we heard the King speaking from Buckingham Palace.

That same summer on Whit Tuesday a party of twenty-five children went with us and Mrs Dibdin by motor coach to a day-light rehearsal of the Aldershot Military Tattoo. Miss Linday joined the staff in the autumn of that year and we said goodbye to several of our oldest members, including our two first pupils, who had reached the age limit of twelve years. Earlier on Eleanor and I had joined the Association of Headmistresses of Preparatory Schools and it was to the children's advantage that they should then at the age of twelve pass into a senior school, either day or boarding of their parents' choice.

From time to time we had isolated cases of measles or mumps but had been able to keep them from becoming a serious epidemic. But in the summer term of 1936 we really did have an epidemic of whooping cough, chiefly in the Lower Division and Preparatory. These were the days before inoculation became general. In fact some parents were quite pleased for their children to get over childish complaints while they were at their prep school to save them falling a victim just as they were going in for their school leaving exam. On this occasion coming as it did in the middle of the summer term and in lovely summer weather and with the various exits into the garden we were able to keep the 'haves' and 'have nots' apart. During the war it was more difficult to isolate in cases of infection and on one occasion having carefully segregated the suspects into the long schoolroom waiting for their lunch till the others had passed through the hall into the dining room I found one of the boarders having' climbed onto a chair, had opened a little window which was never used, looking into the schoolroom and taking in great gasps of the possibly infected air in order to catch measles.

In the summer of 1936 we had one or two changes of staff Mrs Dibdin had to give up for a time when her little twin sons, George and John were born. Miss Rickards came temporarily to fill the gap. Mrs Rake who had carried on teaching French when Mile Girrebeuk returned to France in 1934 had now moved to Shennington near Oxford and Madame Leake came instead. We were sorry to lose Miss Wyatt who went to Jersey to nurse an old friend who was ill, and our cousin, Miss Lawless, drove over twice a week from Bromley to take on the music in the middle of rehearsals for 'As You Like It,' scenes from which were performed at the League of Pity Entertainment in July.