Basket weaving

A few days ago a good friend of mine had a serious conversation with me about the fact that I should relax more, and what was I doing for my leisure, even or especially as I am pulling out of the volunteer work with the refugees. It's true, I find it difficult to just 'do nothing', I always have something planned for a possible wait (read a book, knit a little), and as most of my friends live in places rather far away from here I can't just go and visit a friend to do nothing with her besides just visit and be friends. And once somebody had put a pistol to your head and said "Relax!", that is just about the easiest task in the world!
So it's just as well that I had enrolled in a community college workshop on basket weaving even before that friend of mine lectured me, and indeed she was pleased when I told her that that was coming up. A special kind of café leisure, perhaps.
Today was the first of two days. Apart from the fact that we are having the class in the entrance area of the building where people are coming and going, it's drafty and and noisy and about as cheerful as in a train station waiting room of the 1950s it's been fun and interesting. And exhausting. I never imagined that making a basket requires so much strength. Here are a few pictures of what I am making:

The circular bottom

Temporarily you do need a lot of room!

This is how you can tell that your row has not been finished yet:
as long as there are two empty slots, you need to continue.
Only when a rod extends from every slot have you actually completed the round.
And the beginning/end is where two rods are in one slot.

This is the current state of my basket as it will be put under plastic over night.

We're a fast lot - the master basketeer said he doesn't usually have people who put in the second layer on the first day (which is the darker upper part on my basket here). Now I am wondering whether I will be finished too early - or should I add a third layer before closing it off? It's going to be a basket for my knitting.