So glamorous

If you had told me, say, 15 years ago, that one day I would be going to Brussels for a business trip, I would have thought that sounded so glamorous. Brussels! For the day! Wow!

The reality is somewhat different.

You get up at sparrow's fart, leave while the rest of your family is still snoring, and drive for an hour in the dark and pouring rain to the airport.

The plane is late. You wait.

You fly. You are hungry as you haven't yet had breakfast, nothing appealed at the airport, and nothing appeals on the plane.

You walk and walk and walk to get out of the airport, feeling several blisters developing from your hardly ever worn high-heeled shoes.

You get to the organization you are visiting.

You wait. You meet with various people with whom you may be working. You wait. You eat a canteen lunch. You wait. You meet with further people with whom you may be working. You wait. You are starving.

You get back to the airport. You devour some fast food, but not much in the hope you might find something a bit more healthy. You do some quick clothes shopping (that part is fun, not because there's any particularly glamourous shops, but because the prices are MUCH cheaper than at home).

Something beeps as you go through security, prompting a full body pat down.

You board the plane. You are still starving, having found nothing healthy to eat at the airport that didn't have a huge queue. Nothing appeals on the plane, once again.

You arrive back in your country, eyes watering and very tired. Your feet are killing you.

You snatch the last bread roll from the small food shop at the airport, along with some camenbert.

In the car, you make a hasty sandwich and gulp it down. And see your fly is undone - since when, you don't know.

You drive for an hour in the dark and rain back home.

You go to bed.

Very glamorous indeed.

Cat v2

So, ah, Tabby is no longer. I let her out one morning and we never saw her again. My niece is sure she tried to go back to their place and simply took the wrong road, but I suspect a fox.

There were tears. From the kids too.

After a couple of weeks I started searching for a new kitten. And this morning we got one!

Hopefully we'll manage to keep little Splotch alive...

Fruition II

You've seen the before, here's the after:

There's sunflowers!

And cornflowers!

And some kind of pink flower!

So pretty!

What's that? Oh, right, it's meant to be a veggie patch, not a flower garden. Well, you know we have lettuces... there's also pumpkins!

And cabbages (slightly overtaken by the pumpkins)!

And leeks (also slightly overtaken by the pumpkins)!

And carrots, corriander, peas... and tomatoes. LOTS of tomatoes.

Which the kids eat like lollies.

And which fulfilled a dream for this year: making my own tomato sauce for winter! (and also some oven-roasted tomatoes)

I suspect I'll be making more...

Fruition I

8.30pm. Kids in bed. Washing up done. Right, what's next... the raspberries. Sigh.

And so you go out, across the road to your in-laws, where your raspberry plants have their 2-daily batch of fruit ready to pick.

Trudge trudge trudge up the drive.

Mind whirring with all the other chores you have.

At the vines, quiet. Just the sound of the water gurgling from the old-fashioned water pump in the garden of your child's friend's grandparents' place next door, the jingle of the cow bells in the paddock across the road, the odd swallow above.

The fading light silhouetting the mountains is gorgeous.

The air has a bit of a nip, reminding you that autumn is coming.

The berries are dark, swollen, delicious.

You are all alone.

And you are struck by just how beautiful this life you have is.

It's my happy birthday!

More photos here...

Back to school

You know what mummy actually? The 2eme enfantine is much harder than 1ere enfantine. You know what we have to do? We have to write words, and then we have to take them to the teacher, and then we have to sound them out. It's really going to be much harder this year.

All said without any acknowledgement that he can already read pretty well, and has already, off his own bat, had a pretty good stab at writing.

And despite his avowal of just how hard his second year of school is going to be, he very happily bounded off this morning, barely even saying goodbye.

If only I could equally happily get myself back into the Regime. Sigh.

Relief

I can't remember exactly how many times Téo has been pulled spluttering and gasping from a pool or river, but it's been many. Too many.

Although actually, the last time was pretty funny. It was in the hotel pool in Paris, where thanks to my magnificent packing foresight, he was splashing around in underpants and no swim vest.

- Look at me mummy, I can swim!

- No you can't! You don't have your swim vest! Stay on the steps until Miss M can carry you!

- No I can swim, look!

He leapt off the steps with a huge grin stretching from ear to ear... which, in a very cartoon-esque manner, morphed into a look of wide-eyed panic as his head went under.

So. Swimming lesson time it was.

(Yes, I know, I have said this before. Like, 2 years ago. But! It's not entirely my slackness that has kept him at risk of drowning! I tried to get him in last year, honest, but over here they won't take kids under 5. And even at 5, they hesitate.)

He only got in 3 lessons, thanks to a wet and cold August. But from unfailingly sinking whenever he was unsupported in water, by the end of the third lesson he could do this:

And then yesterday we made him jump into deep water and swim back to the edge.

Which he did, with no sinking and only a little spluttering.

Phew.