Back to school

Well, I was told it was about time I blogged again (Pat here) So here goes..

Back to school after the Easter break. We had a great time, as my brother and his family came to visit. We weren't able to take them anywhere unfortunately, as there are 5 of them and our car isn't big enough. Still, we were able to have them at the house for a bit of nosh. They tried the delights of the Bordeaux tramway! And they took us to a rather scrummy restaurant in the centre: The puds are to die for, the Dolce vita I think.

Then back to school for all. Well I always dread the first day back, cos I have this dread of having forgotten absolutely everything!!! However the teacher for that morning (she is great fun and a good laugh) told me that I had made great progress!

I then spent the next 20 mins in confusion and fog, as I didn't know what was going on in the lesson..well I got the basics, which of course is important, and you can always look at the person next to you, and find out what you are meant to be doing!

We had a test on the passé composé, which I thought I had mastered, but lo and behold, I got all in a tizz!! Ho hum..

By the way we now have French keyboard, which means I have to spend the next 20 mins, correcting all the faults. The a is where the w used to be, the q is where the a used to be, the m is where the ; used to be, so it makes interesting reading until I change it all.

Well; today the children returned from a night away with the scout group!! Aren't they such brave children! Their first night away from us in France! They went yesterday, and slept under canvas. Gwilym is not into the French cuisine though, he hadn't eaten any lunch, and we collected them at 6pm. It was veg soup. The scout leader even tried to coax him with a spoon, but it didn't work. Still, they had a good healthy tea of nuggets and chips with tomato sauce when we got in. Catrin is a bit more adventurous, she tried the soup, but didn't eat the tomatoes.

They both missed us terribly.. really!! And we missed them too. We're terrible if they go away, we wander aimlessly around the house wondering why it is so quiet!! So it's really good to have them back:

Honestly the spell checker insists on changing the words passé composé for some reason, so it is almost easier to do it manually! Although I have done it so many times this evening, that you will have to guess what it is I'm on about cos I'm fed up with changing it!!

Yesterday evening to fill the void of having no children, we had about 11 folk round.. That wasn't the only reason though..

It was a great chance to get to know them. We had also invited some friends from the DEFLE who don't often get the opportunity to speak French with "real" French people.

It was quite funny, cos every so often the numbers would go up. I met a girl who comes to church, and we hadn't seen her as she had been away, so I invited her, then Fiona found others and invited them, hence the reason we had so many. But we had plenty of food, and the more the merrier I say.. We finally got to bed at 1am!!

We had lots of food to eat as I said, and at one time, one of the lads commented on the "British" way of doing things, he meant having the cheese after the dessert! The French have it before dessert, and get really gobsmacked if it appears after pudding.

O well..

We then played silly games, thanks to Fiona Steward who has an amazing gift of pulling daft games out of a hat, but they were great fun, and in French too of course. So, have you ever played charades in French!! Why is it that I thought "The sound of music", had only 3 words?
It doesn't change that much in French! Still somehow my team got it. We had a great time, and I think they did?

We want to do it again, particularly with the church folk, and perhaps end the evening with an epilogue from Mr. Spurgeon. Alan has a copy of Morning and Evening in French. That will be great too, so we may arrange it for sometime next month, and see how that goes (of course if any others want to join us that would be a bonus!)

I'm feeling a bit more settled, at least I am happy here because I know it is where God wants us to be. It's a lovely place to be, and I know it will be even lovelier when the language comes easier.

Well that's my blog, you may not hear from me for some time... well you never know!!

Off to bed now, although we have tomorrow off, bank holiday!

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