A quick review of the weekend
This weekend was encouraging :
1) A new chap came to church through a contact on the blog and seemed very much at home. This morning I got a really enthusiastic email from his contacts in the States.
2) The morning service was a "start of term" family service, kind of, and we felt very much at home with the way this was approached. It could have been a Deeside service - the role of parents and of the family, etc.
3) This was followed by a picnic in a park at Canejan where I suppose there were four or five couples and lots of singles and a good few kids. Long may the rain hold off !
Getting everyone home afterwards was still a bit complicated. One lad was working at the stadium for the Ireland/Namibia game, the Griffins don't yet have their car insured.
But this morning I have the Monday morning blues with a few added complications.
Firstly I have to do lots of sums to work out how we are going to make it through the next three months until our support is increased fully in November.
Then it has just been confirmed that we are again unable to attend the UFM All-Europe Conference this October - it's in school term time. Last year it would have meant taking three days off school and the schools were reluctantly willing - but we moved house. This year it would mean taking a whole week off school and Catrin's headteacher is unhappy. I think they're right, too. We have been told to mark this week off in our diary every year. So there we are.
Still ! One bit of good news. One of the music schools in Pessac (not the one near us) has spaces for students for flute (Catrin) and guitar (Gwilym), their fees are very reasonable (much cheaper than Britain) and you can pay monthly - so we should be able to enrol the kids to instrument lessons. I must ring up today about it.
1) A new chap came to church through a contact on the blog and seemed very much at home. This morning I got a really enthusiastic email from his contacts in the States.
2) The morning service was a "start of term" family service, kind of, and we felt very much at home with the way this was approached. It could have been a Deeside service - the role of parents and of the family, etc.
3) This was followed by a picnic in a park at Canejan where I suppose there were four or five couples and lots of singles and a good few kids. Long may the rain hold off !
Getting everyone home afterwards was still a bit complicated. One lad was working at the stadium for the Ireland/Namibia game, the Griffins don't yet have their car insured.
But this morning I have the Monday morning blues with a few added complications.
Firstly I have to do lots of sums to work out how we are going to make it through the next three months until our support is increased fully in November.
Then it has just been confirmed that we are again unable to attend the UFM All-Europe Conference this October - it's in school term time. Last year it would have meant taking three days off school and the schools were reluctantly willing - but we moved house. This year it would mean taking a whole week off school and Catrin's headteacher is unhappy. I think they're right, too. We have been told to mark this week off in our diary every year. So there we are.
Still ! One bit of good news. One of the music schools in Pessac (not the one near us) has spaces for students for flute (Catrin) and guitar (Gwilym), their fees are very reasonable (much cheaper than Britain) and you can pay monthly - so we should be able to enrol the kids to instrument lessons. I must ring up today about it.
Comments
I must have workd 'em out wrong !
The head of the entire school setup said yes to Gwilym having the UFM Europe conference week.
Armed with this I can try with Catrin's head tomorrow..
Maybe we are going after all !