THE LITTLE THINGS

Sometimes it's nice to marvel at the little things in life...........

These all sprouted up overnight in the woods due to a little wet weather and the kids just love spotting them, no eating though.

The first sign of Autumn, we saw this tree last night on a ride around the village, whilst it feels to warm to be Autumn it seems to be just around the corner.

Samuel and Benjamin have settled well into there soccer teams and really enjoy practice.  They wear red socks so I can spot them on the field.  Manu's been asked to coach the tournament on Saturday so he's thrilled.

Manu and Seb, last night we had a bbq outside our appartment.  We don't have a garden so decided to bbq next to the building in a field and it worked out great.  Well it does help that our grumpy neighbour has returned to Paris.  There's always one isn't there.

CYCLING AROUND PRAZ

Well Manu worked this weekend and we never saw him at all leaving at 7am and coming in around 11pm, it was a long weekend for him.  So to pass the time, I got out my bike, pumped up the tyres and dusted it off and off we set.  Must say my behind is rather sore this morning but it was a world of discovery.

There was an elderly couple sitting at this farm looking over the garden they had just finished preening.  I was dying to take a picture but resisted it looked so French.

Other than that I prepared and froze some berries and prunes given to me by my friend Solange from her garden.  Having lived in Welcome Glen which is practically a sand dune I have very few recipes for fruit as nothing grows there except Proteas and Wild Fig, so will have to get cracking and look some up on the internet for the Winter.  Mmmmm a lovely Blackberry crumble in front of a roaring fire, sounds good.

THE BIRTHDAY PARTY

Well we had a very successful birthday party yesterday.  We rounded the kids up and took them to the woods, it was much quieter that way.  I think Samuel had fun and my friend joined us so there was slightly more control.  Fun fun. 

Then back home for cake..............

SAMUEL TURNS 8

Well we woke up to a dreary day, Autumn has definitely settled in and we had our first fire of the season.  Samuel turned 8 and was very excited.  All the usual things, we opened presents, made cupcakes for school, sang happy birthday and had pizza for supper.  He had a great day I think.

Well we woke up to a dreary day, Autumn has definitely settled in and we had our first fire of the season.  Samuel turned 8 and was very excited.  All the usual things, we opened presents, made cupcakes for school, sang happy birthday and had pizza for supper.  He had a great day I think.

Things haven't been sailing very smoothly lately.  Samuel has meltdowns daily and they seem to be increasing, I think due to frustration mainly.  It seems his capacity to explain things is very much diminished and so he just flies into a rage instead of letting us help him with the speech side of things.  We have now been threatened with the CLIS if he does not make a massive improvement and start to read by December.  The CLIS is for handicapped children who cannot function in a normal school class situation.  It is a class in a regular school but with dedicated teachers to help the kids battling.  Only thing is once you are in that school system you don't get out resulting in no chance of university, college etc.  So maybe he is seeing our stress and reacting to that I don't know.  Right now he sees a Psychiatrist, a Psychologist, a speech therapist and an exchange French teacher weekly then there's Jujitsu and Soccer.  If he doesn't fall over it will be a miracle.  He's fantastic really but Manu and I feel like we have run into a brick wall. ANYWAY.

Rugby is bringing relief, we have been keeping up with all the games and are really enjoying watching them and supporting the Boks.  Thing is who is Manu going to support when we play France. Hummmm.

My brother sent all the paraphernalia so we are all geared to go.

SOCCER TEAM

Well the boys are in.  We took them to the soccer tryouts on Wednesday and they were both chosen for the team.  All very exciting but I'm not sure how excited we will all be when it's -15C and snowing.  They are playing on the new field finished this year, it's astro turf and cost a mere 3 million Euros.  Scarry stuff.

Samuel

The brothers in action - blue t-shirt, black t-shirt

LAC JAVEN IN THE SUMMER

It feels so good to be home, I feel almost guilty for calling it that when I am not in South Africa, but I get that warm fuzzy feeling here and just love being in the outdoors.  We went off to the Lac in Megeve which we did in the winter too, but it all looks a little different.  Not having a garden it's great to have all this on our door step.

.........and here it is in winter

These are the photos of our walk and picnic, it was such a warm day....

MY FRIEND HEATHER

I have a friend named Heather, we went to Hotel School together in 1991 and graduated after many tears and much laughter in 1993.  She was living in the UK with her husband and two little girls and moved to the States - NY - the same week I moved here.  She recently wrote a letter to her friends telling of her difficulty in the States, with her mother and life in general.  I laughed when she said how stupid Americans seem to be (generalization of course).  I remember living in California with Manu and being asked by the checkout girl if I wasn't scared of all the tigers in the garden back home in AFRICA. So Heath, I feel you.  Here in France however the French don't appear to be stupid but more outspoken.  They have absolutely no problem in telling you off in the park because your children have no shoes on (Roux that's for you) or shouting at your kids to shut up in the library, they drive up your backside, give you rude looks if you add butter to your bread with pate, refuse to say goodmorning if you are not at least three generations from the village and my best - have total disrespect when visiting a foreign country due to the fact that they don't eat the same foods that they do. 

I have had a bit of a hectic time here to; six weeks on my own without Manu, up and down to Autophonists (speach therapists), Psychologists, child Psychiatrists etc.  We finally got a break and Samuel was diagnosed with Dysphasia, then everything was blown out the water yet again when the doctor down graded him to Gross Language Retardation, which means it's mechanical failure not mental failure with the speach side of things.  Great but not.  Seems Samuel is now not bad enough to warrent the special needs we would have got if he was Dysphasic not that I wish for a dysphasic child but now no assistant for school, no paid for sessions with the pyschologists and my child at 8 years of age still cannot repeat the alphabet, hence today was a very down day.  And then a little angel appeared.  His name - DIDIER. 

We've been taking Samuel to Didier for a year twice a week so he can be taught French in a small group situation, provided by the government schooling system for all exchange students.  We've been told to drop him by the pyschiatrist and just use a speech therapist which we are doing anyway.  So today we got a message to be at the school at 13h30.  It was Didier in person, he drove 45km to speak to us and beg us to send Samuel to him once again for one more year.  He is so nice and so commited, he so wants to help this child and wants us to use his services.  How easy would it have been for him to say OK I agree because to be quiet frank Samuel's lack of language is dire and I think Didier has been even more frustrated than us at times.  So now we will use him instead of a class assistant take him twice a week and see after six months where we are.  So you see Heather when you think there is no more left in you or no more nice people in the world the world surprises you and hands you an angel you just have to be patient.

So to my friend Heather and all you girls our there I send you a little angel to spark up your day xx

80

Well the reason for going to London in the first place was for my dad's 80th birthday.  Karen had organized a dinner at a local restaurant and they had given her a private dining room so it was perfect.  Guy flew out for the weekend so we were all there except my brother Julian unfortunately but he was caught up in work.

Karen took the boys to get the cake, balloons and decorate the table.  It all looked so lovely.

Wine from Alan, there's eight bottles in one, we didn't even dent it but we gave it our best shot

 - Rioja, it was delicious

My lovely Aunty Margaret

Grandpa with his grown up grandson - Michael

Mom and Son

The two grown up grandchildren - Michael and Sarah

We did a slide show of dad through he life and played it on the screen at the end, so it was great to see everyone popping up

So from Left we have Sarah, Alan, Me, Dad, Mom, Guy, Aunty Margaret, Michael and Karen

With the boys

The birthday boy.