1. The special hell which can be a school trip was refined to it's highest order yesterday, when I was a parent helper on a school trip to the Boat Show at the showgrounds near to the school. Which involved firstly a 2km walk along a busy road shepherding the 34 kids, some of whom had only one speed (slow, with added smirk when you asked them to move a bit faster particularly when crossing the roads). Then, when we got into the showgrounds building, my confusion over why they were told they had to bring swimming gear was answered by the sight of two huge temporary pools set up inside. So then I had to get my group changed into swimming gear and they got into the pool for 10 minutes where they were taught basic snorkelling techniques. I didn't realise that even the snorkelling googles weren't enough to convince Daughter-Two to open her eyes underwater until she swam into the side of the pool and nearly broke her nose. With the 10 minutes up and her in tears, they had to get out and struggle back into their uniforms before setting off on a circuit of the other activities. Some, thankfully, were ones I could sit on the sidelines and watch but we finished with "spinnaker sail" packing races. Splitting into two teams left one team short of a person so the young yachtie running the activity simply volunteered their "teacher" (ie me) to make up the balance. (I'm not much taller than most of the kids after all ... not much taller but a lot older and not as healthy as I may look ... I am suffering today). I never had any interest in yachting and now I have even less ...
Nevertheless, as always I was glad I went ... and Daughter-Two won the 'dress up as a lifeguard and do a pretend rescue race' despite putting both legs through one leg of the shorts.
2. Lots of people have been asking how we arranged the trip to France, and our experience of the home exchange. It was a very spur of the moment thing (which we can do, both being largely self-employed). We were jealously discussing the neighbour's planned trip to Europe, and I said that "one day" we should do a house swap. Purely for daydreaming purposes we looked at www.homeexchange.com and there was someone wanting to swap their apartment in Brittany with a house in Auckland. "Wouldn't that be great' we sighed, "wish we could do it". And then we looked at each other and realised that we could (by cashing in all our nearly expiring frequent flyer points and taking Daughter-two out of school for a couple of weeks). So we listed our house on the site and within a matter of hours had arranged that swap plus another with a couple from Strasbourg. And the actual exchanges went very smoothly, with everything as described and people very keen to make the experience as good as possible. The only drawback to it is the time you need to spend beforehand emailing and making arrangements and making sure the house is all in order. It's definitely not the same as booking a hotel then sitting back and daydreaming about the holiday.
3. It's sale time at Designer Digitals!
Every regular item is now marked down 30% AND there are 31 new items also marked down 30% as well. This is a great time to stock up on all your favorite items. The sale runs through midnight California time next Tuesday (May 22nd).
That also means that this week's new designs are already in store:
4. Here's how I scrapped with them:
(with Belle Francaise elements)
(with the new template and Belle Francaise elements)
(with Gemma kit)
(with Cubist templates)
5. We all went to the zoo last weekend, and saw the lions close up for the first time, as they made the most of some autumn sun. (there is glass between them by the way)
