Spring is in the Air.

Hello again,

We're on holiday, and goodness it feels good.

The days begin with cartoons and are filled with walks and cuddles. What else could a girl ask for?

Flowers!

So, we went to the garden centre and then dug up our 'garden' so that we could plant our flowers and pot our seeds.

In a very cute moment, Emma cut off one of her flowers to plant in the pot over the seeds she'd just planted... she was so proud of herself I couldn't find the words to say that Nature doesn't grow her flowers fast!

Maybe she does, though, because all of a sudden my kids are all big and bright and beautiful!

Just like the first flowers of our wee garden :-)

Hoping mother Nature is making your garden bright and beautiful,
Robynxxxx

Time Travelling

When you're standing in one of the three rooms which are going to combine to be our living room, you are most definitely in the 1970's. The wall paper is faded orange but the flowers are defiantly not fading despite the passing of time.

When you climb upstairs to the third and fourth floors, you go back in time. Way back. The house was built in 1759 and nobody's ever really done anything to those floors. Ben's changing that, though, as he's spent the last couple of weekends tearing up the floor, and the stuff that goes beneath.

That means that when you stand on the third floor you can see through the fourth floor to the roof. That's kinda an odd feeling... particularly when you know that we're changing the roof, too!

The funny thing is that it's a great experience to be in the midst of all this dirt and dust because you really have the impression that you're changing something important.

Thankfully, when we come home we can cook using vegetables from the veggie box that our (excellent) neighbours deliver each Friday. Indeed, that's maybe where we find the energy to keep up with quite so much time traveling!

Hope you're all doing well despite the dirt and dust of life!
hugs,
Robynxxxx
.

Winter Days

The weather is already growing warmer again, but for a couple of weeks the weather was real
ly cold here. We stayed around -10*C long enough for the local river to freeze over... and for us to wrap up warm whenever we went out! In the photo above, we're walking past the local church on our way around Mutzig.

Seeing the Light!

Here we are in the attic.... which will become our bedroom. Ben's just finished knocking down the chimney which traversed the house, which means you can now see down, down, down to the first floor. See that little corner of light? That's our living room.... seen through the intermediary level where the kids will sleep... one day!

Important Lessons

Okay, as we tackled another day of taking down wallpaper, I learned a few important lessons.

1. Taking down wallpaper can be fun. When you're standing on the ground.

2. Watching someone else who is taking down wallpaper while standing on a stepladder is much easier than being the person who is taking down wallpaper while standing on a stepladder!

3. That, even me, a girl (!) can take responsibility for taking down the wallpaper in a whole room*. My room was the bathroom (soon to be the kitchen) and I am ever so proud tonight to know that I did it all by myself, stepladder and all!

And so, while our pile of 'taken down wallpaper' grows ever higher, we are inching our way towards the end of the first 'thing to be done' on our list.... and that feels good!

Hoping you're feeling good, too,

Robynxxxx

*Though, okay, I didn't need to do the ceiling...as we're going to add insulation.

Let the games begin!

Hello there!

Okay, so the kids are fine!

Emma's convinced she's a 'georgeous princess' and Jack is as happy as ever on his bike, and all the more so because he can now pedal freely around the garage underneath our "new" house.

We've now started work on our "new house." We haven't done much so far. We've only pulled the wallpaper off the walls in the stairway and a bit in the living room. Goodness, though, it feels good to have started!

Emma and Jack are helping as best they can... soaking the old wallpaper with water so that Ben and I can tear and scrape as best as we can. Reassuringly, this first task is moving relatively quickly... and that's a good thing because we have a lot more left to go before we're done.

The electrician should hopefully be starting up soon and then from there the plumbers and builders should follow suit. If everything goes to plan, that is....

Hoping your plans are going, well, to plan where ever you are in the world,

Robynxxxx

Happy New Year 2012

Hello there!

I just wanted to take a minute to wish you all a very happy New Year!

I hope 2012 will be a peaceful and meaningful year for you and that you'll be able to fill the hours, days, and months with both projects and quiet moments of rest.

For our part, our BIG project is the house... as we returned from our holiday with Ben's parents, we swung past the house to collect the mail and to say hello to its quiet walls. As we drove away, to come back to our rented home, we couldn't help imagining how good it will be one day to come home to our true home.... for that dream to become a reality, though, we have to wait... and realise the hours, days and months of 2012 will also be spent being together as a family, working madly, and resting peacefully. At least, that's what I hope for us!

And so, however you spend 2012, I hope you spend it well!

hugs,

Robynxxxx

Snow is falling, all around!

Hello again,

Okay, smile, when Ben read my blog yesterday and realised that I didn't think that it felt like winter, he packed us all in the car and took us for a drive.

I would like to say that it was a long drive.

But it wasn't.

We were only in the car for 20minutes or so but, because we live at the foot of the Vosges hill range, we quickly gained altitude and came to the Champs de Feu . Only the fields were anything but on fire... as they and the roads were filled with snow!

We didn't stay for long (as I hadn't brought the right clothes....) but we we had enough time for a snowy walk, to make snow angels and to realise, yes, it truly was winter in the Vosges.

Then, after a change of clothes and some hot chocolate back home, we met up with friends in Obernai to visit the Christmas Market... and so, after cups of hot wine, watching the kids going round on the carousel, petting Santa's donkey, snacking on bredele and mannele, and visiting the local church with all it's Christmas decorations, I finished the day well and truly feeling we were in the heart of an Alsacian winter!

Love n snowy hugs,
Robynx

Moving Times

That's it!

Our lives have changed. We are no longer living in our apartment in Mutzig and we've bought an old house to renovate in Molsheim. As the renovations will take at least 6 months, we're renting an apartment (just next door to our old apartment) until the summer holidays. There's so much to be done that it's hard to imagine that we'll be able to live in the house by July but then, as my dear friend Melanie recently wrote, "if your dreams don't scare you, then they're not big enough!'

In the meantime, all is well. The Christmas holidays have just started, though it's so mild that I'm having a hard time we're realising that we're actually in December. One sign that the months have passed is that the kids have changed again. Emma can now get out of her cot, go to the loo, and get dressed by herself. It's really funny to get up in the morning and to see her living her own wee life. I told her recently that she was my "sweet pea" and she replied curtly, "No, Emma, Princess Gorgeous. No Sweetpea!" Also, she'll tell anyone who listens that she'd like a "bigger, better bed." For that, though, she'll have to wait until we're in the 'new' house. Thankfully, she has her big brother to distract her until then. Jack is doing grand and has written a full list of requests to Santa Claus, via one of Santa's helpers.. who, helpfully, also works at Jack's playschool. He's still living in the world of Flash McQueen but, now Cars 2 has been released, his world goes far beyond Radiator Springs. The upside is that he can recognise the French, English, Japanese, and Italian flags. The downside is that he looks at me strangely if ever I try to tell him that the 'Stars and the Stripes" is the flag of America and not of Flash. Mums, what do they know?

Well, what I do know is that we're going down to Cagnes sur mer to spend Christmas with our French family! So, if I'm having trouble believing it's December now... just wait until I arrive in the land of palm trees and walks by the sea. I can't wait, though, and I'm sure Santa Claus will find us wherever we are and despite the fact we rather seem to be on the move at the moment!


And so, wherever your home is right now, know that I wish you the very best of Christmases and a very Happy New Year :-)

love n hugs,
Robynxxxx

Rock the Statue Green!

I am really (really) proud of my high school students who made this video so they could enter the 'Rock the Statue Green' competition, a competition which calls upon French and American schools to produce art to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the Statue of the Liberty. The theme? The Statue of the Liberty and the Environment.

I hope you enjoy it!

Smiles,
Robyn

Happy Birthday Jack

This is Jack's "YES, I'm FIVE" smile...

and

"yes, I've got a Cars' sticker stuck to me forehead but I don't care" smile :-)

Jack had a grand birthday, with presents and cake and a cool party with some of his friends... but he also had a cute wee sad moment. It was the end of the day and he was getting ready for his bath when he caught sight of himself in the bathroom mirror and starting crying: Maman, look, I'm not five... I'm still four. You lied to me, I can't be five...LOOK, I'm the same as yesterday. I'm still four!"

Then, one week after his birthday, we moved from our apartment to the apartment at the other side of Jack's bedroom wall. The reason is simple, our apartment is sold and our new house is just about bought (we should get the keys in the next couple of weeks). As we've about 6months renovation work to do in the house, we're going to be renting until (at least) the summer. So far, so good as our new apartment is very similar to our old one, cosy, comfortable and a complete mess of kids toys most of the time.

:-)

hugs n all that,

Robynxxxx

October Holidays!

Hello there,

Some of you might be wondering if I've stopped this blog.... but, no! It's not true! It's just that the days are so busy that I just don't have time to scribble down the details (at least, that's how it feels at the moment).

Stop shaking your heads... I'm not being slack, honest. The days really are that busy. Let me explain...

To start with, we've sold our apartment and so we're in the midst of packing up our things and getting things ready for the BIG move.....

Next door!

What? Yes, we're moving into the apartment next door... or, rather, across the wall. That is, we're going to rent the apartment which is located at the other side of Jack's bedroom wall until....

The old (read: 1759) house that we're in the process of buying in Molsheim is renovated... or, at least, is in a fit state for us to live in safely and happily. I'll tell you more about that 'project' once all the paperwork is finalised, as I don't want to jinx anything.

In the meantime, life continues at its usual hectic speed!

For instance, can you believe that Jack will be 5 in just a few days time? I can remember writing the blog announcing his birth as though it were yesterday and so I can hardly believe our big kid really will be, officially, big. And not just big, grand too. For I continue to adore him in all his proud and joyous daftness. The best thing is that he's (finally) discovering Emma as a friend and not 'just' as a little sister. Of course, what that really means is that he's discovered that he can boss her around and position her as his 'underling' in all things game and play.

Emma, though, doesn't care... as she loves feeling BIG, too. She loves dressing herself, going to the loo, and generally being Emma. She so different (and yet also somehow similar) to Jack. She goes to bed with 2 babydolls, 1 talking doll, Noddy, Lala, and an armful of other teddies and toys. She can spend an afternoon dressing them up and feeding them... but is equally happy playing with Flash McQueen as Jack plays out life in Radiator Springs (from the film Cars). Emma's sitting beside me now, colouring in a 'beha' (bear), as Jack watches Tinkerbell on TV. The fire's on and the trees outside the window are as orange and brown as the flames licking the charred wood that's warming us all on this cold, clear day.

Later on today we'll go for a walk... or, at least, I'll walk while Emma and Jack take their bikes. We have time for such fun this Wednesday because we're on school holidays (myself like the kids) and, goodness, it feels good to forget the alarm clocks and packed lunches for a week or two!

So, wherever you are in the world, I hope you're doing well and that your days are as busy and as rich when you want them to be and calm and quiet when you're ready for a bit of rest!
hugs,
Robynxxxxx

Trees

In honour of the trees which have grown

when we weren't looking!

Summer's Close

Hello there,

I guess for all of us (except you over there in New Zealand, Australia....), summer's drawing to a close. Not in the sense that the nights are drawing in and the leaves are turning, but in the sense that it's time to pack school bags again and to quietly realise that time will no longer, entirely, be our own again.

Yet, I know now that however busy and mad the months ahead may be, we've got memories to keep us going and to energise us when the going gets tough.

As I write, we're still in New Deer where, and here you may think I'm mad, the weather has just been perfect : 20*C cloudy with sunny spells. Now that's what I call good summer weather! We can sleep easy at night under cosy blankets and yet go out and play during the day. And each day has found us outside, not only doing the tour of the local playparks (there are some good ones), but also having barbecues on different beaches.... and that has meant the kids have discovered the fun of splashing in the sea, digging around in rockpools, and how the word 'sandwich' got its name!

In the last couple of weeks, I've had the chance to catch up with a number of great friends. Incredibly, 20 years have passed since I left school and 30 years have passed since we moved into the village. Yet, I still feel about the same as I did back then... and so the only way I can really 'sense' that time has passed is by looking at groups of children playing - for they contain my children, which seems incredible - and by looking at the trees. What? Yes, it's the trees which give the game away... for those trees which were young and spindly and not worth climbing when I was younger have grown tall and handsome. They're lovely to see... but they are the final signposts that so many years have truly gone by... and I do need them for I do still feel much the same as I did when I was six!

So, here's to the six year old inside all of us,
hugs,
Robynxxxx

Kite Flying Days

Ben and Jack, flying their kite

Jack's in the bottom right, filling his bucket with sea water.

Emma's watching her Dad's kite

Emma heading out to sea!

Print your Photos

Hello there,

My brother-in-law - Régis - recently set up a photo printing company: Tirages Pro.

They print professional photographs which can render your images absolutely and simply beautiful!

At the moment, he's running a competition from his facebook page which would allow you to win a 40*60 copy of one of your photos!

To me, that sounds like a great excuse to go on over to his site....
hugs to one and all,
Robynxxxx

Annette's Patchworks

Hello,

While we were in Les Omergues, Ben's mother - Annette - ran a week long exhibition of her patchworks.

As you'll see if you follow this link and this link, she designs and creates her works of art in a quite breath-taking fashion!

hugs to one and all,
Robynx

Summer Holidays!

Hello there,

Just wanted to let you know that we're enjoying our summer holidays!

So far, we've spent 2 weeks in Provence, a long weekend in the Alps, time at home in Mutzig, some days in the Wirral in the north of England, and now we're in Scotland for 3 weeks!

Yep, French summer holidays are long and brilliant!In the meantime, we've also just put our apartment in Mutzig on the market, as we're in the process of buying a house in Molsheim (just a couple of miles away). I'll tell you more about that project later on, but for now... if you're looking to buy an apartment in Mutzig, you know where to look :-)

Hoping your own projects are going well, wherever you are in the world!

love n hugs,

Robynxxxx

Almost Free....

Hello there,

I just wanted to let you know that I did my entrance exams to become a high school teacher in France last week. The results are due out next Wednesday....

In the meantime, I'm savouring the first taste of freedom after a very busy year.

And, what a delight - to wake up in the morning and eat a lesuirely breakfast (you know, the kind where the cup of tea isn't left to go cold as I dash out the door) and then to curl up with Emma and Jack in front of the morning's cartoons before planning a picnic in the park.

Yep, if this is what the summer holds for me and for the rest of our family - whatever the results of the teaching exams - I'm looking forward to it.

Hoping your summer is looking promising, too!

love n hugs,

Robynxxxx

Be sure to buckle up!

Hello again,

As spring warms into summer, life continues in its daft and wonderful way :-)

Emma following in her brother's tyre tracks :-)

Brother and sister!

And Jack continues to enjoy drawing ..... roads and cars! His description of the picture above? "So, Maman, here are two race cars (tractors?) and, see, the two people are wearing their seatbelts!"

So, although things are as daft and as wonderful as ever, at least Jack's making sure we stay safe!

love n hugs and hoping you are safe wherever you are!

Robynxxxx