Fièvre de la cabine

Since the early hours of Sunday morning, we have been hit by a severe case of man flu in the gite. First Max, then Stu and finally Luke have been struck down with fevers and chills. As a result, I have been almost housebound since then (apart from some ice road trucking to do the school run) and suffering from a major case of cabin fever.

To be fair on Stu, he has mainly been trooping on, but the boys have worn me down, Max with his incessant whinging and Luke from his aversion to sleeping for longer than two hours. Oh, and his strange reaction to Calpol which seems to make him hyper rather than knock him out.

And to top it off, we woke up to eight inches of snow this morning and a weekly weather forecast that doesn't seem to go above freezing. I'm not sure I can cope being stuck in the house anymore!

It's times like these that I really want to be back at home, where I can easily just nip out with the pushchair for half an hour's sanity, instead of being stuck on a massive hill that is impossible to get up with the double buggy!

Tomorrow I will definitely be leaving the house come hell or high snow fall. The littlies are on the mend and it will do them good I am sure (I won't be braving the pushchair and the hill though).

La luge chez Doug

This weekend we went to see Aunty Jen's dad (also known as Doug!) at his chalet in the mountains near Albertville.

We had a lovely day out taking advantage of the local sledging hills and enjoying a leisurely two hour lunch which ensured we didn't have to eat for the rest of the weekend!

The chalet is fab and spending time there really made me want one, especially after Doug told us stories of how they used to spend all of the school holidays there and the great times they had.

I think I had best start saving! 

Cinq mois

Tomorrow marks the completion of our fifth month in France. I can't believe how quickly time has flown here.

I am a creature of habit and after five months I finally feel that my weeks have a bit of structure and routine. Toddler group, visiting friends, school runs, going to the park, weekly food shopping and my most recent discovery Max Aventure are enough to keep me busy and out of Stu's hair when he is working (along with the usual day to day stuff like washing, cooking, cleaning and making Duplo houses).

I'm no longer scared of speaking the language to people, and although there is still masses and masses of room for improvement I can usually get my point across in one way or another.

Lily seems a lot happier at school and is as enthusiastic as ever about French verb conjugations. Her ability continues to surprise me.

Max is full of toddler mischief at the moment, still cute as button but pushing his luck daily.

Luke is desperate to be on the move and face-planting the floor about four times a day. I reckon it will only be a couple of weeks before he is crawling, which would be great if I didn't already struggle keeping an eye on both of the little tikes!

Stu is working hard, still enjoying the snowboarding and has just bought a little trailer for his mountain bike that the boys can ride in which Max is extremely excited about.

So we are all doing well. I am amazed we have made it this far without too many dramas (airport based ones excepted) and very little stress considering little Luke was only six weeks old when we arrived.

As a treat to ourselves and to enable us to fully relax we have booked an all inclusive deal to Tenerife in March.

This will be my first ever all inclusive so I'm a little bit apprehensive that it's going to be like ITV's Benidorm, but the thought of not cooking or cleaning for a full week outweighs that fear!

And it's only 2.5 weeks until Helen, Michael and the girls arrive, so lots to look forward to at the moment.

So here's to the next five months!

Les femmes de la nuit

Ahh fair Savoie. Home to some of the worlds most beautiful lakes, spectacular mountains...and quite a few Eastern European prostitutes it appears!

Now I'm not so naive to think that this sort of thing doesn't go on around here, but I was actually left speechless when I first saw them. They brazenly line the roads towards Le Bourget du Lac waiting for business which I presume takes place in the red van that awaits in the nearby bushes.

It's obvious what is going on and it seems like the gendarmerie do absolutely nothing to stop it, which is a shame as it kind of taints the pure image I have of the area. I just don't understand who frequents these ladies?! All the Savoyards I have met seem far too nice for that kind of seediness...ok reading that back, maybe I am a bit naive!

Anyway, read more about the problem and see some pics here: http://www.ledauphine.com/savoie/2011/10/05/des-prostituees-decidement-trop-visibles-pour-les-voisins-et-les-elus

Le bon ski!

Thanks to our lovely neighbours offering to mind the little monkeys, me Stu and Lil were able to enjoy a morning ski together on Sunday.

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A good time was had by all, and I couldn't believe how much Lily has improved since I took her before Christmas.  I'm a bit rusty but getting back into the swing of it nicely. Stu is obviously a snowboarding natural.

We did have one drama (when do we not?!) when we lost Lily after she sped off and took a different turn to us, but we found her after about 25 minutes of frantic slope searching. Lesson learned there!

Il est beau, le bébé

Little Luke is six months old today!  He's such a happy little chap who always has a big smile on his face, even when being jumped on/hit/shouted at/woken up by his big brother.

It was lovely taking him back home to show him off to everyone who hadn't seen him since he was tiny. He manages to charm people wherever he goes, even the two poor souls who sat next to us on our flights to and from England.  And the French grannies are always cooing over him; 'Il est beau, le bébé!'.

He's still not anywhere near to sleeping through the night however, but his huge grin every morning makes me forget how awful sleep deprivation is.

Smiley bébé Luc

We're settling nicely back into la vie en France. This week, the French have been celebrating the Epiphany by eating the traditional Gallette de Rois, an almond filled pastry, which apparently 'draws the kings' to the Epiphany. The cakes contain a small trinket and whoever finds it in their slice becomes king for the day and has to wear a crown. 

I got to taste my first one today at a friend's house, which would have been great had I not have given up sugar last week as part of my New Year Resolutions, but I thought it was rude to refuse so I ended up with a massive sugar rush and a banging headache!

The group of French mums I have met have been so welcoming of me and the boys. Not a week goes by without an invite for gateaux et papoter, which definitely makes things easier here.  It's great being able to get a feel for what French life is like by spending time at their houses and with their families. It also gives me lots of opportunity to practise my French which has deteriorated rapidly since being back in England. 

Lily and Stu have already been skiing since we returned, but this time Stu had a go at snowboarding which he managed to master in two hours.  Although he did spend the first half an hour on his arse as Lily took delight in telling me!  She's improved loads with her skiing and has a new found confidence to tackle some of the trickier slopes.

So this weekend, we will mainly be found up the mountain!

Bonne année

I had a lovely entry all written up ready to press the publish button on when we got back to the France today, but due to this morning's events I thought I would just start again.

Our Christmas trip to England didn't get off to the best of starts - the agency who had booked our flights back had managed to book them for the 12th of December instead of the 21st. Fortunately we were early to check in and there were nine spaces left on the flight so we were able to get new tickets. It meant a lot of hanging around sitting in the airport floor though. Not ideal with hungry babies, but not totally unexpected given our past experiences with airports.

The trip back to England ended up really busy and not that relaxing but it was lovely having the chance to catch up with most people and eat as much food as physically possible. Stu broke our no present pact quite dramatically and got me an iPad which this entry is brought to you courtesy of (which means i have no excuses for keeping the blog up to date now!).

This morning we woke at 4:30 in order to get our 6:45 flight back to Geneva. As we went to check in I could tell from the lady's face that something wasn't right. It turns out the flight time had been changed to 6:10 and had already closed and there was no way we could get on. The agency (same one as above) had been informed about the change but totally failed to let us know. So what else could we do but head back to Whitley Bay and head back to bed angry, disappointed, upset, and gobsmacked...

So the New Year hasn't got off to the best of starts. But it means we have a few more days in England until we can sort out some new flights back.

And as always I have a list of resolutions as long as my arm, all on a similar theme (get fit, eat less, stop procrastinating) but most of all this year I want to improve my French to a level where I am confident in most situations. And living in France gives me the perfect chance to do it. But as we're not in France yet, I may as well wait a few days before starting out with my resolutions ;-p

So to anyone who is reading, here's to a healthy and happy 2012! I hope it brings whatever you wish for xxxx