..... shop for Alec's dinner.

Yesterday was Sunday so just like the great one I too took a day of rest.  Sunday for us is also test day.

It's not just moi that needs to get speaking this tricky lingo.  So too do the hubbie and four boys.  The youngest two have a bit of a leg up as they attend a French school.  The eldest not so and their apathy towards acquiring said skill partly contributes to my disappointment with their establishment of not so great learning.

So to help us all we have a verb of the week and we have to learn four tenses of chosen verb.  The winner gets to chose a four course meal of their choice and the loser gets to be footman and scullery maid for this grand repast, too much Downton peutêtre.

Last week Alec was the lucky one poor Elliot the not so.  The carrot and the stick it has to be.  Does it work?  Well put it this way Elliot may not be choosing this weeks supper but neither is he tidying up.  That not so pleasant task will be left to the eldest. Unfortunately it often is, genes will out poor Tom.

Suffice to say I like to ensure I never have to, as I mentioned at the beginning of post, everyone deserves one day off.

La semaine prochaine,

We revisit aller.

..try to communicate with French police

I shall have coffee with a friend and speak French,  this is what my title should have been.

Ambitiously phrased of me.  My french is severely limited.  It was the one O' level I failed, shouldn't have opted for it in the first place but the alternative was welsh and scarely under the circumstances being that I am welsh, that was even worse.

So here I am a year and a half of living here later, with two children in a French school, still as rubbish as I ever was.  I can proudly say I understand more but that was never going to be difficult, nothing to something never is.  The sticking point is speaking.  People who know me laugh in my face when I say I am shy but that is because they know me and I do like to chat.

However my chat often consists of throw away comments and witty responses, with the odd rather volatile debate thrown in for good measure.  I don't do small talk and always feel rather ridiculous when I try.  I am also much better one to one if I am honest especially when in the company of a master of the art of chit chat.  Finally as mentioned previously I talk fast and frankly prefer it when others do.  So little wonder why the speaking french bit is going nowhere.

This can't go on though.  We intend to stay here and will hopefully be buying a house soon which will require renovating, haven't managed to buy one yet that doesn't so why change the habit of a lifetime.  A kind friend has bravely volunteered for the unenviable task of helping me learn.

 So today I shall go to her house and we shall drink coffee and we shall speak French, after the police have left that is.  Bikes stolen from the garage last night and now left to deal with it all using my serioulsy inadequate French.

.

All done

Hubbie will be pleased,

Won't have to,iron own shirts next week, darling.

...drive to Grenoble

 ...along with husband and four boys.  A school our destination.  One in which we hope our boys will thrive.

For big mistake we may have made when from their Grammar school we took.  Outstanding t'was , it churned them out those boys in droves with great results and sent them off to institutions proud.

International though there school maybe it's standards are not quite what they should. Worries fill my muddled head and so consider options would.

The problem is that I have found goodly schools for younger two,  French they are and so much more have they to offer than the other.  Bilingual now their options grow but French schools are a motley crew and who knows on them what I might bestow then rue.

Grenoble,

Picture not mine.