Guess what. This week was another busy week at work. Pfffff. BUT … hold on a minute ... now we're on holiday for two weeks ! Woohoohoo ! There should finally be time for some fun in the next week, hopefully ! In the meantime, here's this week. Not much of interest going on again.
Monday 10th February - The week got off to a very windy start. No damage at home luckily but it was blowing a gale when I was waiting at the bus stop to go to work. Part of the roof of the school gym blew off apparently, but it was all fixed up and lessons could still go on. Can't show the wind in a photo unfortunately but here's the sky as I headed to work, looking very grey and gloomy. Yuck !
Tuesday - Nothing much to share as I was at work all day. I've been trying to get the kids to eat some veggie sausages from Heck. Well, they may offer Veg With Edge but the kids weren't keen, especially on the green ones. Some of them were nicer than others though - I'll be posting our review shortly.
Wednesday - What a difference a couple of days makes ! Look at the colour of the sky. Absolutely nothing like the start of the week. It was still quite chilly and a bit blowy but so much nicer than the gale force winds. I headed into town to get some holiday ideas from the travel agent's. We usually book earlier, before Christmas, but I was a bit worried about the big travel agent chains going bust. This is the beffroi (the belfry) that I walked past. The bells play out a nice tune to mark each hour and there is the tomb of the unknown soldier at the base. There is also the tourist office inside the building. You can pay to go up on the roof, which I've never done. Maybe one day !
Thursday - Another busy day at work. We had an author/illustrator of children's books in for a visit with the school librarian for one of my classes, which was fun. He showed them how to draw camels and kangaroos (two illustrations from his books) which the kids loved ! I can't share pictures of the pupils though, so here's a poster of Dunkirk carnival that I walked past in town. On est heureux = we are happy. It's from one of the carnival songs.
Friday - This is a photo of a website that we've been scrolling through repeatedly as I headed back to the travel agent's on my morning off and booked our summer holiday. We're all really excited as we're going somewhere that I would have thought was totally out of our budget - the Dominican Republic !!! I gave her the usual budget on Wednesday and she said "hmmm might be tricky this year as, with the travel agents going bust, it's put the prices right up for everything … blah di blah di blah" … She went looking through what was available and came up with the usual suspects - Turkey, Tunisia, Morocco … there's nothing wrong with those places but we've been to them all, several times for some of them, so they didn't really hold that much appeal. She did mention Greece and Italy, which were possibles. Then she looked at me and grinned and said, "or … how about the Dominican Republic? It's a ten hour flight though !" Well, that didn't really bother us after going to Alaska last year so I said I'd ask the kids. Funnily enough, they got really excited. I still can't quite believe it myself !
Saturday - Despite having loads to do, I decided to take the time to go and visit a dear friend. We used to work together but she retired a couple of years ago and I go to see her every now and then. She loves to read so I took her all the books I've read since our last visit, which was at the end of the summer. She was so happy to have loads of great new books to read. And I was happy to make some space on my bookshelves !
Beautiful - i might start my own photo a day
ReplyDeleteYou should join in, definitely ! :)
DeleteA good idea to pass on your books. I think the green of those sausages might have been a bit offputting. The holiday sounds exciting.
ReplyDeleteThe green is definitely a bit "vibrant" lol
DeleteLove the first image, it looks like a black ink painting. The green sausages don't look very appetising, I must confess, hope they tasted better than they look. Dominican Republic? Wow, that's a big adventure, and how very exciting. Don't envy you the long flight though. I bet your friend was thrilled with this stash.
ReplyDeleteThat was the downside of the Dominican Republic - 10 hours on a plane is a long time. But they coped with flights to Alaska last year and that was 2 x almost 10 hours. They loved it - especially when they got put in first class and I was in second. Still, I enjoyed the peace and quiet too ! lol
DeleteAlways good to book a holiday. Dominican Republic sounds amazing. Love passing on books too, although have so many still to read as I mostly use my Kindle.
ReplyDeleteItaly and Greece were never going to get a look in next to the Dominican Republic, were they ?! lol. I've never gone on to Kindle - I like the feel of a paper book in my hands when I'm reading in bed ! :)
DeleteOh wow! How lucky that you get 2 weeks off school. We only get a week here.
ReplyDeleteThose veggie sausages sound interesting. I don't think I could convince my two to eat them.
The holidays sounds great, how exciting x
We get two weeks off for each half term, but the school day is 8am -5.30pm (sometimes 4.30pm or even 6.30pm, depends on the day) so I guess it all works out about the same in the end !
DeleteThe Dominican Republic sounds fun. Hopefully you will find a place that is not too full of American tourists. We holidayed in Jamaica a few years ago, which we loved, but were shocked by how rude the American tourists were to the local staff. The Jamaicans still kept smiling and being polite but I was seething with indignation on their behalf and had to bite my tongue!
ReplyDeleteI was browsing the reviews on Trip Advisor and I did notice that pretty much all of the negative reviews were from Americans - maybe they have different expectations !
DeleteThe sausages sound interesting. Looking forward to the review
ReplyDeleteThat is such a good idea to pass on books. Those sausages do sound interesting. The Dominican Republic sounds like a lovely place to visit x
ReplyDeleteFingers crossed ! :)
DeleteThe Dominican Republic? Woo hoo! How exciting!
ReplyDeleteThe green sausages made me smile. I would have turned my nose up when I was a child but I rather like green food now. I hope you manage to convert them sometime soon.
To be fair, some of the green sausages had spices in them, which was what put them off, but some got the thumbs up ! The Dominican Republic is very exciting - still can't quite believe it ! :)
DeleteGlad that you avoided any damage from the storm at your house and that the school gym roof got fixed. Those green veggie sausages look interesting – I’m not sure I could persuade my children to eat those either! Lovely to see the blue skies back during the week. How interesting to have a children’s book illustrator visiting your school. I can imagine that the children must have loved that. How exciting to have a holiday to the Dominican Republic to look forward to. #project366
ReplyDeleteI'm feeling better about the kids not liking them after all of you saying the same thing ! lol
DeleteAlways great to be able to pass books around. The holiday soulds fab, especially to have something to look forward to with the weather being so up and down at the moment #366
ReplyDeleteAaagghh I know, it's crazy at the moment !
Deletehmmmmm doubt I would not be going up either, up not the issue down would be as down affects my balance.
ReplyDeleteHope nothing gets in the way of your holiday.
Have to say Heck sausages are the best I have tasted, bought some w while ago that were reduced
The normal Heck sausages are lovely but the veggie ones were a bit more hit and miss as far as we were concerned !
DeleteThe sky does look grey and gloomy. The sausages look strange. The bellfry looks very elegant but the soldier's body should be known if its in an important location. OoOo so cool of the illustrator to teach how to draw. I hope your trip to DR turns out great
ReplyDeleteThe Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is a common thing, in both France and the UK and probably other countries. They even have one in the Arc de Triomphe in Paris ! It's a way of remembering all of those people who died in the world wars. :)
DeleteThe Dominican Republic sounds lovely, I regularly make 7 hour flights just to commute between hubby and family. It's amazing how the weather has changed from day to day recently
ReplyDeleteWe used to have a 9 hour drive down to the in laws' so we decided it was no worse than that. At least you can get up and walk around on a plane !
DeleteI quite like the vegan Heck sausages, it is quite nice to have veggie flavours rather than meat imitations. Hope you find more books to replenish your shelves and find time to read them before your next visit #project366
ReplyDeleteI have plenty (or I should say way too many !) books already - I have to keep away from the charity shops !
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