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Holiday plans by Littlest


France shuts for Bastille Day.

We on the other hand are very much open for holiday: shopping (the big supermarkets don’t shut on national holidays); eating; swimming, playing tennis; eating; reading; swimming; and eating!

Littlest made a holiday plan before we left home – it included “swimming – at least two times every day” (Littlest, being Littlest in her year group at school is not the strongest swimmer, and in school swimming lessons and at the annual swimming gala tends to get rather overwhelmed and over-swum by her friends; improving on holiday is therefore rather essential, especially as she discovered that ‘forgetting your swimming kit’ i.e. leaving it in the car, is no excuse, does not get you out of swimming and means that you borrow an over-large costume from school making the swimming bit even more embarrassing); “do at least eight pages of my holiday homework in France” – lots of maths in a folder titled ‘Four operations’ (this clearly needs some attention – long addition appears to be fine; subtraction okay ... when you realise it’s not addition; multiplication  ... hmm – need some times tables practice, then because it follows the subtraction section need to remember to add the rows not subtract them to get the final answer; long division ... so far none of us has worked out what method she is using ... one which gets the wrong answer every time, but which she is sure is exactly how she has been shown to do it ; “do my piano practice for 10 minutes every day” – she is let off this one while in France, as this year we left her brother and his keyboard at home; and “see lots of my friends” – she is working on this for when we get back; and “keep a holiday diary” – which is actually more homework from school, but something that she started yesterday.

This is part of her wonderful entry on Paris






“after we saw the eiffel tower we went to a restaurant near the river seine and the food there was really good. I had chicken nuggets and chips and the nuggets were just deticious. we also went to see the notrodam and there we saw a big hedge covered with miniscule swallows and there was a slightly scary but innocent man who gave me a bit of brioche to feed the birds so that they would perch on my hand and at one point I had four clinging onto my fingers and chirping sweatly in unison. I gave the friendly frenchman my one euro and we decided we had experienced enough sights, smells, feeling, tastes and loud noises for one day so we headed back to the train.”



I think she left the capital letters and commas at home with her hand-writing pen.



The rain has changed from constant to showery. And it’s time to see the positive side of precipitation.




Like the England we left behind, France and more specifically the French countryside, is looking exceedingly lush. No summer-burnt-brown grass; rivers full; and a freshness of light when the sun comes out after a shower that illuminates everything with a crystal, newly washed, glinting cleanness that is beautiful – raindrops on roses; white clouds and blue sky reflected in puddles; and the fragile dancing wisps of water vapour rising off warming tarmac.

So not all rain is bad.

I may of course change my mind.

Depending on the weather over the next few days.


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