Visiting White Birds

Sheep. Again I start with sheep. But, I am fascinated by these happy mammals. With as much puff and fluff surrounding their rumproasts, and the way they joyfully munch in one direction and their blue bums! What's not to love? You read that right! Many of them have a spray painted bum. It is not just another form of guerrilla graffiti. No, this determines which flock they are from in case of escapees.

Okay, so hello dear and gentle readers! Okay, if you are reading this, perhaps you are not so gentle! In any case, life has been full of business as usual, except for maybe the REALLY FUN weekends we've been having!
But first, news on the homefront. We survived another round of Teacher/Parent interviews. I feel as if I know the parents better now so we could actually fill a few minutes of the interview with personal chit chat. Always a stress reliever. And I finally figured out how the marks work here. They are actually called 'levels' and the students are aiming at achieving a certain level by year's end.

For example, my Year 5 students would like to achieve a level 4 in all of the subjects and Year 6 would like to achieve a level 5. I suppose that the only difference is that in Alberta we test the students on everything as we finish, but here it seems more to be a test every term on all we have covered. It works. I do wonder though if I should be giving more tests because...because...because...it uses up class time and well, I'm just used to it. Here, we spend more time on teaching and working out stuff. Hmmm. Test skills or spending more time on lessons. I don't know which is better.

Daffodil delight!

The last few weeks have been very occupied by preoccupiedness--try saying that one 10 times fast! Emma's birthday in itself, has been a planning nightmare! Mainly because we are NOT planning it! This is the first time in 12 years that we haven't had to organize reams of giggling games, crafts and snazzy loot bags. Presently as I write this, there are 5 relatively calm, mobile phone carrying pre-teens in the front room watching movies and eating junk. Plus Bonnie and a friend of hers that will sit in and learn the lessons of life. This is one thing that I'll be sad to uproot Emma from in August. She has made some clever and sweet preteen friends and they share secrets and belittle boys together. Thank Heavens for not-so-little girls.

A report of our weekend fun is needed at this point. A few weeks back now, we had a visit from our Canadian friends, the Markos. Janine, Isabel, Emma and Bonnie are a force to be reckoned with. Especially becasuse we went to Cadbury World in a place south Birmingham called Bourneville. Of course chocolate and the production of it is always exciting, but probably the most interesting thing that I learned was that the brothers that concocted the Dairy Milk bar were Quakers. Thank goodness for drinking, smoking and coffee. Those Cadbury boys decided that since they couldn't indulge in things that us make all of us pagans happy, they would invent a suitable substitue. So, Bourneville was born. First a small factory, then with the addition of homes and leisure facilities, the idea became a town. In the end, we saw the history of chocolate, the factory lines of 3 km rolls of wrapper paper, the lines of factory machines and boxes of chocolates. This was

quite amazing. And, the shop which sold misshapes and rejects. Ya, I spent a few pounds and added a few at the same time. Bonnie bought a big box of 100 chocolate fingers and then proceeded to eat half of them on the train ride home. Need I say what happened later? Funny thing about chocolate is that you can eat it and eat it, and even after suffering a bad hangover, eat it again! Not like Sambuca.

Beating up girls in Bath.

Now, I have to tell about mosquito machines. We have these in Alberta. They are bug zappers. Bye bye bugs. But here they are not the same things. No, these eliminate teenagers. Before you get all worked up, these machines do not electrocute our youth. They are just buzzing machines that shop owners put up outside. Supposedly, these machines emit a high buzzing noise that causes anyone who still has good and acute hearing to run for their lives. It breaks up the coterie of teenagers who hang out in their hoodies with their bad dogs. But, the trouble is that babies who go into shops to buy smokes for the parents are also under the influence of the buzzing sound and this leaves them in tears! Well, I suppose if you don't want any business, this is the way to do it. Thank goodness I am partially deaf and can still buy cheese and chocolate without needing earplugs.

Now, last weekend we had an extraordinary time in Looe. Nick and Andrea and their lovely girls met us in Looe on Friday night, west of Plymouth. We drove down in the evening and arrived to a quiet cottage on rolling hills and in the middle of seemingly nowhere. Night time provides a deceptive cover as you cannot see beyond your headlights. But, in the morning, after a glorious snooze in beautifully decorated and cozy beds, we awoke to a world of wonder that I've only ever seen on calendars. Yes, the rolling hills, the faraway sheep and the centuries old trees with their gnarly branches reaching out for kids to climb upon were awaiting discovery. Oh my!! I don't know about you, but walking in silent hills with a glorious cup of American freeze dried coffee is nothing to snort at. Call it dreamy, call it glorious.

After we got our gear, we did a cliff walk along the coast to Polperro. Like the locals said, It's a good thing you are here in the winter. In the summer, its wall to wall humans. I can believe it because it is extraordinary and very isolated. Little blue and white tall skinny houses lining

streets that only human traffic can manoeuver about on. After a mile of walking, we decided to wait for the tide to recede and headed for the Blue Peter pub. Nothing like a pint to pass the time. The tide finally went out and the girls had a blast collecting bits of blue willow china and shells. I don't know why the blue willow was being washed ashore, but the pieces are small, smoothed and like bits of jewel.

Perhaps there was a ship that sank long ago and just now, the shards of broken plates were washing up. Or, some late night pub crawlers smashing plates? In any case, the girls gathered bits with glee and we left with a big bag of treasure. Brian figures we will have to have a whole suitcase just for these things we are collecting off of the beaches.

Upon our return to the cottages, we had high tea in the mansion with Pam. She is the owner of the mansion and her daughter is the proprietor of the cottages. It was splendind. The mansion that Pam lives in was built in the Georgian times--I'm guessing 1700's. When you walk in, you are immediately floored, literally, by the 2o foot high ceilings with crowning of such detail! Then, over the windows which reach from floor to ceiling, there are intricate coverings over the tops. Interestingly, these are made out of tin that was mined in Cornwall. Makes me wonder if there may have been tin miners in my family history. So, we sat in front of the grand fireplace sipping tea and eating sponge cake and apple cake. Pam's lovely cat Jasper and dog Bowser, a happy shaggy Australian sheep herding dog joined us. She said that he wasn't particularly good at sheep herding, but sure did enjoy herding all of the girls!

Pam with Emma, Brian and Andrea The girls playing WW2 in the olde giant tree

Then, the funnest thing of all happened. We were all sitting around after a delicious chicken dinner and the girls convinced us to play 'Sardines'. This is a reverse of Hide and Go Seek. Only one person hides and then we all count. We then run off in all directions and when you find the hider, you hide with them. The last person to find the pile of hiding human sardines is the loser! Now add the element of a peaceful noiseless night in the rolling hills of England, because we played it outside in the dark and died laughing! Luckily I live to tell this marvelous tale.

Sunday we had Brian's famous blueberry walnut pancakes in our cottage and the doves showed up. A pair of white doves came tapping at the window and enjoyed the feast. Then we wandered the beach in Looe and wrapped up our fun weekend with one more visit to Pam's.

A photo of our cottage.

A few weeks back, Brian came back from Edmonton. Please don't let me let him drive after coming home ever again. We were on our way to another exploration on this particular Sunday and all looking forward to some family time. Then, with his instinct to hug the left curb, we lost 2 hubcaps and ended up with a flat tire. Changing the flat wouldn't have been such a problem, but we found out that our 'new' car had no wrench. So, it was a 2 hour wait for the service. Now, talk about family bonding time. And, to boot, we had a few great people postcards. The guy with the dogs, the elderly woman and then the knight in shining armour who actually changed the tire for us.

And so we are off to Ben's parents house this weekend to visit Warwick Castle and Stratford Upon Avon. And to make matters funner, I'm off for a whole week long camp with my class to Devon. Most teachers would cringe with fear and despair, but let me tell you that there is a 'Library' for all of the school teachers to meet in at night whilst your school children are happily supervised by the staff. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about! I'll you in on the details in a couple of weekends.

And of course, Mousse at her finest. She's playing a quiet game of Road Cone here.

And another school dinner joke. Don't worry, I'm not making these up! The students tell me them. Why is eating school dinner chips like having a history lesson? Because they were cooked in Ancient Grease!

Also, a couple of notes from Dundry School. The other day at lunch all of the students came rushing in to tell me--MISS, MISS!! They's horses in the parkin lot!! Well, it turns out that yes, the parking lot was filled with horses. I guess they had escaped from someone's nearby field and some concerned Dundrite? coralled them into the parking lot. She managed to nab 6 or so, but I guess the other 5 were heading down towards the M5 on their way to London!

Also, I found out that the first motorcar to drive up to Dundry in the 1930's or so, had to drive up---backwards! That's my question for the week! How come the motorcar had to make its grand entrance going backwards?

Happy thoughts,

beth