9 Years Old

Alexis came home from school and read two more mangas while waiting for everyone to get home for his party night, especially opening all of his presents.

To eat, he asked for jacket potatoes, his favourite and I made a chocolate brownie cake

He had lots of great presents, from dinosaurs to construction games, a pop-up goal, books, a vintage bus and a remote-controlled car

It took ages to unscrew the car from its box (yes, Alain had to go in the basement and find a screwdriver), Alexis, MK and even Gabrielle waited patiently and guess what? Once out of the box it needed charging for 4 hours..poor Alexis

So Alexis played in the garden with his new goal. I am going to move the goal later today to the big garden, as in the gravel courtyard it's just not going to work, far too noisy.

Les Niniches d'Alexis

A Parcel arrived from Brittany yesterday for birthday boy Alexis who's nine today. He doesn't know about the Niniches yet, nor his presents from his Papy and Mamie, but he obviously knew about some of his other presents, as this morning he said that he'd really like to have one present before school, so we gave him a new watch (this boy is a time control freak). He was happy enough but said he'd like one of his manga's, and I knew exactly where to find them, right under our bed...he's manga mad too.

Back to the Niniches, these lollies are so good, especially the caramel beurre ones, my favourite, lucky the tin's sealed (hard to resist), and there are for Alexis. He'll share them as the girls will insist, bribe him, negotiate, whatever it takes to have a niniche.

One little girl and her Kinder

A little over three weeks ago, no four, we went to out local animal refuge centre in Orgeval, and a dog called Kinder (Gaby chose his name, there they'd named him Paxam, but he didn't seem to react to that) decided he'd like to get to know us (crazy dog) and maybe one day come and live in a little village near Paris

We thought a lot before deciding to adopt him, he was sick with a kennel cough and was a very timid dog. He came home two weeks ago and things are great and he's better now. It's like Kinder has always been here, much to our delight.

He just loves the children...Loves long walks and other dogs, even the chickens next door...he likes bins too:(

107 days later

When we moved in here, there was a stair lift that Mr H had fitted for his wife. It went up right to the top floor and our children wanted to keep it cause it was more fun sliding down on its frame than using their tired legs.

Mr H had it fitted in 2001, his wife died soon after, sad. A constant reminder for him.

Anyhow, dear Alain said he'd take it down (save Mr H the worry, and the cost...he was quite a scrooge..400euros) so he bought an electric saw, good excuse to add to his collection of power tools. There was a little problem of electricity ( the electricity needs some work), so what does Alain do? He yanks the wires out from the lift, just like that, I didn't see it, I just heard the bang....

Well, he's all chuffed, because now he can saw, he cut the frame into manageable pieces and pops them outside. It's all still there, hidden, down some stairs that lead to a creepy cave. What was crazy was the weight of the actual chair, I couldn't lift it and nor could Alain, well barely. He needed helpful (rarely) teenage son to help.

Anyway, after the BANG, the light in the toilet didn't work, and it wasn't just the bulb, it was the fuse. Alain is an engineer. The fuse was difficult to work out, it took him 107 days to work it out, many teenager sleepovers and a party took place in between this time.

Oliver asked if he could invite a couple of friends to play xbox, well, a few turned out to be 25 and most stayed the night, they drunk a bit, used our lightless toilet( a lot) without too much mess, just one teenager who was sick all over a giant rug that Mr H left, a white one.

I still keep forgetting that I can now switch on the light, used to not having it, but Alain's feeling good about it and probably planning a task that could take even longer, if that's possible

Going down very slowly

view from 1st floor landing looking down. the window you can see, rises up between 2 flights of stairs so it doesn't open. we have two like this, the other one is a little lower than this one and goes down into the mud room.

I haven't got much to say, fed-up and stopping for today. I'll sweep up the mess and serve myself a nice glass of chilled white wine...one good thing it that the sun's out, which doesn't happen every day here.

Stairs and landing part one

Going up to 1st floor landing, half done

I'm stripping again. We've saved the hardest for last, the stairs and landings. today, it's the 1st floor that I'm attacking and I hope to get down to the half landing (going down towards entrance) before eI pick Gaby up at 3

landing from our bedroom

wallpaper still hanging on. way down to half-landing

going up to 2nd floor half-landing with giant floor to ceiling fitted cupboards

The floor and stairs have heavily waxed over the years. I want to strip the wood back or unwax it all and varnish. I'm toying with the idea of painting the vertical part in a colour like matchstick or a lighter shade.

As for the walls, well there I'm completely flummoxed. I did think of painting this area using neutral shades and down-pipe on the cupboards, but now I don't know whether a stronger colour would be better and warm it up more (we've have lots of natural light here, despite the exposition).

Matchstick by Farrow & Ball

Thrift shop find of the week

Teenager daughter wants it, she says that I don't sit down enough to appreciate/use it, which is kind of true, but still this table is staying put in my bedroom.

A bargain at 20 euros.