Anniversary Tea

We are back at Mum and Dad's in Hampshire this week, which has been lovely.  Matt arrived a few days after me, so I had spent my time doing lots of things I love like going to the garden centre for soup, walking along the cliff top, eating cake in cafe's, watching the boats at Lymington harbour, and eating even more cake.

Sunday was our one year anniversary, and we celebrated by going back to the hotel where we got married for afternoon tea (so yum!).  We got an upgrade to a beautiful 4 poster bed room, and we had a lovely dinner.  Matt had ordered flowers, champagne, and chocolates to our room too, and it was a really special day.

Today, we went for a wander around the little village of Burley, with it's extremely tacky array of shops, and then went for a hot chocolate along the cliff top.  It's lovely and relaxing!

Moving House and Graduation Day

The day after we got back from Amsterdam it was moving day!  Nothing like keeping busy during the holidays!  Luckily we had some help from our lovely friends.  It took all day, but finally everything was moved, and the flat was cleaned top to bottom.  We celebrated with our removal men in the pub for Andy's last ever 'Shaenke Thursday'.

On Friday, we moved a few more things over to the new flat, after having spent our final night at Gravelottestrasse.  I'm so glad we don't have to live there anymore!  We have now started getting abusive emails from our old landlady, so we are especially thrilled to be out of there.  We flew home on Friday evening, and it was lovely to see Matt's family again.

Saturday was the big Harris family BBQ, which was great fun as always.  Sam and Amy came too, and it was really nice to see them and have a proper catch up.

On Sunday, Matt and I went up to Richmond to have dinner by the river and drinks with some of his old Sunbury Manor work friends.  A few people who don't normally venture out came to see us, so it was really special.

On Monday the Harris family went up to Nottingham for Luke's Graduation.  We went up by train after work at 8.30pm, so we didn't get there until after 10.  We stayed in the Jurys Inn, which was a nice hotel, and very close to the station.  We all had breakfast early on Tuesday, but only Tony and Margaret had tickets to the actual graduation ceremony.  Luke went to the University early to get his gown, and suddenly we had a phone call to say that he had managed to get tickets for Matt, Gran and myself!  So we all got to see him graduate in the end.  The ceremony was nice, and the honorary doctorate was awarded to a very charming, engaging woman, who had started a breast cancer awareness charity for young people called Coppafeel!  She herself was diagnosed with breast cancer at 23 years old, and now at 29 is doing amazing things to raise awareness with university students.  Her speech was down to earth, humble, and funny, and I was inspired by her story.

Luke looked fabulous in his gown and we're all very proud of him.

Margaret's brother and sister, plus family came over from Manchester for lunch after the ceremony, which was great.  It was nice to be able to see them all, including one of our beautiful bridesmaids.  We got back really late yesterday, so are having a relaxing lazy day today.  I'm off to Mum and Dads tomorrow and Matt will join me on  Sunday, which is our 1 year anniversary!

Amsterdam

We've just got back from a lovely (and quite rainy) few days in Amsterdam.  I really liked the city; it has a lot of character.  The train from Duisburg only takes 2 hours, so it's really quick and easy, or at least it would be if the train on the way there wasn't rammed and we had to stand up for the first half of the journey!

We stayed in the Ramada Apollo hotel, which was very nice, and had a rooftop bar (there are a few photos below) with the best view of the city for miles.  It was actually nice enough weather on our last evening to go up there for the spectacular view.

We spent our days eating like pigs - Thai, pancakes, Mexican, Italian, American - and visiting museums.  We went to the lovely, very tiny and cute Tulip Museum.  See below for the most fascinating thing I learnt this week...

I bought a lovely Christmas decoration in the shop there too.  I love to have a decoration from the places I visit if I can find one.

This is Matt, pretending to sort Tulip bulbs... with attitude!

We also went to the flower market, which was more of a bulb market.  Some of the plants you could buy there were certainly interesting...

We visited the van Gogh museum, which was a definite highlight of the trip.  He was such an interesting man, and I really like his art, especially the sunflowers and blossom paintings.  The queue for the museum was a good few hours long.  We decided to have a look at the timed tickets online, and managed to book a slot for a different day, so when we went yesterday we skipped to the front of the queue.  A good move!

We also visited the Museum of Prostitution (as you do; when in Rome and all that), which was interesting.  It's in the middle of the Red Light District, which is the busiest place in the whole city that we visited!  It's all rather seedy, and makes my inner feminist come out rather strongly.

It was a lovely trip, despite the questionable weather.  I'd definitely go back to see some of the other museums whose queues were just too extreme (3 hours for Anne Frank's House).

Now we're back in Duisburg, and packing up the last of our flat for the big move tomorrow.  We're having some friends over for pizza tonight, and they are helping us move tomorrow.  Andy goes back to the UK on Friday, so we will see him on his last 2 nights.  So sad he is leaving, but I can't wait to move into his flat!!!

Schools Out For Summer!!!

School is now over for 6 whole weeks!!! Whoooooo!  I can't believe that we have been in Germany for a whole year.  It's gone so quickly.

This week was very busy for both of us.  Matt had a lot of preparation to do for next year, with his new management role.  He also got asked very last minute to organise the leavers gifts and the end of year BBQ for the whole staff.  No small occasion.  

I had lots of tidying up to do of the lower school storage and resource rooms, and the art room too.  I was also trying to get things ready for next year as much as possible.  Busy busy busy.

Friday was a half day for the kids, and all the teachers were getting goodbye presents from the kids.  I didn't expect anything at all, what with being off timetable and away from my usual kids for the last few weeks.  One girl remembered me though and bought me chocolates and scented candles.  She had even asked another teacher what my favourite colour was so that the wrapping paper would match!  What a sweetie!

The year 6 teacher who is leaving, whom I have been a TA for all year, bought me a very nice bottle of wine, and the other year 6 teacher bought me an Orchid (I LOVE Orchids!) to say thank you for the year, and for making her wedding flowers (See photo at the bottom, and my other blog for more photos http://creative-faye.blogspot.com).

Now we're off to Amsterdam for the week, before we finally move house.  It's going to be another busy week, but I can't wait!

Heatwaves and Quizzes

My Orchid is blooming!  Finally, a plant that I can keep alive.  I'm terrible with house plants, and it took ages for me to find a spot in the house that the Orchid was happy with, but eventually I did.  It has fully bloomed once already.  All the flowers died and there were no new buds, and I thought that was it, but suddenly I had 18 new buds!  They are all coming out now, and it looks wonderful.

This week has been unbearably hot!  It actually reached 40 degrees on Thursday, and still the school stayed open.  The kids go really nuts in the heat, and the classrooms have been smelling rather ripe, especially because the kids are being kept inside at lunch due to the extreme heat.  It has felt like much longer than 5 days at work this week.  Monday seems an age ago.  

Monday was the rescheduled sports day (it rained last week).  Year 3 and 4 were in the morning and Year 5 and 6 in the afternoon.  I ended up leading teams for both, so I was outside for the whole day.  Unfortunately, my house (Dickens) came last for both!  Still, we all had fun.  I'm pretty sure I had heat stroke though because I felt rotten when I got home, and on Tuesday.  I slept for about 3 hours when I got in!  On Tuesday I covered for Year 3, which was quite nice.  They are so well behaved, and it wasn't ridiculously hot, so they were fine.  Wednesday, I covered for Year 1 in the morning.  I haven't taught them before, but they were quite sweet.  Their classroom is on the ground floor of the school, so it was nice and cool.  I'm normally on the 1st floor which is pretty bad, and the upper school are on the second floor, in the roof.  I actually heard one of the kids say that it was 'hotter than the sun' up there!  On Wednesday after school I went into Duisburg to the shops with my friend to buy another friends birthday present.  We bought it all in the craft shop, so I had a ball buying lots of interesting things.  Then we went for a huge cocktail and some veggie fajitas.  It was lovely sitting by the harbor, in the shade, with a nice cool breeze.

Thursday was horrendous!  It hit 40 degrees, and some of the parents actually complained that the kids were watching films rather than doing school work!  I'm not good for anything in that heat, let alone a class full of kids.  You can't get anything out of them!  We had the Year 6 leavers assembly, where they reenacted some of their favorite moments throughout the year.  The best one was when the teachers got gunged at the Halloween disco.  Two of the lads dressed up as two of the female teachers.  It was pretty funny!  Thursday evening, lots of us went to Shaenke.  This is the pub that Matt goes to with two of his mates.  Girls aren't usually invited, but this was an exception because one of the founding members is leaving, so it was like his leaving drinks.  We had schnitzel and ice cream, and it was very pleasant.

Friday was transition day at school, where all the years spend a day with their new teachers for next year.  It's mostly a big deal for year 2, who move up a floor to year 3, and for year 6, who move into the upper school.  I kept spotting them throughout the day looking very stressed!  I can't do much on transition day, since there are no Maths or English classes.  So I spent the day in various cupboards and the Art room, getting them tidied and restocked for next year.  They were roasting hot, and I was on my feet all day, so it was quite exhausting.  Still, it was a job well done.  Friday evening was the staff Quiz.  The year 3 teachers organised it this year, and I was with some other TAs, and a few teachers from Early Years, plus Sean.  Lots of people (Matt included) had chosen their teams really carefully, based on who was clever and who could help them win, but MY TEAM WON!!!  It was a bit of a shock really!  I was thrilled.  I never win quizzes,  Matt's team came third.  There are some seriously sore losers in the school - behaving like the children!

On Saturday it was really hot again.  We stayed in during the day, at the hottest time, then went to the lake at 6pm, with Andy and Chris.  That closed at 8pm, so we had a couple of hours to sit in the sun and enjoy ice cream and beer.  It was still seriously hot even when we left.  Then we had an impromptu BBQ at Andys, in his (Soon-to-be-ours) garden.  It was lovely.

Today there are thunder storms off and on.  It's cooling things down a bit which is definitely needed.  We have started doing some packing for moving house.  We're not in a rush, but we're going to do a box a day, and it should all be done by next weekend, when we're off to Amsterdam.

Here are the boys with their Duff beers...