Dusseldorf Funfair

This week has mostly been about Matt recovering from his trip to Swaziland, and getting on with his second Masters essay, which is due in next week.  The essay has been a team effort, with Matt writing and me reading drafts.  The weather this week has been scorching hot, with one day reaching 36 degrees!  We have made sure that we leave the house every day, even if it's just to go to the shop, walk around the park or go to the gym.  The heat makes it difficult to want to do anything at all.  It does help that there is an ice cream shop next to the park!  

We haven't been particularly social this week, going for drinks and dinner last Sunday with a few friends, and going to the funfair in Dusseldorf yesterday.  We actually had a really fun day.  Matt and I went early, before everyone else finished working on the summer school.  The fair is huge and has lots of rides, food and beer tents.  We also got flame smoked salmon buns, which are my favourite thing ever, and you can only normally get them at the Christmas fairs.

We went on a couple of rides, including both of the ones below.  The ferris wheel was nice and gentle and gave us a good photo opportunity from the top.

The other ride is one of those where you sit in a seat and it swings around.  They are normally for children, but this one is 80 metres high!  It was great!

Once our friends arrived, we went on this haunted house, which was pretty rubbish, apart from one bit!  There were dolls all around, being scary and gruesome, but one of them turned out to be an actual person who came at us with an axe, and made me scream a lot!

We also went on the below ride, which was a roller coaster in the dark with strobe lights, and the individual two seater carts spun around.  A really fun ride.

We had some beers too, and then went into Dusseldorf for cocktails once we had had enough of paying over the odds for beer.  A very pleasant afternoon and evening.

Next week our busy summer starts!  We've had it very relaxing this week up, but from now on we have non-stop plans, including a spa day in Cologne for our 2 year anniversary, 3 nights in Warsaw in Poland, photographing a wedding and then two weeks full of birthday fun and seeing friends in England.  I'm exhausted just thinking about it!

Swaziland

While i've had a lovely relaxing week at home with Mum and Dad, Matt has been in Swaziland, trekking, mucking about with local kids, building a hut and on safari.  He had a wonderful time, and i'm sure he will tell you all about it when he sees you.  Here are some of his best photos...

Sam's 30th and Last Week of Term

It's been a very tiring two weeks, and quite emotional too.  Matt went off on his adventures to Swaziland - World Challenge, with some students from school.  He is off the grid, so no contact until he gets back to Johannesburg airport on Friday.  I've hated not being able to talk to him for the past week.

At school, we had the year 6 leavers ball on Wednesday. I spent the entire day getting the hall ready for the party, and it looked great.  It was hard work though, but all worth it, as the kids had a fantastic time.  I stayed for the buffet, and to see some of the dancing, but couldn't make it to the end.  Just too exhausting!  I had spent all of Tuesday printing and assembling the year books that I had made for year 6.  The kids loved the year books, and I got lots of thank you presents, which was nice, including the lovely flowers in the photo above, chocolates, body wash, candles and bubbly.

On Thursday, we had the end of year trip to Movie Park, the nearby theme park.  All of Lower School went, but each teacher had a group of 8 or 9.  I teamed up with a friend and her group.  We had a great group of year 5s and 6s, and they all wanted to go on the big roller coasters and all of the high/scary rides that I love.  We had a boy in year 5 in our group who gets himself into trouble at school, but he was great fun, and really up for everything on Thursday, which was lovely.  It's so funny to see the kids realisation that they can eat junk food and have unlimited coke on their wrist bands.  They look like Christmas has come early!

Friday was a half day for the kids, and we had a staff BBQ after, to say goodbye to the teachers leaving.  There are quite a few leaving this year, as people have reached the 2 year mark and are keen to move on.  Unfortunately, two really good friends of mine are leaving this year, so next year will be very different.  I guess that's just the nature of an international school.

I flew back to England straight away on Friday evening, and Sam and Amy picked me up from Heathrow, ready for Sam's party on Saturday night.

The fancy dress, 'S' themed party was a huge success!  I went as a Sumo Wrestler, which was a very popular costume, appreciated by all of the other guests.  Matt's parents and brother came too, which was lovely to see them.  Sam had a great time!  It's so nice to be back in England, with family and friends.  I fly back to Germany on Thursday, and can't wait to see Matt on Friday!