Tis the season

...for Christmas concerts.

So far this week Hannah has sung twice in the Nutcracker, Ellie has sung in the Chorus show, and Hannah has sung and played flute in the school 5/6 grade Chorus/Band show. It's only Wednesday.

Tomorrow we get a day off, then on Friday Hannah has another rehearsal for her Wescustago Singers concert, which is on Saturday. I caught a bit of their rehearsal last Monday and it was absolutely lovely. Hannah's really enjoying being part of it.

What else has happened since I last blogged?

We continued enjoying our summer holiday. Portland hit 103F which is Officially Too Hot, right around my birthday. So for my birthday we stayed at the Inn at Brunswick Station, had a lovely evening meal, fabulous breakfast next morning, and most importantly I got to sleep in a building that had air-conditioning.

Towards the end of the summer Renee and Sasa lent us their lake house on Lovell Lake in New Hampshire. Once again we had amazing weather all week, and we spent the whole time relaxing, arguing over the rope swing, and exploring the area (including Wolfeboro which is full of interesting museums). Hannah and I climbed Mount Major which was a fairly major climb.

We took it in turns to sleep in the treehouse, and woke up to the sound of the lake swishing gently below.

Then it was back to work, and back to school.

We have one in Middle School, one in Elementary School, and one in K-1 School. It's hard work! I'm looking forward to next year, when Ellie and Mark are at school together, and we can push them gently out of the door together in the morning to walk there together.

Hannah loves Middle School, but it is also tiring and a new challenge. She has to be much more organised than before, and her life is very full. She's quite relieved that soccer has finished, and that she can just do homework, chorus, band, Destination Imagination, and have a little time left over.

Ellie loves her new teacher this year - Mrs Parkin. She also really enjoys spending each morning recess helping her last year's teacher's class learn to read. She seems to just be quietly getting on with school at the moment.

Mark wasn't sure about school this year - especially as he and I took 10 days to go to Scotland. He came back and was quite confused and out of sorts about how everything worked, and he's only just really catching up now. I've realised that he's quite possibly short-sighted - he's having an eye test on Friday. If he is I think it would explain quite a lot. He has all of a sudden worked out how to read, over the last couple of months, and now he devours books, especially Elephant and Piggy books.

Back in September/October Mark and I went over to Scotland for Granny Vi's 90th birthday, and to catch up with everyone there. Mark really took to being the oldest of the children, and had a great time with Bradley and Rachel. It was lovely seeing them all together. In fact despite the rain it was just generally lovely to see a large part of my family in one place, and have them all to myself for a while.

Since then we've all been hard at work, school etc. Thanksgiving was a nice break, but I missed half of it because I was busy doing a voluntary thing. We had a fun Thanksgiving meal with Sasa and Renee and family, and the children all did a lot of not very much for a few days.

Now we're waiting for winter to kick in. It's been a strange fall. First we had Hurricane Irene at the end of August, which seems to have pushed insurance premiums up spectacularly. Then at the end of October we had 5 inches of snow, which meant we had a very bizarre Halloween trick or treating in snowboots.

That all melted (and our basement flooded after the sump pump failed), and everything got warm again. Then a week or two ago we got another 5 inches of snow, which also melted pretty much immediately. Since then it's been lovely and warm again, and apparently it turned out to be Portland's warmest November on record. I'm sure I shouldn't celebrate global warming, but when you get winters like ours you've got to appreciate anything you can get.

Summer holiday - 3.5 weeks down, 7.5 weeks to go

When I look back on British summer holidays they seem so short - 6 weeks maximum. Here they're 10 or 11 weeks - no idea why they're not always the same length, but this year is an 11-weeker.

We're a bit odd in that we don't dread the summer holiday. There's so much for the children to do, and we usually get some good weather to enjoy the beaches and lakes too, with a bit of camping thrown in. And of course I'm at work for most of the summer, so I'm not tearing my hair out after the first few weeks demanding to know when they go back to school.

So far this holiday Hannah has spent two weeks learning to sail with SailMaine, down in Portland. They're based fairly near Mike's office, so he spent some very happy lunchtimes entertaining her (or should that be being entertained by her?).

Somehow Hannah ended up with the most amazing weather almost every single day she sailed. I don't think it rained once, and most days it was in the 80s. The biggest problem was sunburn.

She's now confident at handling an Opti - whatever that is - and is ready to do Opti Intermediate next summer.

Mark and Hannah both did a week of lacrosse - only part days. I've yet to actually ever see lacrosse played, so I can only imagine what it's like, but they seem to like it.

Ellie did a week of Art Attack, which she thought was okay but she wasn't blown away by it. Then Ellie and Mark both did a week of Mad Science which they absolutely loved. It was held in the Middle School, right behind our house, and apparently Ellie found salamanders under a log in the woods out there. Also she found insects she calls roly-polies. She means woodlice - I think roly-poly is a better description though.

This week Hannah is doing Theatre Camp, and Ellie and Mark are having a week with Nadja - relaxing, swimming at Carl's brother's house, and having playdates.

It feels like it's been hot forever. It's been in the 90s this week, and the 80s over the weekend. I'm not complaining, but it is a teeny bit sweaty.

Last Saturday we went to Dundee Park, a beach on the Presumpscot River, and swam. Then Sunday we went to Crescent Beach State Park and did some body-boarding and sandcastle building.

The weekend before that was Independence Day weekend - we spent it at Kevin's house in Northeast Harbor. Kevin entertained us and our friends. We swam at the beach club, hiked up a smallish mountain, and ate pizza and ice cream in Bar Harbor.

As always it feels like a huge privilege to live here. Long may it continue...

Welcome to 2011

We're not quite halfway through the year yet, so I thought I'd post my first blogpost of 2011.

(I note that my web address www.werbles.co.uk is currently not working because I haven't paid the bill, but what the heck. It might start working one day if I ignore it for long enough.)

Anyway, this time 8 years ago I was kneeling on the floor of our sitting room, groaning quietly while Ellie made her way into the world. I think she was actually born around 5am UK time, or it might have been 5.30am. Anyway, not long now till she's officially 8.

It was followed by the midwives cleaning me up, putting me in a bath, then pottering off home. That bit was followed by me having a bit of a haemorrhage, taking an ambulance to hospital, having 2 lots of surgery and 5 units of blood, then deciding I wouldn't die after all.

So it's a memorable time, during which we like to give thanks for all of our blessings. Especially Ellie, who is absolutely adorable, sometimes argumentative, always a little bit high-pitched, very often sleepy, usually quite quiet (except at home) and has the softest skin in the world.

Happy birthday Ellie xxx