Life in Freeze frame - where now?

I found a link to this on another blogger's site (  ThresholdMum  ) so thought I would give it a go as it sounded like fun.

My life is in freeze frame. We have taken the decision to head to the UK for education and to be together as a family. And yet I feel sad, sad that a life in France was not to be, sad that we are back in the UK but without real purpose as my husband is looking to change jobs but to what and where is unknown.
I have no jewellery tools to make any new designs and feel very much in limbo. I am starting to feel that I need and want more in my life than being the trailing spouse. But I can never be the major bread winner as I have been out of the habit of a sizeable salary for so long. Therefore I have to continue to wait until my husband lands a new job, a new house is found and the children are happy and settled.
And yet that has an indefinite timeline. So maybe I should use it to work out what it is I want to do, what I can do? With that then maybe I can answer the where now? Not just for my family but for me.

Life after the dream

I didn't know how much I had wanted the dream until we took the decision to move to the UK. I feel that I have gone through a period of grieving. For something that will now never be - our family growing up in the beautiful countryside of France, bi-lingual. The long summer evenings living outside and drinking good wine.

However, we were not prepared to gamble on the education. Being bi-lingual would be an amazing skill but not at the expense of all the other attributes and skills that learning should bring. Even after only 3 months the boys have a good level of French and using a private tutor back in the UK will hopefully build on this knowledge and give them the chance to be as fluent as possible. As for the boys, now they know they are going to the UK they are more relaxed with their language and improving even faster.

A comment that my youngest made when we told them brought home how two people can look at things so differently. For me I am going back, even the very phrase sounds negative. I know about the traffic, the poorer climate compared to France, I lived there for 30 years. However, for my little ones they cannot remember ever living there. It was always only a holiday destination. My youngest said that he was excited to be going to live in England because he had never lived there before and didn't know it. I realised that showing them the country whose passport they hold will be exciting. And actually as I have not been there for 6 years we will all be like strangers, discovering the culture and customs all over again. So we are going to be tourists, learning the heritage and history of the land they call England.

The list of things "To Do" is shorter than last time but still quite meaty. A lot is done, cats have their passports, tunnel booking is changed, landlord notified. Just a simple thing of squeezing our stuff into one estate car and roofbox. As my husband doesn't arrive back till the day before we leave at 6 am we have decided to err on the side of caution and buy a trailer to ensure that it will all fit in! One of the major things on the "To Do" list is to find a house in a catchment area of a good school with spaces for the boys within commuting distance of my husband's work. Unfortunately it is proving to be moveable jigsaw puzzle that refuses to be finished. I fear that I may yet be home schooling the boys. We have another 3 weeks to find a place so fingers crossed!

What now?

In my last post, granted only posted today, but written about 2 weeks ago, I hinted at our concerns about the difference between the two education systems. It is something that worries me. We were so lucky with our last school. It had a carpet for the kids to sit on to listen to the teacher, the modern desks were placed so that the children sat together in groups of 6 or 7 and there was a white board in every classroom. The children from FS2 up had regular access to technology and a large space to run around outside.

The current one as previously mentioned has a yard 20m by 10m. All ages play in this space from the small maternelles at 3yrs old up to the CM2 at 11. The access to the two classrooms is up a dark staircase. The classes have 3 different year groups in them. Our youngest's class has two rows of desks each facing a different wall. The desks are old. At first glance there is very little order in the classroom with piles of books and papers on desks on the far side of the room. The eldest's class is similar, accept that they all face the one blackboard at the front of the class. The headmaster is also a full-time teacher only having Friday out of the classroom to attend to headteacher stuff. There is no school secretary. There is a before / afterschool service and these ladies also look after the kids at lunchtime because the teachers have no responsabilty for the children during this time.


A good thing about being here is taking part in the "out of the classroom" lessons. Two weeks ago the boys went cross-country skiing for the day at le Plateau de la Beille. The weather was amazing and it was a fantastic day. It allowed me to see first hand the differences between UK and French ways of doing things. There were no seatbelts on the bus. The teachers did the cross-country skiing instructing, however given that for most it was their first time, either ever, or at least for a year, there was no basic instruction of how to put on the skis, how to move or even how to stop! I was walking with the bottom group helping to pick them up when they fell but I was a bit concerned about my two given that they had not done this before and they were put in the top two groups because they had done downhill skiing. At lunchtime the children were told to sit on the snow and have their packed lunch whilst the teachers all sat together. There was no real concern to ensure that all the children were drinking enough or staying warm. It was then that I learned that teachers in France have the right to hit a pupil! Listening to my eldest describe his morning it sounded like a testosterone filled group that had been out to go as fast as possible uphill and down. Although he is competitive at other things he felt out of his depth, not helped by the fact that the teacher mocked him every time he fell over. This was more evidence that he has not settled and feels completely under-confident in everything that he does. Luckily he was able to change groups and went in the next one down with his brother and loved the afternoon session.

In January we had put in an offer on a house and had it accepted. We had even got as far as going to the lawyer's to sign the first of the documents leading to purchase - the compromis de vente.  However the seller dragged his heels on completing a survey required for sale on the septic tank. When it eventually came in, it transpired that he had not had a new survey done just the old report re-written. He thought it said that everything was fine. He ignored the part that said that it was fine for up to 5 people! Given that it was a house that could sleep over 8 with gites that slept 12 we were not going to be able to take the "do nothing" option with the septic tank. The cost was unknown and was probably going to be very high. Too high for our budget so sadly, we pulled out of the sale. 

Where does that leave us? The situation is thus: no house, a school system that does not appear to offer what I think my boys need, a rental that is too small for our needs, all our stuff in storage and a husband at home 4 nights a month. This all adds up to not much of a life. So we have had to admit that, this time around, our french dream is not to be. It is something for later on, for hubby and I together when we only need to worry about watering vegetable patches and having a cave du bon vin. 

The question now is where do we live? As of 7 April we have no house nor a school for the boys. Answers on a postcard please!

10 Weeks in - Opinion so Far?

I wrote this weeks ago but it is still worth publishing to bring you up to date with what we've been up to.


Well we've been here 10 weeks. The boys have spent 8 of those at school. Many of you may be wondering how it's going and how the boys are coping with this new life. I will endeavour to be honest - as various articles on-line and in magazines that I have read recently have glossed over the reality of moving somewhere new and the difficulties of integration for children as well as adults. This is perhaps because the articles were written over a year into the new life and like all things painful the human body has the ability to forget the bad bits! Perhaps if you too, have had experience of this, you could give some advice and help to me and any others who are also on this rollercoaster ride.

We had got into a routine by the end of January: school drop off at 840am, pick up for lunch at 1145am, drop them back off at 130pm and pick up at end of school at 430pm. Then it is time for a quick snack before homework. Homework is given by my youngest's teacher for him but the eldest ( in CM1 - the second last class of primary school in France) gets nothing. Initially he thought this was good until he realised that I had found books to help him with learning French. Hachette and Nathan both publish books for each academic year covering all subjects and include answers. So he does work that I have set. The youngest's school work includes the sounds of letters and the various ways they can be formed, spelling, reading and learning poetry. I also give him extra work from the books. As you can imagine evenings can be fretful - explaining the homework, translating it and trying to cook tea. Tuesdays are a bit different. It is the night for the eldest's football and the other's basketball. Both at the same time but in different villages! Luckily the neighbour across the road takes his son to football too so I only have to do the pick up after the basketball has finished! But as we are not home before 815pm, they need food before they leave at 6pm. Wednesday is school-free but we still try to do some work.

Then February interrupted the routine with bad weather and the 2 week holiday. Despite doing work during the holidays it was always going to be difficult to go back to school. We've had tears from both over the last week. It is really hard to try to console your little ones whilst you know that they are going into an environment every day where they understand little and can communicate even less. It does make you question why? A move is hard enough but we chose to put a new language into the mix. To this add the doubts over the education system. Our youngest has a super teacher she's in her 30's, she gives me updates on his progress and stresses how well he is doing and how fast he is picking up the french. This allows me to help bolster his confidence when he is upset about not understanding what is happening in class.

Unfortunately the exact opposite can be said about our eldest's teacher. He is old-school, has a strong local dialect and gives no feeedback whatsoever. The impact on our eldest was seen the other night when he dissolved into tears saying how he hated school because he can't understand what's going on, what the teacher is trying to teach or ask him to do. I think he is also affected by not getting any homework - it is emphasising how incapable he is. It then came out just how old-school the teacher is - he shouts a lot. Not necessarily just at those who are misbehaving. I learnt that our eldest had been shouted at numerous times for dropping a pencil on a desk, for trying to shut the classroom door that refused to stay shut and for accidently kicking the football at playtime too high so that it went over the metal fence and into the garden next door!  The boys have also been upset by the roughness of the other children. They shout lots, push and shove in the queue and don't necessarily do what the teachers are asking them to do. All of this is very alien to them as well as to me for our last school was calm, all children were polite and quiet in the corridors, they listened to the teachers when they asked for silence. This has had an impact on my two - they are much noisier at home. Partly because of the noise levels at school and also because they are not as active because the playground is only about 20m by 10m.

La Vie francaise

As I expected, my good intentions of writing every week took a dip over the last 2 due to having 2 boys to entertain on their hols! But back to work today so I thought I would give a little insight into la vie francaise.

Before school broke up for the holidays the school held the Loto in the village hall. I say village hall, it is more accurately described as a large gym where local sports groups play handball and basketball and known in french as la salle polyvalente. It was on a Friday and started at 830 pm. Knowing that the French rarely start on time we arrived slightly late but weren't the last. We had the basics of how to play explained to us and bought our cards and counters (cartons and jetons). It turns out that it is Bingo. The counters are used so that they can re-use the cards each time. The French are quite addicted to their Loto and go to at least one a week. Many take it very seriously with chatting and noise discouraged. Even at the school's event, where the kids were included and expected to take part, children older than 5 were expected to sit at the tables and not make a noise! The boys had been practising it all week at school and did well identifying their numbers. We didn't even get close to a full card and never managed to be the first to fill a line - so no prizes for us. The prizes ranged from a sledge filled with children's toys and books to a gift certificate for €100 to a 5kg bag of flour and some cider! They broke for coffee at 11pm and still had five more games to play. The kids had been good but even they had a limit to how long they can listen to numbers being called out in French! So, using my leg in a brace as an excuse we left.

As previously mentioned we started the process of registering our car in France. The MOT centres here don't fix anything that is wrong - just fail your car and you have to then pay to re-test later. So we booked the car in with our local garage, Monsieur Perrot to get anything fixed that needed it before the test. When we went back to pick it up he said that he hadn't done much except change a couple of bulbs so he hadn't yet worked out how much we owed him and that he would give us an invoice, sometime!

We had been told that registering the car can be a lengthy and frustrating process. But also that if you are organised it is ok. So we got organised. Having made a list of everything we needed and the order it needed to happen. We started slowly ticking things off. I think it is the length of time that it takes that is possibly the frustrating part but happily we got every document that we needed. Last week I left the house before everyone else was awake to get to Foix, our principal town with the Prefecture, in time to join the queue for the carte grise - the official document for your car similar to the V5 in Britain. I was 5th in the queue as the doors opened. Then we had to wait some more for the ticket machine to wake up in order to get our number to be served. It was a very orderly process and I felt quite French sitting with my dossier folder like everyone else! 10 minutes later I was at the counter passing over all the necessary documents to a very bored lady who obviously did this day in and out. Then I moved on down the hall to pay our tax for the carte grise - this time no queue. Then there was one final thing to do - find Intermarche and the man who makes the registration plates (plaques). Knowing that the kids would enjoy seeing the plates go on I took them home. We then went to our local garage and the very nice Monsieur Perrot put them on for us - and still hadn't worked out the invoice!

Snow, snow and French medical system

Well the snow that had been promised for the 29th came on the 1st. The bitter chill that proceeded it brought sleet and cancellation of football training for our eldest and the boys' school x-country skiing trip. It was decided that it wouldn't be much fun for the kids in such bitter conditions. A good decision it turned out because by the time the Friday came around, there was about 5cm of snow with us and lots of small roads were impassible. We braved (well in all honesty 'coz I can't drive - my husband braved!) the ice and snow to get the kids to school Thursday and Friday only to find that most of the kids and 50% of the teachers had not!

The boys loved the snowy conditions and spent hours creating their own version of Mont Blanc and tunnel as well as sliding down any slope they could find. The snow got heavier and the sledges came out! As the road was deep in snow and knowing so many never made it in the previous week we decided to have another snow day on Monday - much to the boys' enjoyment!

The one benefit of my knackered ACL is that my husband and I had longer to discuss an offer on a house that we have found. We decided that we should go for it and see if we could make our French dream a reality. So offer went in and after a nervous couple of days it was accepted! So now the daunting task of getting all the required pieces of paper together and all the i's dotted and t's crossed and monies in the correct place at the correct time! To add to the stress of course is the need to get the gites that come with the house up and running and advertised in time for summer bookings. Oh and find a school for the boys from September.

This week not only brought the snow but my appointment with the knee surgeon. He did a very quick yank and twist of the knee and nodded sagely agreeing with my diagnosis that I had torn my ligament. He needed it confirmed though with and MRI so we hobbled down to the Radio department and made an appointment then back up to orthopedics to make an appointment to see the surgeon again after the MRI. So no definite date for the op but have an MRI to look forward to on 29th Feb and then back to the surgeon on 7th Mar.  It is a lot quicker than the NHS system which is good, however, we had not yet fully registered with the french system as paperwork takes it time and therefore we will have to hope that the EHIC (European Health Insurance Card) does what it says it does - offer reciprocal cover to UK NHS whilst abroad. This should mean that I give them the details of how much we've spent and they then pay us back. We shall see how smooth and effective this system is!

In the meantime it is the February holidays. All schools in France have 2 weeks for skiing with the large school areas divided into zones to help avoid chaos at airports and ski resorts. We fall into the Toulouse area and Zone A so we're on holiday until 27th Feb. I had thought we could investigate the area and go for lovely walks but am having to re-think that!

Where do I start?......

I knew moving to France would, like everywhere, bring its own challenges. From having done a lot of research and talking with others who have already trodden this path I knew about the long administrative processes and the French love of paperwork. I knew about the settling in process, how it is a bit of a roller coaster experience until you begin to feel more "at home". What I wasn't expecting was the accidents of life.

Snow was forecast for our area for Sunday 29th. It was our youngest's birthday and we had promised him months ago that he could go skiing on his birthday to make up for the fact that he wouldn't really know anyone well enough to have a party. We woke up in anticipation of a white-out. But alas, nothing. So we headed off to Ax-Les Thermes and the resort of Bonascre. It lies south of Foix about an hour and a quarter from our house. We had winter tyres on and so felt confident that we would be ok on the roads. The snow didn't appear until we got to Ax. We saw many people putting snow chains on and wondered if we needed them. The sports shops were selling them so we decided not to be macho and buy a set putting them on as we saw the hill we needed to climb to get to Bonascre.

Blizzard conditions up the mountain!

We got to the top and set about organising ski hire and ski passes. We then headed up the mountain in the gondola. The weather got worse with every metre climbed. We got out half way up and immediately found ourselves in a snowstorm. Visibility no further than a few metres. Not the weather the children are used to and certainly not what they were expecting. But they slowly got their "ski-legs" back and we wound our way slowly back down the mountain. After about 3 hours we decided that we would call it a day and head for some chocolat chaud. 


200m from the bottom I turned to stop waiting for our youngest to start off again so that I would be behind him ready to help if needed. I was going slowly, too slowly and in turning right the back end of my left ski didn't. However the leg and the knee did. I heard a "crack" and fell over. Having previously ripped my right ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) many years ago I knew what it felt like. So believe thatI have managed to do the same to my left!!!


The fun didn't stop there though. After being transported down the hill in the sledge head first, I was put in the front if the ambulance as there was a bloke on a stretcher on the back. As we're heading off down the very steep slope the ambulance starts sliding out of control towards the edge and the crash barrier! The other helper in the car got out and put herself between the barrier and the vehicle to try to push the car around so that it was back facing down the hill. After this I discovered that there was only one chain on one tyre as the second chain had broken. 


We crawled down the hill in first gear. Then about 2 turns from the bottom and the clearer roads we came upon a bus coming up the hill. It had stopped to put chains on. He hadn't thought about stopping before the hill! So we sat for ages watching the driver get in and out the bus inching it forward and back to get it aligned with the chains and every time  he got out he slipped on the ice. By then there was a huge queue behind us and one guy decided to overtake - then he realised why we'd all stopped as we couldn't get passed the bus! So he put his brakes on and slid right into the back if the ambulance! To top it all I had been needing the loo since about 11 am and had not yet been. I was now fit to burst and couldn't hold it in any longer so I told the ambulance lady and she got a sheet out and held it, with the help of my hubby, to maintain my modesty whilst I did the biggest wee ever at the side if the road!! Took us 2 and a half hours to go a journey that should normally take about 40!!! 


When we got to the hospital I was seen quite quickly and had my knee x-rayed to check there was no fracture. I was then given a full length leg brace to stabilise it and keep it straight. I have to keep it like that for 10 days waiting for the swelling to reduce. I had to then phone on Monday to make an appointment to see the specialist surgeon on Wed 8th. Which, perhaps unlike the UK, I got with no problem. The surgeon will then tell me how bad, or not, my knee is. Hadn't planned on experiencing the French medical system so soon. Haven't yet joined their social security system or taken out insurance - so lets hope the EHIC (European Health Insurance Card) works! On a positive note my husband is till here to drive the kids to school and ensure we have some food - so something good has come of it. Who knows what will happen next week!