Phare du Trezien

School holiday is here again. Tim and family came visiting and we spent a week in Brittany. 

We were blessed with good weather. It was windy at times but we had sun almost every day. 

We visited the lighthouse at Trezien. It is 37.2m high and we walked up the 180+ steps. The guide at the top explained to us the history of the lighthouse. All lighthouses in France work automatically. The last lighthouse keeper here left in 1985.

 From up there, the view was excellent. It was very windy too.

The wall facing the south is painted white to help the ships in their direction.

Beside the lighthouse was the old keeper's house. Now, it is an information center. Below is a model of a lighthouse out at sea. The keeper would live in the lighthouse.

This is a short and meaningful trip. Especially for the boys.

La méthode de Singapour

Singapore's method on teaching maths is famous in France. Today I was reading an article about a french mother home schooling her children and for maths, she was using the Singapore method. I briefly read through and thought she bought materials from Singapore.

In the afternoon while A2 was having his karate lesson, I waited outside and saw a mother going through homework with her daughter. She was waiting for her son as well. We chatted and she told me she was using the Singapore method on maths as enrichment material for her daughter. She showed me the book she bought. The title was "Maths Méthode de singapour". I was surprised that the Singapore's method was well recognised and in France, there are books adapted to the different classes.

She explained to me that she had done some research and decided to try the Singapore method as Singapore kids have the best grades on Maths. Maths is explained in a graphical way for the primary school children to understand easily. This intrigued me.

Seb and I do not want to give extra lessons to our children at home as we do not want them to get bored in class. If the boys asked about a subject, we would of course answer him. We do not deny the kids if they want to learn something. However, we do not want to get ahead of school learning. I wonder if I should get these text book and work book for the boys. Should I be a kiasu* parent?

*(of a person) very anxious not to miss an opportunity; grasping.

Spring is here.

Spring is here and the trees are alive again. I am always amazed with spring. Barren trees start to bloom once there are a few days of rain followed by a day or two of sunshine. 

This tree is in front of A2's room. Each morning when I rolled up the shutter, we got this lovely sight.

 This other tree is what greets us from the home office. The trees look beautiful. However, once the wind comes, the petals would drop everywhere including our drive way. It is a messy affair trying to clean the ground.

In our garden, the apricot tree is flowering as well. The cherry and apple trees are starting to bud. Chives are shooting out from a corner of the garden. I thought they are gone forever but each spring at the same spot, the chives appear. Just amazing. After so many years in this country, I marvel each time at the beginning of a season. 

Guess it's because I come from a tropical country.

Chouquettes et Café

A1 comes home after school and does not stay in the after school care since the beginning of the year. My big boy wants to be independant and enjoys the short walk home with some older schoolmates. Since he is having his afternoon tea at home, I am trying to bake twice a week. I want to cut down on store bought cakes and biscuits.

Usually, I make banana cake, chocolate cookies, yogurt cake or crepes.

Recently, I made chouquettes with the Thermomix and the kids loved them. It was easy to make..  

These chouquettes go well with a latte. For Seb's birthday, the family and I bought him a coffee machine. It makes espresso the way my man likes it. 

Seb can make mousse out of milk with this machine. Once a while, I would ask him to prepare me a latte in the afternoon.

 He makes me coffee and I would like to make him vegan chouquettes. I have the receipe, just waiting for inspiration and courage*.

* The last vegan chocolate cake I made was not tasty at all.

Sad news for the white rhinoceros

I just read in the news that poachers killed the white rhinoceros Vince in the Thiory zoo. This is the first time poachers committed their crimes in a zoo, in Europe. They managed to get away with one of his horns. Poachers are no longer just confined in Africa. The horns must be so priced that poachers are willing to take the risk to break into the zoo. The population of these animals in the wild are menaced. Now, even the zoos can't protect them.
We have visited this zoo twice and this is such a sad news. :(

Book: L'attentat

I read this book three weeks ago. I borrowed this book from my friend's son who is 17 and had to read it as part of his school work.

This book is available in english under the title 'The attack'. The author wrote under the pen name Yasmina Khadra.

A suicide bomber exploded in a packed restaurant in Tel Aviv. Dr. Amin Jaafari, an Isareli Arab surgeon who was respected and admired by his colleagues was informed that his wife might have been the suicide bomber. He could not believe it and decided to find out the truth.

This book is not a thriller. It is not too dramatic. It talks about how the life of Dr Jaafari completely changed after this news. He went to the morgue to identify his wife. He started asking questions to himself. His house in a high end neighbourhood was visited by mobs calling him names and accusing him of being a terrorist like his wife. He was questioned by the police. He was lost and decided to visit the places his wife had visited to find answers.

As the story gets closer to the end, the author showed the readers the other side of the wall. Life in Palestine. Dr Jaafari realised that his wife was indeed the suicide bomber and he came to realise what she was fighting for. He realised he could never be part of her belief. He was a surgeon meant to save lives.

The ending was sad. This is the second book I read about the conflict in the middle east. I would prefer the other book. Though I read it many years back, it is still one of my favourite book. I shall write about it soon.

A walk in the winter wonderland

When the sun finally came out on Thurs on that ski week, I joined a guided walking tour in the forest. We put on our snow shoes called raquettes in french. Raquettes mean rackets. It is having plastic rackets with metal grips underneath tied to our shoes. In this way, we could "easily" walk on the soft snow. We do have walking sticks to make the walk easier.

Still, I was sweating after walking up a gentle slope. Most of us in the group started to unzip our jackets by then. The forest was silent and it was beautiful. The guide showed us animals' traces. Sometimes, he would go off trail and we would be walking in almost knee deep of snow. It was fun.

Our ski resort was opposite right at the top of the mountain.

The walk was a physical workout. Just that few hours made me exhausted yet the scenary made it all worth well. I am amazed with my boys who skiied the whole day and yet in the evening, were still full of energy.

And I made a friend. Her daughter is studying in Singapore and she is going to visit her in April. She did not expect to meet a Singaporean in this part of France.We exchanged numbers and I promised to send her tips about her up coming trip. Singaporeans are not aplenty but we are everywhere.

Book: La cigale du huitième jour

I love to read. Since I don't take public transport to work, I hardly have time to read. I normally read during vacation or just before going to bed.

I just finished reading a novel and thought I start to write down the title of books I read with a short review as I tend to forget the author and the title after.

I have been reading in French as English books are not available in the nearby library. My friends lent me books in French. I have no complains as I like french writers and french books by foreign authors are usually well translated.

Tika recommended me La cigale du huitième jour (The eighth day) by Mitsuyo Kakuta. I didn't like the ending but overall the story was interesting. It was about a woman who went to her ex-lover's house to see the baby of his wife. Out of impluse, she stole the baby and raised the baby as her own. She was always on the run to avoid being caught. The second part of the story focused on the baby who had become an adult. The story brings us through different parts of Japan. There are various women's issues mentioned which touched my heart.

After reading the book, I would like to visit the Japanese islands mentioned.

First ski trip

For the first week of school holidays, I took the boys to ski with our friends. Seb had to go USA for a work trip so he could not join us. We took trains to Aime La Plagne and the boys were excited to take a TGV train for the first time.

The week we were there, it was snowing everyday. We had sun only on the last two days. The boys had never ski. After a week's lesson, they can ski well. They were in the Flocon class but with different monitors. The monitors were friendly and amazing with kids. A2 kept talking about his monitor, Stephen. I think he was his idol. 

Other than ski, the boys sledged down the snowy slopes.

With their monitors, the boys progressed fast and tried out different trails. They were very happy and A1 eagerly showed me on the map where they had skiied. I was impressed.

On the last day, they had tests before getting their Flocon badge. Both of them made it. Below was a game of cat and mouse and A1 was the mouse. The person behind had to try to catch him.

Come snow or sun, the boys skiied. For me, I lazed around and chatted with my friend who did not ski too. On sunny days, I took out the camera and snapped away. Here was A2 in blue starting his lesson after lunch.

We stayed at Aime 2000. It was really convenient as the ESF ski school was in the same building. The boys put on their skis and could ski from the door steps.

A1 did not want to go home at the end. As our friends came by car, we left them earlier to catch the train. The journey back was a pain as there was a problem on the tracks. We had to take a coach to reach another train station and this delay made us missed our TGV at Lyon. We took a later TGV train and reached home at midnight.

Overall, this ski trip was really fun for the boys. They are sportive and learnt to ski in no time at all. A1 asked why I didn't ski. I told him I started late and did not enjoy it. He could not understand that. Well, I replied, "do you see any snow in Singapore?"

Food note

As mentioned before, in french school, all children have the same lunch. This is the weekly menu of the department 78 we live in. There is a starter, a main with side, milk product like cheese and ending with dessert. 

The children are encouraged to try new food. They can ask for more serving if there is extra after everyone is served. On the thurday of that week, there was raclette. I was sure the boys would enjoy their lunch and they did!

A1 is choosy with cake and biscuits. He like me, does not like chocolate. He does like chouquettes. On new year's eve, my friend brought chouquettes over. She told me it was easy to make them with the thermomix. I found the receipe online and tried it out. Indeed, it was easy. The boys finished them up over dinner and next day's breakfast. There were 4 leftovers as they had the least sugar on them.

While writing this post, I found the receipe in english (non Thermomix). Try out this easy to do pastry here.

It is colder

2017 started on a cold note. The average temperature for the past two weeks was between -5 to 4 degrees. This week, though it was very cold, it was sunny and dry. The fireplace worked hard and we had almost used up our supply of wood. The same amount saw us through last winter.This year, we would need double. Seb is going to order more wood.

A2's room is facing north and in the evening, his room was 15degrees. We had to use the portable heater to boost up the temperature to 18degrees. This is the recommended temperature for bedrooms.

The boys had football practice on friday evening with the temperature at 3 degrees. There was no snow. Unlike 2013 where the garden was covered in snow and we would built a snowman.

Speaking of snow, we are heading to the mountains to ski. Hoping to get plenty of fresh snow but not snow storm.

Bangkok, Thailand

I just noticed that this post was in my draft. I uploaded the photos few months ago and totally forgot to post about the Bangkok trip.

We took the public transport including the ferry along the Chao Phraya to visit Wat Pho temple. This was my second visit to Bangkok after 20 years. I am sure I visited this temple but it was still impressive to see the reclining Buddha. The boys pointed out Buddha each time they saw one. There were Buddha everywhere.

We also visited the National Museum and came upon a German/English guide. As we were the only family visiting on a Thursday morning, the guide tried to explain in English and in his limited French to the boys. Other than us, there were students on field trip and a few visitors here and there. This place was peaceful and the funeral chariot hall was full of interesting and beautifully crafted objects.

Having my mother with us, we visited markets as well and even had durians right there sitting on a bench while the guys (Seb, my nephew, A1 and A2) waited patiently for us. None of them like durians. Too bad for them.

Below are some photos of that long away trip. We won't be visiting Asia this year. Hopefully next year, we can celebrate Chinese New Year in Singapore.

Pine cones a plenty

We received a big box of pine cones from our neighbour.

Apparently, pine cones are great as a fire starter for the fireplace. They crack when burning. Just the kind of sound a successful fire in the fireplace should be producing. I like that sound. 

A1 came home from school and asked to have one. He learnt that lady birds make pine cones their home during winter. He wanted to build one by poking holes into it with a screwdriver. Seb proposed to hang it in the garden once the house was completed.

At the moment, it is too wet to go out hang the lady bird's house. And tomorrow, we might have snow.

Another upcycled bag

I made another bag. This time round, it was for A2. He was happy to have his own upcycled bag.

This bag is slightly different from the other upcycled jeans bag as this is made from a boy's jean. In order to give the bag a bigger storage space, I lengthened it by adding part of the pant's leg. You can see the inverted V just under the zipper.  

This second experience was smoother than the first. I hope to make a third one as this is a fast and easy project. Just need to find someone who needs one. Any taker?

Cold new year

2016 ended on a cold note. It did not snow but it frosted. The temperature for the past few days was a few degrees below zero. 

We went out to the forest to walk the dog as usual but other than that, we kept warm at home. 

On new year's eve, we invited two families to celebrate with us. They are my neighbours and did not have to worry about drink and drive. They walked home at 1.30am.

The kids stayed up until the guests were gone. The next day, A1 woke up at 9am. That is the latest he can sleep. 

A start of a new year. Hoping this year to be good to everyone in terms of health, family and work. You and me included.

Frozen webs here and there. Just lovely. This was on the wood shed.

The forest turned white.

The boys using their bicycles to break the ice.

Kapla fun that reached the sky.
When it fell, it made loud noise.

Handsome warming up. He enjoyed his forest run even in this cold.

A letter from Father Christmas

The boys each received a letter from Father Christmas yesterday. Yipee!

A1 read out the letter to A2. Father Christmas mentioned that he got their letters from his elves while he was cutting wood in the forest. ....

The two letters were identical. At the end of the letter, Father Christmas invited them to color the coloring papers he sent and to upload them on LaPoste website with the help of an adult.

Not very authentic but well, still a nice gesture from LaPoste.

The boys spent their time after lunch coloring the image sent by Father Christmas. They intended to hang them on the Christmas tree for Father Christmas.