Solo Parenting

 A lot has happened since I last wrote, between us, me and Dan have been to 5 countries! We are in the middle of a strange month where apart from a day and a half, me and Dan will not be seeing each other and the kids will just have one parent at a time. If there's mistakes in this blog it's because Dan isn't here to proofread it, apologies.

Dan's company is based in the Czech Republic and although he works online and wasn't being forced to go there, we decided he should take the opportunity to go on an expenses paid work trip there. The timing and the travel there were pretty annoying though. This all happened just before I had to go back to the UK to get my visa, and at the same time Dan's parents came for a visit. He had to go to Burno which is the second biggest Czech city after Prague. We spent a long time researching how he would get there. It sort of seems like it would be easier now, that there's no sea between us and the rest of Europe, but even though the distance from Liverpool to Burno is the same as the distance from Perpignan to Burno flights would have been easier from the uk. The best he could do was a train from Saint feilu d'amont (our village) to Perpignan, then a train to Barcelona, then a taxi from the station to the airport, then a plane from Barcelona to Vienna (Austria) then a bus from the airport to the train station, an then a train the Burno. because of all the extra waiting around in between traveling, the total journey time was 15 hours it would have took 17 hours to drive.

So I had a week without Dan, beginning with my first drive without him, just driving the mile back from our local train station, it felt weird but it was fine I managed to avoid driving into a ditch which is my main fear on those little roads. Two days later I decided to go for a much more ambitious drive to the big shop, to get in some supplies before Dan's parents arrived. I was pretty terrified but the reward of having a bit of kid free time in the clothes shop next to the big supermarket was enough to motivate me. The big shop is 3 villages west. We're sort of near a big main road between the mountains and the sea. So everywhere you can go easily is east of west rather than north or south. So the drive is very simple to navigate but terrifying to do for the first time on your own.

It totally was worth it though, I got 2 nice tops and a pair of shorts from the fun clothes shop and even managed to ask to keep the hangers in Mench (mime and french) and I got a load of food.

Later on that week Dan's parents came to visit, it was a badly timed trip where they hardly saw their own son, but it was great to have them,  because even though Dan's mum is from the opposite end of France, they have still traveled round this area lots and know some cool places. The kids actually had a few days off school when they were there too because ascension day, means two days off school in France, plus Wednesdays are off anyway, so it was a two day week all thanks to Jesus. I bet it took him less time to go back to heaven than it takes to go from Perpignan to Burno.

The first full day they were there was the only coat day I've had since moving to France. It was grey and a bit rainy just like England. They decided we should go on this yellow train up a mountain. My french mother in law bought the tickets, and although I was trying to listen in for language practise neither me or my father in law picked up that the train options were: go up the mountain for a hour and they stay all day somewhere where there isn't loads to do or have 4 minutes to change train and come back again. So we were a little disappointed to just be on a train for two hours, but on the way back we switched to the outdoor bit of the train which although cold actually was like ridding a roller coaster through beautiful scenery. On a nicer day it would be incredible.

They also took us to hot springs, which was like an outdoor pool that was bath temperature, it would have been a bit weird on a hot day but it was the perfect cold day activity. I'm going to go back for my birthday in January when the pool will be surrounded by snow. I hate having a winter birthday, I'm just not a winter person, the last two summer I've put on a weekend festival in my garden and people always ask "what's it for?" what are you celebrating? and it's not celebrating anything, I guess I'm just a big party animal trapped in the body of a mum of two with a winter birthday married to an introvert. 

But maybe from now on I can do snow based activities on my birthday. Did you hear my business idea "wizzney land?" I feel like I must have written about it before. It's snow fun for people who can't be bothered to learn to ski or think they're not posh enough, and want to just mess around on tires and sledges while learning nothing.

That was a tangent...So anyway the next day we went to a mountain/hill you can drive up and see the view over everywhere! you can see our local mountain our village and all the villages near, and you can see right out to the sea. It's very windy but spectacular. There was actually a bit more snow on our mountain, from the previous cold day but by lunch time it had gone again. When we arrived in April there was a good amount of snow still but by the day I left there were just tiny lines of snow like cracks. I wonder what month the snow will come back again.

For a long weekend we went to a holiday park 5 minutes walk from the sea. It was like a little mobile home with a really good pool with water slides and palm trees. It was a strange feeling being kind of on holiday, but also being half an hour from my house, and then Dan not being there and feeling stressed about going back to England to get the visa very soon after that. I tried to relax the best I could but it was quite odd. One evening after the kids were in bed I went out to the beach to explore, they had the festival of islands on, with music and stalls from Tahiti and those kinds of places. They had a big stage with a screen and projected onto it was a beautiful image of a white sandy beach. But that screen was blocking the almost as good beach of Argeles. I don't know if anyone else found it ironic. Part of the festival was  cooking a whole pig under the sand somehow. I don't know how but it involved hot coals and a lot of foil.

The beach they covered up behind a picture of another beach

We collected Dan from the main train station just before midnight on the Saturday so we had Sunday together at the holiday park, before I headed back to England late on Monday night.

I got the plane very late on Monday night, back from Barcelona at the same time as Dan's parents. The plane was delayed by a bit more than an hour which was annoying given that there was already such a long wait before boarding. but coming back and hearing some of the news stories about flights being cancelled, I feel so lucky to have got back at all. My visa appointment was the next morning and if I'd have missed that it would have been a disaster. I wouldn't be able to get another appointment until about august and by that time some of our documents would have expired. and I can't just come back in august because Dan can't take august off work to look after the kids. He can only do it now because they're in school and even then he has to take Wednesdays off work. 

I got to bed at my parents house in cheshire around 2:30 AM and set several alarms so as not to miss the appointment. I still have my car here, but my parents aren't here they on their canal boat traveling on the Leeds Liverpool canal. I got to the appointment which was really horrible, the stress of knowing that if I had forgotten something or done something wrong I would not be able to see Dan and the boys for months was horrible. I parked somewhere I might get finned for because in the grand scheme of things a parking fine is not important. There were severals things they did not like about my application. Firstly it was on cream paper not white paper and that was not acceptable to them. Secondly my photos were wrong and need to be taken again. but it got sorted the lady said it would work and then sent me to get my finger prints taken.

The next few days I was back in Liverpool trying to get my old house nice and all painted white for the new tenants. An estate agent have taken over the house and are putting in a new kitchen. So I've been painting for a few days and I've been lucky enough to go and visit a local friends every lunch time and tea time including my old rabbit Lola, still going strong after nearly 9 years!

I've had a bit of a falling out with the estate agents, they were pretty rude and unprofessional to me and it was stressful to try and resolve it. It's semi resolved now but I am a bit worried they will do the equivalent of a waiter spitting in some soup, like leave a dead fish behind some plasterboard or something. Does this happen? Do all professions have an equivalent thing they do when they're annoyed? I did once talk about putting a secret rude message on a mural that you could only see under an ultra violet light.

At the weekend I organised a bit of a get together with two families I know from the school run at my parents river house. 80% of the children didn't fall in the river. That's good isn't it? I just checked and you only need to get 70% to get a first class degree. So I'm sure all the parents were pleased with my first class play date. The oldest child 10 year old Rosie, wanted to try out kayaking but wasn't very confident in the kayak, she had never done it before and didn't know how to use the paddle. I should have given her an on land lesson first but instead I offered to go in with her. I was sort of squatting down behind her because there wasn't quite room for both of us, and this actually worked fine and wasn't a terrible idea. 

We went down the river a tiny bit and then a canal boat came past, it was going pretty fast for the world's slowest boat. This made some waves which we copped with ok, we faced them head on and we were fine. We tuned round to head back and then suddenly- I don't know how, I was in the water. and then she was in the water which was a much bigger deal because she was already panicked just about being in a boat. This is the first time I've ever unintentionally fallen in that river. I was wearing full clothes and shoes and a non waterproof watch. Thankfully we both had life jackets on but Rosie was trapped under the boat, her head went full under, she swallowed a mouthful of river water and shouted "I'm going to die!" 

I managed to pull the boat off her and push her towards the edge, we were only meters away from my parent's neighbours decking so we just climbed out there and she went to go and get changed. I then needed to rescue the boat and paddle which were floating away so I just jumped back in and swam them back to our decking.

The day ofter that I did a little job painting a mural of a pokemon on a kids wall, in between painting my own house. that was a pretty full on day but now I'm off on my UK tour, last night I visited my sister Jo in Bradford. We went to a very quircky cafe today where she ate ice cream in a yorkshire pudding with chocolate gravy. It actually tastes kind of like eating an eclair. 

Then I went to Gateshead to visit my good friend Lydia and her family. It was her mission to convert me to the north east, and she did a good job, they do have much better beaches than the northwest, and they took me surfing! 

I loved surfing, I'd love to get into it but our bit of sea (the med) is not wavey enough. It was an off and on British sunny day, Lydia offered me suncream, Ha I thought I don't need suncream I've just spent a month in the south of France, your northern sun can't touch me....

The tour continues with 2 days on the canal boat with my parents a trip to alton towers and a visit to Wiltshire for a wedding. (and a few days of work) and then I really hope I can go back to France and seeing Dan and the boys. Poor Dan has had virtually no contact with any adult humans. He's definitely owed a very big lie in when I'm back. Obviously I'm missing them and missing the sun (I did not bring enough warm clothes here) but I'm trying to make the most of all the things I was missing about England, like roads I can drive on easily, British TV, better milk, baked beans and hallomi. 

Thanks for reading this far!

P.s If anyone wants to buy a 2007 Toyota Auris off me for £1000 let me know.