Back

I am still here. Rather lost the will to blog over the summer. So an update in not particular order:

1. Teeth. After my first appointment, I went back and had two wisdom teeth out, plus a filling. I won't go into the gory detail but there were two dentists involved at one point. I'm really not sure that dentistry has moved on that much since the 19th century apart from in one very important area - anaesthesia! Had a chance to look at a dentist's office from the heart of the industrial revolution at Blist's Hill in Ironbridge in June, and honestly, the tools look almost the same. So thank heavens for anaesthesia and loud arias on Pandora radio through the headphones. The other two wisdom teeth are due out at the end of the month.

2. Travel. We went home for three weeks. Well the other home. The flight was fine this time, the jet lag not quite so bad, the weather lovely. We saw family and some friends and the girls' past and future village school in Wales. It was odder than last year which felt more like a return after a long holiday. This year we felt much more torn into two places at once. I remember sitting watching the village cricket - a familiar scene in our past and future home - and having to pinch myself to remember that right now I live in San Francisco which is so very different and yet also so familiar.  One good thing about the holiday was that it allayed any fears I had about our return being a step backwards and into too quiet a world. We love the city we are living in, but we do miss the countryside and our friends and family in Wales and it was wonderful to see them all again and to know that they are waiting for us to come back. There will be lots of outdoor activities to do like riding and sailing on Llangorse lake and walking and chasing chickens. And there will be reading groups to rejoin, and cousins to eat with and play with and swim with. There will be camping in West Wales. And city breaks to Paris and Barcelona and Rome and Berlin.

3. But. Oh it is going to be hard to leave. And as leaving is also going to be a big logistical undertaking for mostly me, it's something that I'm already thinking about. And I want to be closer to my mother and my cousins and my friends, but I don't want to leave these friends, and California, and all the lovely lovely food in San Francisco... Still, we can come and visit.

4. Good times. We spent some lovely times here during the ridiculously long summer holidays. Visits to Oakland Museum of California and the Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park. A walk in the woods near Woodside down the peninsula. Two nights at Monte Rio on the Russian River (heaven!). Dinners with friends. Playdates with small giggling girls.

5. PTA. Doing even more than last year. I am nuts. I think I'd had 4 meetings on PTA related business by the time school started. Still. It's interesting and useful for the school I hope.

6. School. The girls are so far having a really good start to the year. They have teachers who aren't completely new to the school as they were last year. And Emilia's class isn't chaos and the teacher isn't going to leave after two weeks. The girls are happy and look so much more confident than they have in the past and so much bigger than the wailing kinder children.

That's all for now!