Saturday...bloomin sunshine....

Hi all

Woken by the sun, despite the shutters...gad, it's hot. The summer is now here and the humidity has risen to make it feel quite tropical. Evenings are very pleasant and deserving more of a garden than we can claim at present. The balcony doesn't have a great view but it's all we have once Amy is abed. We are considering a move to a house with a garden as Jan is doing some pin money typing with the school but in truth this won't happen until later in the summer if we decide our positions are stable for the coming year. You need to be in a place for a year really before you have the lay of the land and our present rent seems to be very reasonable although the flat is a little restricting (even with two bathrooms there's still no view!).

As we are not being paid over the July and August break I'll probably be back in the UK for July to try and do some supply work. Three weeks supply will cover our rent for the summer and I'll either stay on the island or in Chinnor (dare I hope that I might be able to stay, my darlings?), depending on where the work comes up. This is the plan, anyway. For the August month we'll look to go travelling to see the gite in France, if anyone is there, or perhaps on a tour of Europe for the children's education (they are so African!). I'm told you can buy a big five bedroom farmhouse with land in Bulgaria for £10 000?! Then again, Spain is pretty cheap in places and once our employment contracts are in place in October the local money box will probably allow us a mortgage...can we muster ourselves for another risk taking adventure? Is this the right timing? Ahhhh! Where's my mid-life crisis when I need it?

To be honest there are other things that might be more fun than risking everything on the housing market. Our thoughts have turned to going it alone in recent years. Not the whole hog. I'm not going to set up my own school just yet - more like full-time private tutoring or even a change in vocation to a slightly less child-centred environment. We have met so many people in the last two years who believe we have a massive amount of un-tapped talent that we almost believe it ourselves. We are doing research into other things that might pay and that we might enjoy doing for ourselves. At present I make a school owner very rich (on very meagre return for myself) and our landlord is not averse to rubbing his hands with glee either. Nothing remotely concrete yet but lots of ideas.....watch this space (assuming I haven't become a published author with thousands of pounds flooding in from royalties during the summer!).

The girls (Jess and Beth) had a lovely horse riding lesson yesterday and once again impressed their new teachers with their enthusiasm, politeness and love of the animals. We got more lovely comments. Really, they are such excellent ambassadors for us - we don't deserve them. They are both into exam revision and will no doubt prove themselves this week. Pray for them both as they want so much to do well. I wouldn't be unhappy if they did well, either. They are excellent students, love everyone, make friends easily, have a remarkable talent for smoothing the waters in choppy relationships and demonstrate a strong sense of moral responsibility that makes them a joy to teach and to nurture at home. As Jan has just said they are also excellent in adult company, besides freeing us up by working their magic on Amy. I cannot thank you, my family, enough for all the love and support you have shown us all over the years...starting with you, mum and dad. We learned all our parenting from you and if we do half as good a job, well we'll have 3 pretty good halves. This is not to suggest that we are perfect or anything! So, if I raise a glass of Sangria to you all, you'll forgive me if I drink the rest of the caraf without you!

¡Vivan los Merrow-Smiths!

Jan and Pete