Busy week

We've had a nerve-wracking week with various efforts to get money transferred to the notary's for the house purchase going astray, until finally the bank sent the notary's a fax this morning to confirm that the money is on its way. Only the cynics among you will conclude that this was only done in order to hold the money in an interest-free current account for another couple of days. Not nice, when there's a penalty of 10% of the purchase price hanging over your head if it doesn't go through! Everything should therefore go ahead as planned tomorrow... and I will be very relieved when it does.

We took the kids to meet their new headmaster the other day, and have a tour around the school. The school seems perfect for them, each class has kids from 2 or 3 different years in together, which I think will help Jamie get up to speed on the things she's behind on and keep ahead on the things she's good at. We didn't get off to a great start with the head though - we couldn't work out if we'd done something wrong or whether he simply has an antipathetic personality. If so he's possibly in the wrong career. Fingers crossed that that will work out ok.

Yesterday we took our two and Frank to the very last theatre show ever by a man who used to do a very popular kids show in Holland in the 70s and 80s, and which all the kids have watched multiple repeats of. (He's still performing in other shows, but this was billed as the last ever show of this character). He's a Brian Cant lookalike for those of you who remember Play Away. The show was targeted at both the previous generation of viewers and the new one, so it was an interesting mix. Danny got bored towards the end, but that's par for the course. When we got home he fell fast asleep on the couch so it must have been tiring at least!

Last night I finally met up with Mike, Johan, John and John's new girlfriend Julija at a concert. First gig for me in over a year, it was good to be back. We all had a good natter before the gig started. They will be coming on Saturday to help with the move, along with Pascal and possibly Kelly.

Today Jamie went to school with Majo, and by the sound of it had a great time. Cora and Anja looked after Danny while Carmen and I went off to buy - sigh - bedroom furniture. The ultimate torture, and you get to pay a hefty bill at the end of it! And Madonn' what a bill... Well I guess I should look at it this way, spread over 10 years it's less than the price of a half pint of Grolsch a day.

This is the house we have bought in De Meern, near Utrecht. We move in on 1 July. As you can see the garage has been converted (it is currently a hairdresser's) so will be ideal for me to use as an office. There are 4 big bedrooms.

The house is literally around the corner from a kids' playground, and walking distance from schools and shops. The last bus back from Utrecht is at 12.50 am. Sorted.

Christmas present giving in Spain takes place on 6th January, and the presents are delivered by the Three Kings, aka the Three Wise Men, Gaspar, Melchior and Balthazar. The other evening, there was an opportunity for the kids to post their letters to the kings, i.e. their list of present wants. The kings sent one of their 'pages' to talk to the children and help them post their letters.

Our two had fun queueing up with their friends and talking to the page, who looks suspiciously like a version of Father Christmas, but there you go.

Posting their letters

Santa's big helper (now wouldn't this have made a nice Christmas card?)

That'll do for me

Jamie's hand-made "granny photo" for Anja

Danny had his class Christmas show and party this morning. They all went dressed as Santa, here he is after having just put his suit on.

Getting made up by Ima his teacher. Can you tell he doesn't like anyone putting anything on his face?

The santas sang a little song with actions... Danny started out well but his attention and movement tailed off after a minute or so. At one point he gave a huge open mouth yawn, which had quite a few people in fits of giggles, including the three of us.

They had a Christmas party afterwards with snacks and a present from the Three Wise Mens' helpers...

Jamie's class also had a Christmas party

Jamie's class

Rockslide on 'our' motorway

A hillside collapsed onto the main motorway between us and the French border yesterday, halfway between Bilbao and San Sebastian, covering all four carriageways in rocks and burying four cars and a tanker lorry carrying toxic gas(!). Incredibly only one person was slightly injured.

Looking at the footage on the news yesterday this seemed not just incredible but impossible, can you imagine travelling at 80 mph / 120 kph and suddenly ... ?

The motorway was closed all day while they cleared the rubble and debris, and they have just reopened one carriageway this morning.

Rockslide on 'our' motorway

One wonders if this will make them rethink their policy of cutting away hillsides rather than building tunnels. They'll certainly need to look again at all the other sheer rockfaces like this that line this motorway and many others.

It was Jamie's Christmas concert at her music school yesterday. A bit lower key than previous occasions, this was only attended by the parents and various siblings of the kids. Jamie did her piece on the piano, and we had our first chance to watch her play the violin. We were bracing ourselves for a blackboard-fingernail type scenario, but she did it very well, hitting the right strings each time confidently.

The singing was very impressive, they'd obviously practiced the timing a lot. As a group this is the area they've improved the most in the past year.

The kids slightly more visible here

Here's our Christmas pole in the main square

Jamie's school all drew pictures for Constitution Day, to celebrate 27 years of the constitution. Jamie's picture was chosen to represent her class, so she and her friend Carolina posed (and it was an excuse to try out our new camera, a Fujifilm A350)

Here's a close-up of the picture, it's a book (the constitution) with a cake in front of it with two candles on it (2 and 7), with party decorations and the like around the edge - and people inside the decorations, because the constitution is for the people.

Danny didn't want to be left out - he's always got a cheesy grin to spare!