2016

Return to the Lake District

Wednesday 10th August 2016Wednesday 10th August 2016Baggie

Avid, regular readers may recall that the Bagnalls headed north to Flookburgh at the start of the school holidays last year for a week in Lake District. We thoroughly enjoyed that week in the North and decided that there was so much of the area that we didn’t have a chance to explore that we thought that we would head back this year. Although the leisure park in Flookburgh was a great site and had plenty for the kids to do, it was a little too out of the way (indeed, it was not actually in the Lake District National Park) and any trip involved getting the car. So, for our return, we headed further in to the Lake District National Park and one of the venues of our last trip: Bowness on Windermere. Bowness on Windermere is quite a large town (for the Lake District at least) on the East coast of Windermere (the largest natural lake in England) and home to the Beatrix Potter attraction, which is one of the reasons that we visited the town last year. While we were there we saw a holiday park a couple of minutes walk north of the town and decided that would be a great place to base ourselves for this year’s holiday.

Fallbarrow Holiday Park (and Marina) hugs the shore of Windermere and its proximity to Bowness on Windermere made up for the lack of entertainment facilities that one usually expects with such parks. While we were browsing the site (website that is) looking to book a caravan or lodge we noticed that they also had two cottages for holiday let. Much more substantial than a caravan and not that much more expensive, they also slept nine. It seemed a shame not to let the cottage and it also seemed a shame to let the extra beds go to waste so we asked Nanny Fran, Auntie Liz and Auntie Mary if they would like to join us. Amazingly they said yes.

We hired the cottage Monday to Monday so on the Sunday we drove to Nanny Fran’s to break the journey up a little and be 120 miles closer to the goal. We left after the morning rush hour and headed north on the M6, with Nanny Fran a few minutes behind us. Any of you that are familiar with the M6 will know how often there is heavy traffic and although that was true for us the traffic kept moving and we arrived at Fallbarrow Holiday Park at 13:31 (one whole minute after we were allowed to check in). Nanny Fran wasn’t so lucky. A caravan had overturned blocking all three lanes, while we were the right side of the accident, Nanny Fran was not. Stuck in traffic she crawled half a mile in two hours and so did not arrive at the Cottage until late afternoon, thoroughly exhausted. So while Nanny Fran sat down, had a cup of tea and then unpacked Lucinda, the Baguettes and I explored the Holiday Park taking in the beautiful views of Windermere that the park had to offer.

We had all had enough of driving (especially Nanny Fran) and so, to keep ourselves fresh for the next day, we decided to take it easy and just have a nose around Bowness on Windermere, have a pub meal then try one of the many flavours of ice-cream in the local ice-cream parlour and sit on the lakeside watching the sun go down. Not a bad start to the holiday.

We woke to a gloriously sunny day the next morning, indeed it was a hotter day in the Lake District than any of our days during our May holiday to Italy – most unusual. Being National Trust members certainly reaps benefit on a holiday to the Lake District, as there are so many place to visit. Tuesday we decided to visit one of the newer attractions. Not newer in the age of the building, nor in how long the National Trust have owned the building, but newer in the sense that it has only been open to the public since 2011 and it has only been since 2014 the use of the building has been ‘visitor attraction’. Wray Castle is a Victorian neo-gothic building built in the 1840’s for a retired surgeon James Dawson who used his wife’s fortune, that she inherited from a Gin making empire, to build his dream home. Acquired by the National Trust in 1929 it had been stripped of his internal beauty and so it’s value was seen more as a rental property and so it was rented from then until the early 21st century. Because it has been stripped of all internal decor it is very child friendly and you are allowed to touch everything. There is a dressing up room; a room with large soft building block and, tying in with the fact that Beatrix Potter stayed at Wray Castle when she was 16, a Peter Rabbit themed area. Outside there is a large adventure playground and a path that leads down to Windermere. As you can see from the photos here, it is a very beautiful building and well worth the visit if you are in the area.

If Tuesday saw a beautifully glorious morning, Wednesday could not have been much different. Heavy rain and thunder and lightning greeting us on our 9th Wedding anniversary. Somehow it seemed fitting as our Wedding Day saw one of the heaviest downfalls of rain on record, something one would not expect for mid-July. Not that you can tell from our Wedding pictures and so it was this 20th July. So we stayed inside while the thunder echoed around the mountains but the rain was the least of our worries. Ezra woke covered with spots: Chicken Pox to be exact. The girls had both been fortunate with very mild cases, Ezra was not that fortunate. He was plastered. A trip to the pharmacy was called for, but it would have to wait for the rain to stop.

The thunderstorm was just what was needed to clear the air after the extremely hot day the day before and by 1100 the sun was out and so we headed out for another adventure. Coniston Water is the third largest lake in England and the scene of many attempts to break the Water Speed record, including Donald Campbell’s ill-fated attempt in Bluebird K7, which saw him average 320 miles per hour before he lost control and Bluebird somersaulted killing him instantly.

Our trip on Coniston Water was a little more sedate as we took a leisurely cruise down the lake as far as Peel Island and its secret harbour that was used by Arthur Ransome to set his children’s novel, Swallows and Amazons. It was very relaxing just watching the beauty of the Lake District roll past from stillness of the water and as we passed the secret harbour there was a modern-day Walkers family de-embarking from their Swallow.

Returning to the cottage on Wednesday evening Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz offered to babysit so that we could celebrate our Wedding Anniversary with a romantic meal. We took them up on this offer and heading to the Angel Inn that from its vantage point looked down over Bowness on Windermere and the lake itself. It was nice to sit and enjoy a meal for ourselves rather than encouraging the children to eat theirs while ours goes cold.

Auntie Mary was unable to join us until Thursday so Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz met her at Windermere train stations while we headed to another National Trust venue: Fell Foot at the southern tip of Windermere. Fell Foot is a lakeshore park with an adventure park, meadows and boats to hire. Unfortunately the Baguettes are a little too young at the moment to fully appreciate hiring a rowing boat or kayak, so after exploring the park and having a spot of lunch we headed back to Bowness on Windermere and sought out a cream tea – we were on holiday after all.

We travelled a little further on Friday, back to somewhere we had visited last year: South Lakes Safari Zoo. I do have a dichotomic relationship with zoos. Animals should be in the wild and locking them in cages and enclosures is wrong. However humans are slaughtering animals and destroying their habitats and if a zoo can a) save animals from extinction and b) educate then they can’t be wrong. It is with the goal to educate that I like to take the Baguettes and the South Lakes Safari Zoo allows you to get up close and personal with many of the animals, including feeding giraffes, lemurs and well as a host of waterfowl.

Nanny Fran was heading back to West Bromwich on Sunday and so we didn’t want to travel too far on Saturday and so decided to head to another National Trust venue. Hill Top was the home of Beatrix Potter. It also lies on the opposite shore of Windermere to Bowness on Windermere so we walked down to the car ferry and paid our 50p to cross the lake.

Hill Top Farm in Near Sawrey is a 17th century farmhouse that was bought by Beatrix Potter in 1906. She left it to the National Trust when she died and it is open to the public as Beatrix Potter herself would have known it. Indeed many of her illustrations that can be found in her books depict the house and the National Trust hand out copies of the books as you walk around the house so that you can see where the action was set. The gardens were smaller than we thought they would be so it didn’t take look to walk around the house and gardens before the Baguettes got a little bored. 2016 sees the 150th anniversary of Beatrix Potter’s birth so it was fitting that we visited Hill Top this year.

We said good-bye to Nanny Fran on Sunday morning and hello to the first rain since Wednesday. We decided to head to the South West corner of the Lake District and Ravenglass to catch the Ravenglass & Eskdale steam railway. Ravenglass is the only coastal town in the Lake District and the reputed birthplace of St Patrick. It is also the terminus of the Ravenglass & Eskdale Railway a 15 inch minimum gauge heritage railway that runs 7 miles to Dalegarth near Boot in the Eskdale valley. Ezra enjoys his choo-choos and so do Mommy and Daddy, even the rain didn’t dampen the day for the Baguettes. The only concession that we made was to ride in a covered carriage to Dalegarth.

We disembarked at the terminus at Dalegarth, watched the engineers turn the engine around via the turntable before walking the short distance into Boot. After a fantastic Sunday lunch at the Boot Inn we headed back to Dalegarth and with a break in the clouds braved an open carriage for the return journey to Ravenglass.

We thoroughly enjoyed our week in the Lake District and despite Wednesday’s thunderstorm and Sunday’s dismal rain were very lucky with the weather. We all like the Lake District and there is plenty more to explore for the Bagnalls however we think we need to visit a few more areas of our land before returning. So we have decided that it will be a few years before we head back to Cumbria. The Baguettes will be a little bigger and be able to enjoy some of the more adventurous sports that the Lake District has to offer.

I intended to bring this update to you as we left the Lake District but as with all the great plans at the moment work is extremely busy and thus family time is valuable so this website, among other things, has to be put on the back burner, hence why it comes to you over a fortnight after the holiday ended. So please enjoy the photos and I hope to get another update to you before the end of August. There is a slight change to the website but it might not be immediately noticeable. If you click on one of the photos below it will now open all the photos below into a full frame gallery, hope that you enjoy it.

Peace and Love

Baggie.

Bowness on Windermere

On the swing

May you live in Interesting Times

Monday 11th July 2016Thursday 14th July 2016Baggie

We are rapidly approaching the end of the academic year. A year that has been momentous for all three Baguettes in varying degrees. Éowyn moved to the big campus and automatically went from being one of the bigger children in a small pond, to one of the smallest in a larger pond. In addition to this change of location (and a change of teacher half-way through the school year) school work started to become more serious: there was homework and regular spelling tests culminating in her end of Key Stage 1 SATs. Amélie’s year was, arguably more momentous as she began her journey through full-time education with her reception teacher Miss Snow while Ezra begun his journey of school (or pre-school) life taking advantage of the 15 hours of child care that the government provides for over threes.

All three of the Baguettes enjoy school and that shows in their varying success in their respective development. Amélie is progressing well with her reading and writing and maths. Indeed she has rapidly progressed through the reading levels, finishing the year on level 10, one of only two that have reached those dizzying heights. Her writing is coming along and she has begun to create little books filling the pages with stories. She has also, in some ways more importantly, made some good friends that she so desperately wanted to do at the start of the year.

Éowyn, too, has progressed well. The previous school year saw her move schools and to a teacher that she didn’t get on with and this upheaval and disenchantment therefore meant she did not progress to her potential. This has been highlighted with hindsight in how she has progressed this year and how hard she works for a teacher she likes. Indeed, not only a teacher that she likes but teachers she likes. Éowyn’s first teacher of year 2, Miss Bernath left at Christmas to travel around Australia and was substituted by Miss Jetten. Éowyn responded well to both teachers and their respective teaching styles, progressing well in both numeracy and literacy. Indeed, since Miss Jetten took over and homework has changed she has scored 10/10 in every spelling test – only one of two in the class to have done so.

This may sound like it should be something that Éowyn and, indeed Lucinda and I would be proud of, and yes, we are however until last week we didn’t realise the pressure Éowyn was feeling. A constant stream of 10/10’s is definitely something to be proud of but it heightens expectations, not from Lucinda and me as such but from Éowyn herself. She begun to think that we would be disappointed in her if she got 9/10 or less. We didn’t think we had ever given her this impression and thought we were doing the right thing praising her for her outstanding marks, but that was not what was going through her mind. This came to a culmination and thankfully a resolution when she tried to fake illness on the day of her spelling test. Parents have an innate ability to detect fake illnesses and so we realised something was up and made Éowyn go to school. Wanting to get to the bottom of it I sat Éowyn down in the evening to find out what the problem was.

It was then that she confessed that she thought that we would shout at her or be disappointed in her if she didn’t get 10/10. You can imagine how we felt: the archetypal pushy parents. We had both been trying to praise her for her outstanding scores not put pressure on her to keep that 100% record going but somehow we had got the balance wrong. So, we had a long chat about how test marks are not something to get upset and worried about; doing your best is important but never worry about exams. Exams can’t measure the important things and certainly can’t measure you as a person, just whether you have a got a good memory. Yes, Mommy and Daddy are happy when you do well in a test but Mommy and Daddy are also happy when you read Ezra a story, or cuddle Amélie when she is upset or help Mommy to lay the table or help Daddy in the garden. These things are much more important that whether you can spell ‘discussion‘. We will have to keep an eye on this for the future.

The end of the academic year also means a number of things ubiquitous to schools up and down the country and so it is for the Baguettes. Éowyn and Amélie has their respective end of year discos, held on the same day though not at the same time. Amélie’s was straight after school, then there was an hour or so break for the teachers to tidy the school hall ready for the slightly older children in years 1,2 and 3. They both enjoyed their discos, dressing up and taking a little handbag with some money that they could spend on sweets, drinks, tattoos and glowing rings. When I came home from work, Amélie had returned from her disco and was shattered, getting ready for bed so I picked up Éowyn (and our neighbour’s son Blake).

Éowyn and Blake were hyper when I picked them up. They couldn’t stop talking and telling me all about the evening and the amount of sweets that they had eaten. There is no proof that high levels of sugar caused children to behave hyperactively (is that a word), however I think sweets coupled with the excitement of being at a disco with all your friends didn’t help. It was like walking home with slightly drunk friends who can’t stop giggling and half tell you stories that make no sense to your sober mind.

Unfortunately Ezra is a little too young for a disco, however the nursery organised a pirate party for the class. Ezra was quite excited at home about dressing up as a pirate and looked quite good with his hat, sword and drawn on beard. He seemed quite happy when I dropped him off and all his friends were dressed in their pirate finery. When Lucinda picked him up, however, the teachers said that he got a little overwhelmed with all the piratical shenanigans and spent most of the day sat on the lap of one of the teachers. Poor sensitive soul.

The other main school event found at this time of the year is ‘Sports Day’. Éowyn and Amélie have been placed in the same house at school and with modern school days being about team effort rather than sporting prowess, we knew it was going to save arguments and were thankful. However they had to wait a little longer than we expecting for this year’s sports day. The weather this spring and early summer has been awful, cold and wet and the weather was so bad that the event was postponed for an extra ten days (and even then nearly didn’t go ahead on the second date). Indeed, the weather has been so bad that we have, on more than one occasion, serious considered lighting the fire. 1st July 2015 saw temperatures approaching 37ºC, 1st July 2016 it barely touched 17ºC, however Summer will start soon.

Therefore, Ezra had his Sports Day before the girls. Ezra isn’t very sporting, he can be lazy and you don’t find him running around for the sake of running. Therefore, it was no surprise that he didn’t win any races for in addition to his inherent unsportyness (another new word for you all) he is one of the youngest at nursery. Some of the other children are 18 months older than him and when you are three, 18 months is a significant percentage of your age. Nevertheless in the spirit of ‘no one is a loser’ Ezra received his medal (real plastic gold) of which he was very proud.

Éowyn and Amélie’s Sport Day was all about team races and therefore eliminating the individuality of the races (for both eliminating individual competitiveness and because with 90 children per year and 3 years worth of pupils, it would probably take a two-week tournament to involve all children in all races individually). As mentioned both girls were in ‘Yellow’ house and so the result didn’t really matter, however it was the icing on the cake that ‘Yellow’ won!

Discos, parties and Sports Days are not the only things that have been happening since the last update. Amélie has taken a bit step towards growing up: she had her first solo sleepover at her best friends. Amélie has had one sleepover before but with Éowyn at Éowyn’s best friend, and has had sleepovers with the other Baguettes at Nanny Fran’s but this was her first on her own. She had a fantastic time and was impeccably behaved and so can go again!

Despite the weather we have had recently we have nonetheless had invites to a couple of barbecues. The first was Lucinda’s friend Lisca. Lisca and her family live in High Wycombe and the barbecue was in part to celebrate her birthday and as a good-bye for her, Theo and the kids are moving to Norfolk. There will be no more nipping over for a Saturday afternoon barbecue, Norfolk is a tad further than High Wycombe.

The second barbecue of the weekend was a little closer to hand: next door. Our next door neighbours are completely renovating their house and building a two storey extension so, somewhat ironically, it has brought us closer together as neighbours as we have had lots of, amicable, discussions about the work. We felt very blessed to be invited and kids loved playing in their big garden, especially since they had hired two large inflatables: a bungee run and a basketball game. It must be the ‘in-thing’ to do at barbecues for Lisca and Theo had hired a bouncy castle at their barbecue. We will have to buck up our ideas for our next soiree.

‘May you live in Interesting Times,’ is oft purported to be a Chinese curse. The saying is apocryphal and there is no such evidence of its use in China. The closest Chinese expression is ‘Better to be a dog in a peaceful time, than to be a human in a chaotic period,’ and that is exactly how we find ourselves at the moment. I could write reams about my feelings regarding the result of the E.U. referendum but this is not the forum. However, I will say that it is extremely concerning that the political elite that offered this choice to the general public to placate voters of a far right party had no plan of what to do if the ‘leave’ side won because they are so out of touch with the general public that they never truly believe that the ‘Leave’ vote would win. But win they did and since that vote, the Prime Minister has resigned, the leader of the Brexit campaign has resigned (because he really didn’t want to win), the leader of UKIP whose raison d’être was to leave the European Union has resigned because his job is done. The Labour party are ripping themselves apart because they have a leader than 60% of members like and voted for but none of his M.P.s like and have tried to use this political maelstrom to try to oust him rather than take the Government to task for their lack of vision. There seems to be no leadership and no direction and no one wants to activate article 50 – which is the no turning back exit from the European Union. And in our democracy 0.2% of the population are going to decide our new Prime Minister. ‘(Theresa?) May you live in Interesting Times’.

Work is still manic but for once viewers in the UK can see some our work. The Caribbean Premier League (T20 Cricket tournament) is happening through July and into August and can currently be seen on ‘Dave’ at 1300 each day (that there is a game). This is a rerun from the game that will have happened through the previous night, however they are broadcasting a number of games live. Both the re-runs and the live offerings are coming under my watch so if you find yourself watching cricket on Dave think of us.

Before I leave you today one amusing little tale. Ezra has stopped telling you that he loves you. If you say that you love him, he will reply with ‘I like you.’ Regardless of the incentives you offer or how many times you tell him that you love him we will only go as far as telling you that he likes you. Cheeky little tyke!

I will leave you now to enjoy the photos and see you soon.

Peace and Love

Baggie

Minions!

Sibling Love

Crazy Minion

Coming for you

Can I fit through here?

Surveying the view

Foxy lady

Rainbow guide

Little Fox

It is cold!

It is still cold!

It is cold over there!

Punky bath time

Pirate Ezra

Bouncy castle fun

Warming up

The obstacle course

And through!

Auntie Liz entertains

Can I have a tattoo?

Tower bridge at night

The Guinea Pigs went on holiday too!

Thursday 30th June 2016Friday 1st July 2016Baggie

I truly feel like I am spoiling you at the moment. Two large write ups covering our holiday in Europe (and no, not the decades of EU membership) and now a third in just over a fortnight. You should feel blessed.

So what brings the keyboard out again so soon? Bookends of stories surrounding the holiday that I thought best sat outside the holiday write up itself. With work being manic before I went on holiday (and indeed has been doubly so on my return, hence the delay in this triptych of essays) there was not time to squeeze in an update before we left, so let me make amends.

So last we spoke of more mundane activities the football season had just drawn to end and I was hoping that work would calm down. There was a lot to do before going on holiday and I knew that would mean some long hours but was hoping for some quality sleep. All three children are relatively good at sleeping. Ezra may wake early, and then go into his sisters’ room and tries to wake one of them up (usually Amélie, because she sleeps on the bottom bunk) but the nights are usually undisturbed. That first night after the final day of the season (or not the final day of the season as it turned out, due to a bomb scare at Old Trafford) I only managed half the amount of sleep that I usually get.

We put the children to bed as usual but around 2100 we heard Ezra crying. He doesn’t usually cry so I went up to see what the problem was but couldn’t rouse him. Thinking it was just a bad dream, tucked him back in and came back downstairs. As we went to bed Ezra was crying again, Lucinda went into him and he woke complaining of a tummy ache. We tried to calm him and gave him some Calpol but it wasn’t comforting him. Then he looked me in the eye and said, ‘Daddy, you take me to the doctors please.‘ There was such a level of earnest pleading in his voice that I could not refuse him. It broke your heart to hear him pleading. All sorts of horrible things went through our minds and so I wrapped him up and took him to the walk-in clinic (there is no local A&E any more it has been replaced by a walk-in clinic). When I got there it was closed. It is only open 0800-2200 and by this time his was experiencing bouts where he was screaming in pain. So I got him back into the car and hot-tailed it down the motorway to our nearest A&E.

St. Peter’s hospital in Chertsey is where all three of the Baguettes were born and the nearest A&E department. In addition to the standard A&E department St Peter’s has a separate paediatric A&E department. I was surprised how busy both A&E departments were when we arrived but in fairness we saw a triage nurse very quickly but it was a couple of hours before we saw the doctor. Ezra was much calmer in the hospital, he had occasional bouts of pain but was probably a little tired not to mention over-awed by the occasion. We were directed to a cubicle to wait for the doctor so I popped Ezra on the bed and as the doctor came in to ask me what the symptoms were, Ezra had fallen into a deep sleep. This allowed the doctor to give him a full examination and thankfully it was nothing that was part of the many scenarios that had been running through my mind. He simply had constipation which had caused his bowel to go into spasm. So painful yes, but some paediatric laxatives would cure the issue. It was nice to know that it was nothing major but I could have done without 3 hours of sleep at the start of such a busy week!

Midweek it was a ‘Stay and Play’ opportunity with Amélie’s class. Since Lucinda had her wards on a Wednesday I took the opportunity to spend the first 30 minutes of the school day with Amélie and her class. It was a good opportunity to see what they get up to at school and have a detailed look into the things that they are doing and have been doing recently. There were the usual toys for them to play with (including Lego and Stickle Bricks – I haven’t seen Stickle Bricks for ages and remember playing with them at school when I was about the same age) as well as a table to learn maths, a shop and a table set up as an Indian restaurant, where they had a taste test the previous week. The 30 minutes seemed to go quite quickly and I said goodbye to Amélie before reluctantly rejoining the adult world.

The first weekend after the end of the football season and the last before our holiday was quite busy. It was Lucinda’s birthday mid-week and so we decided to have a little get together for some of her closest and oldest friends (oldest as in, known the longest rather than physical age!). We had planned on this being a barbecue but as per the summer of 2016 so far it was threatening rain and relatively cold, so the barbecue was left in the shed and we made do with a buffet. It was also the day of the F.A. cup final and so after an afternoon on genial chat we gravitated into three separate groups. The kids were all off playing upstairs, rehearsing shows that they put on for us later that day; the boys were huddled around the television watching the football and drinking beer while the ladies sat in the garden drinking wine and catching up with gossip. A good time was had by all and we decided that we do not host enough get togethers and have promised (to ourselves) to try to rectify this in the future.

The next day saw mommy left at home while Daddy and the Baguettes heading north up the M40 to West Bromwich and Nanny Fran. We were obviously going on holiday, the next weekend and so needed someone to look after the guinea pigs. Unfortunately, no one in the area could come round and look after them in situ, so we asked Nanny Fran and Auntie Liz if they would look after them, and they thankfully said yes.

The plan was that all five of us would head up to nanny Fran’s in the S-Max and it would all be nice and easy. However, the S-Max decided that it would display an engine malfunction light and was booked into the garage for the following day, therefore it was down to the trusted Civic to make the journey. Now a Honda Civic is a mid-sized car but the guinea pig cage is anything but and it was only just possible to squeeze the cage, their food, sawdust and hay, the guinea pigs themselves and the Baguettes in. There was no room left for Lucinda.

It really was a flying visit with a drop off and a couple of hours rest and refuelling (us, not the car) before heading back home. We had a week before our holiday began but Toffee and Frazzle were on theirs.

We returned from holiday on the Monday and thus were unable to go and collect the guinea pigs off theirs until the weekend. The week saw the girls return to school, what would have been my dad’s 70th birthday and my return to work and over 4,000 emails. I had deliberately not looked at any of my emails while on holiday (and I had informed everyone that I was doing that) hence why my inbox had bloomed. It was a wise decision despite the pruning that is still required because it meant that I wasn’t tempted to keep checking my phone every five minutes and getting frustrated that I wasn’t there. I wasn’t completely out of touch though and I had told everyone that I would be taking phone calls and text messages – which I did on every day (bar one) that I was in Italy. That sounds bad but a quick phone call is so much easier to deal with than the saga that an email chain can become.

The weekend quickly came and Saturday saw the five of us in the S-Max heading to Nanny Fran. We stopped at our friends in High Wycombe on the way for lunch and a catch up. It may seem weird to say but I actually think that the guinea pigs missed the hustle and bustle of the family and the Baguettes had missed their pets. It was some much more comfortable heading back down the motorway with the guinea pig cage in the S-Max than it had been on the way up to Nanny Fran’s in the Civic.

Life’s now settling into its usual routine for the Baguettes for the last few weeks of the academic year and as this update is a little belated there will be another in a couple of weeks to get you up to speed with more recent events.

Before I leave a quick shout out to my Auntie Margaret who is waiting for heart surgery to repair her aortic valve. Get well soon and when you are up to it we’ll come down for a visit.

Peace and Love

Baggie