As is to be expected, now that it is a week and a half till we have to go (and I don't know, really, who's reading this, but I have a hunch some of you, my faithful readers, are smiling again at the melancholy sound of my voice as I say this, given what the first few months of this blog sounded like), there have been more signs of the end: the boys also had their school fête: there was a wonderful concert (all the kids, from first to fifth grade were completely involved in singing complicated songs, some of them with harmony, many in foreign languages--it did confirm for me what Magdalene has been denying since we got here--French education asks more of kids, and so gets more from them, than American education... or, maybe I should make only very modest claims: Jean Jaures Elementary school gives better concerts than Parkview). We also had a combined party for all the kids to say goodbye to their friends (and us to their parents)/birthday party for Matthias. I had great success by making only American treats (for some bizarre reason, american desserts are very popular in France, in case I haven't mentioned that yet), and the party degenerated into a wild water fight, with a few of the little girls Matthias had invited feeling a bit shaky. At this point, we had our first real goodbyes, although we've been saying goodbye to everyone for weeks it feels: Our friends Stephanie and Xavier, the parents of mateo (Simeon's good friend) who let us stay in their house in the north of Brittany, left for a vacation in Italy as soon as school ended, and we won't see them again until 2012, if they do come visit us. This year really is coming to an end, and look how sad the girls are! (I hope Magdalene doesn't read this, because she's really the only one unreservedly happy about coming back, and she would probably be annoyed at me for misportraying her like this).

The boys had their first and last Judo competition where (thanks be to God) they both won bronze medals and there were only a few feathers to be smoothed (because the older one didn't think he should have the same medal as the younger one).

Then, like the good french patriots we've become, as soon as school ended, the various parts of the family began to fly in all directions for various vacations (although that's not very French, what I'm describing here, that's more American. The French take their vacations as a family, and were very shocked when they heard that we never do that, and as a result of the shock, to try and fit in better, Sean and I decided that we must do it soon, all together, maybe camping, maybe with some friends...)

Vacations then: Magdalene, who had been complaining within ear-shot of her friend's mother that here, she had been in France for a year and had not seen Paris, got invited for a quick Paris tour. I never heard how that went, because she got back from Paris on Sunday at noon, and then left again for Chenonceau with Maura and Julia (yes, from Bellingham!) at 12:15. I hope I get to hear about it when she comes back on Wednesday, but since Julia will be there, as well as Magdalene's American-bashing friend Clara, I may not hear about it till another day, sparks might fly instead!

Me! I had my little vacation too. Annette (my neighbor and friend) and I have been joking over e-mail about a bike-wine tour of the Loire Valley. Well, I didn't think I had it in me, but I organized it! Me, who's always too afraid to make phone calls and would rather pay more than have to speak to someone I don't know on the phone, well, I got us train tickets, bike rentals, hotels, a route (about which, more later), and a wine guide--no, I didn't get that, I figured that would sort itself out on its own. So, if you want to pull out your map (since I haven't yet figured out how to include one here, though believe me I would): Annette and I took the train from Nantes to Tours, where we visited the cathedral and the old city center, of which the dog here is a detail. Then we picked up our bikes and rode to Amboise (in 95 degree weather, even after 7PM). After that ride, we realized that the much much longer ride I had planned for the next day was too much, but no worries, instead of biking all the way to Chinon, we just caught the local train with our bikes.

Now, on the ride to Amboise, we had both bemoaned the fact that we had not brought hats (hem, I guess that sort of outs us as not wearing helmets, doesn't it. Well, no one does it here, really, we were only obeying the fashion requirements of the locals... and the children never saw us). So upon arriving in the center of Chinon and realizing that it was market-day, we went shopping for hats, so that ever after, we rode our bikes with silly twin hats (Annette wouldn't let me take a picture). We also bought other things, it felt very lovely, somehow, to bike into an unknown town and pick up a few things for our wardrobes at the market. After that, we were feeling so very French that we had lunch for about two hours on the central ancient beautiful plaza, accompanied by accordion music (until the police came and shut the guy up because he didn't have a permit). I had seen this plaza before, the time where I had gotten lost in the countryside and arrived four hours late... well, I think that

was why Annette had to ride back to Chinon, so I could stop on that plaza with no one blaming me for being late and no one whining at me about being hungry and thirsty. Well, it's good to satisfy one of your desires in life, even if it's a small insignificant one like drinking Chinon wine on the central plaza of Chinon.

Another desire I had acquired in that long ago trip with Sean and his parents and all the kids where I had gotten lost (note: I never got lost this time, well, except for the very first day coming out of the Tours train station where I

made a wrong turn, but Annette learned quickly to second guess my retarded sense of direction, and we did quite well after that) was to sleep at the hotel inside the Abbey of Fontevraud. Well, I satisfied that one too on this trip. The really cool thing about sleeping inside the abbey is that you can wander the grounds at night when there's no one else around. It's really beautiful. There's no wine specifically named from the abbey, so we had to compromise a little and anticipate: we drank Saumur wine that night, though we were only biking to Saumur the next day: Annette and I were very proud of our adaptability and our spirit of compromise.

We rode to Saumur the next day along the Loire: the photo below pretty much sumarizes our trip: there are the vineyards to symbolize all the wine we drank (ah, but only from within a 30 km radius or where we were, we were purists), and a church steeple to symbolize poor Annette's martyrdom as I

dragged her into every church we came across (that's one per village, multiplied by about 5 villages a day. She took it stoically. It was cooler inside the churches, and some of them had gems like painted carvings from the XIIth century or gory tapestries about tortured saints). Another place we stopped to cool ourselves down (the trip really was very hot) were caves. All the villages there on the banks of the Loire are built from a cream colored stone that is fairly easy to dig out of the cliffs, and then hardens when exposed to air. So there are caves and tunnels and houses inside of caves (some of them with cave balconies), and wineries inside of caves, and restaurants inside of caves and museums (our bike path went right through a museum that had been built from a 10th century tunnel which they said had been a shopping center). The villages are beautiful, all uniform and glowing creamy in the sun (we passed through one, Candes Saint Martin, which is classified as one of the most beautiful villages in France, what an honor, I thought I should mention it here)

and the caves are very cool. Even the front porches of the caves (where we ate lunch on the last day--no, no wine that day, well, until the champagne-like Saumur Brut in Saumur) are cool, even the bathrooms built into the caves are very cool!

Anyway, enough about the bike-wine tour, Annette will be embarrassed with all my bragging. Sorry Annette! I don't know whether I'll write again, as this was my last adventure in France. The men and bigger children (Sean, Steve, Simeon and Steve and Annette's two oldest) are off in Spain walking part of the pilgrimage to Santiago, but those won't be my stories, so Sean will have to tell the tale on his new Facebook page. So, a warning to all of you who are addicted to looking at this (all three hundred of you), I will be closing it soon. It's been a nice way to force myself not to rewrite history too much once it's over--I can't at all pretend that the whole year was wonderful and that all the trips were lovely. Still, it's a weird way to write, with an unknown and extremely public audience, so you always have to be careful what you write in case the wrong person somehow finds the blog. Soon, it will be me talking instead of this page. Less neat and organized, but probably just as entertaining.

Mimi had her school fête on Friday, with singing from the little ones (that's one of Mimi's best friends Gwenaelle, whose mother is British and who speaks English) and then all manner of treats: parent-provided food (not good enough to justify my feeling inferior and self-conscious about my cooking all year; I wish I'd tasted it when we first got here and continued to feel proud of what I cook) that was sold to raise money for the school, and then fun games like lottery, fishing for prizes, and face-painting: here is Magdalene painting one of Matthias's good friends' face (she has a twin sister whose hair is just as red, and both of them REALLY like Matthias). Mimi was so serious and focused on her singing, she reminded us of Magdalene who was in French school in Toronto at that age and who, when she sang in her school choir, seemed to think the entire world's welfare depended on her performance. The other kids seemed to have fun!

On Saturday, we went to a bay full of islands in the coast of Brittany (le Golfe du Morbihan) with one of Sean's colleagues who grew up near there. She wanted to take us to this large tumulus (prehistoric building full of carvings) located on an island accessible only by boat. Of course, the boat wouldn't let on the dog, which I had brought along knowing she would cause trouble because it was her last day with us (about which more later), so I volunteered to stay on the shore while the others went to visit the tumulus (that dog is seriously interfering with my cultural improvement). As a consequence, I will not tell a story of connecting with the mind of ancient and to us forever obscure human beings, but instead, a story about my own heroism and my dog's complete lack of it. When the others were safely loaded onto their little boat, Tipomme and I went along the beach to find another island that is accessible only at low time through a causeway between two huge bays. Well, of course, when we got there, the causeway was deep under furiously rushing water (it looked like one of the bays was emptying into the other one... Sean had the camera, which explains why, though I'm not telling a story about tumuluses, I'm still illustrating it with a picture of one). So we went for a walk in the village, found one of those magic/sacred springs that are so abundant in this celtic area, an ancient cemetery, many beautiful houses... and after 20 minutes, we returned to the island to see if the causeway was passable. Well, having tried once and had to give up, I wasn't going to be put off a second time, despite the still rushing (though shallower) water. So off came my shoes and socks, and slowly, fighting the whole way against the current, walking sideways so as not to be pushed over (the water was up to my thighs at the deepest), trying hard not to slip on the algae, all the while self-conscious that at least 50 people who were waiting for the tide to be low enough were watching me intently, I made it across... only to discover that my dog had not followed me!

Not only had she not followed me, but she showed no sign of coming when I called her. She got anxious and ran along the edge of the water, but she didn't even dip her tiny paws in. I called sweetly, I called authoritatively, then bossily, then positively dictatorially, but she continued to display anxiety amounting to no action, until in the end, she ran back towards the boat landing and disappeared. I panicked right away (being anxious about her anyway for other reasons, about which more later), and off came my shoes and socks again (which I had put on after crossing and before realizing what a coward my dog was), and across I walked, much faster, getting soaked (but without falling). When I got to the other side, I though my audience should really have clapped, but the consolation prize was that I caught Tipomme, put her on a leash, and dragged her across the causeway, which, by this time (whether because the tide had gone down quite a lot, or because I was becoming such a pro) seemed nothing at all. It was all worth it. I had a whole island to circumambulate all by myself, (only when I was coming off were other people finally daring to come on) and it was beautiful. There were beautiful old rock houses on there, and an old chapel, sandy beaches, and a throne carved into the rock with a view of water rushing around the various islands (and since I was alone on there, I got the throne, ahem, especially since my children weren't there to take it from me).

Anyway, the poor dog is a coward, but I miss her dearly, and the whole family has had to make many sacrifices for her. She couldn't fly back with us (problems with the airline companies and the planes that were too small), so we had to send her by freight on her own from Paris. Only she had to be in Paris 5 hours before her flight (the direct Paris to Seattle flight which leaves at 10:30 every morning). Sean rented a car and left Nantes at midnight so as to make it to Paris at 5:30 in the morning. He sent Tipomme on her way (which costs such an obscene amount of money I cannot write how much here) and then faced another 5 hour drive after a whole night of driving. In order to make his trip worth something, he drove through Chartres (another illustration that requires an explanation) and, though he did not find the Cathedral quite as impressive as he had when he last saw it when he was 14, he still said it was the most luminous of them all (I myself have never seen it I think, unless I did when I was a child and can't remember, perhaps it was Rheims). In any case, he made it home in one piece, stopping several times to sleep in rest stop areas, and drinking a lot of tea and coke for the caffeine. Tipomme made it safely to Seattle to my mother's house, we already have pictures of her in my mother's yard looking quite herself and happy... Still, now we have sent one of us home, it really feels like the end, even more than last week.

Everything has the smell of the end now, and after so much complaining on this very blog, it's a little embarrassing to say that everyone is sad about it, even Magdalene (but don't tell her I said that, she'd definitely deny it).

The boys had their last Judo class where they got examined to see what belt they can take back to America (we don't know the results yet, I think they actually get the non-white belts next Wednesday in some kind of ceremony).

Simeon had his last sailing class on Tuesday. Mimi and I ran to the sailing school (about 3 miles up the river from where we live) and were caught in several downpours on the way (I hope the last ones of our stay in Nantes, I'm really sick of walking around in sopping wet clothes) and watched Simeon sail back and forth on the Erdre river in his little sail boat with a very concentrated and serious look on his face while most of the other students in the class were falling and leaping in the water in droves (they've had a substitute teacher for the last 3 weeks who is

completely lacking in authority, and boy did it show there on the river!). Next Tuesday they don't have sailing class, instead, they have an

all-day treasure hunt on the river and in the various parks that border it there, where they have to sail their little boats to various places, land find stuff, and then take off again. Pretty cool.

The event that's been the strongest memento abitus (remembrance of departure, as in, memento mori--note, I had to ask Sean to look this up in his Latin dictionary for me so I could look educated) for us, though, has been our joint goodbye party with our friends Muriel and Emmanuel (who are going to Boston for a year). We had it at their house in La Turballe on the coast, with about 25 adults and 28 children there for the weekend (most of them camping in the back yard, but using the one bathroom!).

Here to the left you see Magda in the play she organized with the children. Ok, now, after being pedantic with my bit of Latin, I will add insult to injury by bragging (this is in addition to all the bragging I'm doing about what a wonderful life we're having here, you really shouldn't believe a word, it rains all the time, really): Magdalene actually wrote a play in French and directed about ten 10 year old kids in it (all in French). And it was really good! And everyone had a lot of fun, she did, the other kids did, all the parents who watched it (and also who were freed of their kids for the time it took to put the play together) did.

The men who were there were all completely foot crazy. They were either sneaking away to cafés to watch various matches, or they were playing it with the kids, or, when they had finally succeeded (through I don't know what devious stratagems and sneaky machiavellian machinations) in getting rid of all the kids, playing it with each other (though they got a bit too rough there, and it didn't actually last that long before someone was injured. It was better when they were holding back for the children).

While the men were injuring each other and themselves playing foot, the children and the mothers were swimming and surfing in the waves, finding enormous jellyfish washed up on the

beach, and, for the more unfortunate mothers with very demanding little girls, walking up and down the beach searching for beach-glass and shells. All that took place Saturday afternoon and was followed by a very long evening and night of feeding kids, feeding parents while completely ignoring kids (not brushing their teeth, not putting them to bed, not worrying that they were climbing trees and leaping all over the place and watching too many videos). While we were eating lunch on Sunday (after drinking and dancing all night on Saturday night, yes, I keep telling you France has totally changed us and you don't believe me, but it's really true, we've turned from total sticks in the mud into party animals), Sean commented that you often see in French movies people having these long meals outside in the country with lots of friends all of them discussing interesting things. Sometimes one of the friends will take out a guitar and play French songs that everyone knows, and some of the children will join in while the others keep playing foot in the background. Well, said Sean, I guess they put scenes like that in their movies because life really is like that in France. I guess that's why we're sad to leave. I suppose I hope all these lessons in good living that we've received here can be translated into Bellinghamese. Still, even if they can, it will be hard to leave all these good friends with not much hope of seeing them again (unless they visit us).