Jane Austen

Jill to George "You might like Mansfield Park. It is on the TV. You can watch half and hour of it, and if you like it you can read the book."

Christian "It's a bit girlie"

Ollie "Is it all about make-up?"

Charlie's party

Charlie and Ethan held a shared birthday party at Laser Quaser in Hemel Hempstead. I didn't get to go into the Laser Quaser shooting with laser room. Ollie and George did that. I got to eat toffee from Thorntons and cake.

George U14 county fencing champion (foil)

George entered the U14 county fencing championship last weekend. Last year he came third. He fences at school and is lucky to have a nationally ranked fencer as his coach. We have to be a little careful not to get excited as there aren't huge numbers of entrants and the venue is local for us (some parents are not going to do a 60 miles round trip) but nevertheless George did brilliantly. There were at least three stand out moments where he really showed smarts and spirit. Firstly, in the round robin section he was 2-4 down (in a first to five match) and realised he had to change his tactics if he was to stand any chance of winning. He did and won that one 5-4. Secondly, after leading all the way to 11-8 in the semi-final he was 11-13 down (first to 15), yet held his nerve to win 15-13 and thirdly, when in the final he faced a boy who had beaten him 5-0 in the round robin section (George was second placed after that section), George changed his game plan to the point where the favourite couldn't fence the way he liked. George took a 7-5 lead and the favourite started to crumble. Even I, who has no idea about fencing, could see that George had him on the ropes. All George had to do was keep his nerve, and ignore the increasingly desperate antics of the favourite, which he did to win 15-8.

George is a top chop. And I very proud of him, especially as he is clearly very good at something I have very little idea about, having never fenced in my life.

George in action, on the right:

The cup:

And with Paul, his excellent coach:

George's Birthday

La Clusaz skiing

This year we decided to ski over the Christmas break. It involved shunting Christmas to the 23rd Dec and driving across France on 25th itself; our Christmas dinner was ham baguette at 80 mph, though we stayed in a top hotel; the Best Western in Bourg en Bresse (Best Western are a totally different proposition in Europe- for a start the branding is tiny tiny, see if you can spot it!):

I had pretty raw meal - oysters and steak tartare. It was good. The next day, the 26th, we drove up into the Alps and checked in. We needed to put snow chains on for the last little bit up into the garages. We had a great view from our apartment: 

It's a lovely old mountain village that has grown into a ski town. These type of resorts are invariably more picturesque than the resorts built specifically for ski-ing. Here is the centre of town and the 19th century church: 

The ski-ing was good. George, if technically not quite there, can outrun me on a long downhill when I am tiring, and Ollie stayed on the pace brilliantly for the first three days. Very impressed. Here is a good shot of Ollie and George ski-ing red (equivalent to single black in US) with the town in the valley below. Check out the ski lift building in the lower middle of the shot as we will return to that in a minute.   

There was one amazing day when George and I set off. It was cloudy and visibility was down to only a few yards at some altitudes. We were right in the thick of it and wondering if it was safe to get on the chair lift and ski down. There was no-one else around but we thought if we were careful we would give it a go. We got on the chair and went right into the thick of the cloud. It gets colder and claustrophobic in the middle of cloud on a chair lift, especially when you can't see the chair ahead or behind. And then....amazing.....we came out of the cloud, above it. It was utterly beautiful and very still. There were very few people around. As far as we could see were clouds. It looked like a huge sea. There were a few peaks of the tallest mountains that cut through, like rocks sticking out of the water. Perhaps the most dramatic shot is the one below from a similar place where I took the shot above. Look for that ski lift building again. You would hardly know it was the same place. 

Other times we just took it easy. George, Ollie, Charlie and myself took a lovely route through the woods one day: 

For New's Year Eve we celebrated by going out for a meal. Here is a picture of tartiflette, a delicious local dish with reblochon cheese, bacon, pototoes, onion and cream. Comfort food par excellence after a vigorous day outside.  

Boys tucked away duck and fries followed by tasty chocolate crepe:

Not caring for the little blob of raspberry jus (too nouveau)...

New Year's Day was our last out on the slopes. We tried snowboarding for the first time. After a couple of hours, George had pretty much mastered the basics. Ollie and I kept falling over - I fell at the same place through the turn every time and of course fell on the same part of my left butt. I gave up when it began to hurt too much. Here is a pic of George and Ollie both up on their boards. 

For a fuller set of pictures, click here.