I love anything to do with Marilyn Monroe and her life. As a young girl I read her biography by the renowned photographer Norman Mailer, and I was hooked. This is one of my favourite vases in the bookshelf, an iconic image of Marilyn by Andy Warhol.
Lake
A busy week back at the Lake, with a delightful Elementary class in the morning and lovely Upper Int in the afternoon. Lots of drilling and Jazz Chants and repetition in the morning, which I think the class enjoyed!
I did 'The Eye' mini saga lesson with the higher level group, and the students came up with this great 'saga':
Also very busy with prepping for the Teachers' course for next week.... I kick off with Phrasal Verbs, a session I love teaching.
I cycle past this park every day and took this photo of the spring flowers inside it.
Attic
I have been very busy in the attic clearing out all the old clothes, ready to take to a charity shop or car boot sale, before I leave.
I found my beautiful Hong Kong suit that I bought there in 1989, and tried it on. It has become far too small for me to wear it and so I will hand it on to one of my sisters, who are much more petite than I am... I loved this suit and it made me look so smart and elegant when I wore it to weddings and special occasions in the past....
I also came across these Christmas decorations, which are no longer used.
My mission while I am here is to completely tidy up the attic and remove items no longer used by the family, ready for a loft insulation and major roof repair project to take place in the very near future. I am doing my bit now, as I will not be here when the project actually begins....
Celebrations
....... on Friday for my father's birthday and a wonderful meal at La Cucina yesterday to celebrate.
We also celebrated Mother's Day.
This photo was taken of me and my lovely mum together.
Vintage Fair
............ later this afternoon, after cooking a special meal for my parents.
Hope I can find a nice bargain! I miss this type of event in Abruzzo.....
I'll add a photo later today if I do buy something.
PS
I didn't buy anything, but it was great fun to browse and look at all the lovely stuff.
Me on my bike on the way back home!
A lovely view of Magdelan College below. It was a beautiful, sunny day today.
View of the punts along the river.
I love these gargoyles!
Finally a shadow selfie of myself of the bike, just for fun!
Roll on Week 14!!
This week has been a very nice quiet one and that is the way I like it!
K took the motorbike out for a spin yesterday evening and has kindly given me permission to add this photo here.
I just love all the colours of the sunset. This was taken at the top of our road. The predicted rain still hasn't arrived and fingers crossed it won't be too bad if it does come. The road is beginning to move again, (yes, I know, it is a scary thought) and cracks are appearing across it again.
I created a tagxedo heart for a summary on Monday.
I highlighted a forthcoming Spring Blog Festival on my main blog here.
I reused the image of the almond tree in blossom, as I like it so much!
It promises to be a great event and lots of presenters will be discussing the art of blogging, including Shelly Terrell, Sylvia Guinan and many more.
On Thursday I picked a few flowers to put in this sweet little jug I bought from a charity shop. I like to add fresh rosemary twigs into the display.
I am keeping a constant eye on the bowl of olives I am pickling. They were freshly picked off our trees in November and have been in a brine solution since then. I have to keep checking the taste and changing the liquid from time to time, and tonight I think they are almost ready for eating! They taste quite delicious and the sprigs of rosemary adds a nice flavour to them.
I recycled some plastic tubs which had contained food and made some plant labels out of them. Nothing ever goes to waste!
I created a Good Luck comic to send to 2 colleagues who are going to China for a few weeks to do some teacher training on behalf of the Lake School. Comics are a fun way to send all kinds of messages.
Our cutter hadn't arrived by Friday so I had to ring the company to ask where it was....It should arive tomorrow.
A lovely Friday evening spent in a local pizzeria with some friends. It was great to catch up on their news and it all came to the princely sum of 10 euros each. We had a huge pizza each and wine and beer to drink. In the UK an equivalent meal would cost up to £20 per head, so prices can still be reasonable in Italy.
For an online weekend activity I created a rose Tagxedo to highlight activities I was doing over the weekend.
A nice relaxing week, all in all!
Roll on Week 11.
What a rollercoaster week this has been! I heard unexpected news from England on Tuesday, which made me book a flight back to England a week earlier than anticipated. My wish for a peaceful and calm start to the new year was not really granted...
A visit to Penne for shopping on Monday. It's a beautiful historical town.
Freddy enjoying the views of the garden.
The state of our road is atrocious and I rang the Sindaco (Lord Mayor) on his personal mobile to ask him when he was going to fix it. He said he would see what he could do, but basically I know the Abruzzo region doesn't have enough money after the severe floodings and landslides......
Would you be able to drive down this 'road' in your vehicle??? It was quite a hair-raising drive to the airport yesterday morning at 5.30am. Our 'road' is 1.2 kilometres long and it is now mostly washed away into the valley. I asked the Sindaco to come and visit it for himself. The land is moving constantly and deep ravines have formed in the surrounding fields.....
The ruts in the road are getting bigger and bigger. The sheer amount of water has forced the land to open up, as you can see below!
Yes, it was quite a soggy mess for a while!!
Our ancient 4x4 is getting battered and bruised by driving in these conditions, and the mudguard has come off. We intend to take this to the Comune when I get back to Abruzzo and ask for a replacement one to be ordered, as it is a comunal road, therefore it should be driveable for the public. Let's see what happens next in this saga.
This week has been stressful with the news of my mother being rushed
to hospital on Monday, just 6 days into the new year, and me being in Abruzzo at the time. I am happy to say that
she is now back at home, and I will be able to help with her rehabilitation,
and I am very happy I can do this, thank goodness.
EVO 2014
This week, however, has also been exciting due to the EVO session I am currently moderating called EVO Crafting the ePerfect Textbook. I wrote and published a blog post about it on my main blog here. I was delighted to see so many familiar faces and members of my PLN joining in and posting their fabulous 3,2,1 introductions.
As one of the 15 session moderators, I am welcoming as many of the new members as possible, and so far I have personally greeted 201 participants!!
There are over 400 participants to date, so it is well and truly a MOOC. (Massive Open Online Course). It's the first time in my life I have ever moderated such a huge number of participants. I am enjoying it very much indeed, and had got off to a flying start at the beginning of the week, but now being back in England much earlier than expected means I don't have as much free time as anticipated. However, I will be catching up with the action whenever I can, and of course doing my best!!
Finally, I was notified by Slideshare today that my presentations have been viewed quite a few times... I am absolutely delighted to hear this lovely piece of news.
Let's see what Week 3 of 2014 has in store....
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