Le Bon Voyage mes Garcons

Just got back from taking the boys up to the school to see them of on their trip to france. Been up since 4am, thought I would need loads of coffee to keep me awake, but I felt sick after a couple of sips, so am making up for it now. Jackie picked us up at 5.20 and we were the first to arrive at the school a few minutes later. Unfortunately, there was a problem with the seat numbers on coach number 2 (the one the boys' were on) and a lot of swapping around, but eventually they got of, even if the school (we departed from the secondary school rather than the juniors) had forgotten to open the exit gate so lots of turning around and narrowly missingly parents' vehicles!! Going t0 be a bit tight for the ferry, so fingers crossed the traffic is good to them. They are going to Le_Chateau_de_Tertre and will be back on Friday evening.

Here they are just before departure this morning

From left to right we have Daniel P, Billy, Calum, Phil and my Daniel. All looking very "touristy" it has to be said!! Billy's mum Janine, will be the one ringing me to say they've arrived safely.

Here are "my boys". Phil insisting on doing his Gromit impression as usual!!

Other news, just while I'm on here. We are moving oop north! Probably Manchester, and probably Droylsden to be near my sister and her family. We are fed up with the situation between Stephen's younger brother and his dad etc here so we are going to be near mine, where we will have the support network when my health deteriorates. I need to know that if I have days when I'm so unwell I can't get out of bed that someone is going to be there for Stephen to help him with the kids, we don't want the added stress of Stephen having to take unpaid leave to look after us all. The reaction from Stephen's family when Jack was born is enough to tell us that we can't rely on them, Stephen nearly became both a dad and a widow in the same breath, but his family didn't care, they didn't ring to see if things were alright, and he coped with getting one boy of on a school trip, one to school, seeing me in hospital and Jack in SCBU all on his own until my mum got back from holiday. It's not just that, my nephew who is the same age as the boys is in Manchester, my niece who is 9 months older than Jack and theoretically they could be in the same class at school together is there and so is my lickle sister who I barely see and our other halves are getting repeatedly hacked of about the phonebills when we spend 3 hours on the phone to each other! My dad is an hour and a half to the east, and Stephen's other brother is a lot closer than he is now in Miserablebro. We're looking to put the house on the market in the new year, giving Stephen time to get a new job, probably contracting, then we will rent for 6 months in Manchester giving us time to find something we want at our pace rather than frantically trying to complete down here, complete up there etc all on the same day, so I would go up 2 weeks before completion, move in and Stephen would stay down here to finish things of. I'm not sure about what is going to happen with my job, I could transfer up there, I could ring them up today and tell them to hold of another year and get me a job in Manchester, I'm just not sure, we can't get a mortgage if I'm not working, so I'll need to have a really good think. Hopefully, this time next year I will be reporting from Manchester!

Just looked at the weather forecast and all I can say is Mr Sunshine, get your bloody hat on for sunday or there'll be hell to pay!