I was mean-girled the other night.
Now, as most of you know, I've been studying French for the past year and a half. I love the country, and love the language and am determined to become fluent by 50. However, this aim is being seriously messed with by my teacher.
She and I have differing views on encouraging students to learn: I believe in the carrot method {praise, encouragement...} while she believes in the stick {a bloody big stick}.
Every now and again she'll pick on someone, just for the fun of it. She'll deride their pronunciation, or their inability to think of a third person pronoun... Anything really. This week it was my turn.
We have to do dictation, where our teacher speaks in French and we write it down. This is hard. Really hard. Usually they're not only sentences we're not familiar with - but words too. Whole new, unfamilar words. Try doing that in English let alone French... This week we had six people in the class, and six sentences. The last two were tough - the final one, impossible. Guess which one I had to write on the whiteboard...
So, there I am, writing word by word. And with every word my teacher's snickering, 'Hoo, hoo, ha, ha"... I'm incredulous - seriously, is this happening? Next word: actual laughter, and encouragement for the class to join in - which, as is typical in a bullying environment, there are a few nervous titters {of the "thank god that's not me" variety.}. I finally get my long, complex sentence up and she comes up. And tells a story. A story of how I remind her of a school student she once had. A student who had many ideas, but, oh, she wrote a story and the teacher said "Is this in French? What language is this?" Because oh, silly child, it was all written phonetically! Um, if you don't know how to spell a word don't you write it phonetically? Isn't that precisely how our children learn?
Then she proceeded to tear every word apart, asked me what the tense was, who the subject was - asked me why I'd written 'e' when she'd so clearly said 'e'. {I kid you not, I still haven't been able to differentiate between those sounds...}
At the time I just fumed silently, but days later I'm still furious. Next week I'll be refusing to write on the board and I'll tell her why. I'm in the class to learn, not to be derided.
I will keep going as I do want to learn the language - fingers and toes crossed that she doesn't teach next year's level. If so, well, I might have to look elsewhere.
Mean-girling sucks at any age.
I'm almost out of my favourite perfumes. What a shame. I estimate that I have about a month's worth of two of my favourites, and will run out just about the time I hit Paris. Guess I'll have to buy a few newbies while in Paris....
I feel like I'm in an episode of Hoarders at the moment. Except instead of 'just-in-case' stuff, I'm at risk of being crushed to death by mountains of laundry - dirty and clean...
It's all grey, drizzly and erky outside, and I have PDLIT {post dancing like I'm twenty} injuries. So I thought I'd best pop up some Jimmy Choos to brighten up the day. Luckily I wasn't wearing these when I was dancing like a maniac on Saturday night, I'd be walking around in an even more sad and sorry state than I am now.
Wow, what a weekend - and another busy week ahead. So menu-planning will save the day!
You know the only thing better than a coffee? Coffee in my cute, new silicone takeaway cup. Oh, and you know what's even better than that? Lovehearts in my coffee! In fact, I think I managed to make a loveheart within a loveheart which is about as awesome as it gets.
Noooooooooooooo. And Yesssssssssssssssssssssss. I'm a Harry Potter tragic, and so I can't wait to see this, but, let me tell you - I'll be sobbing ugly tears at the end. Oh, I don't want it to end! 
Do you think that the people who work at Martha Stewart weddings ever respond with a "Shut UP!" {you know, because that's a completely appropriate thing to say whenever you're overwhelmed... or is that just me?} Anywho, when I saw this garland of lillies - well, I may or may not have uttered the briefest of shut-ups...
Do you have a dream self? I do. 
I was mean-girled the other night.
Oh, it's bucketing down in this neck of the woods. It poured all night and we awoke to an overflowing pool and rain that wasn't keen to stop flowing. It's grey, it's dark - and oh, I need a pretty umbrella like this Lulu Guinness number - I do love a clear umbrella! It'd make the soggy school run a much more pleasant experience.
I plan on taking 30 minutes each day to just sit, in silence, with a book and a cup of tea. Just to be... No laptop, no television, just words and the warmth of a good cuppa. 
Oh red patent, you do set my heart a-flutter. I neglected to feature a shoe last week, mainly because nothing seemed to inspire me. But oh, I made up for it this week. Look at these Miu Miu lovelies. EVERYTHING I love, everything. The colour, the shape, the peep-toe, the bow - and oh, the patent.... J'adore...
My meal-plan flew out the window a few times last week, so we'll see how we go this week. Although I'm pleased I ran out of time last night and had to make pizza - otherwise I wouldn't have discovered that my local Coles has authentic Italian parma ham - the real soft, delicious stuff. I'm going back to stock up today. Here's what we're eating this week:
So, we're all still here... and how glad I am. It's an utterly glorious day today - superb. We've been at the netball courts since 9am as two of my girls were umpiring, and did a sterling job in-spite of the usual problems. Sigh. I consider sport of some description an important part of childhood for most children. It's where you can learn teamwork, increase self-esteem, build friendships and increase confidence. If it's handled correctly.
I'm quite sad about the world supposedly ending tomorrow - on a few levels, but the one that's really biting at me is that I'm supposed to be here in eight weeks time. I know, a Villa in Provence - pinch me. I only paid for it in full today! This is the first villa we're staying in. It's near the alps and a lovely French village called Tourtour. We're staying here with two other families and for a few of the days the husbands are tootling off in a motor home to follow the Tour de France.
Today's flowers, to add a touch of pretty to your day, are lilacs. Can you smell them from here? Yet another cold-area flower I adore {sometimes I think I'm living in the wrong climate - but perhaps I live here so I can appreciate them more?}. Lilacs remind me of walking down the main street of Berrima in the Southern Highlands, and excitedly reaching over to sniff every blossom on every tree. They come in such an amazing range of colours, but my favourite's this one - a purple with a tinge of pink that just whispers lilac.
In news that makes my day, Joel Edgerton, fresh from his awesome turn as Kerry Packer - is set to play Tom Buchanan in The Great Gatsby.
This is it: the life-changing frock. You know, that one dress that can take you anywhere? Oh Kiki, you've done well.
The new Peter Alexander catalogue just popped into my in-box and I do believe that I broke into a round of applause after spying the gorgeous Tahnee from ANTM in its pages. She looks so utterly delightful in every shot that I feel like buying every single item featured. {And oh, the baby pink mohair jumper - to DIE for}
