Weather forecast...

This morning we saw the sun - wow!! Woke up to a view of fog - usually a good sign in Luxembourg (means the sun might come out).

Of course, the sun was gone by lunch to be replaced with rain. To quote the Stu "But Mum... (insert sigh) it's POURING again!"

At a high of 14 degrees and rainy, we are looking forward to heading to Turkey on Monday... where the forecast is 35 degrees and sunny... Yeah!

where did the summer go?

Here we are almost at the end of August - where has the summer gone?

Luckily for us, Stu doesn't go back to school until the 15th of September, so we are off to Turkey on Monday!!

Given that, with the exception of our heat-wave (we did have one didn't we??), we have barely seen the sun or had temperatures break the 20 degree mark all summer, it will be nice to head to the sun for a week - and the fact that they have a SPA isn't hurting at the moment!

Then back for 4 days to hang out around home and attend the 666th Schuberfouer - the Fair that was started by John the Blind and is the longest running in Europe. It is a real Luxembourg institution - food, drink and rides, who can ask for anything more!

And the things they do...

It has been a bit of a rough weekend in the H-T household. Our heat wave of a couple of weeks ago ended abruptly about two weeks ago and we have moved to rain day in and day out and highs of 15 degrees... but I dare not complain. But it has meant that Julia has a nasty cold and that we have not been able to put the boy out to run... so we are all climbing the walls and as Marc just hollered from the kitchen "Julia just hoofed the cat" - she's getting very expressive with her fists and feet. 2 is such a lovely age.

So - let's remember some of the better moments of the week...

One evening as we were doing dishes Stuart wanted to know if Joe (the son of his Godparents) liked the birthday present we sent. I saId that yes, Aunt Jenn had sent an email saying he did. "But how many times has he used it???" Stuart wanted to know. I said I wasn't sure - he'd have to ask Joe. Okay he says, proceeding into the living room and installing himself in front of the computer and pulling out the headset we use for Skype. I asked "what are you doing?" he answers (as if it was clear as day) "Skyping Joe" (Duh Ma!). So I connected him, told him he had to indentify himslef to Aunt Jenn and watched while he and Joe had a conversation for almost 5 minutes... what a little man.

And Mademoiselle has learned how to climb out of her crib. Marc and I are bitterly mourning the peaceful (??) days of being able to put her in bed and know she would still be there when you went back in the room (hollering perhaps, but still in bed). At 27 months old, we got a good 10 months longer out of her than we did out of Stuart. Yesterday morning she was still asleep when Stu and I went down for breakfast... an hour later when things were still quiet upstairs I thought I should check on her. There she was sitting on our bathroom floors counting "1...2" as she took off her pyjama bottoms to try and go on the potty... so quiet, so serene - so grown up, getting out of bed herself. (the rest of the weekend has been hell, she won't go to bed, she's exhausted and sick...)

Any advice on bickering siblings is appreciated - ours have started to fight like cats and dogs (and with the cats as mentionned above) in the last few weeks and it is driving us to distraction (who knew they could both make equally high-pitched screeches that leaves us looking for broken crystal...)

The things they say...

Cute Julia comment of the day, talking to Kyra our black and white cat :"You have belly button?"

Okay, maybe you had to be there but she's so darn cute...