Everything. Dedicated to Helen!

Helen said I haven't updated this thing in ages, the reason being because SO much has happened and I really didn't want to type a lot but she said she wants something to read so here I am.
(Hi Helen *waves*)

I'm back in England for eleven days and have a chest infection though I don't know whether I should attack an inhaler. It seems to be mixing at the moment. Can't really breathe without needed to cough. I feel so sexy. And of course my iTunes is playing stuff that I need to sing along to so more coughing occurs. The consequence of good music.

So what have you missed in the last month and a half? I made a list.. But my camera won't let me take a photo so I'll type it here with fancy bullet points.

♥ Pizza, Momo's
♥ Ice skating! Montparnasse, Helen's favourite place, and Hotel de Ville.
♥ Pam and Helen leaving ):
♥ Stolly's - the 'bar of coincidences'
♥ Knitting
♥ Graffiti knitting
♥ Absinthe in the hot chocolate cafe that I never remember the name of
♥ A few videos to show you
♥ Bread -- bank
♥ Crazy toilets, cowboy guy and the champagne
♥ The C-hat

There's probably more. You'll need to remind me what I've missed. As you can tell they're not in any sort of chronological order. Just a random list.

Pizza - we've had pizza several times together so I'm guessing that's why you mentioned it? There was the excellent pizza at Momo's, recommended by Jesse and Cathryn, the cute little place in Montmartre with the free drinks. Many crepes have been consumed, some with Helen cursing the jam, some with praising the jam. We traveled six million miles to a crepe place with Jesse, Cathryn, Pam and someone we didn't know. We've eaten at a few other places too, had coffee at many places and beer/alcohol in a few places. Overall it's been very productive food wise.

Ice skating! Helen and I have been ice skating a silly amount of times. She doesn't mind holding my hand and I don't mind being helped. Not at all. Been getting better! Can go round on my own and beginning to pick up speed. The best part of ice skating has to be the pitying looks I get when go around slowly or people always want to take a picture of something when I'm about to go past so they get a close up of my head or coat. There was on guy who helped me go round a few times and really helped my self confidence.



Pam and Helen leaving. The worst thing ever. Still sad about it. Can't believe it's Christmas already and we're having to say bye to some people. Helen should come back to Paree and live under my bed or something. Haha. I miss you! Paris won't be the same without someone to talk to about knitting for hours and music!

We found a bar, Stolly's, which I named the 'bar of coincidences'. The manager Dave is from Victoria and we were in Victoria at the same time this summer. Mike somehow knew I was from Mansfield - he's from Swindon and did English literature at Bath Spa. Which is where I'm going in September. We went on the 14th December*, got incredibly drunk then tagged along to a party where Owen broke a chair. It was a legendary night. One that must go on the legends list with karaoke guy! Been in there a fair few times since then. Mainly to see my husband Nick. We got married in the Notre Dame. It was the wedding of the year.

Hm.. Helen mentioned knitting. What can I say? We like to knit. A lot. She's a lot better than me making her my knitting Guru with Needles of Wisdom.

Knitting graffiti is a new craze and I love it!



Isn't that brilliant? I really want to do some! There's quite a bit of it in the St Paul area. Makes me very happy.

What's next? Ah, yes. Absinthe. Helen bought some absinthe so Jenny, Helen and I decided to try it in the hot chocolate cafe we go to on occasion. Pimento Cafe or something like that. I don't remember. I just follow the others when going there. Anyhow, it was ok. Strong but good. Felt like such a rebel slipping it into our drinks. Heh. We are rebels for that. Pratcially legends. 'Je suis une legende!'

Bread -- bank. One day I was walking with Capucine, it must have been below zero that day. It was freezing. She stops walking and I don't know why. She looks at me so I ask her if she's cold or had enough walking and wants me to carry her the few meters I can. I am weak and she is heavy.

Me: are you ok?
Her: bread.
Me: Bread? You want to buy bread?
Her: Yes!
Me: Ok, sure. If you want. Come on then.
Her: .. (refuses to move)
Me: you can't buy bread here Capucine..
Her: ..(won't move)
Me: this is a bank! It doesn't work like that. You can buy bread over there (points to bakery)
Her: .. (still won't move)

In the end I had to pick her up. From behind because when I tried to pick her up from infront she curled up and wouldn't let me. That was a hilariously weird moment.

Seems we find weird people/places when with Jenny. Seriously. Helen and I have walked around for hours and nothing strange has happened then after twenty minutes of being with Jenny something really odd with happen or we'll find somewhere really weird to eat. For example the wonderful crepe place. We found a reasonably priced crepery, it seemed perfectly normal until we were served by a sixty year old guy dressed like a cowboy. He then tried to give us water out of a champagne bottle. That was a weird moment. But the best part of the evening would be when Jenny went to the bathroom and came back with a huge smile on her face. One by one we go see what she was smiling at.

A rave in a small toilet. Seperate speakers, rave light, writing on all the walls. Insane. Genius but insane!


And the C-hat. Helen made a lovely hat with a pompom. She tried to get caught in some tourists pictures near the Notre Dame in it but it didn't work. Here's the video of our failed mission.


Undoubtedly missed SO much but I'm going to stop for now and have a stretch. I have four albums on Facebook of pictures so far. You just have to add me to see them. Sylvie-Claire Porter.

Happy holidays.

P.S. if you're reading this and want to meet up then TEXT ME.




*Haha. Our anniversary Helen! :D

Zee rhuum ov Sylvie-Claire.

For those of you who are interested in seeing what a French bedroom looks like CLICK HERE!

Gah!

It just took me about ten minutes to log in. Sigh.

On a good note I MADE A HAT! (Thanks to Helen's guidance, she is my knitting master.)More pictures in my Facebook account.



And have a ravelry account!

On a bad note I'm getting a migraine.

Oh well, a tout a l'heure!

My fandom is better than yours :P

This made the geek in me very happy.

Fatigue.

Je suis très froid et fatigue.

Saturday night was brilliant - it was the night of legends minus the French perverts who were chasing Helen and Jenny around. I met with Helen for wool shopping - well we met eventually. Think I'm going to have to put my phone to charge every night cos it dies SO quickly it's ridiculous. She bought me some new knitting needles, 10mm! <3

We then went to a pizza place and had free drinks for being their first customers, yay free drinks! Jenny joined us at the steps of the Sacred Coeur where we watched some brilliant buskers and they played Helen's most favouritest Oasis song. After they'd finished we took a walk around Montmartre, the view of Paris is amazing there.

Coffee and beer in the cafe Amelie was filmed in was next on the list. We took a trip to a random place with the internet where we found a true legend doing karaoke to James Blunt and Shaggy with a very strong French accent of course. What a guy. Then we found a random 'rock' club to go to. It was fun, we found two more legends - two older men (about 50/60) dancing with random people - they were better dancers than most of the people there. Helen danced with one of them, so it wasn't too bad until the random French guys were we're talking to got over friendly with Jenny and Helen - I was sat on the stage arguing with one of them about football and rugby - 'zee football is a true sport', he said my French was good. Managed to speak to quite a few people that night apparently my English accent is noticeable cos they all asked me which part of England I'm from then laughed when I fumed about it. We all got told we were beautiful several times all night, the charm wears off after the first few times but it's much better than being told you're ugly a lot of times!

It was almost 5am when we left and pancakes seemed like the best option. Waited until the Metro opened then went home. Got in for about half seven. Just after I went to bed the family started getting up! So that was my Saturday night, how about yours?

Today I had a French lesson in the morning then Sara, Claire and me went back to Liz's for coffee - Claire has managed to persuade me to do exercise on Thursday. Well it didn't take a lot of persuading - I'm going on a bike with Liz whilst her and Sara run. Looking forward to it, there's a promise of soup and French bread afterwards. Who could say no?

La vie est très belle!

P.S. Helen: 'goodbyeee my loooover, gooodbye my friiiiiiend', 'wasn't me!'

Dear you.

Dear prepubescent boy on the bus,
Apparently your parents never taught you any manners, you could clearly see the bus was full and that Capucine is slightly younger and shorter than you yet you refused to give her your seat, I'm not saying you had to but it's polite and makes common sense not to have a four year old standing up on a busy bus. Even when she fell over you didn't batter an eyelid. If I were your mum I would have given you a good slap for that.
Yours,
Sylvie.
P.S. a hat is intended for your head, not that air above it. You look like an idiot.

Dear boy with chewing gum,
It's great that you have chewing, really I'm happy for you but you don't have to share this fact with everyone. Not everyone wants to hear you chewing as loudly as you can. Closing your mouth when you chew isn't that difficult - you can even do it when you're eating too! It's a useful skill to have. Please take this into consideration.
Yours,
Sylvie

Dear bus driver,
You absolute moron. Congratulations you've made my 'people I hate' list. So far there are two people on that list - it takes a lot for me to get this angry and you managed it without saying anything. I'll let you in on a little secret, living in a city does not mean you have to be an asshole. It's not necessary - some people chose to do it and others don't. You do have a choice, think about it.

You made me miss being in England - people seem to have manners there. Most bus drivers do - they wait for people who may have difficulty sitting down to be sat before moving off. You should go to England and take notes. It was blatantly obvious that Capucine would have problems walking down the bus - you saw that she needed help to get on it so why on earth did you speed off like that? She could have been seriously hurt, luckily when she fell (twice) she didn't hit her head though she did hit her back on the seat in front on her when you slammed the brakes on.

Just thinking about this makes me want to punch you in the face, or get someone a lot stronger to punch you in the face.
With anger,
Sylvie.

Yoga and other four letter words.

Had my first yoga session last night and feeling a wee bit sore now. It was great fun, looking forward to going back again. Nearly fell asleep at the end - we were lying down and concentrating on our breathing and relaxing every muscle possible. Felt very sleepytired. I have really weak arms so every time we did something involving arms I could feel them screaming at me to stop - now they hurt a lot. On the way back from yoga I got the best pancake EVER. It was full of chopped hazelnuts and a bit of sugar. Mmm. Going to get one every week I think, as a treat for torturing my muscles.

Capucine has just had the week off school so on Monday we went to the park to play - she was popular of course. She brought some bubble stuff with her so all the other children were playing with us. I sat in the play area to keep an eye on her. A young girl came and sat with me, she said something really quickly in French that my brain couldn't understand so I told her I didn't understand, she asked what language I spoke I told her English and she started talking to me in fluent English! She must have been about five - brilliant English without a French accent! There was a random woman near by who was as shocked as I was. Capucine loved the park so much she refused to come home!

I'm not doing anything today - just going to play on Sims and then pick up the little lady from school at four. Normally I'd have a French lesson in the morning but it's half term at the moment. Pretty sure there wasn't a class today - guess I'll find out on Monday.

Have to wash my amazing jeans now - the ones with pictures from friends all over them cos Capucine sneezed chocolate all over them. She doesn't have magical powers of nose chocolate but her mouth was full of chocolate mousse and then she sneezed. It was so funny. :D

Think that's it for now. Can't think of anything else to add.

xoxo

P.S. Got your letter Alipie! :D <33

About time..

I keep putting off this update which is ridiculous as it won't take too long to do. I'm just lazy. So many things have happened since the last update!

Just got back from nine days in the sunny UK - it was actually sunny. During those nine days I saw Ruthie, Peter, Charlee, Hayley, Jamie and my grandparents, I failed my driving test, boo, went up to Derby to spend some time with Ruthie, bought some books to make myself feel better about something.. Um.. Spent some time with my amazing family, was shocked at dad's beardage, had my first ever Martini.. Think that's it. Felt weird being back but then I adjusted and now I'm homesick again. Missing mum a lot already. Only been here about five hours!

French classes are fabulous and I'm making a lot of wonderful friends. The teacher is great and I'm really enjoying lessons. Learning lots of useful things like verbs. Heh. Just need to remember them now. Also need to do the homework set over the holidays. Completely forgot about that. Oops.

Can't think of what else to say.. :/

Guess I'll leave it at this for now and try to update again tomorrow night. Ooh, tomorrow night I'm going to cook an English meal for the family and see what they think. Wish me luck!

Ok, I've enabled all comments so you have no excuses now! Leave me comments! xo

Adam and Eve.

Meet Adam and Eve.



Eve.



Adam.

Jeany jean like jeans.

I owe a proper update but for now here's my broken shoe and amazing jeans.





And a foot! Oo'

So dilemma: where can I find some ethical shoes? Non leather, anti-child labour etc. It seems like it should be an easy task but apparently not.

Inspired by Luminara.

Inspired by Luminara. Lanterns by Capucine and me. Though they won't be able to be lit as they were made with paper not crepe paper. Still pretty though. Ignore the mad arm in one of the shots. The blue one and gravity are best friends, it keeps falling over at any chance it gets. Forgot to put something heavy underneath it to weigh it down.







Fell over!

And a close up of the rocket. It looks squished but it's the top of the balloon, not the picture size.



THE MESS!



Better go wake up Capucine. She's having a late nap today, after we'd finished doing the balloons and had lunch she was absolutely covered in mashed potato and glue - home made glue too - so I had to give her a quick bath and then put her straight to bed. Going to CALMS in a bit to see her speech therapist so need to wake her up.

Will do a proper update at some point in the future.

Love and other four letter words. xox


Oh and to answer your question Ms Banana, the French classes are taught in French (: sometimes a bit of English but Sonia (who's Spanish) doesn't understand English so it's not useful for her!

First French lesson

Yesterday I had my first French lesson, I managed to be late. I left to get the bus and missed it! Then realised that I'd left my purse at home so had to run all the way back and wait for the bus again. Rang the place to tell them I'd be late, got the bus, then a train then the Metro and had to ask for directions from there. Found a postman - they seem to know their way around.

The French lesson was fun. I learned a lot, who would have though H is a vowel and consonant? Made two friends and we're going to ask people if they want to go out at the weekend or something. There are eight of us in the class. Two girls from American, a girl from Spain, one from Germany, another from Indonesia, someone else from England and a guy from Israel.

Went out for lunch with the two girls from America, we went to a crepe place. It was yummy. I had to leave early cos I have a horrible cold, went to get the Metro and for some reason my ticket wouldn't work - it had been working all day until this point and worked again after. Started getting frustrated so jumped the barrier and, of course, I completely missed and bashed my knee. I have a lovely bruise now. Here's a picture of the wickle bruise. Ise be smart. D:

So that was my first French lesson. Things to remember for next time:
- The bus always leaves before you get there when you NEED to catch it.
- There's a Metro that hates my ticket out there *shakes fist*.
- Remember to check if I have my purse before leaving/don't leave it in the kitchen again.

That is all.

Picture post!

Think it's time for a picture post!



Capucine took this one.



Meet Madame Moustache. (Spelled wrong on purpose!)

And now time for my tale of woe. Yesterday I burnt three fingers making Capucine's dinner, left the pot handle over a lit hob without realising and then picked it up. They're not bad burns but never been burnt before so felt really sorry for myself. The burns don't hurt anymore they're shiny and I'm lacking a bit of my fingerprints.



Let's play spot the burns! Cookies for those who can see them. ^^'

A proper update will come at a later date.
xoxoxo

Long time no update.

So, what's new? Not much really. Having a good time here, really feel like part of the family. So far I've visited:

♥ Montmartre as you know
♥ the Eiffel tower
♥ Notre Dame a couple of times
♥ the Lourve
♥ the Musee d'Orsay
♥ and a few other smaller places.

Really enjoying exploring Paris. In 2008 at some point I'd really like to go to Disneyland with friends, a few people said they would so that would be brilliant if it happens.

Today I had the day off so I went shopping, it's going to start getting cold soon so bought five new jumpers. One, two, three, four aaaand five.

Starting French lessons on the 1st October, looking forward to them. Hopefully will make some friends then get to go home for a bit at the end of October. Looking forward to seeing everyone again, it's been a while. Heh. Then again everyone is going to be busy with uni and jazz. At least get to see family for a bit - missing them a silly amount.

Can't really think of anything else to say. Which is annoying because I will think of stuff to say after I've pressed post or later on when I'm not near my laptop.

Bye for now!
xox

Montmartre

Today I went to Montmartre. It was beautiful, the only problem really was the six million steps it took to get up the big hill but it was worth it in the end. Took a few pictures. All pictures go into my Facebook account - you will need an account to be able to see them but they're good. There are a few videos posted too. They're named 'For John' but anyone can watch them. They make him happy. :D

The Metro was hard to find. It was sneaky and hid from me so I walked up to the next Metro instead. Wasted quite a bit of time but it was ok as I had all day. Once I'd found my way to Montmartre I went and sat in the cathedral for a bit. It was silent in the crypt. Think it was what I needed. I sat at an altar for ten minutes or so and listened to the silence. It was beautiful. Can understand why people find such solitude in places like that.

In Montmartre I found a pretty little cake shop then had a crepe. Yummy. Wish I wasn't alone though. I'm terrible at wandering around on my own. Get bored really quickly. I was only there for a few hours before deciding to return. Which was a lot easier than getting there. Returning only took 20 minutes or so whereas getting there took about 2 hours. It seemed that on the way there I missed the bus, the metro, the train etc. Etc.

So, that was my day. How about you?

I never gave any proper details about being here. Things people are dying to know like what are the family like and what's my room like? Well the family are lovely and I'm lucky to have such a great family. I am aware of this - the homesickness is blocking most things out. Capucine is absolutely adorable! My contract starts on Monday so having a routine might help the homesickness.

They set the internet up in the living room so I can.. Well do this and use MSN. My room is the same size as my room at home, perhaps a bit bigger. It looks bigger because it's square. Though saying that there's a small double bed in it and there's no way I could fit it in my room. I'm still not used to sleeping in a double bed. It's weird, even though I began to get used to sleeping in John's huuuuuge bed it's still a weird experience. Lots of room and nothing to do with it. I keep finding myself sprawled out in the morning. Heh. It's comfy. :D

Can't think of anything else. Feel free to ask questions.

<3

So here I am in Paris. Lonely but safe, was very homesick last night. Still homesick but it's not as bad. Missing everyone a silly amount. Audrey really reminds me of mum which is making it harder at the moment, really miss her, Sam and dad..

It's beautiful here, haven't had time to do much so far. Tomorrow I'm going into Paris by myself. Have to get a bus and the Metro. A bit nervous - I should be ok but I'm still a bit worried.

Not really much to say. The family are amazing and they said that John can stay here when he comes to save him money - they also know some hotels in Paris where other friends can stay and will take me to the hotel to see them. They've set up the internet so I can use my laptop in the living room. This set up is a lot better than using their PC. They have a French keyboard so I'm terrible at typing with it.

2 weeks.

Two weeks until I take the longest adventure I have ever had.