MoreSmiles 45:365

Too tired to post last night so catch up time!

An early start was made better by this bag by the kettle at 6am! Thank you John x

More smiles as I tweeted with @MissJ0nes as we 'sped' (ha ha!) on the train from opposite ends of the British Isles to meet in York with others for a day of research (brain imploded with information overload!)

Great to see Thérèse and many other familiar faces in York - shame I missed Suzi though.

Good to be home after another rail nightmare - I am NOT travelling by train on a Friday evening again - and thanks to John for picking me up from Birmingham with Medjool dates to calm me!

However I did get a chocolate lolly from the guard who called me 'young lady'

Big thank yous from the boys for the chocolates I left outside their rooms this morning.  

And the new PPA timetable sees me teaching Year 2 - WA-HOOOO!

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Leaving snowy Scotland didn't make me smile but I take lots of smiles home with me. 

The look on Jude and especially Isaac's face as they were handed kiddie bags in Bella Pasta today was priceless!

And discovering that John had bought First Class tickets for the return trip made us all smile, especially as the journey was much longer than it should have been thanks to the weather. Never mind, I've had two glasses of Prosecco... ;)

And we did make it home in the end.

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On the way to Glasgow on the train. We're all sitting playing with mobile devices. Currently in the Lake District. Not that we can see anything as it's very dark!

Today was a hard day for a few reasons but my colleagues were lovely and very caring, and I survived (with a wobble in the middle!) 

I smiled because...

Y5 and 6 did brilliantly in their carol presentation to other year groups. 

My class this morning loved the Turkey challenge. And colouring!

I enjoyed watching Pixar shorts in the "overflow chill out room" from the party this afternoon. I didn't realise there were so many Pixar shorts - and thank heavens for Youtube!

I'm on the way to Scotland. The mountains and lochs are calling! 

I was given a free cup of tea as the lad had already cashed up his till. 

John's obsession with salmon also amused me no end!

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One of my favourite times of the year when I can bring out El Pequeño Petirrojo!

Utterly pooped so smiles are very welcome - a great afternoon with year 6 (like gold dust!), funny comments from year 3 and being called 'Tigger' by staff at WPS.

And 'the Panda taxi' fetched John from the station - that was funny!

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Apple crumble at lunchtime and biscuits after school. Thanks Gemma! Delicious and very welcome!

Year 3 loved Un elefante today and made me promise to teach them another song next week. Some of the girls demanded a sneak preview. Cue pretending to be a singing dancing cow whilst on break duty!

A very excited 11 year old has gone to bed smiling at the thought of presents in the morning. I know already what tomorrow's smile will be!

And with winter tyres now fitted, the summer/normal ones are in a tyre hotel in Corby. Wonder if they'll send a postcard?

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My boy's been elected to school council.

A child spontaneously hugged me the corridor this morning with a huge grin on their face. Made me feel a million dollars!

Year 3 giggling at my silly hat changing to teach Señor, Señora and Señorita - and Year 6 liked it too in their "we're year 6 and it is a bit juvenile really, Miss but it's vaguely amusing" way!

Making it home in less than 25 minutes despite hitting 'rush hour' traffic.

Laughing at TBBT with the boys.

And this quotation :O)

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A trip out today - and the first time we've driven past Spitfire Island and the Jaguar Works since we got back - good to see the statue/sculpture is still in the middle of the roundabout and loved the car on the side of the factory!

Home again, I managed to get nearly to the bottom of the garden, not helped by the tenants deciding to turn part of the path into a gravel beach...?!? Still, good to see that part of the garden albeit somewhat in need of a prune and tidy! There are apples on the tree although I won't be up the ladder this year to pick them! Now, where is that long fruit picker doofer with the net on the end....?

Smiles as FC Bayern München equalise in the final minute of extra time, just for the look on Mourinho's face!
Only Connect champions the Crossworders slaughtered the Masterminders (all did well in Mastermind and thought they could take them on...) in a special episode.
And I remembered to take a picture!!

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Hurrah! Meet Efelbert, our new car! Can't comment on what it's like to drive but the passenger seat is very comfortable and the boot is large!

(NB Picture I took has disappeared so this is from the website! The reg starts EF hence Efelbert!)

Other smiles -
Jude sharing some of the "wisdom" shared with him by his cousin.

Messages from friends in Swittzerland.

The episode of The Big Bang Theory in which Sheldon has a mental block, refuses to sleep until he solves the problem and ends up in a ball pit diving and popping up shouting "Bazinga!' to avoid being taken home by Leonard.

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This morning we hopped into a Mini Cooper and popped off to Kreuzlingen with plans! And many smiles ensued. 

First off a trip onto Bodensee on a pedalo - such fun! Pedaloes have come on since I was a kid with comfy deck chair seats and far more room! We even got a sunshade!

The trip was made even better by meeting two families of ducks. So sweet - they swam over to say hello, stared at Jude and followed us for quite a while!

After a wonderful hour 'pedalo-ing', our next plan kicked in - reclaiming tax from shops. About 60 euros worth today! I like walking into shops and they give you money!

And then lunch at Maximillians and home to change before a visit to Buchberg with the Pickups. An incident filled trip featuring close encounters with greenery in Flach, various playground japes, a beautiful sunset and a bus with an identity crisis as well as delicious food and great company! 

So many smiles - and glorious sunshine too! What more could I want?

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John and I went for a short walk after dinner. As we left the apartment, this gentleman zipped past on his Segway. 

John announced that when he's old, he's not having an invalid buggy; he's having a Segway. I tend to agree with him although you need to still have leg strength...

Andy Murray winning Wimbledon - big smile. 

Pretty park on a sunny evening - another smile. 

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Things you see walking down Winti Marktgasse... Yesterday it was a man shopping on a Segway; today, a man shopping on his horse! 

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The Zürcher Kantonalmusikfest in Winterthur this weekend meant lots of flags flying around the town - and on the front of the buses. Looked very colourful and the sunshine helped bring a smile to faces. As did the wonderful music. Nothing like some rousing brass bands to raise the spirits!

Here's an Audioboo and a video.

listen to ‘Winterthur Zürcher Kantonalmusikfest’ on Audioboo

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And these beautiful poppies made me smile. Glad the men on the slacklines didn't squish them!

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I always smile on the bus when I see this sign. I particularly like the 'do not saw the seats' image. I mean, isn't that the first thing that you think to do when to get into a bus?

Grade 4 presented Macbeth in Schloss Hegi this afternoon. In the original language. Brilliant!

And I liked this quotation from Sir Edmund Hillary.

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Back in Switzerland - lovely to see Jude and John and catch up on their adventures including driving home in a Mobility car that was declaring that the engine might blow up! Above is Jude yesterday when they went exploring Aareschlucht.

Smiled - and was very very grateful - when a man came over to help me get the petrol cap underdone so that I could refuel the hire car. Unlike the other cars at the petrol station who just glared and/or enjoyed my struggling, this gentleman did something. Bless him!
Didn't smile when I left my book on the plane though. Grrr!
And more smiles when I got home and found that I'd been welcomed in the Welford Primary newsletter this week!

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Meet Fergie. He's not mine - just borrowed to get us around in England but I'm sure he'd love to meet Bertie and all his ISW friends in Switzerland! He's a cheerful little chap and I'm already rather find of him.

This afternoon I spent time with my nephews. Couldn't capture Harry on film as he was busy playing with Isaac but Robert snuggled up for some extended iPad time with Auntie PigBird :0)

More smiles today:

Visiting Welford Primary and getting a great welcome. 

Kids pumping arms when they heard I'd be teaching Spanish. 

Being hugged because I'm an ADE!

School dinner - curry!

Isaac survived his exams. Now to await the verdict...

Chocolate digestives 

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Today's smile photo was sent to me by my friend Krislyn who thought I'd like it might make me smile as it had her. And I did! 

Other things that made me smile today

Cycling everywhere in the sunshine - I should have logged how far I went but I was just enjoying it!

Finding out that I'd managed to do two 101:365 posts and two 102:365 posts which explained why other 365 bloggers were on 106 yesterday when I wasn't!

Fun at my English class when I decided to teach prepositions by hiding a cuddly lizard.

More sitting in the sunshine reading a book.

Say cheese in other languages

In Cantonese they also say 小小 (síusíu) - a little

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We went to Basel today which meant that we had another game of 'Study the public transport network map and find funny names' - I think you will see our favourite on the above photo!

Jude's glee at being on a TGV was also a huge smiling point - he does like a good train. Isaac, on the other hand, loves a good leaflet, map or timetable!

I can recommend the Fondation Beyeler gallery - a good variety of interesting artists (although we were rather annoyed that ALL the Picassos, and the Warhols and Lichtensteins were on loan to other galleries!

After the gallery we went to investigate Basel and stopped for a drink. Not many McDonalds where you get this view!

And my website is back up and running and pink! Hurrah!

Smile in other languages
In Binary (Intel x86 ASCII set) - 
S= 01110011
M= 01101101
I= 01001001
L= 01101100
E= 01000101

(Thanks to David Pickup for supplying me with more ideas. Watch this space over the next few days!)

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Look what I've got! Thank you so much to my English/Swiss/Hungarian Easter bunnies who smuggled them in from Ireland!

Things that made me smile today
An Easter egg with H and L as well as Isaac and Jude - great muddy fun!
Learning how to play a game that involves hitting boiled eggs against each other, a bit like conkers! Looking on Wikipedia it's played in the North of England too, but we were taught the Swiss/Hungarian version! I didn't have a go but the boys all did - and the great thing is, you get to eat the hard boiled eggs once it's over. If you're really good, you can end up with a pile of eggs (you the win the egg if you smash it more than yours!)
The sun shone and we went for a bike ride. 9.5 miles - and Jude didn't complain once. Hurrah!
Curry for tea!

Smile in other languages
In Dothraki (language of Game of Thrones apparently!) - eme

(Still looking for more languages - I'm trying to get to 100. I have 92 so far...)

PS A great 'smile' related news item - you know how much I love recycling and this would be fun!

Smiles 88:365

I'm craving hot cross buns and am really not capable of making them; I'm 'Running Lisa' not 'Baking Lisa' after all!)  

However, this Osterhase is nearly as good. A bit like an iced bun without the icing but with huge crystals of sugar instead. Lovely with a scrape of butter.

Second smile was Isaac getting a new bicycle today, and handing over his old one to Jude - see above! Amusement was heightened by John and Isaac's glee at beating the 'it's a holiday so no shops are open' by going to Zürich Flughafen to buy it, and then the need to buy the bicycle its own ticket for the train. And at handover time, I had to smile as Jude took his old bike for one last ride and gave it a hug before accepting the new one (Isaac's old one!) He is so dramatic! And then John lived up to his Fiddler nickname by making the back light fit as well as the mudguard when there really was only room for one!

Other things that made me smile today

My hand/arm isn't as painful so I can play with my phone/iPad/MBP more :o)

Bugsy Malone - classic film and so funny. And I'm so pleased that Jude loves it too.

John making us play 'Guess where my sandals come from'; our first answers were - Central African Republic, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Comoros, Nauru. Do you think we watch too much Pointless? (The correct answer was Ukraine.)

The overpowering smell of Gran Padano which is emanating around the flat after Isaac spilt it all over the floor during dinner. I didn't smile at the time but what can I do? He's a teenager and not quite in control of his long limbs!

Smile in other languages
In Breton - mousc'hoarzhin  (thanks to @SylvieBRawlings!)

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The wonders of a Mobility car! Book one for an hour, a few hours or a few days, pick it up from one of the nearby parking spaces and off you pop, returning it when you've finished!

We visited the Bärlauchfest in Stein am Rhein today. It was billed as 'small' but I'd say that was a bit ambitious as, whilst there were some lovely banners, there was very little Bärlauch or wild garlic in evidence. So we moved on to Konstanz rather quicker than we'd planned, which was fine!

Jude did lots of smiling as we went to Maximillans for his favourite Weisswurste mit Bretzel und Senf, and our food was delicious too.

And we smiled on the way out of Kreuzlingen as John took the wrong turning AGAIN not 10 seconds after I'd reminded him not to take the wrong turning...

Icomania also made us smile today as we laughed at the out of date icons for some stars, and puzzled out a couple of 'brand' answers before being let out our misery by being told that Walls is called Langnese in Germany! Thanks @Stephanrinke.

Smile in other languages
In Arabian - dohke