So in addition to being alive I am also ...

-tired beyond all rational belief

-very confused by all the German

-also confused by various practices of the residences and particularly how to use my keys

On the plus side I:

-didn't have trouble getting through customs even though I thought that I would

-found that Mannheim is laid out in a consistent grid pattern that is labelled. I didn't get lost. This is a big deal. More for other people than for me though.

-met some nice people who live in my residence.

Here's my room

And the view from my window

Not dead yet.

Awww... come on now.

Really I just sat down for a minute and somehow I think that more than a week went by. Um... not sure how that happened. I am taking off for Germany in ten days!!
That is all.

Monkey Brains Are Used for Love and Smartness

Park day today with the camp. This means there was crazy amounts of the following : sewing, cleaning, food, games, swimming, hysteria. Combine 8 campers plus various hangers on and you have a really good recipe for churning out such useful sentences as "Monkey Brains are used for love and smartness." And also... "I am a cowboy, but I am not wearing any pants."

Breaking news from the crafty department... western costumes. The annual camping trip with the folks from the German school has been given a theme: western murder mystery. Maddy is hard at work making costumes because no good event can be without costumes. Check out me in my duds.

But the real highlight of the day was Sunfest, the world music festival that takes place in London every year. We saw the sweet sweet Japanese drummers, and some Cuban music and to end off the night Kathryn, Maddy, Dad and I danced like mad fools to Colombian music. Hours of dancing, curry, plus some time to work on the croc socs??? Sounds like an awesome night to me!

A dying day

Today was a dying day in the best and least morbid sense of the word. The craft for the first day of camp was Sundye. The kids started on purses and various stuffed creations by dying the fabric out of which their projects will be made. It went surprisingly without incident. Like that Monty Python sketch where there is NO severed head behind the bushes, NO torso and assorted limbs in the rhododendron and NO spots of blood on the collar of Mr. Percival's white shirt; there was NO splashing of dye, NO dyeing of our clothes unintentionally and NO long lasting trauma for today.

The kids' creations in dye in the backyard.

As always the first day of camp was exhausting. When you are a child you don't realise just how much work can be put into amusing you. Curiously enough the inverse is also true, when you are an adult you finally realise how (occaisionally) so little work was put into amusing you, and how much you loved it.

The highlight of the day was, of course, completing my socks. You all must revel in their incomparable glory. Look at them! Have you ever seen a more beautiful first pair of socks??? I don't think so. And even though I am aware that it is shameless self-flattery to go on about them so much I can't help myself. Look at them. And then they are so soft when you touch them and I made them myself..... okay okay enough with the socks. (I love them!!!!!!)

It's Fake Canada Day!!

So today is fake Canada Day, the day when even though it's not the day the country was founded most people get a day off work. Not me. It was the final set up day before swim and sew summer camp took wing. There will be eight kids in the house this week, which will be at the same time exhillerating and exhausting. That is why we love it. To perk things up, I got to make the welcome sign... yay!

Fortunately Maddy and Kathryn were around to make the day go by quickly.

Unfortunately the spreadsheet with all the information about the campers that my mom and I were filling out crashed. Doing for the second time made me want to poke my eyes with forks. Spreadsheet = BAD. That is the math for the day.

Fortunately we found all the necessary equipment for our crafts for the day.

Unfortunately we spent much time threading splitty thread through welsh weaving sticks. This also made me want to poke my eyes out with forks.

Now I don't usually have this obsession with forks but Kathryn and I watched this crazy crazy movie last night on CBC (note to self, midnight on the CBC is never good) called the ecstasy note about this guy who, when he got stabbed in his left hand with a fork and hit the fork with a knife he made everyone pass out in ecstasy. It was supposed to be all arty and deep. It was not. Just creepy. That is all.

And in other news I am reading Tristram Shandy with which I have quickly developped a rampant obsession. If you haven't read it, do. And then after see the movie. I usually don't advocate movies based on books because they are usually terrible. This one is not. It is fantastically wonderful. Any movie that puts an adult into a giant womb, where the main character isn't even born by the end of the movie and cannot decide how it should be made... excellent excellent stuff.

But most importantly of all, drum roll please, I am almost finished knitting my socks. They are my first pair and I am really really excited about them. So much so that I abandoned a lot of other really beautiful things to make them. The toe on the second sock is giving me quite a bit of trouble. This is the second time I've had to do it, but I am so determined. Next up Croc socs for that lovely sister of mine: MADDY!

Also I think I am in love with socks.