Joyeux Noel!

School is finished and it's after Christmas. And, as per usual I am behind on my updates.

After singing at the Maison de retraite, I had two days of testing. Thursday was the Oral comprehension and expression and Friday was the Written comprehension and expression. That weekend was a pretty low key weekend. My last test, the Grammer test, was Tuesday. Wednesday I went into Paris with Annina and another student at the school to see The Hunger Games :) It's been awhile since I read the books, so I had forgotten several things, which created a bit more excitement when they came up... I also think I enjoyed it more because I wasn't comparing it to the book as much. I love the idea of turning books into movies (some books, at least) but there are usually so many changes made (sometimes necessary and sometimes completely unnecessary) so I tend to be disappointed, but I was pleasantly surprised this time. Thursday we had class as usual and then a group of us went out to eat for dinner and came back and watched White Christmas while eating chocolate fondue. Friday we had a school wide brunch and 'sending' chapel for all of us who have finished at Les Cedres (myself included). That evening I helped Annina a bit with packing. Then Annina, Anna, Sabrina and I had dinner together, which is probably the last time we will all ever be in the same place. Perhaps not - you never know what your journey brings, but for now we have said our farewells. Saturday morning Anna and I took Annina into the train station and she returned to her family in Switzerland. Anna and I did some last minute shopping and then spent the rest of the day, and on into the wee hours of the morning, getting her packed for vacation, moved, and cleaning her room. She left for Romania the next morning and I went to Mimi's for the day. 

Since school has finished I have been sleeping a lot. Love sleep... On the 24th I went to Mimi's (and then Nicole's) and shared Christmas Eve with the Vandenbroucque clan. It was different from my normal Christmas' but it was nice. We started with Champagne and appetizers. Then we opened presents (and I actually got some - wasn't expecting that). Then we started on the next round of food selections, socialized a bit then had our cheese course followed by our desert :) Yummy, yummy, yummy.  

Christmas day I helped Mimi and Edgard (just a bit) get ready for family to come for dinner that evening. I returned to the school after dinner and woke the next morning to a text invitation to have dinner with one of the families who is staying in the area for Christmas. They have two adorable children (2 and 3 or something like that). I will actually be going over there for dinner tonight as well :)

This morning I had an appointment with an ear specialist. There is no nerve damage in my right ear (meaning that I can hear through the bone around my ear just fine) but cannot hear in the 'conversational range' - pas du tout. Not really a surprise. I will need to get a scan of the area behind my ear to see what exactly is going on, so now we play the waiting game. Wait and see and not jump to worst case scenarios...