The little Darlings are back, which always prompts a flurry of blog posting for me.

It’s strange, but I am so busy when they go away, and occupied doing other things that I never feel the need  or indeed have the time to post on my blogs….of which I have many for some reason!

I have come to the conclusion that blogging for me is a form of escape….from the children, from my routine, from Thomas the Tank Engine, from anything really. And it seems that when the children are away, I am more able to relax and be ‘Grown up’. It’s as if my blog entries are the adult conversations that I don’t get in every day life…an escape from that incessant chatter that only children can maintain!

I did miss them though!

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This week is half term, which means that the children will go to stay with their Father for a few days.

I must admit, that when the holidays come round, I am only too ready to have a few days peace and quiet…it is chaotic, noisy and exhausting at the moment, so tommorrow can’t come soon enough!

However, I rarely have a chance to sit back and relax too much. This week, I have plans to decorate the kids bedroom, in anticipation of the house going on the market after the New Year.

I need to dismantle and remove the bunk-bed, paint walls and ceilings and de-clutter all of their toys…they seem to have so many!

And at some point, my sister and I are going to have our assessment horse riding lesson. It is something we have promised ourselves for a long time, but never got round to doing. With the children taking lessons on Saturday and thoroughly enjoying it, we have been bitten by the bug and want to go too! It’s 20 odd years since we last went riding, so we are curious as to how it pans out. Is it like riding a bike or are we in for a shock?

I’ll let you know!

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Yesterday, I thought I ought to start thinking about some of the technical/bureaucratic issues involved in my pending move to France. So I telephoned the people in Newcastle…I was sent to that many departments, I’m not even sure who they were in the end! Anyway, it’s the Health and Pensions side of things.

They were very pleasant, all of them and I got the information I needed in the end. Well, that’s not strictly true but I have a bit more information now, than before I started.

Apparantly, I do not qualify for the form E106, due to my unemployed status for the past 3 years.It would appear that I am at the mercy of the French authorities on this one, so will have to contact them on my arrival. We’ll see about that! I will do some more delving.

Then onto pensions and NI stuff. I am to be sent a Pensions Forecast application form which I send back completed. From there my pension forecast is calculated and decisions will need to be made as to whether I pay additional NI contributions while I am living in France. Seeing as I am 42 at the moment, I would guess I will be paying the extra, although the amount quoted seems quite reasonable.

It would also appear that if I am working in France, I will be paying into their system and so will qualify for a French pension too….lucky me! Another one to take further I think.

Reading back through this post, I am aware that there are many areas in which I am completely ignorant…but we all have to start somewhere.

Having been reading through the forums for a long time now and becoming familiar with the do’s and dont’s of moving, it is now my turn to put it into practice. My guess is that it is more tricky than I thought…but well, I’m not entirely surprised!

I shall update as and when anything happens.

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A few weeks back, I sent out a feedback form to the guests we had staying in the summer. I hadn’t had a reply for a while and thought I wouldn’t…people get back home and life moves on, routines are re-established.

But happily I received one today.

It was a really sweet letter. They emphasised that they had passed a wonderful time with us at Beauregard and that the area was lovely.

They had  listed a few issues but thankfully, there were no surprises. Each item was something that we had considered as ‘missing’ or ‘in need of improving’, so I was quite pleased really. It’s good to think that we are on track with peoples expectations.

Now, I am itching to get down there and start the improvements!

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Todays exercise is to insert a Flikr badge into the sidebar of my blog. They do a really natty little badge that has photos in a box and one by one the pictures enlarge and then reduce to be replaced by another one.

I think it is a great way to animate the site a bit, with colour and movement, without too much bling! I’m not a great fan of the flashing words and glittering titles that you so often see.

I managed to sort out the badge itself and to get the code ready for copying and pasting into the text widget. However, all I am left with is a pile of syntax and code down the RHS of my blog….not my intention at all!

I have gleaned both the WP and Flikr forums and help pages but to no avail. I don’t seem to be getting anywhere fast. I am going to drop it for a while and come back to it later. I’ve got to the stage where I keep trying it over and over but as the saying goes…’If you keep doing the same thing over and over again, you will end up with the same result’. I was kind of hoping that I could sneak it in quietly!

I seem to remember having this problem with the Weather Fairy…now how did I sort that one out?

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You may have noticed that I have had a spring clean of the site.

I have removed the ‘pages’ that related to the letting of Beauregard and have included a link to the un-official/official/temporary website. It’s still an ongoing project and I’m working hard at the photos but I thought I would include it anyway…warts ‘n all philosophy!

I may even have a look at the ‘categories next’…seems to me that they would benefit from a general pruning.

It’s all good fun! Just as well there’s nothing on the tv!

Oh, how could I forget?…I have renamed the blog ‘Beauregard..The Blog’…. so no more Phoenix. I thought it made sense as I will eventually link this to the website and it helps people with their bearings…that’s the thoery anyway!

And I will revisit Flickr and remove some of the Logicam photos of myself and The Boy….there are too many and I don’t want to frighten people…..the photos are a bit grim!

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Oh dear! I’m in the process of compiling the temporary website for Beauregard. It’s going well but I’ve hit a snag with the photos.

I just don’t have any decent pictures to use and those I am able to use look terrible…grainy, poorly lit, bad colours, not composed properly. And that’s just the interior shots!  The garden shots are just as bad. They were taken last year during August and everything looks parched and, well, brown! 

If only I could whizz over for a weekend to take some decent shots. It would appear that the weather is lovely and warm, I bet I could get some good shots too.

Oh well, for now I shall have to use what I have and update when I can….hope it doesn’t put too many people off!

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I seem to have hit a blog black hole. I have been busy reading and ‘researching’ all about blogs; blog writing, what elements make up a good blog entry, how to increase traffic to your blog, how to get an income from blogging etc, etc. But the upshot is, I’ve kind of run out of things to say!

I think I’m a bit overwhelmed with all that’s out there and the great blogs around. Ok, I realise that this site is an experiment at setting up a blog and as such it feeds on what I am doing and learning. At the moment I am raring to go at the real thing, but due to a few set-backs, such as getting the domain name transferred to me from my BIL (who is too busy at the moment), I am having to hold off. I’m beginning to wonder if it would be worth setting up a temporary Beauregard site, here on WP.com, for the time being. I am aware that we urgently need to set something up to link to our adverts.It may be that a temporary site will fill the gap until we have sorted out the domain name and hosting.

Anyway, I digress. What concerns me is, how do you deal with blog-block in the real world? It would appear that regular entries are what keep the punters coming back and I would hate to dry out! I’m hoping that once in France, I will have enough going on to keep me blogging happily for years. I guess time will tell and I’ll just sit this out for the time being and wait for the muse to return!

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