Carneval

Having heard so much about other school carnevals in France, it was fun to finally take part in our own. Unfortunately the request for parents to bring baking to the tea after the carneval was only made on Thursday evening, so this morning was mainly baking (the crowd-pleasing lemon cake and chocolate cookies). In most carnevals, it seems to me, there is a parade around the town/village. Our village is rather spread out and its main centre consists of the three schools (nursery, primary and secondary), the Mairie, and the convent. So we marched up past the convent and the other schools (the Mairie was deserted) and up to the statue of the Virgin Mary, and then some medieval dancing behind the statue (watched, not entirely approvingly, by nuns) and then back down to the convent for lots more dancing. Conor was swept off his feet by one of the girls in his class, then ran away from her and was swept of his feet by his teacher instead. Katherine, as you can see, was mainly covered in confetti.

After all the dancing we popped down to the College (high school) to bother the kids there and cover their playground in confetti (the primary school teachers having sensibly timed the handing out of confetti so it happened after we had left the primary school grounds, and was all used up before we got back there - so no clearing up for them). Once we'd trashed their playground we headed up to a field behind the convent where Monsieur Carneval was burned (big papier maché character). And so with that bizarre combination of the religious and the pagan, we were off back to school for tea.

You could have had a photo of a nun gazing at a little princess, or of the little princess kicking up leaves in a gutter, but I don't know the relevant king and queen so didn't have a chance to ask permission. So you have the back of my daughter's hair instead. If only I'd got it all in so you could see the neat (home-made) haircut.