Seems like our Blog has a “little brother” now:

http://swissorkney2013.wordpress.com/

M&J have started their own blog, which gives you the opportunity to see both sides of the story... Maybe it’s also a “little sister” - and maybe it will turn into a big brother ;o) as Jeremy probably has more time and energy to write. Also, I think, Jeremy’s blog looks much prettier, so I’ll have to see if we can “pimp” ours a little! But anyway, I’m sure it’s worth looking at both of them now and then!

On another happy note: My application for my grant was accepted. Am very happy, but also a bit weary, as I’m not quite sure, what that will mean and how much work it will be. I’ll probably only spend about three days a week at the school, and the other two writing up and researching... Will have to write at least one article about it “somewhere” but the Magazine of Swiss teachers has signalled an interest, so I’m quite hopeful!

On a not so happy note: We had a small accident with our car. My Dad bumped into it. As he is my father, his insurance doesn’t want to pay. And as we know who did it, my insurance won’t pay for “parking damage”, as that is only for “unknown culprit”... But, luckily it just strengthens our conviction that we want to sell the car again when we return...
Ok, I think that’s all for the moment - actually quite a lot, considering I wrote only three days ago!

Well, while I’m at it: Tomorrow is STACK UP day! half a million people all over the world will be stacking (beakers) for at least half an hour - and I will make sure the 250 pupils of our school will be part of the world record! www.thewssa.com/stackup/2013_stackup/
Ok, but now that’s all for the moment! I’ll keep you posted - well, that’s why you come to this blog, I assume...

When I started my blog way back in April I was convinced I would write it in English. So I wrote my first draft, but then, thinking about it, I realised that it would be mostly German speaking people who would read it, so I decided to write it in German. But whenever I was “writing my blog in my head” (mostly when riding my bike) I would always do this in English. Even when talking to Matt about it, all my sentences would be in English! I find that very peculiar and don’t quite understand it, but that’s how it is! But, anyway I wrote all my entries in German, always thinking “Soon I’m going to start an English blog, too!”
Well, spring passed and so did summer, even autumn is nearly gone - but now, here it is! I will start with what I wrote way back in April, explaining why we want to come to Orkney:

Why do we want to come to Orkney? Well, apart from the really obvious things like the unbelievably numerous and interesting “normal tourist attractions”, all the amazing wildlife and the fascinating weather it’s also the feeling we get when we’re there – or even when we think about it! There’s just something magical about Orkney, which gripped us, when we read about it for the first time sometime at the beginning of 2012, when we were planning our trip to Scotland. We read about Orkney and said: “This just might be a good place for a big adventure!” As there’s so much to see all around Scotland (and we only “did” the Highlands) – we only had two nights to spend there. We didn’t meet a real Orcadian, we hardly saw the sun - but still, we fell in love in with these islands!

In the meantime we have found wonderful people who will house swap with us (we will call them M&J in this blog), we have bought a car for the first time in our lives, so we can not only house- but also car-swap, we have visited “our house” and “our school” in Deerness, we have sent and received nearly a hundred emails with M&J, and probably just as many again with schools, newspapers, officials, other people who have house swapped in the past, ferry companies and all kinds of other people and places and we are getting more and more excited! We’ve been planning and dreaming - and explaining why Scotland in winter - for nearly two years - and now it’s only just over six weeks till we leave!
We are very very excited!

Just to make sure we’re all on the same level, here’s the plan: The kids and me are taking 6 months off school and Matt is reducing his job to 60% and will work “from home” so we can live in Deerness, Orkney from January till July 2014! Nanouk and Maleah will visit St.Andrew’s Primary school and I will do some job-shadowing at the school for the first two months. Then, in the summer holidays we will come back to Switzerland and resume our “old life”, Nanouk and Maleah joining their classes and me going back to my teaching.

So, that was quite a big entry, but I’m happy to have started the English blog “in real”, and it no longer being just in my head! I hope you enjoy reading about what’s going on and will come back to read what’s going on!

A blog in English!

Now, all we need to do is get it written regularly!