Parlez-vous francais?

I do. Or at least I used to. With a sojourn in France coming up in May 2006, I thought I should brush up on my French and expand my vocabulary to include a few quilting and textile terms. And so I am off to my local community college for nine evening classes starting next week. Today I purchased the compulsory text, French for Starters. It looks slightly more basic than I was aiming for but I shall withhold judgment until I have attended a class or two (and see just how much I have forgotten).

The trip to France is our part of a non-simultaneous home and car exchange. We had two couples staying at our home while we were away in December. Apart from a few technical glitches - trying to explain our multi-remote, home theatre system was obviously way too ambitious - everything seemed to go smoothly and our visitors got to enjoy the beach and surrounding area. For our part, we get to enjoy Europe in the spring and will be spending 2+ weeks in the French Pyrenees; 10 or so days in the Yorkshire Dales; 2 days in Edinburgh and a week or so visiting friends and family in the London area. We were last in Europe in 1999 so we are looking forward to our adventure.