Level 8 Skate at last!

It's been an uphill struggle, according to Avery, the dreaded required "mohawk" being a nearly impossible feat to achieve. But it's finally been done! And as a reward, she finally got the Fine Red Shoes about which she has been dreaming for months and months. There's a lovely shop in the Marylebone High Street called Rachel Riley, full of clothes for mostly children, but I did get a very wearable and yet chic tweed skirt with leather buckles for myself. Last spring Avery saw a pair of shoes there that exceeded what even I will spend on my child (and for sure she is better dressed than am I). So I had to put my foot, so to speak, down, and she was all right with that. Some things are just too crazy.

But we never forgot them, and every once in awhile visited them in the shop, just to see if they had gone on sale, but they never did. Until last week! John and I were out and about in the street waiting to pick Avery up from something or other, and there they were, massively discounted and in her size. What to keep them for, though? It came to us: Level 8. So today was the day. She jumped up and down and screamed. "This is what I wished for when I threw my coin into the Trevi Fountain in Rome!" Good on you, Aves. Her school friends Isabelle and Sarah just happened to be there to share the glory, which was nice.

Now we are off (after meatloaf sandwiches for lunch, not to be despised) to see "Miss Potter," the Beatrix Potter story with Renee Zellweger. Not sure about her, but everyone says her English accent is remarkable, and it's a grey, rainy, spitty day so we need some cheer.

All this frivolity serves a dual purpose: to mark the last day of the long Christmas vac, and to put off for one more day the awful task of cleaning out the kitchen pantry. John is convinced that if I throw away every bottle with a quarter of an inch of balsamic vinegar, every plastic bag with five pine nuts, every container of outdated baking soda, every spice with price tags in pounds from the LAST time we lived in London, we won't actually have to move. We will all be able to live JUST IN THE KITCHEN. Anything to make him happy... In the meantime, congratulatory telegrams from all over the skating world are pouring in for Avery, and I must run answer the door one more time.