Spraoi sa Ghaeltacht......

Táimid díreach taréis teacht aráis ó seachtain i nGaeltacht Gaoth Dobhair.... agus bhí an-am againn....Bím ag tnúth leis an saoire seo i rith na mbliana de bharr comhluadar, seans an teanga a labhairt agus focús a dhéanamh ar ár gceol, damhsa agus ár gcúltúr.....
Basically what I'm saying above is that we are just back from a great week in the beautiful Gaeltacht of Gaoth Dobhair, Co. Donegal.. this was our third time to go to this particular region and ninth consecutive year to spend time in the Gaeltacht.... I thought I wouldn't find a Gaeltacht area I liked better than Bally Ferritéar in Kerry but this week has been just brilliant..... I look forward to this week, a chance to focus a little on our culture, traditions of music and dance (of which I excel at neither!!) and of course the chance to use our 'cúpla focail' (speak in Irish)... it is a pretty full week for all, everyone from the youngest to the oldest are catered for and we have class from 10 in the morning to one and afternoons are also fully planned out, tours to Glenveigh National Park, climbing Mt. Errigal, treasure hunt in the car (we won again this year!) and lots more. At night there are music sessions, table quizzes, a céili night (where we all show how much we have learnt, or not in our dancing classes all week!!) which is great fun and the kids and the adults put on a concert (ceolchoirm) on the final night... Needless to say with little ones, we don't take part in everything, otherwise we would have some very cranky tired whiny little bodies on board..

Co. Donegal is such a scenic part of Ireland... here is Mount Errigal which I have yet to climb but the adventurous among us had a shot at getting to the top during the week.....I was told that this part of Donegal ~ Gaoth Dobhair is the most densely populated rural area in Europe...

In previous years we have rented a house but towards the end of our week last year we ended up in the lóistín (lodgings/guesthouse) below and we liked it so much that we decided to book it again for this year.... The lady who runs it, Máire (pronounced Moya) is unbelievable. Des Bishop(Irish/American comedian) stayed here during his quest to learn Irish and while making his series 'In the name of the Fada' and of course Moya had a few lessons to teach him!!!! She added so much to our week, a Céad Míle Fáilte for everyone, we got to practice our Gaeilge with her, although I found it so hard to understand her Donegal Irish!..While we were in bed for the night she was busy baking bread for the morning... Our first night a few of us met on the landing and shared a bottle of wine as we were keeping an eye on the little ones while they slept... Every night after that Moya placed four wine glasses on the first floor landing ... needless to say we did not want them to go to waste so had to go out then and buy the wine!!!!!! Nice touch..
Below is a picture of Elena with her friend Éimhín.... We don't get to meet that often so this week has become synonomous with our annual get-together of our family with Éimhín's..... minus the dads of course who are not fortunate enough to be teachers and to have ample time off in the summer to catch up with good friends.!!!!.... Éimhín's Mum Jo is a good friend of mine from our college days and she and I share the same interest in the Irish language so it is a good chance for us all to meet. Ernán, her son is a year and a half younger than Darrelle and they have always got on well and still do... Éimhín and Elena are both 6 and also have in common that they are two Kazakh girls..... bet that red hair had you fooled and that you thought Eimhín a true Irish girl but in fact Alex and Éimhín both spent their first year in the same Baby House in Kazakhstan... So needless to say we value the latest connection we have with this family...
Sinéad, who was on the course with her Mom (one very funny lady who kept us entertained every night with stories over the bottle of wine on the first floor landing!!)was very much in demand and was appointed resident hairdresser to the two small girls....

Here are the two girls with Moya, the bean an tí.... She was soo good with the little ones and the ever persuasive Elena, who was so excited about their part in the drama Red Riding Hood and their dance tendered an invitation to Moya to come and see them... and.... she did.....They were so chuffed to see here there and it was really good of her to come....when she had bread to bake, pigs to feed and wine glasses to leave out...!!!

Sinéad, Elena and Éimhín....

The house was like a Feirm Peataí (Pet Farm). It had muca, (pigs), uain (lambs), siciní (chickens) and more and Elena was able to go with the bean an tí to collect eggs, feed the pigs, and in general check on the animals. They loved it...
Elena checking out the pigs from every angle!!

There was go leor leor deagóirí (teenagers) also.

Darrelle, Ernán ~ son of Jo and Susie (here with Bridget) are in here somewhere... If there was one aspect of the week which I had to pinpoint as a bit of a concern was that Darrelle was not as content as other years... Despite the making of new friends and the meeting of old friends she was missing her friends from home and next year is hoping to leave her ol' Mom behind and spend 3 weeks in the Gaeltacht with her school friends.... Guess that time has come:(

Still maybe she will do both!!! They put on a real funny sketch on the last night and she will 'kill' me if I put it on here so I'd better not! So I think she had more fun than she was letting on!!!!!

New little friends and dancing partners to meet!

Even Alex got to be goofy with his new friend James... these guys sure made a lot of noise when they got together.... Alex loved 'school' which I was so relieved about as he hopes to be attending his own naíonra in September.... he protested loudly every night when we attempted to get him up the stairs to bed as he wanted to go to school.... I hope in my next post to be proclaiming that he WILL be going to naíonra and that he IS fully potty trained but for now I will spare you the details and keep praying.....One step forward, two steps back.....

This was Alex's first time on stage so we had no idea what he would do... or whether he even would go up... As you can see he did not disappoint us!!!! And nice to know his first thought was for his mother and everything else was secondary.....!!!! I had moved from the side to the centre so that I could video him a little better so of course he had no idea where I had disappeared to... Here they are doing '2 little dicky-birds' and 'If you're happy & you know it... ' as Gaeilge!!

The poor quality of the video is due to me laughing and shaking the camera....Seemingly people kept pointing towards me to tell him where I had moved to!!!

A short snippet of Elena and Éimhín's dance...

Great week... Go mbeirimid beo ag an am seo arís...

Looking forward to next year already... despite the fact that we arrived back late last night and have spent today in close quarters with the washing machine!!:)