Frazzled Working Mum

Back to School

2011-02-02T14:38:00.001+11:00

After the long summer holidays, the girls are back to school and we are all adjusting to our new routine. Lauren started kindergarten yesterday with her new class and new teacher, Mr Agnew. Many of her old friends from Prep started Kindergarten at different schools or in different classes, so she was disappointed not to see them after the long holiday. Jocelyn restarted pre-prep but also with mainly new children; I think she missed her sister, who was no longer in Prep.

Both girls were a bit nervous at first, surrounded by the unfamiliar. However, by the afternoon they seemed to have settled in as reports at coming home time were good. This was a real relief for us as parents – we’re aware of the number of changes that they’ve faced over the last 18 months or so and that as a family we could all do with a bit of stability now.

To give them some stability, we are going to have just one nanny who is going to stay with us for the foreseeable future. The girls get on really well with her; we have been very lucky. Our previous nannies, who could only do part time or casual work for us this year, will still see them on the occasional weekend.

I’m going to invite some of Lauren’s little friends that she misses around for some play dates, to ease her into the transition better. Jocey will be pleased to see them too – she loved playing with “the big girls”!

At least there will be no more house moves for some time.

Zoom Zoom Zoom!

2010-08-20T12:12:00.001+10:00

Last weekend, Lauren had her first ever proper birthday party at Zoom. I think it was a huge success because she had an amazing time and loved it! I was a little afraid at first that she might be shy seeing her friends out of context but she took it all in her stride and had lots of fun running, bouncing and zooming around the climbing frames with all her classmates.

We also had lots of opportunity to get to know the other parents a bit better – almost impossible when you are a working mum, especially as I rarely do drop off now. Besides, everyone is always in a rush to get to work, so it’s often impossible to have a chat.

I think a lot of the parents hadn’t realised that we’d just moved from the UK. However, we are fast making friends!

On the day, the children arrived, gave their presents to Lauren and promptly disappeared into the vast network of climbing frames. We had to round them up again after half an hour to feed them lunch and cake – an interesting experience! In this photo, you can see Lauren sitting in the birthday girl seat surrounded by her friends.

Here is the birthday girl with two of her friends, Sarah and Emma. Jocey is in the background playing with her balloon!

More of Lauren’s friends waiting impatiently for the cake to arrive…

Birthday girl and Mummy cutting the cake after the candles were blown out. She wasn’t keen to do it herself – I don’t think she wanted to cut into it and spoil it!

She clearly had a great time at the party and I think all her little friends did too. We did do a bit of running around but at the end of it I felt we had been good hosts. The next morning, Lauren had a marathon present opening session. She was really excited and loved seeing what her friends had chosen for her.

Afterwards, Lauren and Jocey spent all afternoon playing with the various toys and gifts – we have more than enough to keep the children entertained for a long time to come! I was really touched by the thoughtfulness of her little friends as many wrote out the birthday cards themselves and drew little pictures for Lauren inside the cards (and the inspired gift choices by their mummies – it gave me more ideas for the next party Lauren has to go to!).

Lauren spent the latter part of the afternoon and the early evening writing out thank you cards for all her friends. It was a huge task (20 cards) but we did it together (I wrote out the actual thank you part for her) and I explained how important it was because of all the care and thoughtfulness shown to her by her friends in giving her presents on her birthday. Unfortunately, as Lauren has a short attention span, it took us a while to complete the task but by the evening it was all done and I was proud of her for doing it.

A successful end to a great 5th birthday!

Cake Marathon

2010-08-13T22:33:00.001+10:00

Tomorrow, we are having Lauren’s first big birthday party. She’s going to be 5 and has invited all her friends from her class in prep; we are taking 26 children to the local indoor soft play centre called Zoom. Being a winter birthday and not being sure how the weather would be, I didn’t take any chances. Perhaps if we are in a bigger house next year, we’ll consider something outdoors.

Lauren’s never had a party like this before; this was partly our reluctance to host one for toddlers in a small house with almost no garden and partly because Lauren never asked for one before now. Lauren has always been a shy child and didn’t really enjoy parties when she was younger. She ended up clinging to me and not playing with any of the other children at most of the parties we ever went to – if not for all of it then at least for the first 30 minutes.

Since coming to Australia, she has really gained in confidence and is so much more at ease with herself. I remember taking the girls to the park in the first week we were here – I noticed that the girls were too shy to approach the other children to play with them. I was really sad to see it. However, within a short time of starting school and nursery here, they were different children. I think it’s partly to do with the relaxed and friendly way of life here – their school friends were quick to befriend them and make them feel welcome, and the fact that they are happy and settled, and thus more confident.

So she asked me for a birthday party, and I agreed that she could have one.

When I went to organise her cake, I had initially planned to order one through the local cake shop Delany’s; I’d been told that it was very good. When I walked in and saw their sample book, I had to agree – each cake is unique and designed to the customer’s specifications. I could see the staff constructing and decorating the cakes by hand behind the counter. The cakes were really amazing!

However, I felt I couldn’t justify the cost at the moment as we are saving hard for a house purchase, and the cakes start at about $70 AUD, getting progressively more expensive as the cake becomes more decorated and complex. Maybe one for a special birthday, like an 18th or a 40th!

I was left with no other option but to make my own. Sadly, I am not artistic – I have an eye for colour and design but I cannot draw or paint to save myself. This did not put me off (well, perhaps a little!) and armed with my trusted Jane Asher book, I set about making Lauren a cake she could be proud of. My previous attempts had all been rather more humble. This was Lauren’s first ever birthday cake.

Although I can make a tasty cake, I find the decorating part really difficult – when my brother Jason and my sister-in-law Charlotte asked me to make their wedding cake, I stipulated that I was happy to bake them but someone else had to decorate it.

Lauren loves fairies and princesses – one of her favourite cartoons is “Ben and Holly’s Little Kingdom”, from the same company responsible for Peppa Pig. Just like the Peppa Pig cartoons, there is a lot of great humour aimed at adults as well as children. I love Ben and Holly too!

So it was from Ben and Holly that I took my inspiration for the cake. I was going to attempt the Fairy Forest Cake.

Following Jane’s instructions, I baked a large 10 inch chocolate sponge to form the base of the cake. I always tweak the recipe to lessen the amount of sugar and also added a dollop of crème fraiche to keep the cake moist. Having gone to a few birthday parties, the cakes and the icing tend to be overly sweet, which I really dislike. Here was the end result. You can see all the icing that I’d made up ready to go in the background.

First, the butter icing went onto the top and sides. I then had to roughen the surface on the top to make it look like grass. So here is the cake with the “grass” on.

As well as the cake, I’d made some butter cookies the day before in the shape of trees, plants, flowers and butterflies. I had to raid the girls’ Play-Doh set to get the cutters – their play cutters were all in the correct shapes for the cake (my cooking ones were sadly much more boring). Naturally, I washed the cutters before using them on the cookie dough!

A few hours later, I’d decorated the cookies with the brightly coloured Royal Icing – painstakingly applied with a small paintbrush for better control and some texture – and applied the necessary sparkly cachous (the metallic edible beads). Here is the finished cake in all its glory, complete with 2 fairy princesses and a little fairy with her fairy cat.

I wish you could have seen Lauren’s face when she came home from the park to find her cake – she was in awe and loved it! I have put the cake at the back of the kitchen worktop to protect it from prying fingers.

The trip to Zoom in the car will be interesting tomorrow – I have no cake box! Thank goodness it is only a 5 minute drive away…

Wollongong, Sound of the Sea

2010-08-12T18:56:00.001+10:00

We call this city home now and have done for almost exactly 5 months. We love it here and in many ways it found us as much as we discovered it. When we first talked about coming back to Australia, we had no idea we’d be coming here. We’d never travelled to the Illawarra back in 2002, and had never heard of the place until my agent first mentioned that there was a job going there that I ought to consider.

This is an aerial view of the city; what a beautiful place! We live right on the harbour at the moment. The name Wollongong is unusual – one theory is that it comes from an Aboriginal word meaning “sound of the sea”.

When we initially arrived we were living in temporary accommodation by North Beach. Of course one of our first jobs on arrival was to explore the beach!

Here are the girls playing down at the beach shortly after we’d arrived. This was the day after they said that they didn’t want to go back to London – and who can blame them?

Despite us arriving in early autumn, the girls spent most of their days out and about, playing at the park and enjoying the weather.

It wasn’t long before we found ourselves a more permanent base to call home; a gorgeous flat by the harbour.

We love living here. The beach is just across the road and there is also a children’s playground there, which the children love.

We had about two weeks in the flat without furniture before our belongings were released by Customs in Sydney. It was quite a shock to see all our stuff after almost a year of living out of boxes!

It took about two weeks to unpack properly, but when all was finished, it was a really good feeling to be finally “home”. The girls were also thrilled to have all their toys and books back.

We didn’t bring their beds from the UK because they were toddler beds and not true singles (and because one got broken in Richmond!) but we bought them a “princess bunk bed” to compensate for this.

Initially, they both loved their bunk beds but more recently, Jocey has been going through a phase of refusing to sleep in her own bed (and wanting to come into our bedroom instead). I wonder if this is partly to do with the fact that she can’t see Lauren in the night – in their old bedroom, there was enough room for the beds to go side by side but there wasn’t enough room for this in our present flat.

Even I got some new toys – a shiny new fridge, a big new washing machine and new tumble drier. I love the big capacities of my new washer and drier. Seems daft that you can get excited by this – but when it makes your life easier, it makes you happier!

The weeks flew by but we did manage to see Aunt Candice and Uncle Kenneth on their return from an extended holiday in Hong Kong. They decided to see us in Wollongong and came to visit us one Saturday in June.

I cooked a big seafood lunch and we even had some barbequed satays – our first BBQ in Australia! I think we were all really full afterwards; a walked by the beach certainly helped our digestion. We all had a great time and it was lovely to see them.

Over the last two months, we have been very busy – Jase started work with a subsidiary company of one of the big banks in Sydney and commutes up every day. Now that he’s got used to the rhythm of that commute by train, he tells me that it’s actually not that bad. It means an early start and a late finish, but he gets time to sit down on the train and enjoy his new iPad.

Of course, it was also a welcome relief to see him working in a role suited to his level of experience and finally get paid properly for the first time (surprisingly, he got a big pay rise compared to the UK).

Plus, I am pretty sure that this view compensates for the commute – this is the view from his desk!

Back in Wollongong, we’ve had a number of fun outings, including a trip to Symbio Zoo back in April. The girls loved seeing all the animals; here they are patting the miniature horses.

They especially loved seeing the koalas and kangaroos up close. It was really nicely set up and ideal for families with young children. We all had a great time!

More recently, we also went to the circus – a first for everyone except me. It was really good fun (except the opening act with the lions was slightly terrifying when it became obvious that the lions weren’t in the mood to “play” and the handler looked like he might get eaten any moment!) and the girls got to ride on ponies at the interval – which they loved.

The girls have also had fun going to the theatre for the first time. I was initially expecting problems because we had heard from her teachers that Lauren had not enjoyed a show at the Sydney Tower when she and her class had gone on a day trip to Sydney. She cried and had to be taken out because she was scared. It was a shame because I think otherwise she had really enjoyed going to see the Opera House and the Tower, as part of their term learning about buildings and architecture.

So I promised the girls that they could each bring a favourite soft toy to the theatre. I really wanted to take them because I thought it was time they experienced the theatre and the children’s musical that was in town sounded a lot of fun.

To my surprise and relief, they loved it. Despite being apprehensive when the lights initially went down, as soon as the actors came on stage and the singing started, they were mesmerised. Afterwards, they both asked if they could go to the theatre again.
Here they are after “Wombat Stew” last month.

To round off a great day, we went down to the beach for ice cream, and to enjoy the winter sun.

Two weeks ago, we went back to the theatre (after it went down so well with them the first time) to see Dora the Explorer, the musical. They both still enjoy Dora, and this was based on the story of the City of the Lost Toys.

They were impatient waiting for the musical to start. When Boots and Dora finally came onto the stage, their faces lit up with excitement! They had a wonderful time.

The thing I like about the theatre in Wollongong (the Illawarra Performing Arts Centre or IPAC) is that it is a really intimate venue, so great for taking the children. At Dora, we were sat in the second last row, but still had a good view of the stage and weren’t too far away.

I think we will definitely be going back in the future. Hooray for our new lives in the ‘Gong!

Winters

2010-08-12T15:04:00.000+10:00

When we left the UK, it was winter. Travelling to the Southern Hemisphere, we found ourselves facing another winter. It’s been a strange year.

It’s almost exactly five months since we came to Australia. I can’t believe how quickly that time has flown, nor how quickly we’ve settled into life here. Although we’ve had to adapt to new things, mostly things have felt oddly right somehow.

It’s almost Lauren’s fifth birthday – and her very first winter birthday. I’m baking a chocolate birthday cake for her – she’s invited 25 of her school friends to a party this weekend, so I’ll be busy getting everything ready for that later.

Back in our last UK winter, we celebrated another birthday - Granddad’s 70th birthday with him in York. This is Granddad opening his birthday cards and presents in the morning (girls helping of course).

Here is one in the evening with the steak and kidney pudding that I cooked specially for the birthday dinner.

Despite our facing our second winter, I only have to look at these photos to realise that Australian winters are a lot kinder than British ones. This particular day in Edinburgh, we took the girls down to the playground at the Dell, near my parents’ house. It was bitterly cold and there was snow on the ground.

The girls were wrapped up in about 4 layers. I was reminded how much colder Edinburgh gets compared to London!

Although we were sorry to leave family and friends behind in the UK, we set off from Edinburgh to Hong Kong with a fair amount of excitement. After all, it was the start of our new life in Australia.

More family celebrations followed on our arrival to Hong Kong. We were treated to an amazing banquet on the second night with my Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles. We went to Grandfather’s favourite restaurant in Mong Kok. Here we are with the whole family!

During our time in Hong Kong, there was time for a visit to Kowloon Park, which was my favourite park as a little girl. Here the girls at looking at the goldfish in the big central pond.

We were treated to a visit to Happy Valley, home of Hong Kong horse racing; we had a really fun evening in one of the executive boxes enjoying the buffet dinner and the races, courtesy of Aunt Kitty. I won an unbelievable $580 HKD (amateur’s luck, I think) – I think everyone else made a loss that night!

And of course, no visit to Hong Kong would be complete without a trip to Disneyland Hong Kong. The girls had been looking forward to this for months.

Last time we went, Lauren had been pretty much scared of everything. This time, I just about managed to persuade her to go on some of the rides, but she wasn’t impressed! Jocey, on the other hand, loved all the rides and was desperate to go on more.

The standout moment of the holiday was definitely our encounter with the “Princess Mice”. The girls met the mice from Cinderella and absolutely adored them. There were lots of hugs, kisses and giggles and they almost refused to leave! Here we are with the Princess Mice.

We also had the opportunity to watch the parade (which they loved – they watch the video footage Jase took at the time over and over again), meet Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Pooh bear. I think Minnie was their next favourite, followed by Pooh, who was apparently very soft!

Soon, even this time came to an end and we found ourselves at our last family meal in Hong Kong. Even though my family were sad to see us leave, they gave us a great send off and soon we were on the plane to Australia.

Our new lives were about to start.

Our last winter in the UK

2010-05-29T20:06:00.000+10:00

When I wrote the post about the Tooth Fairies, we were just heading into our last winter in the UK. What a winter it turned out to be – bitterly cold with more persistent snow on the ground than I could remember for decades.

We were all trapped indoors for long periods of time. Jocey decided that our flat needed some redecoration; I found this on our tumble drier one evening!

I think they knew something was happening, or perhaps they sensed the enormous stress Jase and I were going through in order to pull off the move to Australia. They were often unsettled at night and sometimes demanded to sleep in our bed. The lack of sleep for us made things pretty tough, and poor Jase developed high blood pressure as a result.

It started to snow on December 16th. No-one was that excited at first because it didn’t look too impressive to start with. Little did we realise what was to come!

It just didn’t stop. And when it melted, fresh snow fell and we went back to square one. We had a white Christmas for the first time in years, and it was bitterly cold, regularly falling to several degrees below zero during the day and at night. However, it always felt colder because of the constant northerly winds, making the wind chill factor really unpleasant.

Our paths, parks and gardens were turned into a winter wonderland. Wrapped up against the cold, we braved the conditions because the girls were going stir crazy in the house. The girls wouldn’t stay out longer than 15 minutes before asking to go indoors.

On top of this, when the snows came, we lost power in our flat for 5 days (fortunately not in a row). The cold took out some circuit in our local substation, depriving part of our block and several nearby buildings of electricity. The nights were especially hard; cooking by candle and torchlight on a (luckily) gas hob and snuggling under our duvets in the living room because it was so cold without heating and hot water. The ambient temperature was so low that our fridge and freezer stuff remained chilled despite the power being off – I guess this was something to be thankful for.

We did end up eating out and getting takeaways from our local Chinese Restaurant in Richmond quite a bit as a result – this was one positive thing to come out of the cold snap. Escaping to a brightly lit and warm restaurant was just so lovely; strange how a power cut makes you appreciate these things!

One weekend when the weather was a little bit warmer, we ventured out to the Science Museum and Natural History museums, aware that it might be our last opportunity for some time.

The girls loved looking around the exhibits and doing all the interactive things. Unfortunately, quite a large section suitable for the girls’ age group was closed for renovation. Despite this we had a really good time and enjoyed our lunch in the funky cafe, even if we couldn’t see the food properly due to the underlit tables!

At the end of the afternoon, we walked over to the Natural History Museum to see the dinosaurs. Lauren was particularly impressed with the T Rex (bizarrely – I thought she would be scared!) and came home with a cuddly version from the museum shop.

It was all too much for some others though…

During this time, every weekend we were trying to get ourselves ready for the big move in one way or another, whether this was to pack or to get rid of 8 years of accumulated junk. So when the day for the move finally came in mid February, we were ready for them and everything went smoothly.

In some ways, we were sad to say goodbye to the little flat in Richmond. Apart from the power cuts and the problems with the electricity points in the kitchen, we had a happy time there. When everything was packed in boxes on the final night, it was strange to see it so bare.

We were finally ready for a long string of goodbyes to our family and friends.

Leaving our old lives behind

2010-05-29T17:35:00.001+10:00

In late 2008 (yes, seems like an age ago now) Jase and I had a conversation about London. For a long time, we hadn’t been particularly happy with our lives there. We had moved to London after our year in Sydney because work had taken us there but neither of us were comfortable living in the big city.

I think, to be fair, that initially it was bearable because we were just the two of us. However, we were already beyond the age where going out all the time was attractive so I guess didn’t make the most of the potential nightlife in London. We occasionally went to the theatre, the opera and to restaurants, but because the cost of living was so high and travelling was such a pain, we didn’t do this on a regular basis.

After the children were born, we quickly realised how difficult life in London with young children was, especially where both parents have to work. I couldn’t afford to go part-time and we ended up putting both children into nursery. We both worked long hours and felt exhausted all the time. Not much of a life at all.

I think sometime in November 2008, we realised that enough was enough. We both agreed that London wasn’t for us and that we wanted out. Every day, we felt like the walking dead, trapped in a never ending exhausting routine which held no fun and was always fuelled by money worries. With a massive mortgage and crippling childcare fees, our money wasn’t going very far at all and we were still living like students. Our accountant worked out that after our food and bills were paid we were living on about £75 per month between the four of us!

Not very encouraging for me after working so hard through 6 years at university and a further 10 years in training posts and sitting exams to become a consultant in the NHS. The pay was surprisingly poor (and no hope of private practice – nor urge to do it in my field; that was never my wish). I guess I was naive to think that becoming a consultant would have changed that.

I think that it wasn’t just London (although that played a large part); we did talk about moving to other places in the UK. To be frank, neither of us could think of anywhere else where we wanted to go to live and where the quality of life would have significantly improved for all of us. Nowhere held the special place in our hearts that Australia did. Hard to explain that to those who have not lived there before, but we loved the country, the multiculturalism (especially as our girls were from two cultures and I wanted them to be comfortable with that), the laid back and friendly attitude to life and the potential for a much more outdoors life - all so appealing.

It wasn’t an easy decision; we talked at length about how we would tell our family and friends, how we would deal with the inevitable negative comments and people who wouldn’t support our move. The hardest thing was not being able to talk about it; I couldn’t even blog until it was common news to all, including at work. I think even then, our families felt uncomfortable talking about something that they weren’t looking forward to.

We had tried to emigrate before in 2006 but the time had not been right. When I enquired about jobs at that time, the opportunities did not present themselves and we encountered a number of dead ends. So we shelved the idea, but to be honest it never left our minds.

Two years later, the time was right and when I started to make tentative enquiries with an agency, I was surprised by how quickly they responded with potential jobs. In a matter of a couple of months, I had a job interview lined up in Wollongong, the third largest population centre after Sydney in New South Wales, located just 60km south of Sydney.

I managed to go for a day trip (yes, how mad!) from Hong Kong during our holiday there in Feb 2009. It was really stressful because at the time Jocey was unwell with a fever in Hong Kong and I was worried about her. I landed in Sydney in the early morning after a 9 hour flight, drove to Wollongong, had my interview, drove back to Sydney to have dinner with my aunt and uncle, then drove back to the airport to catch the evening plane back to Hong Kong. I landed in Hong Kong in the early morning absolutely exhausted, but with a job offer on the table.

It then took a further year to get all the paperwork for my visas and professional registration sorted out. At times, the process was difficult and frustrating. We had to sell our house and get rid of a lot of unnecessary possessions in preparation, and with each step it felt like we were cutting another cord tying us to our old lives in the UK. Cathartic in many ways.

Additionally, life at work had become unbearable during 2009 with the endless unreasonable demands from management, wrangling over hours and pay and a strong sense that I was no longer able to make a difference to people, coupled with lack of recognition where I felt I had made a difference. Faced with absolutely no job satisfaction, I became very low and disillusioned, making it easier to walk away from the job and a workplace that I had initially loved.

When we stepped out of the plane and onto Australian soil back in March of this year, I firmly closed the book on that chapter of our lives. It was as if a massive weight had been lifted off our shoulders and we were free at last to live again.

Pause for breath

2010-05-29T16:25:00.001+10:00

I cannot believe it.

I am actually having a slow weekend.

I can’t actually remember the last time I had one of these rare beasts. My recent life seems to have been taken over with either childcare commitments or packing / unpacking boxes. We have lived in a state of impermanence for some time.

We’ve had a week of really changeable weather, with a major storm on Wednesday which threatened one of the local suburbs with flooding. I was taking part in a disaster exercise at work, only to be notified at the end of it that we might have to do it all for real.

Fortunately, the storm passed and no-one came to any harm; however, more wild weather has been forecast for this weekend, so we are staying put at home.

Lauren and I have been baking a cake this afternoon. It’s fast become my all time favourite recipe, the carrot cake one from the 1950’s Women’s Institute Cookbook that I found on holiday in Devon last year. She even helped me by licking out the bowl and doing the washing up (and not just by licking…).

The gorgeous smell of the cake has filled our apartment; I’ve just taken it out of the oven and will ice it with a cream cheese icing later. It only seems fair as we donated two such cakes to the TIGS Great Fete last weekend and we all missed out on actually eating some. I really hope whoever bought the cakes last weekend appreciated them!

So I guess that there’s no longer any excuse for not catching up on the last few months!

New Beginning

2010-03-12T00:55:00.002+11:00

I'm sitting in our hotel room in Hong Kong tonight on our last night before completing the final leg of our journey in emigrating to Australia. It has been quite a stressful process which has taken up about 15 months of our lives. However, we are hopeful that it will bring some really positive changes to our lives.

Once we find an internet connection in Australia, I am looking to resume the writing of this blog; so much has happened which has been important to document, even if it is difficult to put into words. However others have seen the events of the last year, it will be a record of our past for the family's future.

The meals have been eaten, the photos have been taken and almost all of our goodbyes have been said. Now it's about finding the time to write about the transition and looking forward to our new beginning in Australia.

The rush toward Christmas

2009-12-17T07:22:00.002+11:00

Last weekend we had the last of Lauren’s parties for this season. It’s been a busy time and she’s had a packed social calendar. Even Jocelyn, my two year old has been to some parties, so life has been non-stop.

My favourite has to be the one hosted by Lauren’s friend Oliver (who is Jocey’s best friend Georgia’s big brother) where the girls went together in almost matching fairy outfits. It was (of course) a Pirate and Fairy Party.

Now naturally, any self-respecting fairy would have a wand as well.

Jocey was really annoyed when she found out that her wand didn’t actually work. She was muttering “Acradabra” to herself and using the wand to hit things, like the furniture and her sister. Probably trying to see if she could changes us into frogs, bless her.

I think Lauren was really pleased that Jocey was invited and was coming with her. As I’ve said in previous posts, Lauren is really shy so I think she was looking forward to having Jocey along for company.

Like any good mum anticipating major sweetie consumption, I made the girls brush their teeth prior and after the party. Here are my “tooth fairies”; I just love this picture!

At the actual party, Fairy Pirate Lauren was still a bit shy but Fairy Pirate Jocey got stuck in and had a wonderful time joining in with the big children. They both had a wonderful time – the party was incredibly well thought out and the games were really well organised – well done to Oliver’s Mummy Amie for throwing two fabulous parties for the children!

I think the full social calendar has been lovely for them but also quite tiring. There have been quite a few days recently where the children were just happy to relax a bit and maybe have a bit of a sleep on the sofa.

It’s a long week for them (as they go to nursery full time) and they are busy too when they are there, so I guess I am not surprised that sometimes they just want to stay at home to play. Here are the girls doing some very good sharing and playing together on Jocey’s portable toy stove, which they both love (it makes the most fantastic sizzling sounds!).

We’re beginning to realise that it’s not only Lauren who is artistic (Lauren’s pictures are really fab for a four year old, as this recent work of art demonstrates). Incidentally, Lauren later revised that drawing to show me with the rest of the family in the garden (clearly after I had been released from kitchen duties).

Jocey’s artistic streak has also been coming to the fore. She’s really beginning to enjoy painting as much as Lauren. Here’s the wonderful canvas that she painted at her friend Georgia’s party.

And this one she drew at nursery to raise money for charity. Of course, being dutiful parents, we bought it at the charity auction. I love her bold brush strokes and her use of colour!

She has also felt the need to do a spot of redecorating about the house. Clearly, there just wasn’t enough bold colour in the kitchen. Two Saturdays ago, I went into the kitchen mid-morning to discover this:

I was doubled over laughing!

Fortunately, I could see the funny side because it wasn’t permanent marker, it wasn’t on the wall or floor and was instead on a fully wipeable surface!

Both girls have gone to bed slightly early tonight because they are tired. Fortunately, they’ve both settled in their own beds; they have been a bit unsettled on and off and coming into our bed – like this.

Not much room left for Jase or me; we had to shift them back once they were properly asleep!

I think we are all looking forward to the Christmas break. Work has been mad for both of us and I’ve just spent two “days off” trying to finish our departmental guidelines. Considering I’ve been trying to update them from about June, it’s been a long haul (it’s now over 280 pages and 66,000 words!).

Not long to go now though and additionally having both resigned from work, we are looking forward to drawing a line under this chapter of our lives and moving on. Funny to think that it will be our last Christmas in the UK and that the whole process has taken us a year to get to this stage. I suspect the rest of the time will fly by now.

Jocey talking to Grandma and Granddad

2009-12-04T20:51:00.001+11:00

Here is another little video for you.

YouTube
- Jocey Hello

Lauren trying on her Mary Outfit

2009-11-27T08:21:00.003+11:00

I have been trying out our new video camera. Here is our first effort.

YouTube
- Lauren as Mary

Who ate all the pies?

2009-11-22T01:59:00.001+11:00

Most people who know me probably realise that I am almost fanatical about my food. I always try to explain that this is part of my cultural heritage, that it is an inherently Cantonese thing (to the point that the standard greeting between Cantonese friends tends to involve asking if they’ve eaten yet, or similar) but the truth of it is that I’m probably just plain obsessed.

However, it can’t just be any old food. It’s got to tickle the taste buds, be interesting and preferably with some provenance. I love nose to tail eating, am passionate about seasonal, local produce and proper animal welfare but am not a vegetarian. Giving the animals we eat as food a decent quality of life should be a matter of course but I certainly don’t see why I should stop eating them as long as I do what I can to ensure that I buy responsibly and respect where the food comes from.

I love making things from scratch and very rarely buy anything pre-cooked or ready-made. I just don’t like not knowing what’s in my food or where it comes from. And more often that not, if you have a careful look at the label on the back (if you can make out the tiny writing) you’ll discover all sorts of E-numbers lurking, as well as surprising (and disturbing) quantities of fat, salt and sugar.

However, recently I bought a small ready made pie from our local Waitrose (I love Waitrose). Maybe there is some truth that in a recession people seek comfort food (though the food in that article is definitely not my kind of food!). I thought it might be a good lunch for us at the weekend.

The pie I bought was the Chicken of Aragon Pie from Pieminister, an award winning Bristol company who insist on using the best and freshest ingredients for their hand made pies. Obviously, I checked the small print at the back. No e-numbers, no odd ingredients or preservatives and free range chicken in the pie. Ticked all the boxes so far; what about the taste?

I cannot praise it enough. It was an absolutely heavenly pie with crisp, light pastry and a succulent, tasty filling. Not only were the chicken chunks tasty, but I could actually taste the vegetables as well.

I definitely could have eaten the whole one to myself; shame I had to share it with Jase. I think he was thinking the exact same thing…

I am going to buy two more this weekend. For those not fortunate enough to live across the road from Waitrose, they are also selling these in Tesco and Sainsbury’s. Roll on comfort food!

Opera for Pre-school Children?

2009-11-22T00:45:00.000+11:00

If you had told me before I had the children that a really good idea for children’s TV would be a series of short 25 minute operas or operettas, I would have laughed. What a bizarre idea; surely it wouldn’t work!

Ok, I was wrong.

My children have just discovered The Wonder Pets, a cartoon where most of the dialogue is sung – in essence a 25 minute operetta. They are completely hooked. Jocelyn in particular adores the Wonder Pets. All this week, she has been singing the phrase “What’s going to work?” after which I get a chorus of “Teamwork!” from both children. They have also just about figured the words to the theme song.

YouTube
- Wonderpets Theme Song

It might even start to challenge the joint untouchable supremacy of Dora and Diego…

As with the best children’s TV, the plots are cleverly written and there is always something there for the adults as well. I can’t complain; they love to sing along. And from Dora and Diego, they have learnt about all kinds of animals (nursery were very surprised when, aged 2, Lauren correctly identified a picture of a humpback whale!) and know a surprising number of Spanish words.

Speaking of which, they have also recently started watching Kai-Lan, a cartoon which is all about the adventures of a little Chinese girl who speaks both English and Mandarin Chinese. I’m really pleased that they have picked up some words (and so have I – I don’t speak any Mandarin, only Cantonese Chinese) and are learning a bit about their heritage.

Some of these characters provide great role models; Daddy Pig from the Peppa Pig is Jase’s hero!

Sunday Cooking Marathon

2009-11-16T09:00:00.000+11:00

Every Sunday, I spend several hours cooking. Some weeks I spend two to three hours and other weeks it is more like five or six hours, depending on the number of meals I am making in advance and their complexity. I try to have all the meals for the working week cooked and also to prepare all our lunches for the week in advance.

There are many reasons behind this but the main one is to save time and money. It is often between 6pm and 6:30pm before we get home on a weekday (often I am even later than this) and the girls are tired. They want to be fed immediately, bathed and put to bed otherwise tempers start to fray (and we get tantrums). There is only really time to do a bit of reheating, rather than cooking from scratch.

Additionally, buying ready made stuff is neither satisfying to the palate nor to the wallet. Despite our jobs, money is still tight (costs of living in London, childcare for two children 5 days a week balanced with being low down on our respective pay scales) and we still scrimp and save at every opportunity. Besides, I come from a family where no matter how busy my parents were, there was a proper meal for the entire family to sit down to in the evening. A very Chinese tradition.

Thus the need for the cooking marathon. Last week, I hadn’t had the time to make our lunches and spent about £25 on some rather limp and bland sandwiches. Ouch!

Today, I prepared a fantastic beer braised beef casserole, some herb and chilli marinated lamb cutlets (which were wolfed down by the whole family – not a scrap left) and a beef and vegetable pasta in a tomato and mascarpone sauce. At some point this week, I still have to roast the five spice pork shoulder (a firm family favourite – it has the most amazing crackling if you have good quality meat and get the temperatures right) and steam my organic chicken (another family favourite – steamed white chicken with a spring onion garnish). I’ll probably do that on Tuesday. Thus most of my weekend seems to fly by without much opportunity for real rest; however, it’s always good to know that we’ll eat well during the week without putting in too much more effort.

Today, Lauren drew me a picture. She was really proud of it and I was thrilled to receive it.

It’s of the house she’d like to live in. She explained to me that it was a big house, with enough bedrooms for all of us to have one each (I guess that it’s a four bedroom house then!) and a playroom in the centre (the round window) for the girls. I asked her what was happening outside; she explained that on the left was a playground next to the house. In the playground was (from left to right) Jocey, Lauren and Daddy. On the right was Mummy’s garden.

“Where’s Mummy then?” I asked, slightly puzzled. She pointed at the pink window on the ground floor. “Mummy, you’re in the kitchen cooking,” she replied proudly.

Go figure!

Party, Party, Party!

2009-11-14T11:46:00.001+11:00

The party season is well underway and over the last month or so, the girls have had a very active social life going to all their friend’s parties. They seem to have had great fun in the process. We’re busy most weekends as a result!

The first party of the season was attended by Jocelyn – she was invited to her best friend's Georgia’s birthday party. One evening in October, I happened to ask Jocey (the first time I had asked – at the time I asked I wasn’t even sure that she would be able to answer the question) who her friends were. Her response (and she says this every time now!) was “Err…Lucas…Georgia…Georgia…Lauren…”. Georgia is obviously of such importance that she gets mentioned more than once!

Georgia’s brave Mummy and Daddy invited lots of little toddlers to their house for a painting party. It was a lovely party, very well run and the children enjoyed it immensely. Jocey wasn’t at all shy and was in playing with the other children in no time.

Here is my beautiful girl painting her masterpiece. I was really surprised by her use of colours and her bold brush strokes. At home previously, her drawings have been mainly scribbles with pencils. Maybe she enjoys painting more than drawing!

Once she had finished that canvas, she moved on to do another painting at the easel. She liked using the bigger brushes in particular.

Before this, I had never considered that she might be artistic. I had always assumed that Lauren (who has always liked drawing and painting and is now very good at it) was the artistic one.

Here’s one of little Georgia (with the bunches), about to blow out her candles. Every time I see her, she is asking for Jocey – how lovely!

That weekend was also Daddy’s birthday on the Sunday. Grandma and Granddad came down from York to help us celebrate. We recently discovered a lovely children’s playground by the river in St Margarets (which is in a great position because we walk down to the river, feed the ducks, walk across the bridge and then to the park) so we took the grandparents there to show them.

Lauren and Jocey love the pirate boat in the playground.

We ended up playing a game of chase where I became a scary crocodile and they were in the relative safety of their boat (unless they decided they wanted to go for a “swim” / run off the boat!). They thought it was hilarious and there was a great deal of laughing and high pitched squealing.

Both Jocey and Lauren tired themselves out running madly about but clearly loved it.

I think both girls were sad to leave the playground when we decided it was time to go back to Richmond for some lunch. We stopped at Wagamama’s for some noodles, which everyone enjoyed.

Once back at home, preparations were being made for Daddy’s birthday celebration. Lauren had helped me make the cake and loved the opportunity to decorate it with chocolate sprinkles – her favourite! I don’t think Daddy objected either, to be honest. Mummy brought it out to the table for all to see, where a certain little girl was already waiting in anticipation…

Lauren was patiently waiting for me to cut the cake. Her T-shirt says it all, in case there was ever any doubt.

It is possible that Daddy was also getting a little impatient and wanted some cake too!

Here’s the family at the celebration and after the presents were opened.

I particularly love this photo of Jocey with her Grandma.

Here is Mummy and Lauren having a cuddle. We all had a lovely time that weekend.

Lauren has been to a string of parties. Here she is at her friend Lorenzo’s party, the following weekend. She is sitting next to Scarlett and opposite Lorenzo and the “other” Lauren in her nursery class, Lauren Williams.

These pictures are from the same boy’s party this time last year. I can’t believe it’s only been a year and how much they’ve all grown in that time! In the picture below, Lauren is sitting next to the lad who was her best friend at the time, Cameron. Cameron has subsequently left the nursery but Lauren still talks about him from time to time.

This was Lorenzo last year with his Mummy, Natalia.

Despite being a year older, Lauren is still painfully shy at these parties. I’m not sure why this is (she’s always been like that when she encounters new situations). She knows most of the children at these parties really well as she goes to nursery with them but somehow is still scared by the unfamiliar setting. It is strange to see her like this when I know she is confident and happy at nursery.

That weekend, she also went to her friend Sophie’s party. She was quite tired by the time the party came around so took a long time before she would leave my side and join in with the other children. Sophie came over straight away to say hello when we arrived – she and Lauren were good friends at nursery. Sadly, she is not at the nursery any more either. Most of Lauren’s friends from the last year at nursery have either left for school or gone to other childcare arrangements.

I got into quite a surprising conversation whilst at the party.

I got talking with Lauren William’s Mummy, who was also there and discovered that she was Australian from Sydney. Naturally, we started talking about our time previously in Sydney in 2002 and are upcoming plans to return. Bizarrely, it emerged in conversation that she used to work in the same company as Jase did in Sydney, and for the same team but on a different floor! And of course, we both had daughters in 2005 that we decided to call Lauren. She told me that they are also thinking of returning to Sydney at some point, but cannot in the next year or so due to her husband’s work commitments.

What a bizarre thing!

Last weekend, Lauren went to Leah’s party. She looked really beautiful in her Princess outfit and her Princess crown. She loved flouncing about in her long dress! Here is a picture of all the children at Leah’s Pirates and Princesses party, after Leah’s Daddy bravely rounded up all the children and got them to stand still long enough to take a photo! Herding cats did spring to mind at one point, but his perseverance paid off.

Lauren is standing next to Oliver, who is in her class, and Georgia who is Oliver’s little sister and Jocey’s best friend. Next to them is Leah, who looked lovely in her Princess outfit. Next to her is Anna Maria, a boy whom I didn’t know, Scarlett and Sophie (who had the previous party) in the red and yellow dress. Lauren and Leah are good friends at nursery and often play together, along with Lauren’s friend Lila.

I could see from the party that the other girls were full of confidence and mixed and played easily together, even though they were seeing each other out of context. Lauren, as always, was terribly shy and took a while to get involved in the play. Perhaps some of the other children see each other outside of nursery on play dates so were more comfortable with each other to begin with. Perhaps that is the disadvantage of being a full-time working mum.

Despite all this, she did seem to be happy when she left each of the parties and did seemed to have enjoyed herself. I am sure she will get used to all of this in time! My little shy Lauren!

Glorious Devon for our Jocelyn!

2009-11-11T10:28:00.001+11:00

I confess that it has been two months since I last blogged. Life has been so crazy that we haven’t had time to stop – the weeks have just hurtled by. It is a shame as so much has been happening but I am hoping that I’ll be able to recall most things. I think that ultimately I do enjoy keeping a diary – I did as a child – and perhaps this blog is an extension of that. Shared memories have always been really important to my family; thus we are a family who love to tell stories and laugh over photographs of past adventures.

At present, we are well into the party season and almost every weekend has seen some celebration for the girls or their friends.

This is mainly an account of the time up to our holiday in Devon, where we celebrated Jocelyn’s second birthday.

August

The weekend before the nasty outbreak of E. coli at farms in Surrey, we went to one such farm (but not any of the ones involved in the outbreak) because we’d been promising the girls we’d go see some farm animals for weeks. So on the last Bank Holiday weekend in August, we set out for Bockett’s Farm.

It was a Saturday lunchtime but as we got within a mile of the farm, we encountered a nasty road traffic accident on the road. As we drove past the scene at low speed, I could see that there was only one paramedic on scene who had just arrived moments before. I asked Jase to pull over so that I could see if he needed any help.

An hour and a half later and after trying to save the injured man along with five paramedics and the air ambulance doctor and paramedic, we were finally done at scene and leaving the Police to start their investigation. It had been unexpected and stressful but I was glad that I was able to help in some way. Unfortunately, I was then in no fit state to go on to the Farm as I needed a change of clothes, so we headed back home.

The next morning, we tried the journey again, this time with no unexpected diversions. The road looked so different without the debris from the crash – almost as if it had never happened. I found that quite odd somehow.

However, once we’d arrived all thoughts of the previous day were forgotten and we had a wonderful time at the farm.

Here are Lauren and Jocey looking at the small animals in the hutch. Lauren was quite nervous, even of the small animals. Jocelyn, as usual, wasn’t scared of anything.

After looking at the rabbits, guinea pigs, sheep, goats and cows in the shed, we went outside to have a ride on the tractor around the farm.

It was all very well organised. There were plenty of hand washing facilities (and of course I made sure their hands were clean after they had touched the animals) and the place looked generally clean. It was all a lot of fun and the animals looked happy and content.

After a good lunch, we headed to the children’s playground area for the girls to run around and play. They especially liked the huge sandpit, complete with play house and sand toys!

Of course, Jocey loved the slide and had many goes before she could be persuaded to try something else.

Lauren spotted the bouncy pillow and the shoes immediately came off and she was on it bounce to her heart’s content!

Despite being quite a cold and overcast day they had a fantastic time and loved seeing the animals.

September

September brought a much needed holiday. Neither of us had actually had a proper summer holiday (our break in July was used to move house to Richmond). Work had been pretty busy for both of us and we were looking forward to going away.

I had found a lovely self catering cottage on the internet in North Devon which could accommodate all of us (as both sets of parents and Aunty Madge were coming too) and since I’d always wanted to go to the West Country, I thought it would be ideal.

It was in the most beautiful setting in North Devon; quiet, peaceful and so green. The cottage was located just outside a small town called Bideford, only accessible via a very narrow (and sometimes hair-raising) country lane.

It was everything we could have hoped for – not just picturesque but obviously a well loved family home. Our whole family loved it – the girls ran round the house for the first two hours exploring every nook and cranny of their “holiday house”.

Every evening, we had wonderful family meals in the farmhouse kitchen. I even got to grips with the challenge of cooking on an AGA (not my favourite beast – I love the instant control and intense heat that only a gas hob can provide). Catering for seven adults and two children was no small challenge, but actually one I enjoyed whilst on holiday.

On the first Sunday after our arrival in Devon, it was Jocelyn’s second birthday. She has yet to have a birthday celebration at home – last year, we were in Chicago for her first birthday!

Here is a picture of my baby girl just a few days old in September 2007.

This is her last year in Chicago on her first birthday.

I can barely believe how quickly she has grown into a little girl. Here she is on her second birthday in Devon. She is just about to blow out the candles on the carrot cake that I had baked for her that morning. I found the recipe in an old WI cookbook at the cottage dating back to the 1950’s. It was a fantastic recipe – I have used it a number of times since!

Jocelyn is turning into such a bright, vivacious girl – full of smiles and laughter!

She is so different from Lauren in personality but somehow they complement each other perfectly. We love our girls so much; they have brought so much joy into our lives. We are lucky and grateful that they also love each other very much.

Whilst in Devon, we visited some of the local attractions and sights. We had a day on another farm, called The Big Sheep, which was enormous fun. We had a day meeting the lovely farm animals, including feeding the lambs.

Lauren was a bit scared because the lambs were pretty boisterous but Jocey wasn’t fazed. She even went to stroke the lambs afterwards, and seemed to like that. Rigorous hand washing followed, of course. I was very impressed by the levels of hygiene in the place – there were signs everywhere reminding people to wash their hands and their children’s hands after any contact with the animals and it was generally very clean.

We loved watching the sheep dogs and also enjoyed the horse whispering demonstration. The girls also loved playing in the huge indoor soft play area.

They played happily in this area for at least an hour and a half before we could tear them away for some lunch.

Here’s Lauren, Jocey and Mummy coming down the big slide with Daddy looking on from the top.

Whilst in Devon, we visited a number of the local attractions. On a wet Monday morning, we drove into Cornwall to the Eden Project. Set in an old quarry, I found it to be surprisingly beautiful.

It was architecturally amazing – a perfect blend of sculpture with an industrial undertone and nature in all its glory. The planting was lush and felt natural; you would not have guessed that it’s only about 10 years old.

The girls did enjoy looking around the domes, especially the rainforest one (even though the heat was quite oppressive). Lauren especially liked the cocoa tree (when she found out that’s where chocolate came from!) and the banana tree with real bananas growing on it. I learned something too – I didn’t realise that pineapples grew on squat bushes; I had always assumed they grew on trees. Perhaps that was the fault of all those inaccurate Del Monte adverts when I was a child!

Both sets of parents enjoyed it too. We all agreed that it had been a lovely outing and well worth seeing. I thought that it was educational with a strong conservational message without being boring. I especially liked the cafe, where all the vegetable produce was grown on site by the Eden Project team.

Being real foodies, we decided that no trip to Devon and Cornwall would be complete without a trip to Padstow, home to chef Rick Stein. I planned to try some seafood there (being a port) even if it wasn’t going to be at his restaurant. Besides, I could always drool at the menu in the window.

It was a glorious day but I was shocked that on a Thursday after the schools had gone back from the summer break that the place was absolutely jam packed with tourists. Despite this, we did eventually find a restaurant called Pescadou which served us a wonderful seafood lunch at a reasonable price. My fish was cooked to perfection. I didn’t get to enjoy it for very long though, as Jocey was in a bad mood and had to be taken for a walk along the harbour before she calmed down.

A chocolate ice cream got her back to her normal cheery self very quickly after that!

Lauren, of course had one too.

In the afternoon, we drove back towards North Devon and stopped to take in the sights at Tintagel. Being a fan of the Arthurian Legends since childhood, I achieved a lifetime ambition to see Tintagel.

It is set in the most amazing place; you walk down a very steep path which takes you down a narrow valley and out towards an isolated headland, buffeted by the sea.

To clarify, the ruins that you see are mainly from a castle built in the Middle Ages. However, out on the headland, archaeologists uncovered ruins dating from a 5th or 6th century fort, the correct timeframe for the legends of Arthur. We loved it; the atmosphere and the sheer wild nature of it.

We had unexpectedly glorious weather for the entire week so much of it was spent on the beach. The girls loved this; they spent the whole time running around and building sandcastles. It was fantastic to see them so happy and so free – a far cry from London.

We found two beaches that we particularly loved; one at Instow, which was very sheltered and family friendly and one at Woolacombe, which was huge, very clean and had excellent facilities.

Here’s Lauren and Jocey on the beach at Instow building sandcastles.

Here’s a later masterpiece getting the “Jocey treatment”.

The girls are clearly having fun!

This is Mummy’s attempt at sand sculpture – a sea turtle. Pretty basic but drew many admirers from people passing by on the beach!

Our day at Woolacombe was also fun filled. The girls had a wonderful time doing a dance around their sandcastle – perhaps to bring out the sun?

What better way to celebrate the joys of the beach than for the whole family to enjoy a lunch of fish and chips in the sunshine? I had some fresh whelks as well…yummy!!

It was a fantastic day out, as you can see by everyone’s relaxed smiles.

We attempted some family photos but unfortunately the girls were too tired by then. This was the only one we managed to get successfully!

We loved Devon and we loved our holiday there. The week was over far too quickly (as always with holidays). We were truly sad to be heading back to the concrete jungle of London. The quieter pace was something I definitely continue to yearn for, and maybe we’ll find soon. I would definitely like to go back some day.

The rest of our holiday photos can be seen here.

The Big Fish Tank

2009-09-02T06:17:00.000+10:00

We’ve had a number of successful days out from Richmond over the past few weeks.

One weekend at the end of July, we went on the train to Waterloo to the London Aquarium. We had been promising the girls that we would go to see the “big fish tank” for some time and they were very excited about going. Even the train journey was lots of fun for them and they kneeled on the seats to look out the windows to point at other passing trains along the way.

We got there relatively early, but despite this there were already hoards of people in central London. The queue for the London Eye was already massive. Here’s Daddy and the girls outside the Aquarium.

Lauren had recently watched a “Happy Monster Band” episode on Playhouse Disney where the band go to London and see the London Eye, Big Ben and meet the Queen, so she was really excited to see Big Ben and the Eye in real life.

No show for Queenie though…

Here’s Jocelyn and Daddy; Jocey’s clearly eager to go in as she’s pointing to the Aquarium!

We didn’t have much of a queue for tickets at the Aquarium but unfortunately we were kept a long time at the desk as the girl could not work out which pre-paid ticket we’d bought. So much for pre-paying!

It was our first time at the Aquarium and the girls loved it, although Lauren (as usual) was a bit scared of the bigger fish like the rays. There was an open tank inside about halfway through where you could get really close to the fish and see them from above. Poor Lauren got really frightened when one of the rays rose up out of the water towards her to have a closer look. She wouldn’t believe me when I told her they were nice fish with big smiley faces!

Once she got over that though she seemed to enjoy the rest of it, especially seeing “Nemo” and “Dorey” and the sharks. Jocey, meanwhile took it all in her stride and wasn’t scared of anything.

At the end of the trip, there was the obligatory stroll around the gift shop. Jocey fell in love with a cuddly Nemo and asked to take him home. Bizarrely, for a girl who was scared of the big fish, Lauren chose the cuddly shark (now called Bruce) in the toy shop at the exit – go figure!

Lauren’s 4th Birthday

2009-09-01T08:58:00.000+10:00

I am slowly catching up with recent events; it has been so hectic that I’ve barely had time to catch my breath. I can’t believe that two weeks have passed since Lauren’s birthday and that I haven’t been able to blog about it until now.

Mind you, in that time I’ve been to Australia and back, but more about that later.

The birthday girl had known for some time that she was coming up to her fourth birthday and mentioned it quite often. She talked about the party she was going to have (with all the family there, of course) and the cake that she wanted (chocolate, with Dora the Explorer on it – a bit of a challenge for poor Mummy!). She was really excited as the day got closer and the family started to arrive.

Peter and Suzanne stayed with us in the flat and my parents stayed in Kingston as the flat isn’t big enough to accommodate both sides of the family at once. The children were thrilled to see everyone here in our new home. Both sets of parents have been impressed with our new flat – smaller but perfectly formed, and our new surroundings in lovely Richmond.

We decided to have a big meal out with the whole family on the Saturday night and went into Putney to the original Royal China there. We had an enjoyable meal even though some aspects of it were not as good as the newer Bayswater one.

Lauren’s fourth birthday was on the Sunday. Recently, I bought a Cobb barbeque to try out as we only have a small balcony as outdoor space and it is so compact. We lit the coals and prepared a large birthday feast – this is fast becoming a tradition on her birthday.

Here’s our journey with her in pictures. This is my beautiful girl on the day she was born, in August 2005. She was so tiny as she was only 34 weeks and was 4lb 3oz (1.9kg)!

Here’s Lauren on her 1st birthday, looking very excited at the prospect of birthday cake.

Here’s the great barbeque on her 2nd birthday. We had a glorious day as the weather was superb.

Here’s happy Lauren on her 3rd birthday. We were about to bring out the cake at this point!

Here’s my beautiful birthday girl waiting patiently for Mummy to finish icing her cake so that she can open her presents on her 4th birthday.

She is our darling girl and we love her so much!

When the cake was finally finished and brought out (as ordered) I hope it didn’t disappoint. It was moist and gooey inside – just as a chocolate cake should be.

Poor Lauren went a bit shy when we were singing “Happy Birthday” to her and retreated to Mummy for a big hug. After this, she opened her presents, which she clearly enjoyed.

As you can see, the birthday girl loves her princesses, so a fairy princess outfit suited her just fine. She wore this for most of the day!

When Aunty Charlotte, Uncle Jason and George arrived, they had also suspected that Lauren might enjoy being a fairy princess. Lauren was thrilled to get this second outfit, with even bigger wings! A girl can’t have too many…

With barbeque food flying off the tiny but wonderfully efficient Cobb, the day was a huge success. Lauren had a wonderful time, and the grown-ups did too.

Exactly six days to go before we do it all again for Jocey’s second birthday, as their birthdays are only three weeks apart. I’m keen to give Jocelyn a really good birthday this year as last year we only had a small celebration and then had a long plane journey.

This year, we’ll be with the whole family in Devon and Cornwall; we’re renting a beautiful 16th century thatched farmhouse. It will be the first time we’ve ventured that far into the South West – can’t wait!

Life in Richmond

2009-09-01T07:58:00.000+10:00

I am finally back blogging after a significant break – it may even been the longest period I’ve had where I haven’t blogged. Swine flu is just a distant memory now – although Jocelyn also caught it (bizarrely, not from Jase) and was quarantined too.

We went offline shortly after my last post because of the house move. There was a frantic push towards the finish line as the move date edged closer, but we finally managed to get all our stuff ready for long term storage and the house ready to be packed by the removal men.

On the morning of the house move in mid July, the girls got up for the last time in their bedroom.

Here they are in their beds in their room. Most of their stuff had already been packed away and this meant that it had already been depersonalised to some degree. However, I did feel sad for them as it’s been the only home either of them have ever known.

Despite this, they seemed genuinely excited when they said their goodbyes to the house and I promised them that they would go to the new house when they came home from nursery.

The removal men came and with great efficiency packed all our remaining stuff and loaded the vans ready for the trip to long term storage and our new flat in Richmond. Since the flat is smaller than old house, we had already decided that much of what we had would need to go into long term storage and only brought back out when we move to a bigger permanent home.

The move actually went very smoothly although it took most of the afternoon for them to unload our stuff at the other end and lug it up to our second floor flat. They worked very hard and were really good – I’d definitely use them again. Of course, that was only the beginning. It took me a good week and a half to get the flat organised, tidy and in good working order – a lot of hard work. However, by the end of the first afternoon, the girls’ bedroom was ready for their return and we had a functioning kitchen and living room, which I think was a huge achievement.

The girls returned home and were absolutely thrilled. They loved going up and down in the lift and they were really excited to find their bedroom almost exactly like their old room (smaller, but with their furniture in a very similar layout to the old room). The familiarity helped them see that the flat was our home now and they settled in quickly. We even brought some of our pot plants with us to put on our balcony, which Lauren then immediately recognised as “Mummy’s Garden”.

For about two weeks, they were a bit unsettled at night and were anxious when they awoke and didn’t recognise their surroundings (which was a good excuse for climbing into bed with Mummy and turning Daddy out into the spare bedroom). However, that settled down as well and they are now really at home in our new flat.

Mid July was also George’s first birthday. Charlotte and Jason had planned a big party with their friends and family at a venue in Hammersmith. My parents came down to stay with us in Richmond but the Friday before his birthday weekend, Jocey contracted swine flu and was placed in quarantine by our GP. This meant that sadly she and I missed out on the big party. Jase, Lauren and my parents went and took some pictures for me to see.

Here’s the birthday boy with Charlotte and Jason. He’s clearly looking forward to his birthday cake!

Lauren having hugs with her Gung Gung at the party, and probably looking forward to the cake too.

Here’s the birthday boy playing with Lauren and my mum. They are clearly having a lot of fun.

When Jocey was declared safe to join the world again, we made the most of our free weekends and explored Richmond from our new home. Our flat is in a fabulous position, right in the heart of town but off the main street where the pubs and train station are. This means it’s convenient but we don’t have drunks or much noise at night. This was a major factor in choosing this property for renting – great location and functional layout inside. As Richmond is so compact, everything is within easy reach and we rarely take the car except to go further afield or to go to work.

Here we are at our new local playground, a lovely small park in Worple Way. The girls are trying out the swings and having a great time.

The girls giggling on the swings!

Here’s Jocelyn playing with the football on another occasion. She’s very good on her feet and is showing some sporting promise!

This one was taken at Old Deer Park, a little further away, but also with a great children’s play area. It is a huge expanse of green next to the river – good to end up there after going down to the river to feed the ducks!

Jocey enjoying the climbing frame.

Lauren also having fun on the climbing frame.

Head first down the slide! Wee!!

After any trip to the park, a big ice cream is mandatory. Lucky that there is just such a place across the road from the new flat. Bliss.

What more could a girl want?

Our other Richmond photos can be found on my Flickr account here and here.

Days of our lives

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I’m pleased to report that Jase has recovered from his brush with swine flu. He was in quarantine all of last week but after starting Tamiflu made a speedy recovery.

We’ve had the opportunity to deal with approximately 30 years of photographs over the last two weekends as part of our packing and sorting. We found an excellent company on the internet who take all your old photos and scan them into digital copies.

We sent them approximately 2000 photos from 30 years (unfortunately excluding ones already in photo albums as I had packed these already) and within three days they had scanned them and returned them to us with the photos on a DVD. Through this method, we were able to save these precious photos from further degradation in quality.

I am so pleased with the result! We looked through the photos and it brought back so many memories, but frustratingly we also realised how much we’d already forgotten. I’m hoping these memories will come back when we look at the photos again.

We have begun to build our photo archive here on Flickr. I will need to get Jase to dig out some of his baby photos the next time we are in York.

Ruby Wedding celebration

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Four weekends ago, we headed up to York to celebrate my in-law’s Ruby Wedding anniversary. Suzanne and Peter had invited their close friends and wider family to help them celebrate the occasion. My parents headed down from Edinburgh for the weekend as they were invited too.

We were a little worried on the way up as the weather hadn’t been all that great and the forecast was for a cold and grey day. I hurriedly unpacked all the summer clothes that I had originally packed and repacked for a colder day before leaving London.

We arrived close to midnight on the Thursday night, so went straight to bed on arrival. The following day, we helped Suzanne and Peter get ready for the big day by preparing food and doing odd jobs.

On the Friday evening, a large marquee was erected in the back garden. We were amazed at the speed with which it went up considering at that time the heavens opened and it was pouring with rain.

On Saturday, Suzanne’s family started to arrive. It was lovely to meet them for the first time and get to know them a bit. My parents also arrived that afternoon, so we spent a lovely evening as an extended family out at a local Chinese restaurant called Maxi’s.

This is Suzanne with two of her sisters. Jase also got to meet one of his cousins for the first time.

The girls are enjoying hugs with their other grandparents in this photo.

The girls can be a bit fussy at times about their food when we go out to eat but fortunately they were both on best behaviour. They both enjoyed their noodles and had some crispy duck and stir fried beef. I thought both girls looked lovely in their little party dresses.

This photo is of Jocey giving Aunty Madge a cuddle – I thought it was really lovely!

The day of the anniversary party turned out thankfully to be dry. The finishing touches were added to the marquee making it look fantastic.

The guests started to arrive, including Suzanne’s brother and another sister that we had not met before. It was fabulous seeing these long-lost siblings reunited at such a happy occasion. Here they are at one of the family tables.

Everyone helped themselves to drinks and before long a real party atmosphere was underway! This is the magnificent marquee in their back garden.

Lauren and Jocey also got to meet all their second cousins. They played really well together (maybe because they were all girls!) and had a fantastic time. Lauren especially loved playing with Alice, who is a similar age. Here’s Lauren with Georgina (aged eight) and Alice (aged four), the children of Oliver (Jason’s cousin) and Caroline. This was taken after they had finished playing balloon tennis with me in the living room.

Little Lara (aged two) was also there with her parents Janet (Jason’s cousin) and David. She was too little to join in the more boisterous play of the older girls but seemed to enjoy herself nevertheless.

We all sat down to eat the fabulous hog roast before long. The food was wonderful as the hog was done to perfection. My only regret is that the caterers took away all the leftover hog roast, including an awful lot of excellent crackling. When Jase went to get me seconds, he omitted to get any crackling for me and when I next looked, the hog had been packed away. What a missed opportunity!!

We sat with Jase’s cousins Janet, Claire, Oliver, Jo and their partners. There was a lot of talk about babies and children at our table. We all had a great time catching up; I especially enjoyed chatting with Caroline about our lives with two children.

The girls all had a little table to themselves adjacent to ours. Initially, this was only meant for the three older girls but Jocey soon decided that she was not going to sit with Mummy and Daddy and would rather sit with Lauren, Georgina and Alice. Extra chairs were quickly produced!

Lauren and Georgina then began to look after the younger children, looking after them and being Mummy to them. Lauren was feeding Jocey and Lara chocolate cake in this photo. Good sharing!

Both Peter and Suzanne had the opportunity to speak and talk about their time together and their happiness that they had their family and friends all around them to help them celebrate their special day.

The girls enjoyed themselves immensely and were very well behaved. We were so proud of them. As they got on so well with their second cousins, we promised Caroline and Oliver that we would make every effort to see them and their girls again in the near future.

The grown ups were pretty tired out by the end after a day of entertaining the children but it had been a truly memorable day. Here’s Dad catching forty winks on the sofa with Jocey and Octpu.

All Peter and Suzanne’s hard work in organising the event led to everyone having an absolutely fantastic time, as well as raising a sizable sum for one of the local children’s hospices. I am certain that everyone there will remember it fondly in the years to come. Most importantly, they themselves were relaxed and had a wonderful time, despite all the work they had to put in behind the scenes!

The family photos from the day can be found here.

Moving to Richmond

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At the end of last week, we finally exchanged contracts on our house and have set a date for moving out! We were absolutely thrilled to have sold our house in 7 weeks despite the current housing market and additionally to get what we asked for the house. Our estate agents worked their socks off for us, so all credit to them.

We have had several weekends of sorting and packing, thus the lack of updates online. We finally finished clearing out the loft this weekend, including all the old carpets that had been stacked up there from the year dot. Worryingly, some of them had become a good hiding place for moths so they were quickly taken to the tip. The loft is now gloriously empty; just a shame it wasn’t that way when we moved in ourselves.

It has been really cathartic; we have taken 5 car loads of stuff to the tip and at least 3 car loads to the charity shop. I couldn’t believe some of the stuff that Jase had hoarded over the years in our loft (we’ve only been in this house since the end of 2004 but there was hoarding going on even before that).

The house is chaos as you can imagine; boxes and stuff everywhere, either waiting for packing or having been packed.

I find it a bit difficult to relax in the house at the moment because of this and can’t wait for the move to be all over. However, to be fair, we have done a lot of packing and there isn’t much more to do.

My job for today has been to find a company to clean our house before we hand it over to the new owners. Now I know that some people will wonder why we are bothering but I feel that it should be part of moving out and is a courtesy to your buyer. Our buyers seemed to be really nice people when I met them and have done everything they can to make the exchange a smooth process, which is all the more reason.

Of course, there are also personal reasons for this. This was our very first house together in Bonaly, Edinburgh which Jase and I bought in our final year of university. It didn’t always look this lovely though. This picture was taken when we were preparing to sell it back in 2003.

We moved into the house in February 1997. It had been a really cold and grey day and by the time the move was done it was dark. The previous owner had left the house dirty, had taken everything including the loo roll holders, towel rails and shelves off the walls and left each room with just one 40 watt light bulb (even in the rooms with more than one light fitting). There was also a pile of discarded odds and ends in the garage which she had not bothered to remove.

I remember sitting in the dark front room at the end of that day feeling exhausted and disappointed because it hadn’t been anything like the home I’d expected to move into. Contrast this experience with our move into our current house, where the previous owner left us a bottle of champagne and a friendly note explaining how everything worked. The house had been left tidy, and whilst not super clean, it was still a huge improvement on our experience in Edinburgh.

We take possession of our rental flat in Richmond tomorrow. I was thrilled when I found it as it is just right for our family’s needs at this time. It is right in the heart of Richmond so everywhere is within walking distance and it’s a good size being a post-war flat. I am looking forward to spending Tuesdays and weekends exploring Richmond and Kew; Jase and I are both hoping that it will be less pressured and less hassle than West London, where we’ve been living up to now. Of course, being closer to work and nursery (it’s about 5 minutes drive from our new flat) will be fantastic too.

We can’t wait!

Glorious summer

2009-06-03T02:00:00.000+10:00

The weather has been absolutely glorious for days. At the weekend, we spent a lot of time at the park with the girls as the whole family took advantage of the fabulous weather. Our garden is looking wonderful but is needing a lot of watering as the sun is so fierce during the day. There has been very little rain lately, so it looks like we could have the very hot summer that we’ve been promised by the weathermen.

June is a busy month for all of us. My brother Jase and Charlotte celebrate their second wedding anniversary today. My in-laws celebrate their Ruby wedding anniversary this weekend. We celebrate our 11th wedding anniversary in 3 weekends’ time; that same weekend, my cousin Jeff will be getting married in Toronto. We are really sorry that we won’t be there to help Jeff and Leanne celebrate their special day.

So this weekend, we are all going to York for Suzanne and Peter’s Ruby wedding anniversary. There is a big event planned for Sunday with family and friends, with a hog roast being the centrepiece of the festivities. We are all really looking forward to it and having a long weekend out of London.

Next week, I am going to view some rental accommodation in Richmond for the family, as our house sale appears to be reaching the final stages. We are really pleased to have got here so quickly and can’t wait for everything to be finalised. Moving to Richmond will get us closer to the nursery and make our lives a lot easier as commuting will be less.

Once we are safely settled in Richmond, we intend to kick back and enjoy the glorious summer ahead!

Happy Birthday to Grandma!

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May is a month of birthdays – we had PoPo’s (Grandma Maggie’s) birthday at the beginning of the month and Grandma Suzanne’s birthday today at the end of the month. So just for our two Grandmas, here’s a special rendition of the Birthday Song!

Happy birthday!