England - finally!

Hello!

SO finally we've made it to England. Only 18 months after we first forecast that we'd be here (back in september 08). Anyway - its very lovely here.

We've had bit of a bum of a time finding 6 months accommodation. Either places were gone, or wouldn't be ready in time, or they wanted people for more than 6 months, or you had to have been in the UK for 6 months (for credit checks), or the agents wouldn't answer. So we ended up having to stay in two seperate lots of holiday rentals. Eventually we found a place which is near bridgnorth of Shropshire.

Its a grade II listed house attached to a huge old mansion with beautiful gardens all round. The place came furnished, which is very convenient, and they've done a really good job at making it nice.

We've also bought a car, a Zafira by Vauhall. (Yes Susan, we've joint your club). Finally I'm out of fuel guzzling beasts and it something a little more pleasing to the environment.

Anyway, my photos here are all back to front - starting from Saturday and working back.

This is at an historic estate that we went to, where the kids had a go at being servants...

This is the house, with the mansion in the background, with our new car in it.

We went on a road trip to Wales, and there was so much to see! The kids had a swim at this gorgeous beach (I thought beaches were meant to suck, but very much not so).

This was some of the mountain scenery. We had a little walk some of the way up one of these mountains, and one day we'll come back and climb to the top of the biggest one (now that I've written it, I'll have to!)

This was a water fall along the way. You had to pay to see it, which was new. There was a fence and a gate where you had to insert the coinds to get in. I didn't have the right change but some pepople came along just after us, so I asked the guy if he had change for 5 dollars. He gave me a funny look, and asked his wife what the exchange rate was. Woops- so I promptly corrected myself and said pounds. The waterfall was well worth it.

This was a beautiful little Welsh town, whose name was completely unpronouncable. Have the Welsh not heard of vowels?

This is some canal boats, we went on a ride on the blue one at the front.

This was the second cottage that we stayed at, which was right on a canal.

This was our first ruined castle. Very cool. Played kings and queens with the kids, they had a marvelous time, which is good because I'll be taking them to many more.

This is the first cottage we stayed which was a gorgeous little town called Chelmorton.

This is Dave and Tracey, some great neighbours that we met at our first house.

Just a very cute photo of a sheep.

This Tallis making friends with the cows (in her pjamas of course)

Another lovely secnery shot...

This was a little walkway in Chelmorton...

Heres some cows that held us up one day - seemed very Brittish and Rural, which I found very entertaining...

This is a further off view of Chemorton - note the stone fences...

And thats it!

Hope everone is well,

Keep in touch,

Nic

Ney York, New York

Hi Everyone.

So finally I'm sitting down to do my blog! Its taken more than two hours messing around uploading photos, so I hope its appreciated. We've been doing heaps! Right now we're in New York City, but I've done the photos backwards again, so I'm going to start back at Christmas. Also, I should mention that when I started with the New York photos I was very motivated, but as I progressed, I got less and less motivated, so theres very few early photos, and probably a few too many current photos. Oh well.

We had a really lovely Christmas, Lake Badin where we were staying at the time was gorgeous and the house was so peaceful, which really suited Christmas. Because it was just us, our day got a little late and by the time we'd got around to Christmas dinner, Ainsley was fast asleep on the ground. We decided to wake her up for dinner, but she kept falling asleep at the table, so I relented and put her to bed.

On Boxing day, our friends Bob and Celeste came for a visit. We decided to adopt them as our American Family. It was very nice to have some visitors at Christmas, because I'm not really used to spending Christmas with out anyone but us. Had a good time and stayed up well past our bedtime having fun.

In January, I went my friends Tori from North Carolina on a trip to Biltmore house. I couldn't take photos from the inside, but this is the outside.

It was built in the late 1800's, but the guy that had it built had very classical tastes and had antiques from all around the world. I was most impressed by the leather wallpaper from spain that had been hand embossed.

This photo was on my birthday where we went to old salem. Its in the north of north carolina, and its a town that was settled by the Moravians, who were a religious group from Europe. The were still living their very basic lifes, and they made it so that you could go around and see everything that they were doing. In some ways it was much better than a museum, because the people really knew what they were talking about because the did it every day. They were a bit funny about photos, so I only got a couple. This is Tallis and Ellery carding wool.

Two days before we left for the snow in Canada, it snowed at Lake Badin. I did hope for a white christmas, but the weather seemed to want to be ironic instead. This is the house we were living in.

This is one of the gorgeous sunrises that I managed to rouse my early enough to take a photo of.

On our way up to Canada, we stopped at Washington DC. We went to the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History and the Aeronautics museum. The natural history museum was great - has some very cool and large fossils from before there were living animals on Earth.

This is the white house. We saw a couple of helicopters land, maybe one had Obama in it - but I guess its also possible that it was just the kids coming home. Do they all travel by private helicopters? Anything is possible...

This is the kids walking across the national mall (can't remember if that was what it was called, but I think so), with congress in the background.

The next day when we woke up to leave for Canada, theres been a huge dump of snow. This was just before the all that snow that was on the news. Good thing we got of there when we did, because apparently it was Bedlam a few days later with all the snow. I really love the look of trees covered in snow - it never lasts long though.

This was at the Blue mountains in Canada. Everyone had a great time skiing. Tallis and Ellery I got to do a couple of black hills (which are the hard ones) before we left - I was very proud. Lindsay got up to doing intermediate hills after a few lessons. Ainsley had a lovely time, she had a few goes of skiing, but it she couldn't really go down by herself, so I'd hold her between my legs. This is Lindsay at ski school.

And Ainsley at ski school.

Heres Tallis and Ellery after a morning of skiing.

This is Lindsay with an icy pole (popsicle if you're American) he found hanging of a bush. All very convenient. Tallis Skiing. You really had to cover any exposed skin, otherwise it'd get really painfully cold.

This is the ski village at the Blue Mountains. It was very pretty.

This is our back door after a big snow storm.

This is our windscreen at -20 degrees. I had tried to remove as much ice as I could with an old library card (pretty much all I had that wouldn't scratch the windscreen), and managed to scrape enough of a hole to see through. Luckily it didn't take long before it melted away with the heating.

This was at ice festival that we went to in Toronto. The kids all got a big chunk of ice with a toy inside and they got to crack it open to get their prize.

The ice festival...

This was a very cool owl that we saw at bird of prey demonstration.

This is the kids sitting in front of a frozen lake. We were on our way to the pool, which had an out door area (well heated) with a water slide. Going up to the water slide was a bit agonizing in the freezing cold in bathers, but the adrenalin rush and the awaiting hot water made it worth it.

This is looking down the ski hill. I've high lighted where we were staying. It wasn't a very long walk to the chair lifts.

Lindsay at ski school.

Tallis and Ellery had a go at snow boarding. They found it really hard and resorted back to skiing. Must say - watching them do it, instead of the pros, it really did look impossible.

Ellery doing night skiing. The slopes were open until 10 every night. Came in very handy with all of Pauls work.

Some wild turkeys (stuffed, in a cabinet) looking very cool. This was on the drive to New York from Canada. We stopped for a couple of nights at a place near the Allegheny state park. While we were there we stopped at the state park (of course), but also in the area were some Amish communities which we visited. They didn't like people taking photos, so I didn't, but we had a great time. They have no power, so all the homes were candle lit and the crops were all tended with horses. Seemed like a fantastic way to live, but I think all the religion would drive me insane. I had a really long talk with a guy there, who seemed to think that it was the religion that made it work, and stopped all the pettiness that often comes with small communities. I'm sure he's right.

This is some very cool boulders as the state park.

Then we arrived at East Hampton. We had planned to go to New York City, but we stuffed up our accommodation, so we decided to have a bit of break at the beach. It wasn't peak time, so a lot of restaurants and attractions were closed, but it also meant that our month there was only $4500, instead of $25000! The house we stayed in was slightly run down, but it backed onto the beach, so all was good. We decided to do no TV or computer while were here, seeing as they had the beach to play at, and it was great! I couldn't believe how creative the kids were with keeping themselves entertained. This is Tallis on her birthday.

This is Ellery on the beach that our house was at.

This is also at the beach here, I absolutely love this photo!

This is theview from the back of the house. It was very peaceful. If I ever decide to write a book, this is the place I want to do it at. (Although I may have to write a bestseller first, so that I can afford it).

This is Ainsley enjoying her Easter Eggs.

And Again, on her birthday.

A sunset out the back...

This is a house on Shelter island, which is an island in the hamptons. It was a very typical house. (theres sooo much money here, its a bit frightening)

And this is spring blossoms blown across the street.

Now we're in NY city. Wow! Theres so much variety here. The amount of pedestrians walking by is just amazing. So many people the place is just buzzing all day and night. This is Times Square at night.

This is the kids running across central Park. Central park was like a beacon in a storm. Paul and I have a theory that the city wouldn't have a grown the way it has with out the calming effect of Central Park. It's such a huge park - theres hundreds of places you can go, where you can't even see the city on the out skirts. I did get a bit camera happy here - so theres heaps of photos.

Ainsley beeing a butterfly (thanks to Emma for the cute costume!)

Lindsay in a tree...

For Ellerys birthday we all got dressed up (very much) and went a very fancy restaurant for dinner and then on to Cirque du Soleil. The girls had their hair done in rollers (although Ellerys curls onl lasted about half an hour) and had make up and nail polish done. They were very pampered and they really loved it. This is the big kids at the restaurant...

This is Paul and Ainsley waling to the restaurant. We never drove anywhere in New York - always the subway or walking and the odd death defying Cab ride.

This is the city from with in central park.

Heres just some cute photos of the kids...

This is the crazy tiny apartment that we first stayed in. This was the entire living area...

...and this was the kitchen. Mum was visiting at the time and had to stack up the dishes (in a very artistic way) just to serve the dinner.

We actually ended up moving apartment because this was a bit of a dive. For starters it was adifferent aoartment to what was advertised when we paid for it, and there was exposed power points (without cases) and the lights had no switches so the only was to turn them on and off was to pull the cords out of the sockets (power sockets in the US have no off switches). This apartment wa on the upper east side, and we moved to greenwich village, which a much more vibrant and interesting community anyway. What I didn't account for was the five pubs directly across the street - but we happened to have a very old and noisy air conditioner in our room, so if we turned that on it would drown out most of the outside random noise with a consistant hum. The mood was cool though - you could open your window in the evening and feel like you were living in the middle of a party.

This is in a store - Lindsay and AInsley were having a great time...

This is in the foyer of the Museum of Natural history in New York, which was easily my favourite place here. We paid for a family member ship which was great value because we ended up going back 6 times. I especially loved the hall of Human Origins, featuring REAL neanderthal skeletons and a family tree of skulls from all breeds of hominids (humans).

This was at the Metroplitan museum of art - they'd built this huge bamboo construction on the roof, and people could walk up on tours! The kids desperately wanted to go up, but you had the be the right height and age (which they weren't). I was kind of glad.

This is Mum and the kids being very absorbed...

This is a crazy guitar the had there. What I want to know is, who had four arms to be able play the thing?

This is Tallis at the play ground drawing with chalk on the pavement, wearing 3d glasses that works with the chalk. A huge novely which we all enjoyed.

This is at a home school sports day - Ellery is in the blue singlet.

Heres the kids in central park on their scooters...

This is my friend Tori in front of Murrays cheeses. She came and visited us with her two girls, and we went to this amzing cheese store that she knew about. We bought a nice selection of cheeses and cured meats and had tasting night with the kids.
This is Lindsay and Ainsley on the giant key board at FAO Shwartz...
Ellery riding a bike with square wheels at a science festival.
Lindsay and Ainsley on the subway being very cute...
Tallis playing soccer at the park...

AInsley being a priness at the park. I really like this photo and couldn't resist including it.

One of the last things we did in New York was go to Coney island. It was a bit of dump, I guess because its so old. We went with some friends from Texas that were visiting, so it was lovely to catch up with them. This is crazy ferris wheel that we went on. On the inside the carriages were on a track and they would slide along it as the wheel went around. I didn't go in one, but the kids went with Seanna (our friend) and I could really hear them screaming!

Anyway,

Enough for now,

Cheers, Nic