Feels like home to me...

Yesterday was our First Year Oziversary (took me a while to think of that word, and then to work out how to spell it)
I can't quite believe it's been a whole year - I feel completely at home here, although because my mum just flew home on Sunday I'm currently prone to crying at random songs while driving along... (I mean really random songs..)

I haven't really written a blog post about emigrating - I always meant to but then we just got busy doing it - building our new life. All I really need to say is it really isn't that hard to do. 
A little over a year ago it seemed like the biggest, hardest thing to do - I couldn't imagine leaving my family and friends. I do miss them every day.

What has surprised me though is how much I miss England, the green - really green - countryside, proper trees, Autumn leaves, windy beaches, drivers who know how to merge properly and give way to you at junctions. (And say thankyou when you give way to them.)
Being able to walk through fields of long grass without worrying about being bitten by a snake - decent television, marshmallows that don't taste like soap, real genuine liquorice allsorts. 
You know - the important things in life. The things you take for granted whilst sitting on a radiator moaning about the weather..

But really, there's nothing to complain about here. Apart from the right wing politics and downright racist attitudes of a certain section of Australian society, apart from this town's loyalty to the mullet and belly button length beard combo, apart from a certain newsreader who yesterday pronounced Zurich with a 'ch' sound on the end... Apart from all of this I love living here.
We can hear the surf while lying in bed, our neighbours are lovely (and they seem to like us although our house looks worse by the day). The school run is now fun, compared to living in a tiny village in Gloucestershire where all the other mums were related to each other...
It was a really little village.

So what I'm saying is I'm happy! The boys are happy, Mark is really happy - even Molly is happy!

Just one thing that still niggles - we still haven't found a decent curry. We've found some incredibly awful ones... But tonight we're acting on a tip from Mark's sister in law - fingers crossed for a proper Prawn Balti....

Winter Beach

I think I like our beach best in the winter - bigger waves, emptier sand, we usually have it to ourselves apart from the surfers.

Molly the beach dog!

Winter

So this is my first Australian winter.

It's pretty good so far - apparently it got down to 2 degrees last night which is really quite chilly! Mark's struggling not to say 'I told you so' every two minutes...(I refused to believe it would ever be cold...)

Now though, at 1pm, the sun's out, the sky's blue, the neighbours are mowing their lawn, the upstairs of our house is lovely and warm.

In fact, if I shut my eyes, it feels a lot like an English summer's day - of the warm dry variety ;)

New purchase...

We bought a house...

I'm not going to show you a photo of the whole thing yet because it might give you nightmares (like it's giving me..)
The words 'fixer' and 'upper' were invented for this house.
In fact the words 'knock' and 'down' might be better!
It's a 1960's fibro beach shack, it needs everything doing to it (most obviously the asbestos has got to go) and it's all ours on the 4th February!

Wish us luck...

(It's never been painted as you can see from the original lot number in the photo)

Wrapping it up

Christmas wrapping is like a competitive sport in my family.. and it's possibly the only competitive sport I enjoy.

I spent a happy afternoon wrapping up our presents to send home - this year I went for a recycled brown paper theme (we have 130 brown paper wrapped boxes in the shed), with crochet accessories and a few pompoms for added oomph.

I suspect it's the added oomph that has carried my parcel over the threshold from acceptable postage costs to the kind of prices that make your jaw drop open and the post office staff look at you sympathetically. Sympathetically but at the same time thinking what an idiot you are...

Next year's wrapping - tissue paper with feathers.

In the city

Yesterday Mark had a job interview in Perth (he got the job - yippeee!) 

So I went along for a wander round Subiaco, which is probably my favourite Perth suburb

 It even has it's own Regal cinema - an Art Deco one just like Evesham!

So far this week...

...We went to the beach. 

A lot....

We didn't go on a plane (just parked under the flight path)...

We bought crabs and ate too many of them...

Living the dream?

Now we're in our fifth week in Australia, the holiday feeling is starting to wear off. The boys are in school, I know my way round the supermarket (although I did get lost for an hour last week trying to find our house..) and the job hunt continues...

I keep reassuring Mark that this is the period of time we'll look back to in years to come as the hardest weeks - it was never going to be easy starting a new life from scratch and we're just lucky to have Mark's family close by to help us out when we need them.

Onwards and upwards!

This is what Australian weathermen call a 'cloudy day' ...

Rain, rain...

When it rains in WA it really rains...  No slight variations in 'type' of rain over here - drizzle, light shower, heavy shower etc. Just solid loud rain pounding on the tin roof all night.
And then the next morning, the rain is gone! Where the water goes I don't know...

First Days

Yep, the sun is shining in Australia!
Just finding our feet at the moment - bought a new laptop yesterday so we feel a bit more normal now.
Still hunting for a car.
Catching up with Mark's family.
Getting over the jetlag.
Off to see Molly in quarantine this morning!
Job hunting starts next week....

Last days

It was the boys' last day at school today.. so sad!
They're leaving their tiny 50 pupil village school where they've been so happy, and taking a leap into the unknown. 
Any school in Australia is bound to be a lot bigger, but I'm thinking a bigger school will mean more facilities and activities. 
And lots of new friends!

Still sad though...:(

Mini Molly

We're all a bit sad tonight because today Mark delivered Molly to Heathrow and she flies at 10.30 pm to Perth!

Poor girl... I hope she's not going to get too stressed out. 

Luckily she met a nice Labrador who's also emigrating so at least she wan't be on her own.

Here she is with her mini-me at the weekend!

The Ancestral Home

It's nice being home - although it hasn't really been 'home' for a while it still feels like home.

Things don't change much round here - the clocks still each tell different times..

There are even more books than ever- when they run out of room my dad just makes a new bookcase...

The garden is still jungle-like, in a good way - with a giant fennel plant...

And my dad's shed smells the same as it did when I was little - a mixture of creosote and wood shavings...

It's good to be home.
For a little while..

All over the place

Life is pretty chaotic at the moment - we moved out of our house and in with my parents - which, let's face it, is something you shouldn't do after a certain age.

Like 18...

This motley collection of photos from the last week pretty much sums up my state of mind!

An 8th birthday cake in the shape of a trilobite! (As requested)

Moving on..

Today is the first day I've sat down since Saturday... moving house is really not fun!

This was the scene on Monday afternoon when the packers had gone crazy with their brown paper and tape and were packing up everything that stayed still - I thought they'd packed the dog at one point.

You may think it's a bit flash getting someone else to pack for you but this is no ordinary move...

Fourteen years ago Mark arrived at Heathrow from Perth (via Nepal) with a backpack and £60 in his pocket.
Nine years ago he met me.
Eight years ago we got married, bought a house and had a baby.
Five years ago we had another one!
Two years ago we decided to move to Australia..
and in three weeks that's exactly what we're doing..

September

It's a bittersweet time of year, September. 

It can be an exciting time - new school year, new beginnings, a chance for a new start.

It can be also be a sad time, because sometimes new starts and new beginnings mean saying good bye.

We're moving out of our house next week so we've spent the weekend ferrying seven years worth of accumulated 'useful' stuff to the tip.

I sorted through a cupboard of baby clothes, sent a lot of them to the charity shop and got a bit overemotional!

It seems like a good time of year to move -  a turning point. So I'm thinking positive and holding back the tears...