Keiren's 12th Birthday Pool Party

So Keiren decided that he wanted to have a pool party for his 1st Aussie birthday because his birthday is now in spring instead of winter like in the Uk. So we were prepared for 10 12 year old boys and armed with food and drink galore!!!









The boys had a fab time playing in the pool and spa and playing pool and playing games in the pool it was very different to Keiren's normal indoor parties he is so used to having. The weather was not too hot or too cold it was just right and all the kids were so busy having fun they didn't want to go home when their parents came to collect them!!!

My Birthday!!!

So we decided to have a family day out and picnic for my birthday today at Belair National Park. The weather was absolutley great and we all had a great time playing games and eating nice food and a couple of bottles of wine it was bliss!!!




There was a family near us whose baby turned 1 today and his grandad came over to me and played Happy Birthday to me on his bagpipes!! Well that was it for me i just cried all afternoon. We had a really enjoyable family day out and it was very different to the normally cold Uk birthdays I am used to having!!

Adelaide Xmas Pageant

We decided to go to the Xmas pageant to try to get into the xmas spirit!! It was so strange as it was very warm and so un-christmas like compared to the Uk. However we decided that it isn't the Uk and therefore we needed to see it as very different and not compare the 2.

The day was fab and the parade was amazing, they put so much effort into the floats and it lasted for ages!! The kids were able to chalk pictures on the main roads in the centre of Adelaide and they loved doing this as it was something that was not normally allowed.

After the parade we went to the river and sat chatting with friends before we wnadered to the International horse trials where we spent the remainder of the afternoon and had a fab day!!!

Fleurieu Folk Festival 4-6 Nov 05.

This was our first Aussie camping experience and we decided to go to the folk festival to see what it was all about. We arrived at 5 on the friday evening and put up the tent in very warm weather with swarms of flies constantly in our faces but we were too busy laughing at each other slapping ourselves around the head to be bothered. We had no expectations of the festival and it turned out to be a really fantastic weekend where we heard bagpipes, harps, copious amounts of gutiars, flutes, violins and accordians.




There was a main stage where bigger acts played and we often went to watch but we mainly stayed in the area where the sessions were held which were unrehearsed sessions where people just started to play and others followed suit. I was in my element as many many Irish songs were played and we sang along and the kids also were dancing and having a ball.

The weekend was really warm and the kids made lots of friends and even came out of their shells so much that they entered a talent competition where kennadie recited the Owl and The Pussycat and Keiren sung a funny Llama song!!! They both received a medal for this and were very pleased with themselves. They both went to a harp workshop where they each had an hour to learn to play the harp which they both really enjoyed unfortunatley I wanted to learn but my nails were too long but I have now chopped them off and have been inspired to get back to learning my guitar and even got a bodhran drum bought for my birthday!!!

We had the best weekend and there is another festival in march in a place called Frances which is about 4 hours dtrive away and we are really looking forward to it. We have met lots of people and there are many events planned which we will be attending and the last sunday of every month many musicians get together in the hotel where the festival was and play sessions so we will be going regularly to these which should be good.

We arrived back home sticky, smelly and filthy but a fantastic weekend was had by all!!!

6 Months later and this is now real life.

Well I really cannot believe we have been in Austraila for 6 months now it seems real strange. In some ways it feels like it was only a few weeks ago we arrived tired and bemused at the tiny airport in Adelaide with our 2 kids and all our worldy possessions in 14 pieces of luggage or packed up in a ship on the ocean somewhere!! However on the other hand it feels like we have been here for ages, things have become so familiar and even very entrenched in everyday life.

This was one of the biggest decisions of our lives and with not even having been to Australia it was a journey made blind with very little expectations. Adelaide to us felt so very like "home" when we first arrived and we did become very settled very early on. The city itself is not huge by any means but it has a quaint township feel about it and is actually a very pleasant place to spend the day meandering around the shops and taking in lunch in many of the cafe's. The suburbs tend to merge into each other with no real distinction from one to the next which in some respects in real nice but in others a pain as you fail to know where you are at times as they all look so similar. We decided that in order for us to become really involved in all aspects of aussie life it was time to buy a house, but after 3 months of looking at real horrible and over priced houses we were becoming disallusioned that the right house for us just simply was not out there. We eventually by sheer chance came upon the house we have now bought and we fell in love immediatley with the place and it is now so much home for us it is unreal.

The christmas festivities are now about to begin and it feels particularly strange as we are now having days of 30 degrees and trying to get motivated to prepare for xmas in that heat is very strange but is also a difference I am starting to welcome (slowly!!) The feeliongs of any homesickness have been absent for most of our time here however there was a period of feeling particularly low when the kids were at school and Darren was at wo and I was sat at the rental in the winter with no jonb and very few friends and I did become rather lonely and plain fed up. The changing point in all our lives was when I finally got the job that has made me become ME again!!! I cannot believe how much I have changed now I am back working and doing the thing I do best and this has even proved very positive to my superiors as I have already been promoted in the short 6 weeks of being there.

The Aussie lifestyle for us is just so US we are very outdoors people and spend the majority of our time outside on the patio or in the pool and having many barbies it is really everything we dreamed it could be but reallyu thought in the back of our minds that we couldnt possibly acheive this. There are still times when we all miss our family back in the Uk but this is only natural and part of life but we have a new life here in Adelaide and the way that the whole family has adapted and embraced the lifestyle is just evident that this is meant to be for us. What will become of our time here? I ask myself this many times and genuinley I feel we will kick back and enjoy Australia for all it has to offer and embrace and changes or difficult decisions that come along. I am being very naiive if I believe that this will be home for the rest of our lives as I am not totally sure tht is the truth, however I do lnow we for the future will not being going back to the Uk but maybe in a few years when the kids finish school we may move to a different state to see what they have to offer. Who knows the world is such a huge place and for the time being we are very happy settling here in Adelaide and can see ourselves here for the next few years.