Oahu

Have been back a few weeks now and only now have had five mins to myself to add some pics of our fantastic holiday to Oahu Hawaii. We arrived to get our flights on time but discovered when we went into the terminal that United had changed terminals about four weeks previous. We trotted across to the other terminal with time to spare and found our check-in desks. They could not find us at the self service desks so we were sent to the usual desks. That was when we were told that the travel agent had not confirmed our tickets with the agents so the airline had to cancel our tickets!! I felt sick. The lovely lady at check-in then took us to the sales desk. In the following hour OH and United tried to get us on a flight. OH had not luck but thankfully United did. We were put on stand by for a flight to LA and then a connecting flight to Oahu. Thankfully we got on that flight but we had to run for it!! Not the best start, but even being up for over 24 hours it was well worth it when we arrived. It is beautiful and the weather is fantastic.

2 Days And Counting..

Wooooooo, hoooooo!! We are off to sunny Hawaii on Wednesday. I cannot wait. Most of the ironing and packing has been done. Just a few odds and ends to finish. Not sure how the cats and dog are going to take being away for so long. Bella can be a real miserable so and so. Poor Azlan is bound to be given a hard time lol!

Olivia is back from camp and had a fantastic time. However I think she had a better time last year. No pics unfortunately. OH and I got her a new bed, wardrobe, desk, lights etc when she was away as a surprise. She loves it and now spends all of her time in it!!

All Off....

For now anyway. The market is so bad at the mo that we have taken the house off the market. We dropped the price to practically what we paid for it three years ago and had one viewing and even they were not even on the market. If we had sold the house at that price we would not have been able to buy what we wanted in Italy. Being sensible about it, we have decided to hang on until the market picks up and maybe start paying off the mortgage early in the mean time. It still is hugely disappointing =-( In the long run I know we are doing the right thing.

A couple of weeks ago OH went to Italy for six days on business. Yeah right!! The first day he arrived the chap he was doing business with did not fancy doing any work so they spent the afternoon in Venice. Tough life!! I cannot complain as he brought me back two gorgeous bracelets. He also went to watch the World Superbike at San Marino. I am clearly in the wrong line of work!!

The children broke up for the summer holidays on Thursday. They are already driving me mad!! Olivia is off to camp tomorrow for a week and then we are all off to Hawaii. I cannot wait. However I am not looking forward to the flight but I cannot get round that. While Olivia is at camp I am planing a few days out for Amber and Luca =-)

Still Here

We are still waiting for our second quote to come back. Fingers crossed, it should be ready Monday or Tuesday next week. I had a call from the estate agent and they have a viewing for us on Monday. I am not holding my breath. I almost cannot wait for the contract to be up and at least then I will know either way if we are selling this year or not. It is a real pain not knowing.

OH spent last Sunday rearranging the rear garden. It had to be done as the play house was making the back of the garage damp. So he has moved the playhouse, taken down the chicken run that he put up and put the original Eglu run back on. He has also had to move a couple of sleepers. 15 bags of bark later, hey presto!!

Belated 1 Year Anniversary

Well I have been doing this blog now for just over a year and we are still no closer to moving to Italy =-( Patience is a virtue as they say. I am trying to be optimistic about it all. I spoke to a friend of a friend who has a friend who moved her family to France (get all that!!). She has four children and they settled in really well. I think they were 12, 9, 7 and 3 when they moved. That has always been a worry for me, that Olivia will be to old to adjust to the new language etc if we leave the move any longer. However I feel a bit better about that now. Besides it is all out of our hands at the mo. We have decided that we are defiantly not going to extend the contract with the estate agents at the end of the month.

We are currently looking to extend and have had one quote back of £47'000 +vat!!!!! We would be removing several limbs to go with that particular contractor! We are now waiting for our second quote which we should get back next week. Life is never cheap!

On a very sad note, I had to have Henrietta put to sleep as she took a real turn for the worse. It was not fair hanging onto her. The vet I saw who owns chickens herself found a lump that the previous vet missed. OH has said that I can get some more. The breeder that we got Henrietta from has hatched some this year so I will be going back to him. OH has also said that I can get a Cube from Omlet once we have rearranged the garden, which holds more chickens then the Eglu. OH has chosen an orange one, which will go lovely with the greenery of the garden =-)

Poorly girl

My fav chicken Henrietta is very poorly =-( She has not been herself for a while. Lethargic and generally not herself. I have wormed her as she had a runny bum, treated her for mites just in case. She was wobbly on Friday so I decided to take her to the vets. He thinks that it is some sort of tummy bug and has given me a week of antibiotics. If this does not work then I think I am going to have to let her go. The thought of that just brings tears to my eyes. I am soooo attached to her. She is such a lovely natured chicken. I have had her since she was a young chick.

On more depressing news, we are still no closer to selling the house =-( The market is getting worse, not better. We are having a builder round next week to measure up and see if our plans to extend are possible. If we do manage to pull it off then i think that when it comes to sell it will be more attractive as it will have a dining room and large playroom. We will only do this if we do not sell by the time our contract runs out. OH and I are really looking forward to our holiday, we need it lol!

My boy....

Vasco. Here are some recent pictures of him enjoying being out in the field with his best friend Oliver. I am really enjoying him.

Facebook

OH and I are addicted to Facebook at the mo. Its crazy. We both go on having a look for friends during the day and then again at night. So far I have found my best friend from primary school, who I have not seen for over 20 years!! I am sooo excited about finding her. We hope to meet up over the children's summer holidays. She has two sons, 9 and 2.5. It only feels like yesterday that we were kids wearing dodgy 70s/80s clothes and playing british bulldog!! I do love the internet =-)

Gardening Therapy

I have just spent the past couple of hours pottering around in the garden, tidying, mowing, de-pooing etc. I am no gardener as I have the brownest fingers and seem to kill every plant in my care!! But as with most things that are OH jobs, he stops doing them and I then seem to adopt them as mine. The therapy has helped this morning as I have spoken to our estate agents.... If we want to sell, the long and short of it is that we need to drop the price again. OH and I are going to chat about it tonight. I must admit I cried a little after getting off the phone, I feel as if everything is against us. The housing market and the Euro *sigh*. Its enough to turn me to chocolate...

On a good note, Olivia turned 9 at the beginning of the month. We got her an iPod Touch (OH idea, not mine) as she was saving for a Nano and a Nintendo Wii and a couple of other bits and pieces. She had a lovely day, apart from having to go to school. Olivia wanted a duck pond cake which a friend makes but I only found out after eating the last piece of it that the poor girl never got to have any. I feel awful, poor thing. We also took her to London to go shopping in Hamley's (its not what I remember as a kid!) and lunch at The Rainforest Cafe. We had a fantastic day. Got a fast train to Waterloo and then a taxi straight to the door of Hamleys. Lunch was a real experience. The restaurant has about 4-5 waterfalls, the ceiling is hanging with plastic foliage and various creatures are hiding about the place. Oh and about every 20 mins there is a thunder storm, thankfully without any rain!! We sat near a huge fish tank and got to watch the fishes over lunch.

My Little Man

This past week it has dawned on me that my little boy is growing up and fast (sniff). He now calls me Mum instead of Mumma (I think he is far to young to be doing this! lol), he was singing along (in his own funny way) to a song in the car today, his speech is getting better all the time and he is just getting physically bigger. At times as a parent you are wishing they were more independent but at the same time you greave (not sure if that is the right word) for the time when they were babies. Sigh.....

Aloha

We booked our summer holiday yesterday. TWO weeks in Hawaii, woooooooooo, hoooooooooo! OH really needs it. I am sooooo excited, I feel like a big kid. OH has always said that he would like to take us all there. The only places that I really fancy going to is Hawaii and New Zealand. Roll on August =-)

On another happy note we have a viewing today with a couple who viewed our house on Thursday evening. So we are keeping everything crossed. They are also viewing a couple of others for the second time. However our estate agent said that he did prefer our house out of the three that they are viewing. Lets hope they feel the same.......

Let It Snow.....

Woke this morning to five inches of snow!!! What is going on? So the kids and I were outside this morning at 7.30am playing in it. When the weather people say that we are going to have snow it usually means a handful of flakes that do not settle. We only ever see this sort of snow when we go skiing. The dog loves it but our eldest cat Bella was not at all impressed. However Azlan seemed to enjoy himself pouncing on the snow and charging through it.

Our open house did not go very well. We had ONE couple turn up. I am not sure if the weather helped, it was chucking it down with rain. I spent the whole day cleaning, dusting etc. Grrrrrrrrr! I even got rid of the kids and animals. However we have had a couple of viewings since then. We are still keeping everything crossed for a buyer.

We had a lovely easter. Olivia more then us as my sister took her to Disneyland Paris with her cousin by eurostar. The rest of us were very jealous. I cannot believe how many rides they went on. They packed so much in. The kids as always got brought too many chocolate eggs. We still have a pile of them. I might melt them down and make some cornflake cakes.

2nd Time Lucky (Fingers Crossed!)

Dropped that kids off at school this morning, came home and spent two hours sorting the house for the estate agents visit!! They looked around the house and seemed quite impressed. They have the same house as ours on there books but on for 10k more. The people who own the other house are in no rush to move so happily over price it. There are some other smaller properties for sale in our estate that will be on for the same price as ours. I am sure we will ruffle a few feathers by pricing ours so competitively. I feel we are just being realistic with the price. I have also decided to do an open day with our house. Never tried that before, what is the worse thing that can happen? The house will not sell that day. At least we would have tried. They took pics and details, just waiting now to check them. OH has just called me with his holiday dates in August, so fingers crossed we hope to be viewing houses that week in Italy….

Once that estate agents left Luca and I had lunch. He then had a nap while I ironed my way through our mountain of clean clothes. I then had to collect the kids from school followed by a trip to the bank and supermarket. Then home and cook the kids dinner. I am pooped.

I rode Vasco three times last week. Bliss. He is lovely to ride and esp comfy with my instructors dressage saddle. Will try and take more pics soon.

Slimming World

I joined Slimming World early August 2006 (the pic attached was taken in late August 2006. It is a shame that you cannot see the tops of my arms in the picture) because I had had enough of my weight and none of my larger clothes fitting. I managed to loose 1.5 stone in 11 months which I was very pleased with. However I then went of the rails and have put a stone back on since then!!!! I stopped going in late August last year but have re-joined about three weeks ago because I was finding that clothes that fitted before were now not. I thought I was being very good the first week and was most disappointed that I had only lost 1.5 pounds, so spent the following week eating what I liked (I know it is my own fault) and I missed last weeks meeting (slap wrists!). I am fed up of looking at my overweight self so I have to pull my finger out and do something about it. I went to Tesco earlier and brought myself the Slimming World magazine for some inspiration. They always do fab recipes and it is always lovely to read other people success stories. I am drawing a line in the sand today and am not going to go back to my bad old ways!!

He Has Arrived

Finally Vasco has arrived. He was collected late on Sunday night, spent the night in Dover (thankfully not in the truck) and arrived at the yard at one yesterday afternoon. The kids and I went to see him at five yesterday evening. He was a little anxious, which is to be expected. My instructor took him into the inside school and let him loose. It was lovely watching him kicking up his heels and rolling around in the sand. A couple of carrots later, we went home. This morning after the school run I collected MIL who looked after Luca so that I could go to the yard. I arrived to find a much more calmer horse. I spent an hour learning what brush to use etc. I have so much to learn, it feels daunting at times. I am having to use all of my will power not to keep on popping over to see him. He is such a gentleman. So willing to give you his feet so that you can pick them out and when he takes food from your hand he is so gentle. I am positively beaming. I am having a sit on him on Friday night but will not start having proper lesson for another couple of weeks. We both need to build up our fitness!! It has been three months since I have been in the saddle and I think I might also be using a dressage saddle!!

I want to cry....

Just spent all morning cleaning and tidying the house in preparation for the estate agent. He spent two minutes whizzing round the house (he has already seen the particulars on-line from the previous time we tried to sell it!). He has valued it 35k lower them we want for it. I want to cry, well have done a little =-( I think we may have two options, stay here another two years or get a mortgage in Italy. Neither are particularly suitable. We just need to decide now how badly we want to move. Will discuss more tonight with OH. It has really p****d on my fire. Just want to go to bed and hide under duvet but not sure if the kids will let me, besides have to take DD2 riding in 25 mins. TTFN
PS Vasco is still not here (that is enough to make me want to scream!) however have been promised that he will be here on Saturday when I will be visiting my big sister in Devon. I am not holding my breath.

The Story So Far

I cannot believe that it has been a month since I last posted anything. Anyway I have been busy. I ordered a skip so that we could have a major clear out as we do not want to be moving with loads of rubbish and wanted to de-clutter the house ready for viewers. OH said that we should have words with the neighbours and see if they wanted to add anything to the skip. I suggested that we waited first to see if we managed to fill it ourselves. Good job we did as we filled it to the top!!

My horse is still not here =-( The previous yard that my instructor had lined up fell through because the owner got greedy. Sounds like she had over stretched her finances and was trying to make up the short fall by increasing the deposit on the yard. It has worked out for the best because my instructor has managed to find another yard that is closer and loads better. It also has an indoor school which is a bonus. Vasco was meant to arrive last night but unfortunately the previous horses that were collected before him were stallions and behaving like complete arses. So the poor driver was having to stop all the time and sort the horses. Prob best that he did not travel with them as it would have prob stressed him out and they could have hurt him. He is now due to arrive next Wed. Am keeping everything crossed. MIL was due to have the children for the day early next week and I was going to spend the day at the yard. She is still going to have the children but i have decided to decorate the kitchen instead (joy!).

The estate agent is due to value the house on Thursday which gives me plenty of time to sort the house out. Hopefully it will be on the market early next week. The only thing that I hate about selling houses is the strangers tramping around you home looking in cupboards. Thankfully I feel much better prepared this time.

I brought OH an antique map of Northern Italy that I have hung above my desk. Its lovely to look up at it and dream that one day we will be living there.

OH decided that he wanted to buy a running machine. It arrived all boxed up on Wednesday and is still waiting to be unpacked!! I am as keen as he is to use it. I am hoping that it will be the key to me losing weight. I plan to use it while monster chops is having his nap in the day. OH plans to use it after work. I am tempted to keep tabs on who uses it the most. I would like to think that it will be me.

Monster chops has just woken up so I will have to sign off. I did try to add a pic to this post but the b****y thing is playing up and is not letting me do it. I do like to add a pic because it always makes it more interesting. TTFN

Ski Deep

The first week the kids are due back at school is when we have our annual ski holiday. In the 7 years that OH and I have been together this is only the third season I have skied. Having babies puts a stop to my skiing. However Olivia has not yet missed a season and it shows!! The first season I skied was great but then I had a five-year gap and last season was awful. I was getting panic attacks at the top of the slope and had no confidence at all. Much to the annoyance of OH. He had to carry me back to the chalet on his birthday I was that ill!! However since then I have started horse riding again, which has given, loads of confidence. I said that I would not do ski school this year and would just get out on the slopes. OH did not share my enthusiasm and thought that I would chicken out! I proved him wrong. I was sooo chuffed with myself.

Olivia was absolutely amazing. She makes it look so easy. This was also the holiday that we wanted Amber to start skiing. We put her in ski school last season, which was a complete disaster so this year we decided to pay for some private lessons. It worked a treat. She can now ski. The instructor is an English lady who has the most amazing way about her and gets reluctant skiers skiing without realising it! I am sooo proud of Amber. The trip for Luca was just about having fun in the snow. I really enjoyed just going off with Olivia and skiing together. We also skied with OH a few times and as always he would be showing off and messing around. The last run we did together he fell over showing off. He is still suffering for it and has a nice bruise to remember it!

We stay at the same place every year www.skideep.net . OH has been going with this particular company for about the past 13 years. The only difference with this trip was that we drove instead of flying. We could not face the airport with three children so we went by Eurotunel. What a fantastic experience it was going by train in the car. It is soooo easy. Why people use ferries I will never know. The only pain was the 700 miles each way. Having said that the kids were amazing considering the time they had to spend in the car. We did it in one day, which we were not planning on doing. We had planned to stop off over night in France but we were keen to get to resort on the way and keen to be sleeping in our beds that night on the way back!

What made me laugh when we got back and watched the recordings of us skiing is that we only seem to use the recorder when we go skiing because last seasons was right before this seasons footage!! Another new years resolution, use the recorder more often!!

PS Vasco is not arriving this Saturday but that is another story.......

Belated Greetings

Mid January 2008 and I am only just posting about Christmas (mental note, must try harder to update blog this year). Anyway we all had a fantastic time and were lucky enough to get some fantastic presents. I did not dislike any of my presents this year, which is a first. I got a great grooming kit for Vasco from OH, he also got me a gorgeous Radley handbag, some Agent Provocateur perfume to name a few. The kids got loads as always. Olivia has finally reached an age where she really appreciates what she gets. As a surprise we got her a pair of skis, which she adores. It took Luca about a week to open all his presents. He would open a few and then get distracted with playing with them.

Christmas lunch nearly turned into a disaster. OH parents were 10 mins late but his sister and brother-in-law was 45 mins late! The annoying thing is that they had also come from OH parents house so no excuse really. OH was livid and told them that he would not be cooking Christmas lunch for them again (his sister and brother-in-law that is).

Will update again soon with the rest of my news………