Cold -14c sunny.

In between the christmas and new years break I have been working mornings at the office and afternoons from home.  Today I stayed in bed and reversed it  

I am working on a Project in Saint John for it's regional health authority. Big project $24 million will be around 70 people. I was called in after the oral presentation for the Networking proposal. Seems they liked me

Julie has finished decorating the lounge and dining room and it looks smashing. We are at last starting to put our personality on the house.

Thank god for DVD's the North American TV is impossible to get used to with its commercial breaks every 10 minutes and the commercials last for 5 minutes sometimes repeating the same Ad twice in the one break..... They also turn up the volume to!! everyone reaches for mute when the adverts begin.

We are all looking forward to our New Years eve party at the Delta Hotel tomorrow

Well its Boxing day and we have snow, another quiet Christmas with just the four of us. It is very relaxing. We did spend some time with our neighbours and visiting friends.

View out off the deck across to our nearest neighbours.

Julie on our annual boxing day constitutional around the beaver trail.

We called family now spread all over the world to send messages of good wishes and to tell them we had snow

Today we had been invited to the Chickadee Lodge to have (another) Turkey dinner with Guy, Christine, Alex and Danielle. Her sisters and mum were there too.

Great dinner, tomorrow we will have to go for a good walk around the Nursery to walk it off (and the one from the day before). 

We spent the evening playing Sequence, drove home late and the roads were very slippery (freezing rain).

Kathryn and I went for a late walk so I could test out my new head torch  I am surprised she would walk out with me looking like a geek (according to Gemma).

I have been very busy the last few weeks working on a big proposal for an regional wide healthcare network including WAN, LAN and Voice over IP across all the health authorities in New Brunswick. Value $22 million so big push on to win it.

This winter is starting a little different from our first one. 2nd December and it was about -5c freezing rain everywhere. Far to dangerous to drive. I lit a fire in the woodstove this morning.

Last night we met Derek Kirby who runs the Christmas Craft fair and discussed Julie's idea about making purses (handbags to you Brits). He said there was a waiting list to get into the fair and he would only accept high quality craft because he didnt want to devalue his show. He obviously doesnt understand Julie's nature as a perfectionist. I am sure that anything she produces will be way upto and probably above his expectations.

NewComers club meeting at Dooly's (pool hall) then onto Pizza Delight after. A great evening. The new comers club has really helped us to settle in.

Lazy Sunday morning -8c, fired up the stove and made some porridge for breakfast for everyone.

Julie worked on her bags while I carried on fixing up the basement to make a new guest bedroom.

Sunday dinner was a favourite of mine, Trout, sauteed potatoes and peas with a grape and almond sauce. I then spent a lazy afternoon watching X-Men while the dishwasher did all the work.

Newcomers executive committee meeting at Tim Hortons in the evening to discuss events for Christmas and January.

We had a traditional Bonfire night party with bonfire and fireworks (rockets are banned here because there is so much forest and the risk of fire). We invited our neighbours and friends and Julie made 7 litres of her Chicken Curry while I brewed up about 7 litres of Mulled wine! The girls made toffee apples and brandy snaps.

We had a great turnout of about 35-40 people and only the brits understood why we burned an effigy of Guy Fawkes on the bonfire… It did look a little barbaric!

After all the party clean up and preparations for winter (loading the 3cord of wood into the garage, winterising the lawn mower and strimmer, putting the deck furniture into the shed etc…) we sat down and went over the year we had just had to put some thoughts together for this news letter.

What do we like about NB Canada?

• We love the house and the garden; we have privacy in the garden and our own space in the house.
• We have lots of friends, people seem to have more time to stand and talk. Most of our friends are from somewhere other than Fredericton, they are like us, and have moved here to live a different life.
• The nature, the variety and new things we see especially the whales in the Bay of Fundy.
• There are many new birds and animals to see, you cannot imagine what it is like to find half a dozen turkey vultures sitting in the trees of your garden, with their six foot wingspan! Then the next thing you see is a tiny purple breasted humming bird hovering in front of a flower.
• The Camping and walking facilities are good too.
• The scenery is very pretty too, with some amazing sunsets in St Andrews (a little seaside town).
• Winter sports and activities are a positive experience for us too. We have taken up cross country skiing (again) and this year are planning to try snowshoeing!
• We have a better standard of living than the UK with the larger house and three cars. Because everything is new to us we can visit local areas and they seem like a holiday to us.
• Having time to do things rather than having time for working
• There are more opportunities because there things are less developed.
• There is less snobbery and they are less concerned with consumer items / designer clothes than the UK.

What don’t we like about NB Canada?

• The Fredericton people are very cliquey and getting to be included in their circle friends will take a lot longer than we thought. In some ways it is like living in a small rural village.
• Because of the lack of traffic the general driving skills seem poor to someone from the UK. People drive slowly and seem to have little understanding of good road positioning.
• There is not much to do for teenagers
• TV is poor and directed at the lowest level (dumbed down)
• There is a very provincial view people are not aware of outside world and what is going on within Europe say.

• The shops not modern enough.  However this means there are opportunities for  entrepreneurs .

• Because the children mainly use the school bus and the rules around both lanes of traffic having to come to a complete halt when a school bus stops, they lack road awareness. They often just step out and most drivers just stop regardless if the person is at a crossing site. This is scary as a driver when people are at crossing they assume you will stop if they walk out. These crossing are not marked like a zebra crossing or pelican crossing in the UK

• Another bugbear is the poor social skills particularly in children (probably due to isolation) this is displayed as poor manners, little or no please and thank you's, people cut their food into bit size pieces with their knife then eat with just a fork or just use the fork and cut their food with the side of the fork.
• Cost of healthcare and car insurance is high(er).
• Overall the cost of food is generally higher than the UK as a proportion of your salary.

What do we miss from the UK?

• Good manners, hearing please and thank you’s.
• The inefficiency in many things. For example in the UK when we shop for food, we pick it, queue, pay and get out as fast as we can, while here we shop and have to wait while the checkout person has a chat with the customer at the till
• Variety of Shopping, we girls particularly miss ‘Next’ shops.
• Our local Butcher and his quality meat also the variety and quality of food in the supermarkets. Sainsbury’s had a consistency of supply and variety in items such as fruit
• Heinz Baked Beans, the Canadian versions just don’t taste the same
• The quality of TV in North America is poor with lots of commercials a two hour programme in the UK will take three here. There is a lack of quality dramas we miss the BBC. Although we can get a version of it here there are still commercial breaks. You can find British TV if you search (Cornation Street and East Enders are both here)
• We all miss English Robin's and Blue tits.
• I think I can also say we all miss Barney our dog. He died before we left.
• We miss tourist signposts, places to go, much easier to find in the UK a challenge here.
• Our local Leisure centre, although Fredericton is building one which will be ready in the spring, plus it will build another one next year.
• Crime Watch, crime is no were near the levels in the UK and a drunken driver will make the headlines. I think there have only been two murders this year in New Brunswick, both violence on partners or siblings. To give you an example in the UK the murder rate is 1 in 56,000 and here it is 1 in 200,000.
• Because of the smaller population there are less quality restaurants, they tend to close by 9:30pm in the week due to lack of custom.
• Friends, we all miss them and finding new ones isnt very easy for me. (Kat)
• I miss not having pets. Dad’s being a pain and refusing to consider any. So I brought an aquarium and have started breeding Guppy’s. Oh yes I have also started breeding meal worms (to feed the baby birds) – (Dad says…  they sound like pets to me)

What don't you miss about the UK?

• Road rage you very rarely see it here and if you do it is probably someone from out of town.
• I don’t miss the Police and Ambulances coming to school nearly every day (Gemma)
• Oh yes I definitely don’t miss the constant background noise. It is so quiet here!
• In the UK I had horrible views from my bedroom window and here it is much prettier.
• The general lack of privacy, you couldn’t sit in your back garden and not listen to the neighbours playing football with their kids. Here we cannot even see into our neighbours back gardens they are so far away!
• Long commutes, long working hours and crowded public transport (in the south east)
• Tony Blair / Gordon Brown / UK Politics / EU – I will say no more.
• Crime and the fear of walking the streets
• The cramped housing in crowded streets with people who you don’t know and never meet because they are all to busy making ends meet.
• The millions of people, in New Brunswick there are 750,000 people in an area with is ¾ the size of England!
• Rubbish/litter in the streets. People seem to take more care of their environment and there are less of them to make a mess in the first place.
• Here we are the foreigners and on the whole we are treated with a friendly “hello and I love your accent”. Immigrants make the effort to fit in learning the language and learning to explore new things. Perhaps my list of dislikes shows how hard it is for newcomers to fit into any nation, even one that is similar.
• The only non English speakers we hear are people speaking French as New Brunswick is bilingual.
• I don't miss my 7x8 bedroom
• I don’t miss being scared to walk around the town (here you are watching for bears when walking in the woods!)
• I don't miss the traffic and chance of being run over

What advice would you give to someone emigrating to NB?

• Understand the health costs
• Get full dental check up and work done before leaving
• Ensure you have a supply of prescription medicines and bring your own tried and tested medical remedies to tide you over. Anadin, paracetamol, alka seltzer, Andrews, benylin etc because there are differences and you may find you react differently to them.
• Understand the school regulations, our 18 year old could have gone into high school to finish her high school diploma rather than the local community college which would have saved us $5000!
• Check the job market and learn the necessary skills, get experienced / certificated in the required areas
• Learn French it will improve your job opportunities
• Be prepared to take things more slowly, except buying a house, that's much easier
• Understand the banking system, you pay for cheque books, you pay monthly service charge for the banking facilities
• Do not under estimate the how closed communities are. Because of the smaller size they are similar to villages in the UK where you are an outsider for 20 years. But they are friendly and helpful.
• Find and join the newcomers club, if it doesn't exist start one
• Try to time your move with children around school natural school breaks
• Get any qualifications for older children assessed for Canadian equivalence.

• Try and get all orthodontic work on your kids done before arriving. Dental work for orthodontic work costs a fortune in general in North America ($6500 per child).

• Bring a multi-region DVD player and a library of good DVD’s to watch because the TV is pretty grim. Apparently it takes a couple of years to get used to all the commercial breaks.
• Think about bringing over a couple building site voltage converters and keeping your power tools. Replacement is relatively expensive compared to using what you have. They will get you little cash when you sell them at car boot sales anyway. Although the cost of power tools here is low.

• Become people who actively seek out and do things rather than sitting back and waiting for the community services to put on events. You must be together as a family and find things to do together.
• Organise a pub review group with the newcomers and visit a pub per month to assess its atomosphere, charm, drinks, service, food etc…. good way to develop your friendships with the newcomers clubs plus a chance to meet locals.

• Don't have a boyfriend when you leave UK (Dad say’s … this advice is from the girls)
• Basically get used to driving slower and a slower way of life, people have conversations in the checkout queue. My mum has a chat with one check out lady at Sobey’s supermarket and she sometimes comes out from behind the counter and hugs us!

Summary

David:

A great year we have made amazing progress from arriving with no home and no job. I love it here, my commute is short, I seem to have more time to spend with the family and mostly work is confined to work time. There isn’t the expectation that you will produce for work outside work time. Family time is important and that is the view of employers here.

I find it very difficult to imagine moving back to the UK.

This coming year we have to become people who ‘get out there and do things’ rather than ‘watching and hoping to find things to do’.

Julie:

Canada is very nice, the scenery and wildlife are fantastic. Driving is an interesting experience and the social life is excellent only thanks to the newcomers club. We are generally happier than we were in the UK and all in all an excellent year!

Kathryn:

University is hard to get into, there seems to be little advice offered, you appear to have to dig for everything. However things have improved a lot in the last three months. The driving test is a lot easier and now I am mobile with a car and job things are looking rosier.

Gemma:

I love the wildlife and we all see more of each other, Dad especially seems to have more time.

I have more friends now and we are all looking forward to Christmas and our new friends have invited to their house for Christmas Eve and Boxing Day suppers. I am looking forward to the snow and trying out my skis, snow shoes and ice skates!

We will be back in the UK in 2007! 

Julie’s brother is getting married in March 2007 and David has the honour of being asked to be Ian’s best man.  The wedding is in Cambridge and there will be a reception in Edinburgh, so we will be around Cambridge, Nottingham and Edinburgn for two weeks in the middle of March. You can rest assured we will be stocking up on those food things we miss and are allowed to bring back.

From the 7th -9th July we drove Julie's Mum and Dad around Northern New Brunswick. I hired a seven seater (or should I say, rented a ...) and we drove up to Parlee Beach apparently the warmest waters north of Virginia. Hot and sunny so a day at the beach was a great way to spend our time.

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Doreen and Ernie were impressed with how clean the beach and it's facilities.

We stayed overnight in a motel and the next day drove up to Tracadie Sheila a pretty town on the Acadian Penisula.

This part of NB is mostly french speaking but the majority of people are bi-lingual and it is very strange to sit in a restuarant and listen to a family talking over dinner and switching between English and French effortlessly. I wish we had the same level of skill with the French language, but alas my schoolboy/tourist french enables me to order food, ask directions and be polite. We stayed overnight at another Motel. Better quality than the one in Parlee Beach and cheaper too.

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The next day was marathon driving day (a case of the Brits not realising what the distances are on 1/200,000 maps). We drove further up the penisula to Shippagan and visited the Marine centre. After a couple hours jumped back in the van and headed down to Bathurst and across to Mount Carleton Provincial park!

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That is when you realise that taking roads that are less well used means lots of potholes and driving speed drops from 90 - 60kph. My well thought out travel times went out of the window and it took us all day to get to the park. On arrival the roads were rough (no tarmac) and I shredded a rear tyre. So while everyone went for a dip in the inviting lake a couple of hundred yards away, I changed the wheel and when I finished very hot, sticky, and mosquito-bitten I dived into the freezing cold mountain lake  oh but it felt so good.

That night we spent in Plaster Rock, a lumber mill with a town. The people were friendly enough but the local restaurant closed at 7:30pm so we had to buy a some burgers and fries from a local snack hut. Plaster Rock's claim to fame is it's annual World Pond Hockey  Championships.

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We left late in the morning Ernie wanted to visit Grand Falls, I am now driving on one of those temporary spare wheels so my speed still very reduced. So off to Grand Falls it was. In the brochure this looks much better than in the flesh. However it is a pretty town astride a gorge overlooking some waterfalls that are probably more impressive in spring than in the middle of a hot summer and the water level is much reduced. It was to hot for us to really enjoy the town and its river gorge. So we remounted and drove back to Fredericton by way of Hartland and the worlds longest covered bridge .

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Decision - WAY TOO MUCH DRIVING

Lazy start to the day, the girls are taking part in the Canada Day parade as part of the Fredericton Pony Club.

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The parade was great fun with lots of people and entries into the parade, marching bands, and flags everywhere. The girls looked great and everyone was smiling on this sunny day.

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Dinner at the Chickadee Lodge. Guy and Christine were our first friends in Canada we stayed at their lodge during our research visit in 2003. Dinner was a BBQ and Guy is something of a gourmet BBQer, the food was great. We eventually left about 9pm and headed into Fredericton for the firework display.

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I had never seen so many people in Fredericton! We had a real traffic jam at midnight when everyone tried to leave..... It almost lasted for 30 minutes!

Julie's Mum and Dad arrive on Thursday 29th June and the whole weekend has just been consumed with work on the basement bedroom. It has been a frantic rush to complete it in time. We decided to paint the floor when I discovered I needed to lay a subfloor before laying the hardwood floor we had brought ($1,000)  so we should be finished tomorrow and hopefully the smell of paint will be gone by Thursday.

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Yesterday we attended the 'Stars under the Stars' screening in downtown Fredericton (they show old films for free). We turned up with our lawn chairs and enjoyed "Gentlemen prefer Blondes".

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There is so much for tourists to see and do in Fredericton in the summer, fingers crossed that Doreen and Ernie have a good time.

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We have joined the Fredericton branch and this has suddenly increased out circle of friends and at the first meeting there were about 5 British couples at least 50% of the members are British.  I won the raffle (a selection of beauty products … wasted on me so the girls claimed them all). Our social life is definitely more active here than in the UK.

It helps that I get home around 5:30 – 6pm even if I work late, plus we have a house were more than four people doesn’t make the room feel crowded, and we can always spill out into the garden (weather permitting). We have held several “curry” dinners which have caused a stir with lots of people asking for the recipe and I took a curry to the company “pot luck” lunch (pot luck means everyone brings a dish and they are all shared, great way to have a lot of food and people without having to spend a fortune).

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We have brought our first gas (petrol) powered lawnmower as I have nearly half an acre to mow (notice now it involves an engine with exhaust and a manly pull start it is not Julie’s job any more, lawn mowing in Canada is very macho). As soon as the weather allowed Julie was in the garden and has been organising the how it will look, getting some of the 150 (approx) trees cut / pulled out (great to have a friend with a chain saw) and digging out the stumps, making flower beds, staining the deck, planting things and generally pottering around and working hard

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Looking forward to the summer, we have visitors booked in for the rest of the year, with Julies mum and dad starting off 29^th June – 20^th July followed by Gemma’s boyfriend arrives on the same plane as Julie’s parents leave on, he stays until mid August, then my mum and dad are coming over in September!  That’s our summer holiday this year, being tour guides and learning more about the Province of New Brunswick at the same time. It should be fun. You can join in and send us your ideas for a tour see the website www.tourismnewbrunswick.ca/en-ca for details. Might save us some time.

This emigrating game must be in the Whelbourn blood, My sister, Lynda has emigrated to Australia with her husband and family. They have settled in Sydney after a visit to Perth. Richard is working and they are just at the beginning of their emigration journey. So good luck to them and hopefully in a couple of years we will be swapping houses in the winter :~) they can enjoy the winter snow and we can get the beautiful sunshine in February without going to Cuba, Canada’s equivalent to the UK’s Spain.

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Before we know it, we will be celebrating our 1^st year in Canada with a traditional Whelbourn bonfire night party, the 5^th Nov is on a Sunday.

Right now we are preparing for the summer visitors. We are fitting out the basement workroom by splitting it in two and creating a new guest bedroom and a smaller workshop. I am finding that DIY in big old North America is like the rest of everything here Bigger than in the UK! It gives him the chance to browse around all the power tools at Canadian Tire (his favourite store) http://www.canadiantire.ca/index.jsp for all you camping / power tool, automotive gardening freaks here’s what he gets to look around! Our post code is E3E 1A3 (you may need it for the website)

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PS we saw our first humming bird in the garden on Sunday 21^st May.

This last few weeks have been full of ups and downs, little moments were we are happy and then ones were we aren't.

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The Ups

• The weather is warming up.
• At work things are going well for me. I have been promoted and awarded a nice pay rise.
• Out of the blue we had a call from a friend of a friend and apparently Wendy is connected to University of NB and comes to Fredericton every other year! Isnt that weird we never knew. Anyway she took us out for a drink and she has alot of connections here so we had a great night in the pub and connected with some local people.
• The work on the basement is progressing well to create our fourth bedroom mainly for guests.  It has to be ready for June 21st when our first visitors arrive.
• Kathryn and Gemma are both enjoying the Pony Club and seem to be picking up. Gemma is getting more friends at school.

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Downs

• Julie is feeling more homesick than ever, and to add to this she feels like the girls are growing up fast and don't really need her anymore. It doesnt help when I am so happy here.
• Kathryn still doesn't have any friends as such and she too is feeling homesick.
• I will be working in Toronto for the next few months (just when I didnt want to be away) working on the implementation of Client Registry for Cancer Care Ontario. 50 Hospitals in four months ..... of course everyone tells me its impossible and that just makes me more determined.

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We need to get out more and do things.

 Things are going better than we expected I am is settled at work, Gemma is doing well in Fredericton High School and they have put her in a sort of creative writing class with 17 & 18 year olds. The teacher keeps getting her to read out to the class so they can hear a British accent.

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Kathryn has started applying for universities in Atlantic Canada and the she is doing well in her preparations at the NB Community College for taking the provincial exams in maths, chemistry, English and biology (so the universities understand her qualifications).

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Julie has started looking for work, however it’s tougher for Julie than we thought. Every government job asked for bilingual English/French and the rest of the workplace seems to be run in cliques with jobs for the people you know rather than outsiders.

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We have had some shocks though.

Healthcare costs are very high compared to the UK, both dentistry and prescription medicines make you realise why North Americans value jobs with healthcare insurance so highly. David had his usual prescription for his knees and in the UK  he would pay 12 pounds for two items, here it was closer to 200 pounds! (How little we realise the true cost of drugs in the UK…. So don’t ever grumble about prescription charges again).

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Surprisingly we find food more expensive in relative terms than the UK and probably spend the same amount (in £ value) as when we were in the UK but of course we are living on a Canadian dollar salary.

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By mid march the snow had all gone, it never really returned after the big thaw mid January. This has been the mildest winter in living memory. The spring is beautiful all the green, trees in burst into bud almost overnight. There are so many varieties tree it makes you dizzy trying to count them, beech, birch, red oak, cedar, elm, rowan, several varieties of fir, pine and maple, the silver birch is beautiful in its pristine white bark that peels off as it grows. That list is just from our garden!

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For relaxation we have been walking the trails in the hills behind the house and the local provincial park (Mactaquac) about 15 minute drive from us, going away from town.  During the walks we have seen beaver and muskrat in the ponds, big black and white kingfishers, owls, hawks and huge turkey vultures plus groundhogs and deer.

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White tailed deer are a common sight as we drive to and from work / school so much so we don’t really notice them much anymore.  I have twice nearly collected a deer on the hood (bonnet) of the car. The deer seem to play chicken on the main road, they wait around in pairs and one dashes across as the car approaches and the next one waits a few more seconds to make it interesting (scary for us).

We will be back in the UK in 2007!  Julie’s brother is getting married in March 2007 and David has the honour of being asked to be Ian’s best man.  The wedding is in Cambridge so we will be around Cambridge and Nottingham for two weeks in March. So we will be stocking up on those things we miss or just don’t taste the same in Canada:

• Heinz Baked Beans (available in Canada but stronger flavour)
• Paxo stuffing
• Oxo cubes (available in Canada but weaker flavour)
• Bisto Gravy (available in Canada but weaker flavour)
• Branston Pickle
• Back Bacon
• Processed peas
• Pork Pies
• Cornish Pasties
• Sausage Rolls
• A decent curry restaurant
• A decent Chinese takeaway or restaurant

Its funny how you suddenly start to crave those things you were not partial to when you can’t get them. Julie has developed this craving for UK baked beans (no she isn’t pregnant). In Canada the baked beans are darker and no matter what type we by (even Heinz) they seem to have some form of sweetener such as molasses added. Oh well I suppose we will eventually get used to the taste, and when we try some UK beans we will think they are bland.

Today it started to Rain. The temperature was +7c and it is forecast to be about the same for the rest of the weekend and beyond. This is very warm for this time of year.

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By the end of the day there is a spring feeling in the air as the thaw is nearly complete. All signs of snow have been washed away. The grass is losing some of its frozen and brown look!

Visited Jeff and Heather's for brunch. Great food Jeff loves cooking so we had Eggs Benedict and piles of crispy bacon. I do miss back bacon with a bit of rind on it. In NB it seems to be all streaky that is fried crispy. Nice but I miss the back bacon.

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We spent the evening at a dance in Fredericton. The pub had a live band who played 70's and 80's music plus disco! we had a great time. Below is a photo of Heather and Jeff enjoying themselves. Well Jeff is

 We moved into our house on the 16^th December 2005, went to the xwave Christmas party on the same evening. The entrance fee was a bag of shopping to go to the disadvantaged families within Fredericton area (great idea). The party was themed on a Casino night I blew my casino money quickly. Julie kept hers going most of the night and she won a $25 gift voucher for the Mall.

When we left at about 11:30pm we discovered there had been an ice storm (freezing rain onto already below zero surface!) while we were indoors and the car had become a huge ice-cube… This was a very different experience to cleaning off the frost on the windscreen! How do you open a door that is covered in ice to a 3-4mm depth very weird and chip away softly.

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Christmas preparations were all completed early as the last day to post to the UK was the 5^th of December so we only had to buy for ourselves (I still didn’t really shop until 22^nd Dec). The Canadians seem to have a extra set of furnishings especially for Christmas. When they decorate for Christmas they replace all the pictures with Christmas themed hangings, even the towels in the bathroom are Christmassy.

So to ensure we were seen to be integrating with the community off we went and brought our first Christmas hangings/ornaments.

 Kathryn and Gemma with our Merry Grinchmas sign.

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We sent Christmas cards to our nearest neighbours and they all came and delivered theirs with little house warming gifts of home made jam, biscuits etc. This is a friendly neighbourhood and people seem to make their own jams and wine much more than in the UK. 

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We had a cold snap were the nighttime temperatures were down to – 20^oc and some days the high is only  -12^oc. The roads are cleared very quickly and there isn’t really a problem driving. Seems like my decision to by a Ford Escape (4WD gas guzzler) is a waste of money (but fun to drive).

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Well we had a White Christmas this year (I know its hard to believe), with a quiet dinner just the four of us (the first time in 24 years). It was very relaxing, not having to worry about what people, wanted to eat / drink or what to do in the afternoon etc…

After Christmas dinner, we went skiing, just a walk across the road and through some woods! Apparently, there are over 25 km’s of ski trails there! Wow, this is the life.

Here are the girls in the Tree Nursery just across the street from us.

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On the weekend of the 13^th January we had a huge thaw with temperatures way above freezing (even as high as 15^oc) and lots of rain which washed away all the snow. Then in a bounce back they forecasted an ice storm approaching for Tuesday. Canadians take ice storms very seriously, so Gemma had a snow day(school shuts for the day), but we had not listened to the radio and David took her to school and he noticed no one seemed to be about, so he gave her money for the telephone and told her to call home and left her there (mean Dad). The storm failed to happen so the schools were all closed for no reason!

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Everyone keeps telling us that the winter so far has been exceptionally mild.

Back to work, saw me being put forward to Project manage the Province’s foundation healthcare project in preparation for future eHealthCare records that will save millions of $ (well that’s the plan).

The girls pony club events are starting to take off, with meetings yesterday and one planned for next week. The two leaders have asked the girls to do some cross-country riding / racing. (lucky girls)

Everyone is settling in well, and getting into a rhythm.  We will update you all again in February (should be cold then).