While I am waiting for an AOR from CHC London (which hopefully I will get by the end of the month) I thought I should say a little about how we got to this point.

We are:

me Penny 43

Husband Shane 42

Son James 22

Son Luke 19

Up until the age of 40 neither Shane or myself even owned a passport.

The boys had visited Spain and France respectively with their schools, but we hadn't been further accross the water than the Isle of Wight.

In 2002 my best friend having got her visa moved to Eastern Ontario.

In February 2003 we took the boys and got on a big plane at Heathrow to go and visit for 3 weeks.

We stayed for 3 days in Toronto and then got our hire car (big 4x4 for the snowy roads) and headed east.

My friend has a 30 acre horse farm with a (then) 3 year old house.

All of this she bought for £125,000

We had a great time ,visited a frosty Niagara falls, skated on the Riddeau canal in Ottawa and marvelled at the Ice sculptures in the park. Luke tried his hand at snow boarding.

We also had the stange experience of an ice storm. it comes down like hail and covers everything in what looks like a glass casing. 

In May 2004 we visited again. Couldn't really afford to but Canadian affair had flights for £150 return so could't really afford not to!

This time James stayed home and we took Luke and also our niece Emma (they are similar in age).

We felt a lot more at home on this trip and as the weather was warm we did a lot more too.

At this point we talked about what a great place Canada was and the boys would actually be able to own their own home and that kind of stuff.  We didn't think about it seriously though as we had my disabled mother living with us and didn't think we would be in a position to look at it for real.

Then in December 2004 my mother became ill with heart failure. This was a real shock as although she was disabled through artheritis she was healthy in every other respect. To cut a long story short she never got to leave hospital and died after 6 weeks. It was her kidneys that gave up in the end. I think all the years of taking multiple pills to counter the arthritis must have taken their toll. She was 72.

By February 2005 we started to think about what we would do with the house (we had lived upstairs and mum down) before.

It gradually dwned on us that not only could we move house if we wanted to but actually we could go wherever we wanted to.

Thats when the idea of moving to Canada materialised in earnest.

A new problem then appeared. James was 21 and would turn 22 in September at that point he would no longer be classed as a dependent and could not be included on our visa.

Talked to an immigration lawyer and decided that the New Brunswick business PNP would suit us but one snag, could we do it before James turned 22.

He said sure. If we don't we will submit to federal gov first and NB can play catch up. No Problem.

We submit initial forms - go to Fredericton NB for interview. Whole family happy with the place.

On our return home my lawyer is sending emails saying it would be better for James to be in full time education. No I replied. He has a good job doesn't want to go to school.

In the end I phone lawyer who has to admit that if James doesn't go back into F/T education he cannot be included on visa!!!!!

All his talk of submitting to feds first was just made up from the top of his head. ( so much for using a lawyer at great expense because they are the experts and know what they are doing)!!

So we had a choice. After visiting NB and getting excited about the whole thing we did not want to give up now.

James looked at the prospectus and decided to enroll at Bournemouth University on a business Management degree.

He started college on the day he turned 22. Talk about cutting it fine.

This could still be picked out by a very picky visa officer as the wording for dependents is that they "should be in f/t ed since before turning 22".

So it has cost us far more than anticipated given that we are now supprting him financially as a poor student insted of picking up £40 a week in houskeeping from him.

And now we are nearing the end of the visa trail. One way or another we should know in the next few weeks or months.

The next installment of this blog should be when I hear something from CHC London. Given their track record it could be a long wait so I won't hold my breath.