Stop talking about my home, you guys are driving me insane with homesickness!!!! I'm a Caerphilly/Cardiff girl and would go back to Cardiff tommorow if I could.

Last I heard they were trying to build a ton of military housing on Raf's Lakenheath/Mildenhall so that they could house all of the military in one place as opposed to having them all over Norfolk and Suffolk! If that's the case then the Military housing in Newmarket would be up for grabs. I have no clue where they are in that process though, it could be a long while before they are ready to move everyone.

Always 21,
What does your American wife feel about moving to the UK? My husband is American and although he would love to live in the UK he just feels way to strongly that we just can't afford to live in the areas where we would need to so that he could find a good job. Most of the good paying jobs are in the cities and city living or even commutable distance living is generally way too expensive. I would be interested to know how she feels about the whole move.

My wife is pretty much my biggest concern about the move as I feel like I'm dragging her away from everything she's ever known and can't bear the thought of her going through bad homesickness. She's being so good about it though, saying she's excited and looking forward to a change. She had a really tough time last year with her parents' separation while she was pregnant, but they're still her family. Her mother moved to Arkansas though, and her sister has been in the army for four years and will be moving to Colorado, so it's somewhat reassuring to me to know she already knows what it's like to be separated from family. I just hope it's not too much when she's separated from ALL of them. She's nervous about learning to drive, excited about shopping... so many mixed emotions for both of us.

Yes, the cost of housing and living is a big concern. I would love to stay in the south east and work in London but am not sure if we will be able to. It all depends on how good a salary I can get. As an alternative we are looking at Birmingham. Although it would be a bit of a trek from my family it would be nothing in comparison to 3000 miles and an international flight! Have you considered Birmingham? It's pretty decent for jobs, and housing in the suburbs is much cheaper than the south east. Perhaps I'm not looking at the best areas, but I'm certainly not talking about inner city slums either (I'm looking at 3-bed semis from 80K and up... the delapidated terraces start around 50K). We are used to living in a slightly rough area here (though by no means the worst part of Baltimore) and as has been touched on in another thread, we keep ourselves to ourselves and have never had any trouble.

See, that's why I let my Hubs make the decision to move.

We were up your way this afternoon, btw, taking the lil 'un to the aquarium, (which he loved).

No, it's the U. of Glamorgan. Cardiff doesn't have a department in my specialty area. I've been keeping my fingers crossed last couple of days in the hope that the phone might ring .... nothing yet. You never know with academia - some places they really get a move on with the job side of things, others they seem to take forever.

I've never actually looked at the house prices in Birmingham. My mum is from there originally so I don't know why I've never considered it. I'm from Wales and the travelling distance between the two isn't that bad. I should take a look and see what there is around that area for curiosity sake

Well, like anywhere, there's good bits and there's horrible bits!!! Not sure about the house prices, but it will depend on areas like anything. My OH family are from Brum, they're all nice and live in nice areas. I just spent a couple of weeks there over Xmas.

The city has recently been going through a bit of a "regeneration" phase. They have done up the canals I believe, and are starting to turn old warehouses into trendy appartments (bit like London's Docklands). Also, there is plenty to do with kids (dunno if you have any). We went to the Aquarium, the Millenium Point (a science museum type thing), there's also the Cadbury factory, and plenty of stuff around. They have also done up the Shopping Centre - a huge improvement.

I do have a child so the fun family stuff is always good to have close by. My Mum has very fond memories of growing up in Brum (although I'm sure not much remains the same since then! ). Depending on where you are you can get to Wales in about an hour which really isn't that bad when I know that there is no way that we could afford to live in the decent areas in Wales that we would want to.