loubiblu

Oreos yes, no do(ugh)nuts though. The biggest decision was which type of Cheetos to buy!

Cereal seems to be almost entirely made up of sugar. I really dislike anything sweet, anyone found Weetabix?

petitefrancaise

Trader Joe's has weetabix and CRUMPETS!! And lovely GF choc chip cookies, and really nice authentic creme fraiche and some red languedoc that was so good I went back for a case. And lost the diet somewhere on the way home!!

Sally Redux

The crumpets are very mealy but they have to suffice.

fozzyb

We used to mix our own muesli from Wholefoods, plus there used to be a bagel shop just down the road that I could bike to and pick up breakfast while it was still warm.

The waffle maker used to get a bit of use too.

The day-glo breakfast cereals used to be a once a week treat for Sunday mornings, which has kind of remained a family tradition even after we returned to the UK.

WEBlue

We have a terrific bagel bakery/café within biking distance too! One of the true joys of living in this part of the USA....

Yorkieabroad

We have weetabix round here....the British aisle normally has it at $7-8 a box, but you can generally pick up one that is branded as organic in the regular cereal section for $3-4. That said, it's quite a while since I've bought any as it's One of those things that goes through phases of popularity in our house...

I like raisin bran, but kellogs are even messing with that, with the "extra crunchy" variety...ie more sugar coating

phodg

The Chicago-Manchester flight on AA is always awful. A few years ago British Midland used to do a direct Chicago-Manchester flight that was far superior (better food and entertainment), but unfortunately they dropped it. I've even gone Chicago-London-Manchester a few times just to avoid taking the AA flight.

phodg

Jewel (in the Chicago area) sells Weetabix. Most places do. And PG Tips. And HP baked beans.

retzie

World Market is in Chicago and has a variety of foreign foods.

Mariano's is great for groceries, falling somewhere between Trader Joe's and Wholefoods (although, I used to cherry pick between all three). If you want information about specific groceries, or just inspiration to explore the Chicago food scene, check out LTH Forum.

phodg

Yeah - World Market is good for chocolate (e.g. Flakes, Lion bars etc.).
And finally after 20+ years, McVitie's Rich Teas are suddenly available all over the place. I used to have to bring them back with me, but not any more.

loubiblu

Their Man-JFK flight is equally bad! American are stopping their Chicago flight from Manchester from Jan to April (not sure if this is an annual schedule change), so we are going to have to go indirect when we move out permanently in January.

We've done most of our food shop this week in Jewel, but I sent the kids down the cereal aisle as I couldn't face their arguments over what to get - ended up with one of those variety box packs.

Weirdly, I don't eat sweet stuff so won't miss chocolate or biscuits. I did discover a fantastic cheese market in Oak Park - Marion St Cheese.

moNYC

Hey Loubiblu

How is it going with the kids? Are they excited? Have they seen the new schools?

We spoke to our son's school here and they said that in principle they are happy for him to fly back and sit his exams next year, just need confirmation from everyone internally.
The relocation agency is now sending us lots of info and the immigration papers are with the company's lawyers so it is starting to feel real.

How on Earth I am going to pack, organise, chuck stuff with 4 kids is still a question mark. Just this afternoon, as I started to shred over 400 years of bills and junk we accumulated, my 2 year old thought it would be fun to throw all the shredded paper around!

I tell you, there is a business opportunity here for someone to come in and help you sell /throw away / recycle stuff!

Hope all is going well!

loubiblu

The schools were beyond our expectations, the older 2 really engaged and were very animated afterwards (anyone with teens will know that this is not normal). Youngest spend a half day in the 6th grade of his potential middle school, although he might start in the 7th. His only objection seemed to be the weekly mass he'd have to attend!

House hunting is going ok, we've got 2 more viewings this afternoon.

Great news re your son and his GCSEs, keep pushing. There should be no reason why he can't sit the exams as an external candidate if he has to. The only issues we came up against were the separate science ISA timings, an English Controlled Assessment and a music ensemble performance (school is happy to schedule her individual piece when we return, it's proving more difficult to schedule the group piece so we might need a very quick visit back. Obviously these issues will depend on subject choices.

I'm tackling the packing/sorting/binning in stages (without your young children issues). I'm going cupboard by cupboard, room by room. So far I've been quite brutal - it's only still in the house because it's either coming with us or is going into storage. In theory this will make it easier when the Relo people come to pack everything up.

Good luck with everything

lizzyq

I wholeheartedly agree with that! I only used that routing this month so I could bring the cats, but never again.

moNYC

Brilliant news! Very glad they like the schools!

I am also trying to declutter as much as possible, but get frustrated as I'd like to be doing more then the kids will let me. We did take a bunch of things to the charity shop today and we are saying bye bye to our car tomorrow, so we are making some progress I think...

Good luck with house hunting!