Originally Posted by stevensfamily

Hi Stu,

You moved back!!! sorry missed that one. I must say we visited Perth after seeing Lou in Adelaide in November , we have friends in Woodvale north Perth and its not my cup of tea at all so different from Melbourne and Adelaide.

Sorry to pinch your post Lou but wanted to wish Stu all the best for the future

Cheryl

Oh and please no offence mindblower as Perth is beautiful but it just felt so new great beaches just didnt have that homely feel to me.

Originally Posted by Weasy

Well where did all that time go? I can’t believe that I’m already writing our one year update!!!! Sorry if it’s too long……

We landed in Adelaide on Australia Day 2007 after a two week trip around California, Arizona and Nevada. My Uncle and Aunt (who sponsored us) were at the airport to meet us and took us to the rental we’d managed to arrange before we got here (thanks Andy J). The rental, in the beautiful Piccadilly valley in the Adelaide Hills, was fully furnished down to towels, bedding etc and the landlady’s Mum had even made us a pavlova – what a lovely start all round. We did think we wanted to live in the Hills as we liked the area when we came on our reccie trip.

Within 2 weeks we’d bought a car, done all the medicare/tax file nos etc etc and Chaz was offered a job on about the same money as he was on in the UK (he’s in finance).

The new school year started 3 days after we arrived so we went to look round our local school and loved it straight away so the girls started the next day. Alice, who had already done a term in year 2 in the UK went ‘back’ to year 1 and Molly restarted year 4. The slight step back was fantastic for both girls as it meant that the emphasis has been on settling in and making friends rather than on the academic work. Mind you, we’ve been very impressed with the standards and curriculum at our particular school and it has definitely born out all that we’d read about developing the whole child.

Otherwise the kids are so busy with music, swimming, drama, beach, friends etc etc. They have grown into very confident young girls and continue to grow daily. They are outside far more than they used to be – all great for them.

We had planned on renting for a while but we loved the area straight away and the girls loved the school so we started house hunting (as well as buying a second car). Plus the urge to get back into our own home was quite overwhelming. After looking at some horrendous homes and some beauties that were out of our price range we found our little log home in the hills on 1/2 an acre. It’s smaller than we thought we’d buy and doesn’t have the rumpus room I dreamt of having but we just couldn’t get the place out of our heads and it has the most amazing deck area. Well, we love the place and it’s completely ours – not the banks. The wildlife is amazing, we’ve had a koala, loads of birds all the time (kookaburras, lorikeets, galahs, magpies) and a family of possums.

Shortly after moving into our place we adopted a rescue dog, Roxy, from the RSPCA and our family was complete J.

During all of this we were rapidly becoming part of the community in the hills. We have made some marvellous friends, both aussie and brits. Some of the brits we met on UK meets and on our reccie and I think we’ll be friends with some of these people for a very long time. As for the aussie friends, they too are a fantastic bunch. I have a bunch of mum friends that I go for coffee with on Friday mornings and I can honestly say that I haven’t laughed as much in years. The aussie sense of humour seems to suit me to the ground. We really feel that we’ve been welcomed with open arms in this area – very lucky indeed.

After 8 months and realising that the rest of the family were getting well settled I decided I needed a bit more than constant coffee mornings so I decided to start my own business as a consultant selling lingerie and clothes at in home presentations. I’m thoroughly enjoying it. It’s giving me some income of my own, I get to wear the lovely clothes, it’s also very social and it fits in with the kids. I had worked for myself in the UK in my own home but found it very isolating. My current work gives me the independence of working for myself whilst still getting out and about. I believe this is necessary as too much time on my own could lead to homesickness.

Towards the end of our first year Chaz got promotion at work which takes him back to the position he was at in the UK so that rounded off the year nicely. Also we thoroughly enjoyed our first Christmas here although it does feel a bit odd having Christmas in the summer.

All in all I’d say we’ve been incredibly lucky. Many things just fell right for us (although there has been the odd challenge) such as managing to exchange all our house proceeds when the rate peaked last February (we did take advise and they all reckoned it would peak when it did – and it did). We’ve also been lucky to find an area that suits us down to the ground. We did take a lot of advise to heart such as saying yes to almost all social invites. As a result, we now have an amazing social life so much so that we crave a break at times!!!!

Missing family and friends can be hard and sometimes I have pondered if it’s worth it – usually deciding that yes, it has been worth it. We came with the attitude that we were going to make it work and we have really put ourselves out there and worked hard at settling and fitting in – all this helps, I think!

Nowhere’s perfect and I’m not going to pretend that it is but we love it here and count ourselves extremely lucky to have the opportunity to live here. Roll on many more years here.

Originally Posted by Weasy

Stu

Great to hear from you. How's life back in blighty? No worries about hijacking Cheryl, it's great to hear from Stu.

Lou
xx

Originally Posted by wafc

Hi Lou,

Lifes not too bad being back here, its very grey and dull though which is a bit depressing! I'm still looking for a decent job but hopefully something will crop up soon.

Watching all of these "Wanted Down Under" shows which are on the BBC at the minute does make me have feelings of wanting to return to Oz but I dont think its likely up to now, but you never know.

Hope you're well.

Originally Posted by s/nurse

Hi Louise, great post, we must catch up
jacqui