Set Sail For The New World

After just over a year of being in NZ, all our stuff from the UK is now on it's way. We had quotes from 3 of Teesside's major removal firms: Devereux, Richardson and Pearson, and were surprised by the difference in both the price and the actual service offered. In the end we opted for Pearson, as they gave a competitive quote and a comprehensive door-to-door service.

The team arrived as scheduled on Friday morning to our storage facility (also known as my Mam's house!), and began the arduous task of packing for export, inventorying for customs and insurance purposes and loading on the van. One of the guys even recognised me from a picture in the kitchen, and I had worked with him over 12 years ago, whilst I worked in removals during my college years.

So now the journey begins for all our belongings. They'll go back to the removals depot, and into a container, then off to the docks for loading. After that, it's a few weeks at sea as it makes its way around the world to Wellington. The expected time for this is 8-12 weeks, but that will depend on the shipping company, weather at sea, customs once it enters NZ and loads of other factors we have no control over!

Hopefully we can track the ship once the container is loaded, as it would be cool to see the journey our stuff takes, as it follows us to Aoteroa.

People, People, Everywhere!

Well its been a horrible weather week this week, what I would describe as 'English weather', completely unpredictable. But by Friday Mother Nature pulled her act together and we were blessed with a day like this:

So you can imagine that everyone and their dog headed out to soak up the sunshine. I was to meet Susan , Jo and Joan at the Botanical Gardens but after 10 minutes of driving round trying to find a parking space I had to give up and call Susan. Luckily she was also driving around so I dumped my car miles up the road and we all jumped into one car, after 5 minutes we found a space.

The gardens were heaving, and when I say heaving, I mean like more than 10 people (which is a lot for Wellington standards). We walked through the gorgeous greenery and up towards the play area where we were meeting Jo and Joan.

The children all headed off to play and it was chance for us ladies to lay out in the sunshine and catch up on some gossip.

After a good laze in the sunshine we headed back down. Stopping off to feed the ducks, well I say feed them, because of the amount of people at the gardens that day the pond was full of bread and the poor ducks just weren't interested, but how do you tell an eager feeding group of kids that?!

The walk back through the gardens was phenomenal. The stunning arrangements of tulips were utterly amazing. The colours and the smell was superb, we spent a long time here looking at all the different colours and learning the different names.

The whole of the tulip gardens were just heaving with people and rightly so, it was just stunning. I'm not really a flower person but when the sun was shining as stunningly as it was and the flowers were glistening in the light, you can only be in awe.

By the end of it all and the intense heat I was ready for home. Luckily for me chauffeur Susan dropped us back at our car so all I had to do was drive home and lay on the sofa!!

Birthday Fun

It's been a quiet few days, the weather changed on Monday after that wonderful weekend and it's been so cold, with the southerly wind and rain.

It is Jo's birthday tomorrow and so we all got together at Joan's house to surprise her with a little party. It was so funny for us all to be hiding behind the furniture waiting to jump out with a SURPRISE!

We had a great afternoon, the children played fantastically and us ladies divulged in the most amazing cake and some bubbly (not for me though!) and we had a lovely relaxing time.

Have a fantastic day tomorrow Jo, I think I might have to celebrate again and go buy some more of that cake!

Getting Creative

After the blistering weekend, today wasn't so good weather wise, rainy with a chill in the air made it perfect weather for mammy and Bethany to spend the day at home together.

Bethany loves the one on one attention and comes up with the most amazing and interesting things to do. She is quite creative really and today was no surprise when she asked if we could make some animal masks.

So with cardboard, pens and a bit of mammy's help she was happy. I drew and cut out the actual animal faces and left Bethany to get creative...

We had a lovely day together doing this, drawing, painting and making an art scrap book and we had numerous fantastic kisses and cuddles.

Our little girl is a stunning little creative creation.

One Year On...

That's right, its been exactly one year since we arrived in Wellington to start our new life. This was probably one of the most heart breaking and yet joyous weeks we have ever endured, but here we are one year later, older, wiser and having one hell of a good story.

Lets take a little trip down memory lane...

Monday, 18th September 2006 was the hardest day, one which we will probably never recover from! It was the day we said our goodbyes to our nearest and dearest, one which we spent in floods of tears, the day we last got to cuddle those we loved without the knowledge of when we would meet again.

Tuesday, 19th September was the day we started on our amazing life journey. We spent the night before in a hotel in Manchester, there was no way we could face saying goodbye and getting onto an airplane the same day. We had a sad night, mixed with tears of sadness and tears of excitement and joy that we were finally 'on our way'.

Wednesday, 20th September we arrived in Singapore. We went from the airport to a gorgeous hotel called The Grand Plaza Park Royal, and it certainly was royal, but we were soon to discover that was most of Singapore!

We had a wonderful break here, we sampled local foods, got caught up in the street crowds, passed armed guards (with real guns - eek!) and were totally exhausted by the overpowering 30 degree heat which was 24 hours a day. We do wish we had spent more time here but at that point in time we were desperate to get to Wellington!

We flew out from Singapore on Thursday and on towards our final destination...New Zealand!!

Friday 22nd September 2006 - we had finally made it to New Zealand! However we still had one more trip to make and that was from Auckland to Wellington. One final flight and we would arrive in the place we hoped we could one day call 'home'.

Finally hearing the news from the captain that we were approaching Wellington made our hearts skip and we all held hands knowing that this was it. This was the beginning of it all.

One Year On...Marrisa's feelings:

Wow, one year? Heck. Looking back now our whole emotional journey from making that decision to emigrate in 2005 to actually being here has been amazing. That week we left will always stay with me forever, I think my heart actually broke that day knowing I would probably never see some of my family and my best friend for what would could be years.

The actual flights though were fantastic, Bethany was a star and was literally amazing. Michael and I enjoyed our new freedom and the feeling of excitement in our hearts. Coming down into Wellington whilst we all held hands will be something I will never forget.

So how do I feel about my first year? Of course the first few weeks were easy as it felt like a holiday, and we were staying in a 5 star apartment so of course it wasn't hard! But after that it hasn't been easy, I can tell you that. The first 6 months were the absolute worst. I couldn't seem to bring myself out of the lull I was in because I so painfully missed everyone so much.

Then once we found a house, Michael went to work and I was alone with Bethany I started to feel the pain. I missed my parents the most, I just wanted them to pop round and I wanted every time I went somewhere for them to be able to share it too. Bethany also went through a rough stage where she couldn't understand why she wouldn't see them anymore, even for her to mention them would make me cry. I asked myself a million times if we had done the right thing doing this to Bethany and changing her life so dramatically.

The first 6 months seemed to go on forever, they were hard for me, very hard. But then it seemed that this low lifted, we had a much better routine going, Bethany was in Kindi and I was starting to meet new people. In no time I had some amazing friendships and I was really starting to appreciate everything around me. Then of course our family came to visit us and that made everything so much better, they saw where we lived, they joined our routine and that calmed me knowing that once back in the UK they could now picture us in our lives here.

And now? Well I am 110% happy, I have learned so much, gained utterly stunning memories, developed as a woman and a mother, and I love our life. Michael and I are healthier, happier and we do amazing things every single day. Bethany has thrived on being here, she is going to have an fantastic life here and for that we are grateful. She knows of her Grandparents and hasn't lost one memory for them, of course she still misses them but she deals with it in a more content way now.

I wouldn't change a thing, I will now never return to the UK to live, there is too much life to live and we cant wait to do it here in NZ. I believe that everything happens for a reason, and I am so glad we found that reason to make the biggest choice in our life and move to New Zealand.


One Year On...Michael's feelings:

Bought a wicked BBQ, drank some awesome beer - sweet as!

So there you have it, the above really was typed by Michael! Congratulations to us for making it one year on and for becoming what we feel, a truly amazing family with what is going to be one amazing life...

A Meating Place

One of the greatest things we've discovered since we arrived in NZ is Island Bay Butchery. Being an avid BBQ'er and meat eater, finding a place like this was nothing short of a dream come true!

Last summer we spent a fortune in here on steaks, burgers, bacon and of course sausages. As you can see from the picture and following list, they do a huge variety and we are still working our way around them.

List of Don Andrew's locally made sausages:

1. Boerewors
2. Chicken
3. Italian
4. Chorizo
5. Traditional Italian
6. Toulouse
7. Loukanika
8. Don-a-Cini
9. Continental Garlic
10. German Bratwurst
11. Moroccan
12. Pork & Sage
13. Hot American Spiced
14. Kielbasa
15. Lamb & Rosmary
16. Venison, Herbs & Garlic
17. Indian
18. Beefy Bacon
19. Thai Pork
20. Champagne Veal & Truffle
21. Beef
22. Old English
23. Pure Pork
24. Traditional Garlic
25. Venison
26. Cumberland
27. Lamb & Mint
28. Mexican
29. Vegetarian

So as BBQ season is most definately upon us, they can expect to see more of us as we stock up and enjoy!

Busy Beautiful Friday

It's been such a busy day today, Fridays always are and it has proved it today with me just waking now from 2 hours in bed!

Again the weather has been stunning, beautiful blue skies and the sun was blazing hot by 10am. I just love mornings like this, you wake feeling cheery and all summery. I rush upstairs to get the windows open and welcome the fresh morning air in.

So with the smell of the beautiful day already circulating our house Bethany and I took a walk over the road to the nature reserve. We are so lucky to have this amazing area literally right over the road from our house.

As we walked we listened to birds, saw butterflies and the one thing that signifies summer here - crickets! That wonderful over-powering noise is back!

As we reached the gully Bethany asked where the Weta was...the Weta she was referring to was the one we found with Grandma and Grandad when they visited in February, talk about an amazing memory, she even knew which rock we left it on!

Bethany picked flowers and threw stones in a little mud pool and we then wandered back to the house de-robing in the heat on the way.

After some lunch we headed out to Bethany's swimming lessons. Bethany has developed amazingly over the last few weeks and is now a confident under water swimmer. She has also made good friends with her little swimming buddy called Norbert.

As always on a Friday after swimming, it's a drive over to Eastbourne for Hip Hop classes. Bethany just loves dance class, and spends most of her time saying 'excuse me...watch this' whilst performing some type of move!

I love the Friday afternoons in Eastbourne, we drove back along the coast stopping off for an obligatory ice cream. We sat on the beach and watched people in the ocean and joined everyone having an amazing time in the sunshine.

On the way back to the city we even had time to go to the play area which funnily enough is Bethany's favourite. By this point though I was starting to fade slightly, getting the afternoon tiredness that comes for me with pregnancy.

Bethany was an angel and when I told her the baby wanted to go home for a sleep, she gave my tummy a cuddle and said 'OK baby, we can go home so you can have some rest'.

It's now the end of term here for a few weeks so there will be no structured things going on, hopefully I will get some time to relax a little now, but no doubt if the weather stays like this that won't happen!!