Pääsiäinen 2017 Sydneyssä

A quick update from those of us north (but not too far north) of the Murray.

It's been a busy, er, four months? (When was the last time I updated here??) As you may have read, Dee's contract has ended so she's now looking for work — and considering how to move her career back into the startup scene (anybody need a scrum master?). Not bad timing as these things go, since Jules has had his first week of school holidays now; the local after-school-care does run a holiday programme, but we're saving our pennies until we need it again. I think Dee has enjoyed spending this time with him, as much as he makes it difficult to concentrate on one thing for any length of time, but I'm sure she'll be happy to get back to work too.

We had a trip to Taronga Western Plains zoo, too, which was fun (and a good way to relax after the inevitable stress of finishing up a contract). We stayed in Orange on the way there and back (do they speak mandarine in Orange, I wonder?), dropping Lucy off at her favourite kennel along the way. A long drive, but worth it to see how excited J was when we finally arrived.

And this weekend has been Easter! We've cooked, planted, ridden ponies and partied with some bikers — and we still have another whole day to recover!

Glamping in Glastonbury, a weekend in Wednesbury, and Chemistry with the Cubs

Hi all,

The last three weeks have simply disappeared! So here's all three bumpdates at once.

Glamping in Glastonbury

In Mid-May B & I decided to try to fit in a babymoon - a short holiday before bub arrives and changes everything. We started looking, with a few caveats - it could only be a weekend (B doesn't have much leave left for the year and we want to save that for after the little tyke arrives), somewhere close-ish (long car trips weren't that comfy for me), and obviously, not too expensive. And as the title suggests, we ended up glamping in Glastonbury.

We stayed in an ePod on the edge of a field - a little wooden building with a fridge, toaster and kettle. There was a Weber BBQ outside for cooking, and a private bathroom & toilet a short walk away. It was really relaxing to have a couple of nights semi-camping - food cooked on the fire, surrounded by greenery, listening to relaxing birdsong.. with the luxury of a real bed, blackout blinds, and access to a heated swimming pool! Divine! 

Saturday was our day for exploring (we arrived Friday and had to drive back Sunday). We started with a hike across fields to the Glastonbury Tor - apparently one of the most spiritual sites in the England. What a good place for a bumpdate:

From there we walked into town, past the Chalice Well (another spiritual site, but too expensive to look through a garden). Glastonbury is a strange town.. loads of hippy-type shops but with prices that seem above average. Bruce called them rippies (rip-off hippy shops, or shops for rich hippies). :-) After a tasty and random lunch (cream tea, chips & cheese ploughman's - all shared) we walked back out to the camp and had a swim. *phew* we certainly earnt our smores that night! For those who don't know, smores is a North American treat, we made ours by making a sandwich with chocolate digestives and marshmallows and heating it on the BBQ. :-)

All in all, it was a lovely relaxing weekend!
Some more photos here

Weekend in Wednesbury

Last weekend was British Father's Day, so Friday night we headed up to Wednesbury. We went shopping in Willenhall on Saturday, and visited Grandad on Sunday before going for a short walk around the Swan Pool.

And here is last week's bumpdate..

Chemistry with the Cubs

We've had a busy weekend this weekend! Yesterday Bruce had to keep 21 Cubs and 5 leaders occupied from 1pm-4pm. He hadn't been able to find any helpers, so I went along.

We ran three different activities - solar windmills, hydrogels (disposable nappies), and red cabbage chemistry. The first activity was engineering, the next two were chemistry (although hydrogels are a smart material and so they also fit under the materials engineering banner).

It was a super-busy day - we spent the morning collecting everything for the workshop and then the afternoon running everything (and cleaning up). As a treat, we stopped at Wagamama for dinner on the way home (mm, ramen). We ended up being out of the house for more than 12 hours, and my ankles certainly showed it (where did they go?!).

On the up side, we had some lovely weather at Swansea Bay Campus, so this week's bumpdate is from there:

Today we had our first antenatal class, it ran from 10am until 4pm. We were asked to bring along sharing food for lunch.. but apparently it isn't something that the British do. We took a tasty salad (mango, strawberries, bacon, chicken pieces, lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, mushrooms and a yellow pepper - using veggie "meat" of course).. and we'll probably be eating it for the rest of the week! Other contributions included crisps; crackers and hommous; shop bought flapjacks and slices; grapes and watermelon; and cold pizza. O well.

We now have some idea what to expect next month (! Time flies!!).  We've got the second (and final) class next week. It's quite an intensive course but we couldn't fit in any of the "slower" classes (that run a couple of hours each week for 5 weeks) because either B or I were away for one of the sessions! We're lucky to have found any course that we could get to!

I've got two busy weeks before I start my maternity leave - I'm off to Aberystwyth tomorrow, back Tuesday.. then with training sessions in Swansea, ChemNet events in Treforrest and an open day, I'm already looking forward to sleeping all day Saturday! Bruce also has a busy June.. but he's promised me that he has no events booked in from mid-July - in case bump decides to arrive early. :-)

Everything is going fine with bump.. lots of moving and kicking (often when I want to sleep). We still don't feel ready, but we did get a pile of baby clothes from one of my friends (she got them in the grand tradition of hand-me-downs). Once I'm on leave I'll wash everything and get the Moses basket set up and all of that kind of thing. It's really weird to think that the due date is only four weeks away!

Apologies for another mammoth post. I'll keep the next update shorter. :-)

Where did that month go?!?

Hi family,

It feels like it's been ages since I wrote an update.. and after checking the last few posts, it's been more than a month! How did that happen?! And what have we done with ourselves since then?

The last couple of weekends have seen us in 'Spring Cleaning Mode' - we've taken a car-load to the tip and 5 bin-bags full of stuff to the op-shop. I've packed up half of my wardrobe (all of the things that don't fit me right now but that I want to keep) and Bruce emptied out at least half of the shelves in the store-room and moved around some of the furniture in the lounge. *phew* Clearly, this is all part of the 'get ready for baby' preparations and we know we've got lots still to do.

Speaking of preparations, for those of you who missed the photo on hangouts, here's the bumpdate. This was from last weekend when we were out looking at prams and cot-beds (note: it's still not warm enough for t-shirts yet.. not for longer than a few minutes anyway.) :-) This week I'm having a glucose test (fingers crossed for no gestational diabetes) and I think we're almost sorted for all of the 'big' purchases - car seat, pram & cot-bed. Now it's just all of the 'little' things we need to work out (and I don't even know what they all are!). And I realise that I need to get in-shape - I've got about three months to build up my strength and flexibility. Anyone got any good links/suggestions for programmes/stretches/etc?

Work has been keeping B & I busy, as always. We've both been travelling lately, with more to come over the next month.

Easter was a welcome break - we had a lovely quiet Easter at home and then headed up to Birmingham(ish) for Phil & Sarah's wedding. Phil and B have been mates for years, so B was a Best Man. Here's a pic taken by Gwen - I'm sure you'll agree that Bruce scrubs up pretty well. :-) The wedding was lovely - religious ceremony in a little church followed by reception at a hotel in the middle of nowhere. Good food, good company and we stayed at the hotel, so I didn't have to wait for B to be finished before I could go to bed. Yay!

After the wedding we headed even further north for a short-break with Vicki and Stephen. We stayed at a lovely little flat in Gatehouse of Fleet (Southern Scotland) and spent the time exploring castles and abbey ruins, spying on the local wildlife (we saw a seal in a field!), playing games whilst it rained, and enjoying wine, cheese and chocolate! I haven't looked through my "real" photos yet, so here are a few from my phone.

Caerlaverock Castle

Feeding the red kites

Sweetheart Abbey

The coming month is looking like it's as busy as the last - I've got two weekend conferences and at least two trips to North Wales! But we've also got two bank holidays in May (yay!) and I'm planning on taking some leave (not to go anywhere, but to sleep-in and relax a little). Next weekend is May Day and there's a local festival in Radyr and Morganstown - we might even see what that's all about.

What are the rest of you up to?

Our stop over..

It was so great to see everyone over the last two weeks! Sorry that we only got to catch up with Glenn, Dee, Jules and Cheryl online - hopefully we'll see you all in person next time!

Our flight to Abu Dhabi was long and uneventful - 13 hours flying time gave me a chance to watch four movies and a couple of tv shows. :-) Thanks to a pre-booked car, we got to our four-star (!) hotel just before midnight. We didn't have to get our bags out of the car or drag them up to our room - one of the staff brought them up on a trolley. It felt so posh!

Our room was great - giant comfy bed, good view over the city, all the mod cons (including a tablet-thing that controls the lights, air-con and things with unidentifiable icons). I definitely made the most of our fancy hotel - don't know when we'll stay somewhere like that again!

We had a fairly relaxed day on Saturday - the hotel is attached to a mall, so we went shopping! It was a little bit of a struggle to fit the bargains into our cases - but we got there in the end. :-) The shops in the mall seem to be mostly American & British with a smattering of Emirati. We even managed to find a stall that makes those spiral potatoes! We may not have found them at the Scot's Day Out in Bendigo but at least we had them once on the holiday. Yum!

Sunday we went on a tour, Hala's Story of Abu Dhabi - a half-day tour to show us the main sights. We went to a date market (yum), the Heritage Village (with a museum and some handcraft stalls), and Saadiyaat (a strange island-development). The highlight of the day was the Sheikh Zayed Mosque - it's amazing! It's the largest Mosque in UAE and is the only one in Abu Dhabi (and possibly UAE) that allows non-Muslims inside. There's a fairly strict dress-code - I had to wear an abaya and headscarf (Bruce could wear regular clothes) and no shoes are allowed inside, but it's worth it to see the largest chandelier in a Mosque (12 tonnes of Murano glass and Swarovski crystals!) and the biggest hand made carpet in the world!

Monday we headed to Yas island for a boat ride. We ended up being the only passengers, so we got a private trip! Yay! The captain didn't really give us a 'tour' but he did point out local wildlife - we saw storks, herons and gazelles. After our 90 minute trip, we headed to the local Mall and had a lovely day of cake - caramel cheesecake at the Cheesecake Factory (just like on Big Bang Theory) and then found a Patisserie des Reves in a department store (we went to the original Patisserie in Paris with Mum in 2012!). 

We had a car booked to take us back to the airport on Tuesday - they took us to the first class check-in and we were through security within 5 minutes! That would have been great if there were any decent shops to look at.. instead we just used the free wifi to catch up on email. :-)

If you want to see the rest of the photos from our trip, they're in this album.

We were both back at work on Wednesday - straight back into it! I'm pretty tired this weekend but hopefully everything will be back to normal by next weekend. :-)

Updates from you lot?

Back to work

Bruce and I were back at work this week. For me, that meant a trip over to Aberystwyth to talk to trainee teachers, a little bit of office work and two workshops for 14-15 year olds. *phew*
B spent the week looking at flights and stop-over destinations, with a bit of work here and there. ;-)

The result - we're coming to Australia!

We arrive into Melbourne at 10pm on Saturday 6th February and will stay over at the airport. We'll then make our way to Bendigo on Sunday 7th. Hopefully the weather will be warm - I'm bringing my togs and hoping for some swimming time! :-)

We leave from Tullamarine Airport at 4pm on Friday 19th February. Rather than flying straight back, we're stopping for 3 days in Abu Dhabi - which will give us a chance for more adventures and hopefully reduce jetlag a bit (since we're back to work on the Wednesday after arriving at Heathrow Tuesday night!).

So the visit is a little sooner than we thought - it was the best option to fit around work and everything. I know we spoke about flying in to Sydney and out of Melbourne (or vice-versa) but by the time we came to booking the trip, those flights had become stupidly expensive. That and the fact that Glenn, Dee & Jules need to move in February means we probably won't get to Sydney this trip. Sorry guys - we'll just have to video chat more.

Somehow I picked up a cold this week, so I've been taking it easy this weekend - I've got more travels coming up (Bath on Monday, Swansea on Tuesday..) but I'll tell you all about that next week.

*hugz* to all!

A busy month

Good to read about everybody's comings and goings!

We've been keeping busy over this side of the world too. I can't believe that it's been more than a month since Mum went home, and I've had over two months of being forty. The week after we waved goodbye to Mum, Bruce spent a week in a tent. No, we didn't have a barney; he was working at the Green Man Festival making solar cells, batteries and woollen molecules. In the end, the molecules were made out of pom-poms rather than crocheted (but thanks for the prototypes, Mum!).

Bruce making a water molecule

The weekend after that, we enjoyed a very Welsh weekend - beer, bogs and Brecon. We spent Saturday evening tasting local ales at the inaugural Cardiff Brewfest.

Cardiff Brewfest

Then on Sunday morning we headed into the Brecon Beacons to watch some of the International Bog Snorkelling Championships.

Bog snorkelling championships

After a picnic lunch (in the car because it was starting to rain..) we headed across the hills (through Ministry of Defence land, around a rally and along some very winding single-track roads) to the Llandrindod Wells Steampunk Weekend. Apparently they'd had a whole "Victorian Week" (the era, not the place) and this was the final weekend. It was disappointing - no activities, only a couple of people in costume, and the heavens about to open. So instead of staying around for a few hours (for the music and fireworks), we drove back towards home and watched the latest Mission Impossible movie instead. :-)

The next week was fairly non-eventful, I took some leave and did nothing (ahh... doing nothing.. although I feel a bit guilty for not sorting out the photos from mum's trip..). B had to work as normal.
The weekend of 11-14 September our friends, Vicki & Steven, visited us in Cardiff. I collected them from Bristol airport on Friday afternoon and we had a lovely evening in playing Killer Bunnies.

Killer Bunnies game in progress

We had a relaxed start on Saturday - brunch and a few games of Forbidden Island (the game that Glenn introduced us to when we last visited). Vicki and Steven's visit was well-timed - it was the Millennium Centre's 10th birthday celebration, so we headed to the Bay for Ar Waith At Daith - A journey of Welsh myth and magic. The outside performance told the story of The Birth of Taliesin using puppets, storytelling, music, projection and pyrotechnics.

Ar Waith Ar Daith at Cardiff Bay

We explored Waterfall Country on Sunday. We packed a picnic, drove into the Brecon Beacons to the Waterfall Centre. We decided to take the shortest waterfall walk, the Elidir Trail - a trail past four waterfalls with a round trip distance of 4 kms. It was beautiful weather.. right up until we'd finished our picnic back at the car! Score!

Waterfalls on the Elidir Trail

Before Vicki and Stephen headed home on Monday, we popped over to Weston-Super-Mare to experience Dismaland - the depressing arty exhibit curated by Banksy. I'm hoping to get my photos sorted soonish so you can see more of the exhibition. It was such a busy (and fun) weekend!

Stephen & Vicki outside Dismaland

After another week of work, we drove up to visit B's folks - we were going to visit Grandad in the care-home but a number of the residents were ill, so no visitors were allowed. We still had a good visit with John and Gwen, so it wasn't all a waste.

As a belated birthday get-together, Vicki, Steven, Bruce and I travelled to the Black Forest in Germany last weekend to catch up with Angelika and James. Vicki, Angelika, James and I worked at Manchester University together seven years ago. James and Angelika moved to Waldkirch a few months ago, and with two small kids it seemed sensible that the rest of us would visit them.

We were only there for a long weekend, but still managed to pack a lot in. All of the things you'd expect from the Black Forest - beer, hiking, and Black Forest cake. In Waldkirch we ate home-made spatzel (a type of pasta), read books to the kiddies, went hiking on Kandel, drank champagne (for my belated birthday), and explored the lovely little town.

Waldkirch

We spent a day in Freiburg, wandering around the market and the Minster.

Freiburg

And on our final day in Germany, we went to the tourist-town of Triberg - cuckoo clocks, the highest waterfall in Germany, and tasty Black Forest cake. Yummo!

Triberg

What a great weekend!
So that catches me up.. Sorry for taking so long to get there!
Who next?

A Hop Across the Pond - Montreal

I missed a post last week, work has been keeping me more than busy! This month is a bit insane for me.. I was working last Saturday (a teacher conference), had an evening event on Monday, drove to Bangor (North Wales) on Tuesday to run a workshop and attend a Local Section meeting, had to be in Brecon (mid-Wales) by 9.15am on Wednesday and then back to North Wales for a Skills event that ran for Wednesday evening and all day Thursday. I finally got home on Thursday night and after three very, very long days, I did very little yesterday!
If I'm lucky, then this map will show you where I've driven this week.

John & Gwen are visiting this weekend (it was Gwen's birthday earlier this week) and I'm working in Swansea tomorrow - but I'll keep that until next week. The bottom line is I'm spending way too much time working and need to find more 'life' balance.... somehow...

Anyway, time for the next installment (as the holiday fades in our memories)...

Montreal

We didn't really have much of a plan for Montreal - we wanted to catch up with Max & Malika (I knew Max from Canberra) and we had a list of 'recommended activities' to do if we had the time and inclination. After the bustle of New York, it was really good to have a few days to just relax in this laid-back and arty city (check out some of the wall art - it was really cool and it's everywhere!).

Sunday
Arrived in the afternoon and after finding our apartment, went for a very tasty vegetarian meal with Max & Malika. They gave us a whistle-stop tour of the area and pointed out a few things that we could do.

Monday (Labor Day)

Walked up many, many stairs to the top of the Mount to check out the views (along with everyone else who was visiting Montreal!). We found a new band playing one of the "Pianos publics" (pianos just left around the city for anyone to have a go at). Was pretty good but I've forgotten who they are - I think I have a business card for them somewhere. :-)

Descending the mountain, we wanted to check out the "Underground City" (a bunch of shopping centres joined by tunnels so locals can still shop during winter). Unfortunately, being a public holiday... nothing was open! :-( So we just wandered around downtown for a while. Had dinner with M&M again (they cooked very tasty BBQ salmon).

Tuesday

This was our 'culture' day - we headed down to Old Montreal, wandered around the Old Port for a while and then headed to the Pointe-à-Callière Museum to discover the history of Montreal. It was really interesting - but we spent so long wandering around the museum that we got a little tired... (told you that B could sleep anywhere!). Once we pepped up again, we learnt how to be a pirate, found out a little about Marco Polo and then continued exploring Old Montreal.


The Notre-Dame de Montréal Basilica is incredible - the columns, paintings and altars inside are beautiful. But the Chapelle du Sacré-Cœur (Chapel of the Sacred Heart) is even better.. all carved out of wood! Such a lovely and calm place.


Wednesday

Decided to head to the islands - we started on Île Sainte-Hélène and Bruce walked on the Grand Prix track (oooOOOOoooh - it's used as a cycle track when it's 'off-season', so even taking a photo on the track was a little dangerous). We investigated the Biosphere, which was created for the 1967 World Fair Expo, took some photos and then relaxed in the park for the afternoon (I managed to write some postcards whilst B had a nap).

After relaxing, we decided to find Habitat 67, which was also created for the Expo. It looks incredible.. and the crazy box-shaped flats are now just people's homes! Unfortunately, Habitat 67 is on the other island, Île Notre-Dame and we decided to walk from there back to town... it's a LONG way! We got to a main road eventually and managed to get on a bus instead. Phew!

Thursday
After a relaxed morning, we headed out to the airport for our short hop to Toronto.
Stay tuned for next-time..
;-)

p.s. Dee, I had to take this photo for you.. ;-)

A Hop Across the Pond - New York

I've had an interesting week - caught up with a friend on Monday; spent Tuesday at a team meeting in London and got a free make-over on the way to the train station (Kat & I decided to do some window shopping and turns out it was a fashion week event and shops were all doing special things - like giving out gin or offering make-overs); Thursday we were at a careers event in Neath Port Talbot; Wednesday and Friday I spent in the office but there's still a lot to do.  I have a LOT of events coming up in October, so I'm going to have to try really hard to write my updates. And even harder to update the Six Month Challenge site - because I actually have to DO something before I can update that one. :-)

In the meantime, here's the next little bit of our trip...

New York

We arrived late on Wednesday night. It had taken ages to get across the border - a bus load of people all having to go through immigration and have papers checked! Luckily we'd booked a late-ish flight, so it didn't matter that we were half-an-hour late arriving at the airport.

We stayed in New Jersey, just across the river from Manhattan so it was really easy to get in and out of the city (and check out the view from the bus stop below!). We spent very little time in the apartment - there's just so much to see and do in New York.

We had three full days in New York City, and we walked a LOT. We bought the City Pass and tried to do everything that was in the booklet...

• We went up to the top of the Empire State Building - twice (once in the morning and then again at night - I forgot to collect my tripod both times.. oops). 

• We walked through Harlem and along the length of Central Park (the park itself is about 4km!), stopping for lunch on the rooftop of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (about half-way along the park). We made sure we checked out the art whilst we were there - it's an incredible collection. 

• We saw the longest running show on Broadway (Phantom of the Opera, for those who didn't know) - we were in the second row, so it was almost like we were IN the show. :-) 

• We took a cruise that went past the Statue of Liberty (but there were so many people on the boat that you couldn't move from your little plastic seat). 

• We shopped in Macy's and window-shopped in Tiffany's (but didn't have breakfast in the jewellery shop), visited Grand Central Station and spent some time in Times Square.

• And on our last day in New York we managed to fit in the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the American Museum of Natural History AND the Guggenheim Museum. 

Looking at it all like this, there's no wonder we were really tired by the time we got to Montreal.

But you'll have to wait till the next instalment to find out what we did back in Canada. :-)