2nd half term and Halloween

Jacob and Abi were very lucky, they ended up having two half terms as Brunssum's and SHAPE's were different. They did go into school to visit on the Friday of their 1st half term. So their 2nd half term started without Allen as he was still in Poland. We carried on unpacking but also did a little exploring. We found an excellent ice cream and coffee shop which I'm sure we'll visit regularly. I also drove into Mons to have a look at the centre. We popped into a cafe and enjoyed yet more ice cream! The centre on Mons is a little like Sittard but no where near as pretty. I think this is my impression of this area in the whole, it's no where near as pretty as where we have come from. The up side though is our house is 100% better and we can walk to the base and school. There is a lot to offer on the base, a bowling alley, cinema, a cafe and restaurant plus a Carrefour supermarket. It's good to be able to walk to all of these. Cycling is going to be harder here. We were really spoilt in The Netherlands with all of the safe cycling paths. You're lucky to get a walking pavement here let alone a bike path! I have cycled to school with the kids but their road sense is not the greatest. We will give it another go as they are opening a gate much closer to our house so it will mean a much safer cycle to school, it will also knock 15mins off the walking time so that's great too. Jacob and Abi can go on the bus but, for some reason, they are enjoying walking so I'm not arguing.
We went back over to Brunssum to pick up Allen on the Tuesday, staying once again at Chris and Matt's. We had a pizza from the pizza bus, our favourite. We celebrated Halloween on the American base walking around with the Mertes. I've inlcuded a photo of Allen with our kids and then one of Jacob, Abi, Haley and Kaden. They had loads of fun and Jacob met up with a friend there so he was very happy. We drove back to SHAPE that night as we were off to the UK the next day.
We popped back to the UK for a day and a night to pick up our new car. We are trying a Superb Estate. Personally I can't see much difference but I suppose I'll only be able to tell when we go on a skiing trip to see how mcuh I can fit in! It did well with all of the shopping I did in the UK, still room for more!
Rachael.

October half term - Playmobil Germany

Hi

We had a fun half term, first we moved out of our house in Munstergeleen and into our new house in Casteau, Mons. This was not the easy move I had planned as Jacob came down with a chest infection on the day I was meant to be cleaning. All of the furniture left Thursday morning and I spent the morning taking Jacob to the doctors, dropping him at school and then picking him up 45mins later as they thought he was too ill to be there. The doctor had said he could go but he was tired from being up in the night coughing. Luckily my next door neighbour, Chris, took him in and he slept around there while I cleaned. I was going to let them go to school in Brunssum on the Friday but, as Jacob wasn't allowed back, I decided to drive over and join Allen in our new house. Again my kind neighbours, Chris and Matt fed us before we left and it was straight to bed once we got to our new house.
The rest of the weekend was spent unpacking and then we made our way back over to Munstergeleen to finish the cleaning for the march out on the Monday. We stayed next door and they fed us again! The march out was fine, I'm glad I'd cleaned behind the radiators as he used his torch to check them - it had taken me about 2 hours to do this and I had had enough by the end.
Allen went off on exercise to Poland for ten days and Jacob, Abi and me went to the South of Germany to the Playmobil funpark. Nadine drove us, she'd booked it all too. We stayed in a great Holiday Inn Express and had a brilliant time at the Playmobil place. I've included a variety of photos from the day there. Abi and Haley enjoyed the panning for jewels the best and Jacob loved the throwing balls at bottles activity!
After two nights here we moved a little further south of Nuremberg to visit Nadine's Grandma. I've included a photo of Jacob next to a Jacob beer truck - it was parked in the car park of the hotel we were staying. So we had a brilliant first half term.
Rachael.

Early 10th Birthday for Jacob

Jacob decided to do his 10th Birthday party here as we will have just moved for his actual birthday on the 10th November. He would have only  have been in school for a week so we thought it would be best all round to have his current friends to celebrate.

He has wanted to do laser tag for a while so we booked for 10 people at the Valkenburg caves. You get a game of laser tag in the caves, then a ride up on a chair lift to the Toboggan run. Then 4 goes on the toboggan, back down int he chair lift and pizza back in the caves. This all takes 2 and a half hours. They had a great time, Jacob would do it all again. Allen took part in the laser tag as one boy didn't turn up. He enjoyed it but said it was very hot! I had a go on the toboggan with Abi but wouldn't let her go as fast as she wanted to!

We finished off with cookies, a brilliant early birthday!

Berlin Swim Meet

Jacob and Abi are both in the Orcas swim team here. They go to swim meets every other weekend and a month ago we had a swim meet in Berlin. We chose to go by train whoch took about 5 hours. Most of the rest of the team, 70 people, that included parents and sibblings too, went by coach - overnight. I'm glad we took our option as an over night on a coach with kids can't be all that fun! We then addred an extra day on too so had a great time exploring Berlin. It's not a pretty city but there was loads to do. We stayed in a good location and bought a travel card that meant we could use any form of public transport for the three days we were there.

From the photos you will see we went up the TV tower, went to a large piece of the wall that had an exhibition along with it, saw the World Clock, visited the Holocaust Memorial and the Brandenburg Gate. We did a bus tour too, so a busy but fun weekend in Berlin.

Brussels in August

Hi
Before school started back we went to Brussels with Nadine, Kaden and Haley. They took us to Little Europe and Atonium, two places that we will now take visitors to as well. It was about an hour from where we live at the moment and will be just under an hour from where we are moving to. The children prefered Little Europe, I think that was because they recognised a lot of the places there. I thought it was handy as it showed where I would still like to visit in Europe! I've included a variety of photos from the day:

Atonium is that atom looking thing in the background of the mini Eiffel tower, you can go up some of the tubes and get a good view out.

Up to Scotland

So after a week with the Blunks down South we headed up North for another week of fun. We drove up in two cars, my Dad had kindly lent me his for the week. We had a girls car and a boys car - which worked very well all week. We stopped in North Allerton to have lunch with Allen's Auntie Rosemary. The sun was shining when we got there so we had a lovely lunch in the garden. I'd not seen Rosemary's house, even though she moved a few years ago! It's great, lots of character and a superb garden too.

We had managed to get tickets for Brazil versus Honduras, Olympic football at St James's Park so Allen took Tim, Betsy, Will and Jacob while I drove the girls up to Allen's Mum's. We arrived and got sorted and they all agot there around 9.30pm, so not bad at all.

We then had a week exploring Scotland. We did a day in Edinburgh with the children, it was very wet so we'd booked the underground cave visit - Allen and I dropped everyone off and then came right to the door to pick them up as it was raining very hard! Edinburgh was extremely busy due to the festival. The adults got to come back again as Allen and Tim played golf with Ernie so Betsy and I got to shop and have a look around for the day. Marion and Louise had the children for us, a lovely relaxing day for me and Betsy!

While in Scotand we had a night away on Loch Lomond, luckily the weather improved so we walked up Connick Hill - not something you should do in Fit Flops, I ended up taking them off to get down! We also took a boat out to a little island on the Loch and spent some time on the beach. It was beautiful, I've included a photo looking down on the Loch with Abi in the for ground and me and Jacob down below - we did make it up to the top too! There are also photos from the grounds of a historic house near Melrose and one in Marion's garden.

We also celebrated my birthday with a pub supper and pedicures for Betsy and myself!

After a great week we drove down to Birmingham and stayed in a huge Hilton. Betsy and Tim managed to get on the executive floor so we had access to the drinks and snacks happy hour, which we took full advantage of. The pool was great for the kids so it was a relaxing end to our holiday. Allen then dropped the Blunks at the airport. The two weeks flew past but it was a trip of a lifetime. Can't wait to get out to Denver for a bit of skiing and to catch up with the Blunks again.

We then dropped Dad's car back, had a BBQ at Holwell and made our way down to Ashford. Stayed in our first Premier Inn and was very impressed, so much that we've booked another one for when we swop our car next month!

Now we are getting ready for our move to SHAPE in two weeks. We've got rid of loads of rubbish that we have been carrying around for years, still lots to sort though! Visitors welcome, we have a lovely new build house, garden is all a bit open as there's nothing in it and it looks directly onto base but I have ensuite so I don't care. See you in Belgium, Rachael x

The London Eye

Well after three days of being in London we were getting a little tired! It was Tim's birthday so we went off for lunch in Covent Garden. Had a lovely lunch at an Italian and sat outside. I've put in a photo of the kids showing off their face paints that they had done for free at Earls Court in the morning. You should definitely see which country Jacob favours!

After lunch we headed off to the London Eye, no queuing and straight on. It was good to see the views of London, I did worry a little as it's very exposed but I also enjoyed it. I've put in a variety of photos from this experience.

After this we then did a bit of a walk and a bit on the bus to get to Tower bridge. Unfortunately the rings were not down but it was still good to see the bridge and tower, it was very windy.

We thought about doing a bus and boat tour, but by this point we were knackered and went home to enjoy the cake Mum had made!

We had one more day down South before we headed up to Scotland. We had to get our car sorted and then did a bit of shopping too. Mum cooked us a nice leaving meal. We had an excellent time at the Olympics made better by having brilliant friends with us. Thank you to Mum and Dad for putting us up and ferrying us to the train station and also for feeding us all. A big thank you to Katharine, Steve, Matthew and Amy for vacating the house by going on holiday!

Up North next.