Homeless....but happy!

We have been back in England now for 5 weeks and we still haven't found ourselves a home. I shouldn't really complain though as the holiday chalet where we are staying in Norfolk is lovely, has all the comforts of home and it sits beautifully on the edge of a golf course (the 18th tee, I am told by Katie). We have beautiful views and we have seen some wonderful wildlife including birds, squirrels and deer in our garden. We brought the Paphos sunshine with us and we have had no need for the winter woollies I packed in our suitcases.

Our place in Norfolk

Katie has relaxed into our new life beautifully. She has been so patient while we have searched 3 or 4 counties in our search for the perfect home. Once again, I think we must be too choosy, because the search is proving far more difficult than we thought and it's taking so much longer than we thought! In our defense, it has been reported in the press that there is a serious lack of rental properties available, especially in East Anglia...that's us then.  And we did actually find a lovely house quite early on and we thought we could finally settle down in our own home. However, the obnoxious. money-grabbing landlady soon put a stop to that. In hindsight we probably had a lucky escape (and her property is still up for rent weeks later!!)


In between house hunting we have visited some lovely places including Redwings Horse Sanctuary, Banham Zoo, Africa Alive and Dinosaur Adventure. We have done a lot of walking and talking and learning along the way! Katie has had a great time. She is passionate about animals, especially the wild kind, and is taking a keen interest in habitats and conservation. She is also very interested in the many species of birds who visit our garden. She has taken charge of feeding the birds and our landlord kindly gave her a beautiful Bird Book which she has poured over. He has also given her a brand new, still in the box, Bird Feeding Station to take to our new house. 


Aaarrgghhhh!!

Dinosaur World!

We have have visited Jaime and Tony in Clacton and had a lovely family meal with the in-laws. Katie has loved seeing her family and has even had a sleepover at Jaime's house. Dave and I had an evening to ourselves, first one in 7 years!lol


Poor Jaime has suffered with really bad sickness these first few months of her pregnancy. Thankfully she seems to be feeling a lot better this last week, and yesterday she found out she is having a little boy! A grandson! WoooHoooo!
Just need to find a house, not too far from the hospital in Colchester, as Jaime has asked me to be with them for the birth. How amazing will that be? Baby Davis isn't due until October_we will surely have found a house by then! (nervously crosses fingers behind back).





Cyprus Memories

Let the preparations begin!



Pineapple and Strawberry Upside-down Pud.

It's less than 4 weeks until we move back to the Uk and we still havent found a house!
We have been packing and sorting and selling. Katie has made 50 Euro from her unwanted toys and games and books. I use the term unwanted loosely, because if she'd had her way everything would be coming back to England with us, but there simply isn't the room.
In spite of being so busy we have still had time for lots of lovely baking, cupcakes, cheese scones and pineapple pudding.


We have even found a buyer for our car. Katie and daddy gave it a swift clean before it's viewing...

We have tidied the gardens, pruned and weeded and dissected a flower to see just exactly what was inside.
We managed to name all the parts and label them in our science book.
Katie thought she'd take a photo. This was taken after we'd just squashed a gang of tiny black beetles that had emerged from the middle of the bloom to scatter accross my kitchen table!

Petal, Sepal and Carpal and Stamens

Washday!

We have been busy making plans for our Big Move back to the UK. Less than 6 weeks!!
Katie is excited about returning to England. She thinks it's a big adventure and I guess it really is!
We have decided to take only personal belongings, clothes etc back with us and sell the furniture we have here in Cyprus. It is cheaper to sell here and buy new in England rather than ship home. So, we has been sorting through Katie's toys and books, deciding what she will take with her and what we can sell or leave to the charity shops.  She would like to have a "yard sale" like in ToyStory but in reality we will hire a table at one of the local markets in Paphos. Any money she makes she can spend on new toys later. Of course, if Katie had her way, she would be taking every single toy and book and game and jig-saw with her . Unfortunately, we would need a full shipping crate just for her things alone!

So, we sorted through the mountain of toys  and "classified"  the items and negotiated a while over what could stay and what should go (this took a good while!!) and then we washed the soft toys so they would be clean and fresh for the sale.


Here they are drying off indoors. Katie is checking them out, wondering if there night be room in her case_ for just one more??

Valentine's at Latchi Bay.

Today we headed off to Latchi Beach in Polis. The weather was warm and bright although a little overcast.
The harbour was very quiet apart from a handful of fisherman tending to their nets and boats. The beach was deserted, such a contrast to the summer months when the tourists and holiday makers crowd the streets and harbour cafes.


Katie was in seventh heaven playing on the sand with Dave. They searched for "special" pebbles, skimmed stones into the sea and made a Stone-Henge village out of pebbles on the beach.
Herbie wasn't allowed on the beach so we watched from the side-lines. He was none too happy! What he would have given to be let of the leash and chase the skimming stones into the water.


The coastline at Latchi  Bay is beautiful, despite the rather neglected buildings and restaurants skimming the beach.
As I sat watching Katie and Dave playing in the sand I looked out accross the perfect turqoise sea and I wondered, not for the first time, what we are thinking of_ going back to England. Will we miss all this? Probably. But I am hoping we will find new pleasures and new places where we can enjoy just being together. Just like today.

Katie and Dave discussing pebble skimming tactics!



Stone-Henge Village

And a Valentine's Heart from Dave to me!

Our new project...

Alpha and Omega

So far we have covered Grey Wolves, their characteristics, habitat and diet.


We have  read about wolves in Katie's books and researched on the internet. Katie has printed off pictures of real wolves, Carabou, Maps of Canada and N.America and Jasper National Park, where the film is set. Discussions have led us in a hundred directions. Topics include mammals, holidaying in Canada or even re-locating there in the future. I wish!

Strawberry Snowflakes and not so wild wolves!

More baking. Daddy's favourite cakes. Katie has named them Strawberry Snowflakes!

Not so wild Wolves!

Katie has  a keen interest in animals, especially the wild canine kind! She also loves Animation Movies, so this latest film "Alpha and Omega" has grabbed her attention.

The film is about two wolves who fall in love against the social rules of their pack. Humphrey is the Omega, fun-loving and fancy-free. Kate is the Alpha daughter of the pack's leader, hard working  and raised to be loyal and true to her pack. There's also a golf-playing-goose and his duck-caddy, amongst a host of other colourful characters!

 The film is due for release on DVD next week. Katie has pre-ordered it, for delivery to Cyprus, from Amazon and is she is so excited!  She's counting down the days until it arrives. Katie is getting quite adept at ordering from the internet, but bless her, she always insists on paying from her own pocket money.(This is where her mental calculations manifest themselves!) However her pocket money has increased healthily  these last few weeks mainly due to a succession of visits from the "Tooth Fairy" and Katie whizzing through her Carol Vorderman MathsFactor (completion of each level incurs a 20 Euro reward!) So....I guess she can afford it!

She has been eagerly looking at trailers of the film and researching real wolves on the internet and in her wildlife books at home. She has been so enthusiastic that we have decided to make a Lap-Book around the film and it's characters.

Katie has been working away virtually all day! It's amazing how much she can accomplish  when she is self-motivated and having fun.

Lap Books are a great! Previous lap books we have made include Sponge-Bob Square Pants and The Ginger-Bread Baby by Jan Brett, one of our favourite authors. It was amazing how much we covered and learned from doing our Lap-Books and it was so much fun!

Will post pictures tomorow of Katie's efforts so far.

Cupcakes

Cracking the eggs for our Cupcakes.

Mmmmm...tastes yummy!

Oh, and Katie just loves washing the dishes.....
Long may it last!

February already!

February already and we are still waiting for winter to start! The days are bright and sunny and very warm, the evenings are much cooler.  Fortunately, we have the luxury of central heating in our villa, which is unusual for homes in Cyprus, so perhaps that is why we have not felt the cold so much. It is hard to imagine on these sunny warm days, the biting cold of England, the snow storms and the torrential rain and flooding in parts of the UK.. Sometimes I wonder why we are going back, are we mad? I guess time will tell. But right now it's what we have to do. It's time.
Our little dog Herbie will  not be ready to fly until the beginning of May so we can't leave before then. However, we have started to plan the move and are looking at places to live. It's exciting and daunting and I can't wait. Patience was never my strong point!


Meanwhile here in Paphos we continue our lives. Days filled with playing, reading, talking, drawing, cooking, gardening and swimming. It's a hard life, I know....

Crystals and Cats

Katie grew a pink crystal. Pretty! 

..and we tried our hands at sewing!

       
January has been very warm (and dry) even for Cyprus. Katie has been busy as usual. Still bursting with energy though, as demonstrated here_

Krazy Krystals

We have been busy...we grew crystals!

and voila!

The grass is always greener.....

We are a family of three living on the island of Cyprus. We relocated to the island thee years ago from the Uk. So much has happened  since we arrived here. Lots of lovely times and some not so good times too.
Katie our  DD was only three when we left the North East of England and has very few memories of her early years in the UK. We had already decide early on that we were going to home educate Katie and that continued here in Cyprus. Home education has been daunting, amazing, exciting, liberating and has afforded us so much freedom as family.


We plan to return to the UK very soon and we are so excited. We are not sure where we will re-locate to yet but I would like to be fairly near to my eldest daughter Jaime who lives in Essex.
Our family and friends are almost astonished that we would want to return to the England rather than stay here in Cyprus but life here is not as idyllic as it might seem and I feel after three years it's time to move on.
The grass is always greener? Who knows?