OUR FIFTH WEEK...

Monday morning saw our internet being installed so we can now skype anyone who has this facility. They also came out and mended our landline which has not been working even though it had been connected - just a small matter of a wire dangling from the roof that hadn't been wired in!!! Our telephone number is ... +61 395 871 639.

Tuesday we went into the city and did a tour of the Etihad Stadium - one of the five sporting stadiums in Melbourne. It is mainly used for AFL (Aussie Rules) matches but also international cricket games and concerts - Robbie Williams has performed there and U2 are coming in December. It has a seating capacity of 53,000 and has the largest retractable roof in the southern hemisphere which takes 8 minutes to open or close. We were the only ones on the 1p.m tour and the Boys really enjoyed it :)

On Wednesday, I drove( by myself) to Anglesea to visit some friends of the family who used to live in Hampshire and who had chinchillas (like Dad). They emmigrated to South Australia 50 years ago as £10 Pomms and travelled 6 weeks by boat with their belongings on board. The parents - Eileen and Len travelled with their 4 very young children and started life "Down Under" - how brave was that! No internet or skype to keep in touch then!

Anglesea is a pretty little village at the start of the "Great Ocean Road" to the West of Melbourne and it took me just over 2 hours to get there. It was Eileens 83rd birthday and I met Eileens twin girls Mel and Pat and their husbands Dave and Peter, who have all visited Mum and Dad in the UK over the years. I stayed overnight and the next day we took the car over by ferry to Sorrento at the tip of the Mornington Peninsula (you can get the map out to follow this!) and visited a National Trust garden called "Heronswood" at Dromana. It was very picturesque and we enjoyed a lovely picnic looking over the water with Melbourne city visible in the distance.

We then parted ways and I then drove up the Mornington Peninsula back home to my Boys, which only took 45 minutes. It was a lovely 24 hours - good company, great food and excellent wine!

We found out yesterday that our container has arrived in Melbourne - hoorah! However, it now has to go through customs so we are looking at the 12th Oct for it to be delivered to our house ( I am secretly hoping it may come a bit earlier!). Clocks spring forward an hour this weekend so we will be 10 hours ahead of you. And the Boys start school on Monday... at long last! So a big week next week! Will they be able to wake up in time I wonder? Think we may have some very grumpy teenagers for the first few days!!! Will let you know how they get on :)

Our 1st BBQ!!

Hello! Just a quick post to share some photos that we took this afternoon.

The weather here today is nice and sunny....hitting 22c. This morning Jack and Sam played football in a friendly for Brighton. There was a mixture of ages from 14 - 18 and Sam and Jack played on the same team.

They both really enjoyed it and Sam coped really well playing with the older boys/men. In fact he nearly scored twice and set up his team's goal.

This afternoon we had our first BBQ on the terrace which was lovely. Then we decided to drive down the coast a bit to a place called Chelsea. It is about 15 mins from Mordy and the beach just stretches on for miles. There were lots of boats coming in and out of the little harbour. Also there were quite a few jelly fish washed up on the beach - William counted about 8 of them.

Take a look at the pictures on our Flickr site here.

Had a good day Thursday. Jack and Sam weren't working so we decided to make a day of it and head into the city. Managed to leave home by 10.30 (quite a feat in itself with the Boys sleeping requirements!) and visited "The National Sports Museum" at the MCG. It was excellent! Even Will enjoyed it and I did think he may be a bit bored since reading was required!! Had loads of info about all Australian Sports people, especially cricket, so will be a good place to take my Dad when he comes over. The highlight was a little theatre portraying Shane Warne as a hollogram in the MCG changing rooms doing an interview. It was so realistic people go up to him at the end and ask for his autograph! Amazing!

After that ,we went by tram to the new Docklands shopping area (bit like Gunwharf but still work in progress). Would be nice to visit with my girlfriends rather than Sam and Will who really weren't in the mood to appreciate it!

Friday afternoon the table tennis table arrived - hoorah! Alas, instruction-less! Fantastic! We had to walk into Mordi to buy a wrench coz guess what - our tool box is in the container! It's amazing how you take things for granted - until you don't have them! Try ironing work shirts without an ironing board... interesting! But there's just no point buying another one when you know it's arriving in a couple of weeks!

So, eventually managed to build it and even Jack was impressed when he came home from work!

Friday evening we had Dave Gates birthday party and when we got home, Chris had returned, exhausted but in one piece.

Today (Saturday) we have had a relaxing day. Chris and I went for a 5.5 mile run along the beach (not so relaxing!), Sam worked all day and made up 8 bikes earning himself an amazing

$80 (£55)! We have had tennis table contests and watched the AFL final! The latter was pretty nail-biting stuff, between Saint Kilda and Collingwood - neither team having been in the final for over 20 years. Collingwood were leading by over 20 points at the half-way mark, then St. Kilda came back and it ended as a draw 68 - 68! So they have to have a replay next weekend!!!

The other exciting thing we booked today were tickets for the Boxing Day Test at the MCG! What an experience! Then we are flying the next day to Sydney for New Year celebrations for the week - something to look forward to.

Watching the re- run of "I'd Do Anything" (finding Nancy for "Oliver") at the mo! ...

Zzzzzzzz

Well that was one of the hardest weeks I have worked in a while! It started on Monday with a 7am flight to Sydney to lead a proposal for a big project...at short notice.

We had one week to respond and a huge amount of work to do. I had 6 partners working on it with me (translated as...giving me their opinion...but not actually doing that much really). Anyway after lots of ups and downs in the week we did a really good job and submitted a really strong pitch. We will find out next week whether we have been put through to the final round.

Although it was stressful and tiring (3 hours sleep last night) it was actually a great opportunity to really get time with some of the senior people in my part of the company. The good news is that if we win the work then I am going to be the Programme Director....

Sadly I have just got home and Caroline and the boys have gone to a party round our friends the Gates - it is Dave's birthday....so I will be off to bed soon!

It is a big weekend in Melbourne as it is the AFL finals - everyone is talking about it. I would say it is just like FA Cup Final day...maybe even more popular. The MCG is sold out (100,000 tickets) and 10,000 people just turned up to watch the teams train this morning! Collingwood are the favourites (bit like Man Utd) and they are playing St Kilda who are generally more popular. Should be good and I am sure we will watch on our new HD TV! If only we had a sofa to sit on too.

We had an email this week to say that our container is still on track to arrive in Melbourne on 30th September. It then takes 2 weeks to clear customs....can't wait to get all of our stuff....especially my bike as I really want to get out onto the open road!

The weather in Melbourne is still quite variable - generally about 16c with clouds and some sunny spells. In Sydney this week it has been quite warm and sunny - it generally seems to be a couple of degrees warmer there.

The main things I miss about home:

- Green countryside
- Decent tea bags (they are too weak here)
- Football on at the right time of the day (I am losing touch with all the news)
- Sky Sports News (Fox Sports is good...but they talk about AFL all the time!)
- Friday Night with Jonathan Ross
- Dark and warm beer
-.......oh yes...AND ALL OF YOU!!!!!!

Back soon!

Chris

Sorry for the lack of blogs this week but there really hasn't been too much to write home about!

Chris went off to Sydney 5a.m Monday morning and hasn't been seen since! He has really been thrown in at the deep end, trying to put a proposal together for a client he's never even met! He has been working ridiculous hours, getting into the office at 7.30a.m and not leaving till 10.30/11p.m! Tonight, (Thursday) he thinks it might be an all - nighter because the bid has to be on Friday. Let's hope he doesn't get too many more of these!

Jack has been going into the fruit and veg shop for a couple of hours every afternoon, which sort of breaks up the day, especially as they don't get up till 10 at the earliest!!!

I went for a 5 mile run along the beach yesterday morning. There is a pathway that runs alongside the beach for miles and miles, beautiful sand on one side, amazing houses on the other. It's a nice easy run (no hills) so I think this may become my new course, as long as it's not too windy.

Decided a couple of days ago that I would buy a table tennis table for the Boys. Wanted to buy one at home last year but nowhere to store it. Here, we have our great big garage and can also roll it outside to play. Thought it would be something we could all play whilst waiting for our container to arrive and half the price than in the UK. So Jack and I started bidding on Ebay and were chuffed to bits when we won it ( Jack had some good tactics!). Because they wanted $60 (£40) to deliver it and we wanted it straight away, we decided to pick it up in our big van. So, yesterday afternoon, we drove 45 mins to another part of Melbourne only to find when we got there that no way was it going to fit in even our big car, so we had to drive all the way home again and pay for delivery! Goodness knows when it will arrive!

I went out last night for my first "Girlie Night Out!". Jackie invited me to the cinema where we met three of her other friends who also play tennis. The cinema was lovely - really plush and up-market, much nicer than Odeon Leisureworld. The seats are huge and comfy and get this .... you can buy an alcoholic beverage and take it in with you!! The film was really good, called "The Kids are all Right" with Annette Benning and Julianne Moore - definitely recommend it though not heard anything about it.

Two thing I keep forgetting to mention (bit random but I will throw them in!) is that everyone keeps to the speed limit here - it's great! On the main "A" roads it's usually 80 (bout 65 at home? Not sure) but you don't have any mad people going tons faster. The fines here are huge and they have speed cameras everywhere so no one wants to get caught!

The second thing I forgot to mention from day one(and is VERY important!) is that I have my very own ....walk in wardrobe!!! How Sarah Jessica Parker is that!!! Mind you , compared to her WIR, mine is a cupboard! But hey! Whose comparing sizes! I'm very pleased with it and that's all that counts!

Friday evening is Dave Gates birthday so we are heading over there for our first Aussie BBQ! They have loads of people going so it will be a good chance to meet some people. Unfortunately, Chris won't be home in time for it and don't think he will feel up to socialising. Think he will be crashing out all weekend in recovery mode!

Have a good weekend everyone - can't believe how the weeks are whizzing by! Let us know what you have all been up to...

TV Mania.....!!!!!!!

Hello....Jack here! We have had a good weekend. Sam worked on Saturday and made himself 65 bucks at the bike shop. Dad had a busy weekend spending lots of money! Dad went out and bought us a new 50 inch TV for the living room as we are going to put our one from home in the garage with the X-box.

The good news is that I finally got my birthday present...a new T.V/DVD player! Only 2 months since my birthday! On Saturday night I went out with Josh to watch the AFL game round his mates, it's the grand final next week! Mum and Dad went out for their anniversary on Saturday as Dad is away in Sydney all week with work.Went to a lovely fish restaurant in Mordi called "Doyles" - we will take any visitors there because it was lovely!

Not sure what we will get up to this week(it's 2 weeks holiday for the Aussie kids too). Hopefully I will be working a few days and I think we might go into the city another day but I am sure we will find something to do (watching the new TV?!)

FRIDAY 17th SEPTEMBER

First and foremost...."HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAREST DADDY!" we are celebrating your birthday before you are so it will be a long party! Think this is the first birthday I haven't spent with you in a very long time, but fear not, I will definitely be raising a glass or two (or three or four!!!) to you! Love you lots. Have a great day!

Sam went back to the bike shop at three yesterday and put together three bikes, earning himself 30 dollars! Will went along too because he was bored and earnt himself 5 dollars by polishing them! So they were very pleased with themselves! They didn't get home till 6.30p.m, just as I got back with our new car. Drives really well, nice and smoothly, so I'm sure we will pleased with it. It's nice to be high up again in the driving seat!

Jack had a bit of struggle getting up at nine this morning for his first day at work. Will let you know how he gets on!

Off to buy more school uniform today, then meeting Jackie for a coffee in Brighton....

THURSDAY 16th 1.30p.m UPDATE....

Both Jack and Sam have a job!!! Went into the bike shop in Mordy to enquire about second hand bikes and the Guy who runs it is from Bath! A complete bike fanatic having cycled round the world and full of local info! He will train Sam how to put bikes together that come in from the factory in a box and pay him 10 dollars a bike.( The guy will obviously check the bikes over to make them road worthy!) The more he does, the quicker he will get so the more money he will earn!

Jack has got a job in the fruit and veg shop in Mordy starting tomorrow! Following in his Uncles footsteps!

Fair play Boys!

THURSDAY 16th SEPTEMBER.

Hi (or should I say G'day!)

This is Caroline just doing a little update on what's been going on this week. Afraid there wont be any photos because Chris is "The Master" of blogging but since he wont be home till late tonight, thought I'd have a go!

This week we have been spending a FORTUNE at the shops fitting the house out with a few basics, just to tide us over till our stuff arrives in the container, which may still be another month away (nightmare!). It's due to arrive in Melbourne 30th September but then has to go through customs which can take up to two weeks.

The house is lovely but a little echo-y since it has wooden floors throughout the hallway and lounge. Since there isn't a lot of furniture and no curtains (roller blinds everywhere) and because it is open plan, it can be very noisy , especially when the Boys get going! We have to escape to the bedroom for some peace and quiet!

What we intend to do in a while is convert the garage into a room for the boys and put a sofa, TV and X-box out there. The garage is single width but has space for three cars. It is fitted out with lots of storage and a fridge for their tinnies ! We will put some carpet down and they will be sorted! Will also put Wills drum kit out there and there will still be space for a workroom for me, if and when I decide to do some curtain work.

We have been to both schools this week for enrolment and again, spent a fortune on second hand school uniform. Brand new, the prices are outrageous! We are talking £50 for a pullover each, £30 for a pair of trousers and £50 for the jacket they have to have. Plus shoes, shirts P.E uniform - our bank card is quaking under the strain! I tell you, it makes you realise how cheap everything is in the UK. A whole school uniform for a tenner aren't they advertising in some places?!

We were very lucky with Wills uniform yesterday though. Someone had donated a school bag (60 dollars new and it's compulsory!) to the shop and didn't want any money for it. It was practically brand new and even better - inside were two pullovers and a polo shirt all Wills size! Hoorah! We ended up just paying 10 dollars for a pair of shorts - result!

Over here, you have to pay for all the school books and exercise books, even 17 dollars (£10) for a planner! And 500 dollars a year just for miscellaneous stuff. Times 3 Boys - you can see where our money is going! And this isn't even private school, this is Government funded - ha! What a joke! It seriously makes you realise how lucky we are with our state schools! We will never run them down again!!!

Today we are having Foxtel (cable) put into the house (the guy is here already and it's only 8.30 a.m!) so we will be able to get all the English footie (I'm so happy as you can imagine!!) and UK TV (that I am happy about!). Then this afternoon, we are picking up our new car. It's three years old but still cost us £20,000! We sold my lovely S-Max for £12,000 and that was three years old too!

Hey ho! I'm sure there are some benefits living over here - just haven't found too many yet! Petrol is cheaper and the train is miles cheaper - £160/month for Chris's train fare compared to £500 at home.

The Boys are fine but getting a bit bored since all the kids here are still at school till tomorrow (then it's two weeks off). Without the X-box , lego and all their stuff from home, they don,t have much to do. Jack has spent the last couple of days trying to find a job (with no success as yet) and Sam thinks he might try a paper round delivering the freebie paper (The Leader). At least it will give them something to do and earn some money.

They have "The Melbourne Show" starting in the City tomorrow for ten days (a bigger version of The Romsey Show) but unfortunately, all the jobs have gone for that.

Chris's job is going fine - meeting lots of people and getting home now at about 6.45p.m He will probably be starting on a project soon.

Our next aim is to find a soccer club for Sam to join and clubs in general for all of us so that we can make some friends. Jack has joined a cricket club and goes to soccer training with Josh. Will wants to try Aussie Rules footie but the season has just come to an end.

Thats about all for now. Please, please keep emailing us (I don't have everyone's email addresses on this laptop) and commenting on our blog. We really look forward to hearing from everyone and if we don't get any we get very sad:( !!!!

Lots of love to you all from "Down Under" xxxxx

Mordy...our first day

Sunday afternoon saw us moving into our new home. Then in the evening the Gates family came round with a bottle of bubbly and we had a takeaway to celebrate.

When we stayed in the CBD we were woken by the traffic and sirens going off continuously, hence we were looking forward to a good nights sleep. However, as dawn broke, we were awoken not by pigeons (like in Romsey) but parrots squawking their heads off and at 7 a.m, workmen starting work on the house opposite!

Sam and I headed off to the big"Westfield" shopping centre 7 minutes down the road to make purchases for our new house and to start stocking up a very empty pantry. When we returned at midday Jack had just managed to get out of bed! Since the sun was shining, we headed down to the beach.

Chris went on the train to work today which is just under an hours journey, so was home at 6.30 p.m - rather different to his commute to London! Long may it continue.... :)

The picture above is of the main road through Mordialloc where there are lots of little shops and cafes.

New home, new car!

We picked up the keys to our house today and are just as pleased as when we first viewed it. All we need now is for our furniture to arrive and we will be set.

We had a little explore and walked to the station (9 min) and then onto the beach. It is a lovely

little beach with a marina also - there were lots of people fishing and just generally walking around. The temperature today has been 18c which isn't bad for early Spring!

Also we managed to buy a car today. After much debating and discussion we decided to get a people carrier type car although the selection here is quite different to the UK. We bought a 3

year old Toytota Tarago which is an 8 seater giving us the practicality that we need. Not quite the same as Chris's BMW....maybe that's for next year :-) Chris drove a hard deal and managed to get a 2 year warranty, full service and even reversing sensors....as well as $2k off the price!

Tonight we are off to the Comedy Store in Melbourne where Chris managed to get some free tickets thanks to PwC. Here is a little picture that I just took from our balcony...remember there are more pictures on our Flickr page here

Aussie Rules.......OK?

We've just got home from a great evening at the MCG tonight where we watched our first Aussie Rules game. It is the semi final play offs at the moment before the big final on Sept 25th. The MCG is a wonderful stadium with a capacity of 100,000. For tonight's game it was about half full but the atmosphere was still good. Will and Sam really enjoyed it as there are lots of goals and the game keeps moving all the time. Even Caroline managed to stay awake until the last 20 minutes :-)

It has been a good week on the whole this week....

• Chris has a good first week at work. There are a couple of interesting projects on the horizon, the people are very friendly and he had a good time on Thursday evening at a PwC triva evening where his team came 9th out of 60....not bad for a Pommy!
• Sam and Jack were very happy to hear that they have been offered a place at Brighton school. They really wanted to go to this school rather than the local Mordialloc school. However, Will feels that the Mordialloc school will suit him much better.....and it is only a 10 minute walk from the house!
• Caroline and the boys were able to explore Melbourne a bit more this week. They visited the Eureka Tower for great views of the city and also the old State Gaol.....where I think it was tempting to lock a certain 3 boys up but apparently that's not allowed :-(

This weekend we are moving into our new house which we are all excited about. We get the keys on Saturday and we will probably move our stuff in on Sunday (see map below for the actual location). On Saturday we are also going to look at a car....probably something similar to the S-MAX that we had in the UK (although they don't do that here).

View Larger Map

On Saturday evening we have some complementary tickets to a Comedy show in Melbourne thanks to PwC....the boys in particular will enjoy it I am sure.

So a good week with some 'big ticket' items sorted. Once we have moved into our house then I think we can all get into more of a day to day routine....

Hi Ho....Hi Ho...it's off to work I go...

I had a bit of a shock to the system on Monday as I had to go to work! After a long journey in.....well, a 6 minute walk I made it in on time for an 8.45 start. The first two days have been really good and mostly just covering induction stuff - lots of forms to fill in, new processes and systems to learn....and of course I was given my laptop!

Everyone is very friendly and happy to help which is nice. There are a couple of projects for me on the immediate horizon both of which are in Melbourne which is good!

Caroline and the boys have been sorting out items for the new house to tide us over until our container arrives in mid October. We had a trip to Ikea last night which was exactly the same as the UK including prices. Caroline has also found an Aldi and her new favourite shop is KMart - lots of bargains.....including 4 bottles of wine for $20 :-)

The school situation is still up in the air at the moment. Whilst the boys all have places at Mordialloc High School (which is 10 minutes walk from our new house) they would ideally like to go to the school in Brighton. At the moment it is not 100% clear if this is possible but we hope to find out soon. There are lots of things to consider such as travel time, style of teaching, facilities as well as academic results of course...

On Sunday we move into our new house so we will provide some more updates soon!!

Our New Home

We are all feeling really happy today as we have found a new house to rent that we are all pleased with - 18 Steedman Street, Mordialloc or 'Mordy' as the locals call it.

It is a lovely single storey traditional 'Ozzie' home with 4 bedrooms, a lovely big living area and a study/5th bedroom too. It is 10 min walk from the beach (OMG....what a beach too), 10 mins walk from the station, 10 mins walk from the local school. The train journey into central Melbourne is 35 mins....just a little bit less than Chris's usual 2 hours (+) commute!

The people who own the house are in a similar situation to us except they are moving to China - a lovely Australian family. What is great for us is that they are happy to leave some key items such as oven, dishwasher, fridge/freezer and even some items of furniture for us - perfect!

We also looked at 3 schools today so have a couple of options on some good schools - more information to follow once we have had some discussions over the weekend!!!

Here are a couple more pics of the house:

Well, we arrived in Melbourne on Monday a little later than planned due to a 1.5 hour flight delay but our apartment is really nice and very well located - just a 2 minute walk from the PwC office. Chris has no excuse for being late for work!

On Tuesday we were met by our relocation consultant who spent the day driving us around different parts of Melbourne and showing us about 7 different properties. At the end of the day we were all a little tired and fed up as none of the houses really seemed to fit our criteria.

On Wednesday morning we went to the bank to sort out debit cards etc which was all quite painless and then spent most of the day on the web looking at various properties...still nothing that seemed to fit our requirements :-( In the late afternoon we caught a train out to Moorabbin where our friends the Gates family live. They moved out here from Romsey about 5 years ago and their son Josh was friends with Jack at Mountbatten. We had a really good evening with them and they kindly drove us around their area and helped us find some potential properties to view. The boys got on really well with their kids (Jodie 18, Cara 13 and Josh 16) and Jack even went to football training with Josh! We got home late but really happy (maybe that was the Ozzie wine) and motivated again!

On Thursday (today) we picked up our hire car (a Ford Falcon XR6 complete with boot spoiler) and went to view two properties. The first was in Mordilliac which is about a 30 minute train trip from the office. The house is all on one level, had 4 bedrooms and a study and a large living area with lovely wood flooring througout. The kitchen area is lovely and all the bathrooms etc have been recently refitted. The living area has lovely doors that open onto a decking area suitable for bbqs....and the garden even had a trampoline in ! The price was good and there is a good state school nearby so we left that one feeling really positive.

The second house was in McKinnon - a little nearer the city but right at the top end of our budget. It was a beautiful property similar to the first but with an upstairs den area for the kids and built in home cinema! Also one of the best schools in Melbourne is very close by. The drawback is that it is likely to only be available for 12 months so it would mean having to move again....hmmm...decisions, decisions!

So tonight we are eating in - Caroline is cooking a lovely Chicken curry....and we are going to have lots of discussions over dinner. We all like both properties but are going to work through the pros and cons!

Hopefully our next post will give an update on our decision!