I'm back again, running a little late.........

The newly altered view from my back door:

At the end of my last blog entry, I said it was starting to get rather cold. A couple of days later, we woke up to a very white Ralston. There had been a blizzard overnight and the excitement from the children the next morning was just infectious. Within a few days however, that excitement had quickly turned to frustration mainly due to the time it takes to put on all the snow gear before leaving the house...... and it does take ages. We're not being softies though, it's not just a question of a touch of snow - within those few days, we were walking to and from school in temperatures of around -34*c! Honestly, none of us have ever experienced anything quite like it. Within about 10 seconds of being outdoors, it's completely normal to feel one's nasal hair freezing, resulting in a very spikey feeling nose - I had never been aware of my own nasal hair until now! So off we trog to school every day, Harry in his sledge, the girls in their abominable snowman outfits and me in my massive rabbit fur hat (got to say, much as I like all our super ski kit, and it does mostly keep us from being cold, my fur hat is THE business; my head is positively warm when I wear it. So now I reckon if I had a rabbit fur, or indeed, any fur coat, I would be toasty the whole time. Might look a little out of place and end up with a few raw eggs running down its glossy coat, but I would nonetheless be nice and warm! So.....as those of you who know me well are aware, I can't help myself being magnetically drawn into charity shops and now I have a stonkingly good reason to start frequenting them again! Fur coats here I come.....

This is what Richard sees of the snow. Definitely one of the perks of the job, I reckon.

So, for some time now we have been living in sub zero temperatures and it now feels absolutely normal - no more wide eyed excitement from the sprogs. This jolly freezing temperature thing is all completely relative though; we went to Calgary hospital a couple of weeks ago for Henry's final blood tests and check up (from the Kawasaki episode). When Richard stepped out of the car he told me it was nice and warm and I wouldn't need my coat. Naturally I thought he was mucking around, so I totally ignored him and kitted up for going out in the cold, only to have to strip off almost immediately as it was only -12*c! It does sound absolutely ridiculous, but having left Ralston where it was around -30*, arriving several hours later to be greeted by a balmy -12* felt positively Mediterranean. For those of you to whom I haven't managed to pass on the news - Harry has been given the all clear from his ghastly time in hospital with Kawasaki disease. It's quite miraculous really - there were so many awful side effects he could have been left with, but he has nothing apart from a new leaning towards allergies, which is certainly easy to control (and nothing has shown up yet). What an immense relief and weight off our shoulders. Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers from across the water.

A couple of days later, it was Richard's birthday so we organised to go to a hockey match in Medicine Hat (we've been several times now and really enjoy it). We went with another couple as it was both our husbands' birthdays and then went out for grub afterwards, so it was altogether a lovely evening. The local team, The Med Hat Tigers is the highest level a hockey player can reach before joining the NHL (National Hockey League). Placers are often already signed up for a national team whilst still playing for the Tigers. One thing we hadn't anticipated just how young the players are. They are all aged between 15 and 19! The reckless abandon with which they play is astounding, or maybe that's just the mother in me talking, but it really is quite a violent game and it is complete evident that these boys have been on skates since they could walk - it's easy to forget they are playing the game on an ice rink as they are so adept at getting around, leaping over each other and basically just doing anything at all to make sure they get the puck. A lot of spectators like sitting up high in th auditorium to enable a full, clear bird's eye view of the rink. We have tried several spots but have decided we like best sitting in the front row right on top of the action! Distanced from the rink it is more like watching a game on the television, sitting in the front couple of rows it is really exhilarating - the players frequently smack into the Perspex wall in front of us - makes us jump every time!




The next important event which took place in November was Lizzie's enrolment as a Canadian Girl Guide and Lexi as a Brownie. There was much excitement surrounding this, particularly from Lexi, it was a lovely little occasion.

A few nights later we went out around the village for another safari supper - this is the second one with which we have been involved on this base and on this occasion I was providing the pudding course. I think I may have explained before when we took part in one during the summer: one brave person organises all the couples involved into dinner parties of around eight people and as each set of eight disband from any given course they are sent off to a different location for the following course, thus resulting in meeting and sitting with many people throughout the evening. Having been allocated a pudding course, I was delighted as I could prepare them before we left for someone else's starter. Pud (for those of you who might be interested, and I know who you are.....!) was a chocolate and rosemary mousse in a tiny shot glass on a plate placed with a lemon and lime tart and raspberry coulis and a mini meringue. All stuff I made the day before so it wasn't stressy at all which was great. I'm not looking forward to next time when the odds are I get a main course to do - the difficulty is arriving back at one's own home at the same time as 6 other guests (the idea is that no one knows who the guests are going to be until they arrive) and producing a hot meal pronto! It was also slightly different this time as we all were of course walking from house to house all over the Patch in the -30*s! So I wore a slinky number but had my heels in my handbag and traipsed from house to house in a big snow coat, snow boots, massive mittens and hat. Very glamorous!


The last few days of November brought to a head what I have been working on for weeks and weeks. It was the SSAFA Christmas Fayre; the SSAFA committee (to which I belong) organised this event for the village. I took on the creating of the Santa's Grotto. It was an enormous undertaking for one person and there were definitely times when Richard was pulling his hair out (!), but I was desperate for the children to have as magical an experience as possible, so this is what I did........







Richard flew Father Christmas to the grotto (from the North Pole, of course), the children were shrieking with excitement as he came in to land. They were beside themselves, it was lovely.

He made his way to the sleigh (I had asked the Army Workshop guys if they could possibly make me a sleigh - they did a brilliant job, I then made it all Christmassy). The Girl Guides and a Scout then pulled F.C. through the crowd to the stage where he sat in his throne and gave a great deal of time and interest to each child. He was super. This particular Father Christmas also happened to know, very well indeed, the fab doctor who diagnosed Henry with Kawasaki, so our three children were amazed when he mentioned to Harry that he knew how ill he had been this year etc.!


After Father Christmas left, his sleigh was the focus of much interest to the true believers!

Again so much time has passed........

.......since last I wrote. Sorry!

Hallowe'en has been and gone. It's a big thing over here. I have managed to pretty much avoid it in one way or another all these years, but it is such a major event here in Canada that both girls had only one lesson in school and the rest of the day was party/film/competitions etc.. In the evening there had been organised a party for the children - I said they could go as long as they didn't chose horrid, scarey outfits. Lizzie put in her order for a homemade Batman costume ("I like it that you make these things for me, Mummy and you don't go out and buy them!" Nothing like pressure!), fortunately with her own black leggings and a black poloneck of mine and a little bit of handiwork here and there, I managed to come up with something passable. Lexi chose a black cat - I breathed a sigh of relief, that costume was done in no time!

There were all sorts of games at the party, some really gross, you know the type - hand in a large covered box into various bowls of jelly/spaghetti etc and being told they are blood and guts etc. Fab! One of the games involved turning one's mother into a mummy - we came second!

Richard had been in Atlanta for a few days, he returned on the Friday, we went out that night to a lovely dinner party and then the next morning straight off to Calgary to see Richard off to the UK. This was the first weekend in November - as he had to fly from Calgary, which is a bit of a drive away (not by Canadian standards, but I reckon I am still in Brit mode when it comes to long distance driving - although driving on the right hand side of the road is pretty automatic now), we decided to make a weekend of it. We all drove up there with him and stayed the weekend mooching about doing nice family stuff, eating nice grub (always pretty much top of my priority list!) and seeing the sights. As you will see, there is a tower in Calgary, it's fairly high and the views from it are super. We all went up to have a look (elevator - no stairs - shame, that would have tired the sprogs out nicely) and the children and I were over to the glass floor overhang as soon as we saw it. Moments later I noticed Richard rooted at the join of solid floor and glass unable to move forward! My husband, the pilot, has vertigo! Oh how I laughed and took the mick for far too long (and then lovingly shoved him forwards so he had to step out onto it!). Makes me smile now just to think of it! Henry, particularly had simply no fear and loved looking down on the "toy cars"!

At the end of the weekend, Richard flew to the UK and I drove the children home - thank goodness there is a DVD player in the car. He managed to take a bag full of Christmas pressies with him and did a whistle stop tour of various friends and family and (boy am I envious of this) met my new little nephew who was born as I was driving home from the airport!

A few days later it was Bonfire Night - clearly not a night celebrated in Canada, but here in Ralston we had an excellent time. It was a shame Richard missed it. There was a stonking bonfire (planted in which was a silhouette of a fort/castle built I think, by the workshop chaps it was a really nice touch). SSAFA organised grub and drink for everyone -yum, November 5th wouldn't be the same without Gluhwein. There was a rather spectacular ending to the evening, as somehow, the grass caught alight and within 20 mins or so there was a faintly alarming, pretty large spread of fire across the prairie. The fire chaps however, did in the end arrive - much to Harry's delight. Seeing the fire engines was definitely the highlight of his evening!

The temperature has started to drop a little now and evidence of that is the deer that keep appearing in the village. They seem to be rather tame - well, at least I was able to get about 8 feet away from a stag the other day. Shame I didn't have my camera with me.

Here, Armistice Day is a day when many Canadians are given the day off work/school to reflect and show their respects. It was no different for our children, they had the day off school and we attended an outdoor service here on the base complete with helecopter showering the parade with poppies from above. Afterwards there was lunch in the mess.

Late the following Friday, Richard returned home from the UK tired and jetlagged, but with the knowledge that he needed to be on the ice at 8am the next morning for the BFBS Hockey Tournament. All the teams here (and there are quite a few - comprising the chaps from various units) spend the day playing in this tournament. As we are the closest possible house to the rink, we came and went throughout the day as Richard's team played. Richard played well and scored a goal but I don't know how he stayed upright on such little sleep.

The children thought the tournament was great as it meant they could eat as they pleased from the concession stand - greasy burgers, hot dogs and chips galore! Yuck.

That's all for now. Bye! x

Well, as usual, my good intention of writing the rest of my catch up a few days after my last blog entry has failed miserably, so here I am trying to make up for it!

So.......a couple of days following my return from the UK, it was my birthday. It started pretty early as Richard was up at 5.30am for his team ice hockey practice. He, not possessing anything remotely close to light weight, fairie-like qualities, I could see that I was going to feel less frustrated it I got up too, so I used the time to do some baking for later that morning. I had invited about a dozen or so friends round for coffee (and brownies, cookies etc) and a kind lovely friend made me a birthday cake – lemon drizzle, my fave. So we all sat about for an hour or two munching and chatting until 11.45am when we all realised we needed to dash off to collect our respective children – quite a few of them had entered a triathlon organised by the Army, including Lizzie. Those who weren’t competing had to stay at school (Lexi thought that sucked!).

The children had to complete laps of the pool, then cycle around the base and then, finally dump their bikes and run to the track and do a couple of laps. Swimming is Lizzie’s weakest hand and she needed all the encouragement she could get, but she made it in the end, following a little choking/sinking episode! Not the greatest of multi taskers - my daughter, as she was flagging three quarters of the way through the swimming, swallowed some water. She stared coughing and spluttering and then, I saw the thought cross her face remembering that she should cover her mouth when she coughs, so instead of carrying on swimming, she brought both her hands up to cover her mouth and consequently promptly started sinking. At this point, I was aware that the life guards hadn’t noticed so I, like a true frantic mum, ran down the side of the pool and shouted to her to forget about putting her hand over her mouth, get over to the side and hold on. She then recognised the error of her ways, had a good choking session and finally finished that leg (a l o n g time after everyone else, poor thing). Once sopping wet and on her bike, however, she managed to catch up and overtake several of her peers, ending up somewhere in the middle. Richard managed to get time off work to come and watch too – we were both so happy for her that she did it and finished it. Sport has never been Lizzie’s strong suit, English, Art and Music are where she shines, but to do this triathlon has been an enormous boost for her, it’s fab.

So, following the triathlon, I needed to collect Lexi from school and then get back to the poolside for the prize giving. Honestly, buy the time I had walked to the different checkpoints cheering Lizzie on, walked to school, run around after my dwarf escape artist of a son all afternoon as we followed Lizzie, then gone home given the sprogs a snack and then taken Lexi to her swimming lesson, I can tell you....I jolly well felt like I had done that triathlon. I was worn out! That however, did not stop us going out for a spot of birthday grub. Richard had booked one of the Med Centre nurses to come and babysit for us and we drove into Medicine Hat for a meal. Now I know that sounds like a perfectly normal thing for a person to do on their birthday, but please bear in mind that door to door, it’s a pretty long journey (about an hour) so it was a real treat. There is a “pub” on the base – we haven’t been to it yet, or up the other end where the single lads live (where Richard works) there is a fine eating establishment, fondly known as “The Gag and Puke”. Neither of us really fancied that (actually, I think it’s only for the single soldiers anyway). So off we pootled into Med Hat (and pootle is the word, remember, no speeding here – on these lovely big highways – why not?) and found, yes you guessed it, a steak house.

It was pretty good though, the steak was so succulent and the cocktails were super too (note the cowboy hat in the background! A very normal sight here). It was apparently the birthday of Alexander Keith brewery as well as it coincidentally being the week of the Oktoberfest in Germany, so all the waitresses were dressed up in oh so traditional German costumes – frilly low cut off the shoulder white cotton tops and v. short gathered skirts etc. . I did have to giggle at Richard’s feigned disappointment when we were allocated the only waiter – gawky, long greasy lank hair, skinny, you get the picture! Anyway, because of this occasion, the special of the day was lobster and a pitcher of beer. Richard though he might go for that (obviously my extreme hatred for anything from the sea meant steak for me!). When we saw the food arriving at the neighbouring table, he quickly changed his mind. The lobster was super huge, hanging off the edge of the platter and it was a veritable pail of beer! We had a nice night together though and it was just lovely to be able to have a conversation from beginning to end with no interruptions! Don’t think I was the most glam date in the world though, as I fell asleep in the car for most of the journey home! Sociable.

The next evening, Lizzie took it upon herself to send me out of the kitchen and prepare a birthday meal. I honestly was delightfully surprised when she and Lexi called me in. They had both secretly changed into "posh" dresses (Lizzie in one of mine......). She put on a super spread, made a cake, laid the table beautifully. It was lovely.

Last weekend Richard was working (yup, again!) so I decided to fill Saturday with buying my three sprogs some ice skates. You might think it’s a question of nipping into the shops fitting them and coming out again. Oh no – it took near enough 2 and a half hours. It was painful (mainly because as the girls were being fitted, all Harry wanted to do was play with all the hockey gear on show). I decided to get them hockey skates - they’re more robust and formed from some hard plastic/resin stuff (obviously I have a technical mind) rather than figure skates – which Lizzie really wanted. Figure skates are pretty tricky to use apparently, with the hockey ones, it is easier to get going sooner, but it’s impossible to use them for figure skating. I kinda think that I won't be seeing my children executing triple axels in the next two years, so for at least that time, we are safe with the hockey ones! I took them to a place where Richard and I purchased ours – instead of buying new cheaper ones, it is possible to buy an originally more expensive pair, but second hand and have them moulded to one’s feet. The assistant first does a foot and knee analysis, checking for arches/flat footedness, where the most ressure is on a certain foot etc and then chooses a skate accordingly. I was quite surprised at how different a skate can feel. The guys are good at their job though and usually get the right pair straight off. Lizzie and I had to try a couple of pairs. With each one, they put them in a special oven thing and then mould them to the foot. Mine now feel soft and bungy and really comfortable, and so I hope, do the children’s.

We have enrolled the children in skating classes, Harry first (we let him go on the basis we would see if he was even capable of following instruction, at the age of two, on ice! We shall decide this week whether or not it’s worth him continuing or if it’s just better for him to go on the ice with me at public skating time). Richard took him on, as the teacher likes the parents there to begin with. It was the funniest thing I have seen in ages. My sides were aching I was laughing so hard. To begin with he was like a cartoon. He was able to stand upright, but as he tried to take little steps, he just stayed on the spot because of the lack of traction, so his little legs were just going round and round and he was going nowhere.

It was so amusing – Richard was absolutely no help at all because he was laughing too hard too! Nearing the end of the lesson he was beginning to grasp that moving the skates just straight forwards and backwards would not help him gain any distance and was in the end able to move around the rink.

The girls went on to the ice for the first time in their lives and suddenly realised it wasn’t quite as easy as it appears on Dancing On Ice (I had tried to tell them!). Lizzie, in particular managed to grasp pushing outwards into a small glide to she could get around, Lexi was more prone to falling over (she burst straight into tears – she is, after all, landing on thick ice on top of concrete!). She forced herself to get back up and continue the lesson (beginning with how to fall over properly!) and by the end was getting around.

Last Tuesday, we went to a cocktail “do” at the other end of the base. The preceding few days had been lovely weather, so I knew what I was going to wear. Less than an hour before we were due to leave, the weather suddenly drastically changed. The wind was blowing a gale, large branches were down in the garden and the rain was beating down. We dashed out to the car, me wrapped up with a pashmina round my head looking, at worst like the queen when she goes riding in a head scarf and at best like I was wearing a burka! We made it to the hosting mess (the visiting battle troop here on Exercise or about six weeks host the do). When we walked in, I was dumbstruck – it was unlike any other mess I had seen before. I couldn’t believe it. Usually the way a Mess is furnished and decorated is a variation on a theme – pretty much like a private members’ Club; old brown leather sofas, dark coloured walls, lots of silver knocking around on display, often a fireplace and so on. This place was different. It was a very basic rectangular breeze block room, not lined, simply painted white, all heating pipes etc. visible hanging from the ceiling. It was rather reminiscent of old village hall public loos. Actually not reminiscent, most similar.

The grub was being served in an adjoining marquee, which, had it been a balmy evening would have been lovely, but given the weather that evening, the whole thing ended up being a little comedic. We served the food ourselves as the chefs had to hang from the corners or the marquee to stop it from taking off! The spread was superb, everything from the most tender steaks – beef, lamb, pork to duck and lobster. Masses of super side dishes too. Like the true Brits we are, most of us stuck it out in the marquee (our mouths chattering our food down rather than chewing it!). The good cheer ran out by the time we ate pudding and we all scarpered inside the lookie likey village hall bogs for a bit of warming wine. It did the trick as the white wine was indeed warm. Anyway......it was actually nice just to go out, spend some time together, have made an effort to look half decent and get to know people.

The weather remained cold for the next few days until we left for our week long holiday in Canmore ( in The Rockies, close to Lake Louise). Whilst I was in England, Richard had decided it would be good for us all to have a week away – we was right. We worked out that since he left for Afghanistan we had spent very little time together as a family apart from him 2 week R&R in the middle of the Afghanistan tour of duty. He had also at this point, I think, only had one weekend off since our arrival in Canada. We left on the Monday (Richard was working over the weekend prior to our departure – surprise!), Richard was keen to drive off at 9am - ha ha ha oh ho ho ho. Yeah, me ready to leave having packed for us all at 9am. Strangely, it didn’t happen. We finally drove off at 10.30 (I wouldn’t want to spoil the habit of a life time).

The drive was fairly quick – the Trans-Canada Highway is just so unwaveringly straight, one hardly needs to concentrate on the drive. The car has cruise control, fabby heated seats (ahhhhhhhh) and there’s a built in DVD thingy for the children. So once we had overcome the marriage threatening late departure, the journey flew by.

Two hours into the journey, the flat prairie land all of a sudden was covered in snow. It was quite strange. We were driving along, able to see the next 20 or so miles in the distance and we could see se were approaching what looked like a blanket of snow that had just been randomly placed on the land. The snow stayed with us until we reached the foot hills. It was pretty exciting to see them too, it signalled the close to the journey and the beginning of some pretty awesome sights. The Rockies really are phenomenally beautiful, totally breathtaking. The children just kept gasping as we drove through and I must have dozens and dozens of photographs of them.

We stayed in a lodge. It seems fairly common around here – it’s like a relatively large hotel with rooms and suites but with no restaurant. We had a suite with 2 bedrooms, a sitting room and kitchen which was perfect so we could come and go as we pleased and I could still cook and be mother! The lodge had an excellent underground garage so really we never needed to go out in the cold unless we wanted to. As the days went on, it became quite deceiving as to how cold it really was outside because we would wake up cosy and warm, pad around in t-shirts (everywhere here is very well centrally heated), go down in the lift to the car park, jump in the car, drive out in and then suddenly see how snowy it was and see the outside temperature on the car fall pretty speedily.

We did all sorts of nice family type stuff while we were there – went in a cable car to the top of a mountain (Henry’s fave bit of the holiday – he still talks about it), went for a river side walk, where we quickly decided we needed to buy far better hats and gloves! We also had a good romp around Banff, which is a really picturesque old frontier town which is now used as a base for much mountain/out doorsy activity.

One of the days we had a super walk a good way up one of the mountains. It was I think, quite simply full of the most beautiful sights I have ever seen. The snow was compacted so relatively easy to walk on, the fir trees were dusted with snow. Every so often walking up the path, we would come to a clearing where a stunningly clear pool of water was nestled amongst the trees – deep pools, bright turquoise and clear right to the bottom. They were always frozen around the edges – the beginning of Winter getting a grip, I guess. Most days we did the obligatory visit to a coffee shop. 4 out of 5 people in my family know their lives are not worth living if we don’t.

We had grub out quite a bit which was a real treat – really super of Richard to plan it like that. I had bust a gut preparing lots of food that we took with us, which, in the end we didn’t really need. Richard, however had in the meantime planned that we would eat out quite a bit so it would be a holiday for me too. I was actually a bit overwhelmed with all the stuff I didn’t have to do on our holiday. Wot a jolly nice husband I got!

During the middle of our stay, Harry had an appointment at Calgary hospital, so we all traipsed into the city whilst the poor boy was again prodded and poked. His heart was examined and he had lots more blood taken. The little boy was so good. He was silent as the nurse tightened the tourniquet (very tight indeed – or maybe it just looks worse on such a little arm), and just watched as she prepared the needle, followed her as she put it in his arm, watch the syringes fill with his blood, didn't make a peep and then said thank you when she had finished! He completely made redundant the second nurse who come in as a matter of course to hold children down! The girls were good too – we ended up spending most of the day going to different departments of the hospital.

On our last day, we dropped Lizzie off at Calgary Zoo. Months ago I had signed her up to join a night time trip organised by the Youth Club here. There was to be a coach trip to the zoo where the children were going to stay the night and then come home the next day. Richard, completely unaware of what I organise for the sprogs had far more recently booked this holiday across the zoo trip. Lizzie, on hearing this, declared that she didn’t want to come on holiday with us if it meant missing such a cool time at the zoo, so I managed to arrange that we meet up with the rest of the Youth Club in Calgary and sent Lizzie off for her adventure. And what an adventure it was. When she returned home, she regaled us with tales of how she had been unable to sleep properly as the elephants in the elephant house, where all the children were sleeping (honestly, they were!), had snored really loudly! She had, quite clearly, had a most enjoyable time, although she was so tired and excited, she did look like death warmed up when she returned home!

Richard and I took Lexi and Henry to the zoo too (taking great care not to bump in to Lizzie – that would be just too embarrassing for a 10 year old). It was quite a big deal for them both. Harry had never been to a zoo before and Lexi couldn’t remember her only visit. It was lovely watching their amazed faces drinking it all the sights in.

All of us, without exception were sad to be leaving Canmore. Lizzie asked nonstop if we could move there (kerchinnnng!) and Harry kept asking for more mountains and a cable car. So after the rocky (!) start (oh, Noo, how cheesy) , it was a super holiday – I recommend it to anyone, outdoorsy or not. Ours is an open house, so please do use us if you fancy a trip to one of the most beautiful places on this planet. My photographs really don’t do the sights any justice whatsoever.

Better Late Than Never!

Well, hello! It's been weeks and weeks since I have been in touch. Sorry I have been so remiss at jotting down my scatty thoughts. A great deal has been happening - moving here hasn't been the smoothest process. This might be a fairly lengthy post as I need to fill you in on four weeks! I haven't any photos for this time as we are away on hols and the photos are stored back at home, but I shall stick on some good ones for the next entry.

Lizzie and Lexi were pretty settled in school by the time we were "Marched In" to our new house on 16th September. It was a far more lengthy progress than I remembered and I think the first time we had been able to do it without the girls. It was a good way to do it! The house is of a super size and we feel very blessed to have it. We have landed on our feet this time! The two main high points for me are that there is a really large open fireplace and a fab basement. We managed to organise that our boxes of stuff arrived later the same day (quite a feat!) so by Wednesday afternoon, when the girls came home to see inside the house for the first time, we were all feeling pretty happy - although climbing amongst or over the boxes and tripping over the excited tearing out of children's belongings was how we were getting about! I managed to locate the box in which were all my curtains - always of major import to me - getting rid of the Army drapes and putting up our own kick starts the feeling at home process.

I have taken a video of the house as it was when we arrived so that when I am totally finished, you can see the before and after. I shall post it when we return home so you can have a guided tour of the house.

Now a free bit of entertainment for you.........when we arrived here, both Richard and I decided to take up ice hockey. There is an ice arena here and lots of people here do enter into the sport mainly as a way of getting fit, and it's the main way of socialising. In the Winter here, there's not an awful lot to do, so I was pretty fired up about it. Now, I know most of you reading this know about my awful slippy, slidey, formerly dislocating bones and it may well seem like a completo bonkers idea to enter into such a sport. You're right. I made the decision on the plane coming over here, however, that I was going to do this, no matter what. Getting fit has always been the way to improve my jingly jangly achy body, so ice hockey inspired me (I know a Davina exercise DVD at home might have been more the thing, but I don't like to do things by halves.......).

The first step toward getting on the wives team was a week of intensive skate school. A while later is then a week of Ice Hockey School. I was unable to make it to the first week because of being in hospital with Harry, so the only way for me to catch up was to join one of the chaps' teams for their skate school (coincidentally ended up being the "Flyers" team, therefore Richard was on it - nothing like a bit of healthy competition to spur me on!). So on the ice were lots of big blokes all in their hockey gear (think: top half American Baseball, bottom half Sumo wrestler) and then me. No, not in the least intimidating. I was pleased to discover however, (oh just see how charitable I am now....) that quite a few of the blokes were perfectly hopeless, which was a huge mental help to me and made me press on. It was hard keeping up with them mainly just because they have a longer stride. Again, though, that made me try even harder! All was going well, I was enjoying myself, although the 20-25 minutes it takes to get the kit on was a bit of a bore, but I was looking forward to each session . I managed to persuade Richard to come home at lunchtimes so I could go to the public skating sessions at lunch times ready for the next night's lesson.

One particular lunch time session I did managed to provide some most brilliant in house entertainment for quite a lot of people. I was getting on pretty well with my corners and speed so decided to take it up a level, but instead of sticking to the all important slight squatting position needed for safety when getting up some speed, I just didn't think, straightened up (which I quickly found out I was not good enough for yet!) and did a superb cartoon style slip up. I saw my skates come up in front of my eyes as my head went backwards smacking on the ice just after my coccyx. Wonderfully stylish, I know. I was winded pretty badly and when able to wanted to burst into tears! As you know though, that would not be an option I could ever take, so two friends came over to help me up (yup, I couldn't even get up by myself, how much of an exhibitionist does one need to be?!). I could feel straight away that something was wrong immediately and several days later, still continuing with the skating, I have to say, but needing lots of pain killers to get through the sessions. The med centre thought I had probably fractured my coccyx. This sounded entirely possible to me, just because of the pain levels, but there's nothing that can really be done for that condition, and I didn't want to travel miles to hospital so just decided to let it mend in its own time. Several days later though, the skating was so painful I had to give it up. I WAS SO CROSS. SO CROSS. I was loving it and actually, it seemed I had a thing for skating and was ok at it. So, no more Ice Hockey training for me. Richard, however, still kits up and goes off to play, which, I'm afraid does bring out a little of the green eyed monster in me! I shall get some photos next time he goes off and stick them on here.

So suddenly I had a lot more time on my hands and turned my thoughts to unpacking the removals boxes. Quite a daunting task, but exciting nonetheless. I had got into the second day of unpacking, which really just meant getting the boxes in the right rooms, when I received a 'phone call from my sister, telling me that our beloved grand father had died a few moments before. He was the most super man. The absolute best Grandfather any person could have and a top, top role model. My family and my grandparents have lived side by side in two halves of the same house for years, so we were all totally involved in each other's lives. It's a big blow to all of us and our cousins. I called my sister the next day to see how everyone was, and for various reasons the funeral was almost immediate, so within half an hour I was somehow on Army transport to Calgary Airport (hours away) and nabbed the last seat on a flight home. Richard, meanwhile got a crash course in looking after three children and their various activities (in a house with not much at all unpacked!). It was all a bit of a whirlwind and I haven't travelled by myself for years, let alone a transatlantic flight - I'm quite surprised I got there!

When I returned, everyone was still in one piece, a fair amount of pulling stuff out of boxes had taken place (deep joy), large “helpful” piles of things for me to go through were in most rooms (!) but all three sprogs were happy, well fed, in school on time each day, Harry had been enrolled into Pre School (so Richard could still go to work for a few hours in the day), 3 daily lunch boxes done, no swimming lessons missed, youth club attended etc etc and.....Richard taught Lexi to ride her bike! The best thing of all, Harry was hugely better.

I left Canada on a Tuesday and returned on the Sunday a few days later. When I left, Harry was still trying to make up for lost time with his speech since being in hospital. He was just a little bit skinny although nearly back to normal, but his speech was still not that good. He has always been a very good chatterer. Long words, strangely adult sentences in the right context and most able to stand up for himself amongst the girls. When he came out of hospital, he was exceedingly moody, wore a constant heavy frown and mostly spoke in single words. When I left for England, he had improved masses, but was not normal yet, so leaving him wasn't easy. On my return to Calgary at the airport, a loud voice greeted me with "hello Mummy, I thought I just saw you coming out of the lift!". That was the best welcome I could have had. It was a long, lonely journey coming away from my family in England - but to arrive and hear my boy speaking normally again was just brilliant. I was overjoyed.

Whilst in England, it was 2 weeks since my superb slip up on the ice and my coccyx was getting to be a bit of a pest, so I took up an appointment my sister had recently cancelled with her osteopath. She immediately said that I had slipped a disc and weirdly and wonderfully, she somehow managed to put everything right. I didn't even know that was possible! She strapped me up for the 10 hour flight home (don't know why it was that long, it was only 9 on the way to England - something to do with the jet stream or something.....) and I can definitely say though, I felt great pretty quickly and have done ever since!

Frustratingly, I am too late to join in with the Ice Hockey now (yup, I hear you - probably a daft thing to do anyway and Richard has practically forbidden me!).

Right, I shall sign off there. I have brought you half way up to date to the present day and shall continue in a couple of days – next time with photos. x

On Monday it was a bank holiday here and the children were off school. I couldn’t really decided what to do as Richard was working (yup, you guessed it – that’s my husband working on a Bank Holiday! Surely that hasn’t happened before?!). First thing in the morning, I received a phone call from a lovely woman here on the patch asking if I wanted to join her and some friends on a little trip to a local park/lakes/play area called Echo Falls. It was lovely. This country is just so beautiful, there is so much space everywhere. The children had a lovely time although it was extremely windy all day (nearly all my washing flew off the line! How lovely for the neighbours receiving my underwear on their lawn). The weather here has been just lovely since we arrived (how terribly British I am now getting.......). It has been superbly hot 36° on some days, now though, we can feel that Autumn is just starting to set in. It’s cooler in the mornings – still t-shirt weather, but cooler than it has been, but by about 10.30, it’s hot again and I’m stripping off into lightweights again.
Going to our local town is quite a trek. It’s not like England where there is a town centre or high street and one can wander around getting pretty much everything. All the stores are very scattered about and look a bit like our smaller industrial parks. I definitely can’t just nip into town – any errand that needs doing means a several hour round trip, so I try to save them all up! We have, of course, found the most important thing – a rather nice coffee shop. A couple of girls had mentioned it to me as a good place to find – it’s an oasis in a desert of steaks and fries! There is definitely dearth of nice places to eat – we’ve found a Thai place which we are due to try out soon. The children really like Thai, so I hope it will be good.

I cannot explain how amazingly beautiful this country is. The space and stunning open skies are just amazing. It’s really bright here too (I know there is only one sun and we have the same sun in England, but it’s just brighter here).
Right, I am going to sign off now and I very much hope I’ll be on line next Wednesday evening. So until then..... LOL.xxx

Hi Chaps, Gosh it has been a long time since I have had access to the internet – I’m having withdrawal symptoms!
Well, we are back from hospital. I have a couple of photos of how Harry’s rash started out – as he became worse, whipping out the camera was the last thing on my mind,but you can see how if this is how he was on day 2, imagine how disfigured and swollen he was by day 7. Not good. The staff and facilities at the hospital were just tip top – I can’t sing their praises enough.

Following a week’s worth of close to midnight bedtimes for the girls, they went straight back into school, probably feeling rather jaded, but it was important that they get to know they way around and meet their new classmates having missed the beginning of term. They have pretty much settled in now and have made friends which is good.
The school is close and since her second day there Lizzie has walked by herself (“it’s soooo lame to walk with your mother, Mummy!”) and I follow on behind with Lexi and the pushchair. The girls have stopped giggling and putting on a Canadian accent every time they say “recess” or “Math” now, which must mean things are becoming normal for them!
Life here hasn’t properly settled into a routine for me yet mainly because we are still not in our house so not having internet and ‘phone does hamper things slightly, also not having the car (Richard generally takes it into work) means not much exploring takes place. We found out yesterday however, that we are due to move into our new home next Wednesday 16th Sept at 11am. Hurrah! Don’t think our packing boxes will arrived until the following week though! We’ll get there in the end.......

Richard and I went to a Safari Supper last weekend. This is where some serious organisation (by someone – definitely not me!) takes place and four or five dinner parties take place at the same time. Each couple has drinks and the first course in one home, then everybody splits up and has the second course in another home and so on. Whose ever house is used for any given course is the host and cooks that course. Needless to say most main courses around these different dinner parties were some sort of casserole as the host would not be in their own home until the time came to eat it. We were given a delicious lamb tagine – it was super. The final course is coffee and liqueurs where I have to say a few people were starting to look a little worse for wear! Some friends had brought with them a scooped out water melon in which were lots of straws and the melon was filled with some fairly nice tasting concoction of booze. Half way through the evening, however, I was offered another sip – thought I’d have a look in the melon only to find the most weird, vile looking mixture I had seen since my teens! I think people had been adding Bailey’s and all sorts. It was a bit grim by that stage!
We had Sunday lunch with some new friends the following day which was lovely, they were so hospitable and made us really welcome.

Wednesday - back at home

Hi Chaps,

This is just to let you know that the hospital have discharged Harry and we arrived home last night at midnight. He is now just a little unwell (slight fever, and very wobbly indeed on the old pins) but well enough to be at home.

The girls had to go into school today as they have missed the beginning of term already. They weren't very happy about going, in fact poor Lizzie burst into tears at the prospect of making friends again.

Right, sorry to be short, I am in Richard's office making use of the internet access (still none in our Welfare House and no 'phone either) so I will be updating this blog far more infrequently from now on until we move into our new home sometime mid to end of September.

Thank you all for your support over the last week. We all apppreciate it very much indeed.

Love Noo.xx

Modern Day Miracle!

Well, I was meant to go in to hospital in the middle of the night and relieve Richard (several of you in LBS will now be guffawing) from his night duty, but I woke at 8am having slept through my alarm and four 'phone calls from Richard on my mobile. Think I must have been tired! So, when I finally got into the hospital with the girls, I was met with a huge shock and thought I was going to be sick. Harry's room was empty, no Richard, no Harry. My immediate thought was of course, that Richard had been been trying to call to let me know something had happened. That was until a nurse broke into my thoughts to ask who I was and if I was lost. I stared at her rather blankly trying so hard to remember whether or not I had seen her before (we really only get to see the eyes and foreheads of all the medical staff because of all the protective gear they wear to treat Harry). I finally came to the conclusion that I hadn't seen this lady before, so explained who I was and asked where my son had gone. She promptly told me that I was on floor 2 and he was on floor 3 - "every one knows about the boy with Kawasaki!" The girls and I giggled and snorted our way back to the elevator and began our morning again! This time pressing button 3.

When I reached Harry's room, Richard looked a little worse for wear but Harry was looking rather better than the night before. He was able to move his arms and I could see some of his eyes. His lovely blue eyes. I sent Richard off to catch up on some sleep, settled the girls in with (yet another) DVD in the corner of Harry's room and then I learned that Harry was just about due to start his treatment again. An ICU nurse had been brought in to stay at his bedside constantly and they started to administer his treatment. He was given a concoction of 2 things to curb his allercic reaction as well as the blood pressure dropping so violently yesterday (the specialist thinks the latter may also have had something to do with the fact he was having IV codine last night as well as all the other medication too). This stuff woke him up from his drousy state, the allergy IV made him scream the place down - they said it might really sting. Immediately after that, his IV of white blood cell anti bodies (I think that's right) started. He had been prescribed a massive dose - the doctors said in order for him to get the quantity he needs, it takes thousands of donors. That really suprised me. Of course, I had asked a doctor at an earlier stage if Richard and I could give the blood - if he hadn't been such a polite chap, I think he would have laughed at the thought of just 2 people being able to do the job!

Within an hour or so our little boy was waving his legs in the air and shouting "Bang Bang you're dead, fifty bullets in your head!". Normally this sort of greeting to a nurse, I do rather frown upon (!). On this occasion however, I was delighted! Poor boy's not going to know what's hit him when he comes home and discipline sets in again!

Really the whole process of the IVIG (intravenous immunoglobulin - the antibodies) was monitored so closely that we were all taking it 10 minutes by 10 minutes. It was just before the 2 hours point last night that his body started reacting against it, so I was pretty tense at that stage today. It made his face itch quite a lot and his blood pressure did fall, but we decided to continue and with the ICU nurse in with me I felt much more comfortable. As each ten minutes went by today, Henry's recovery came on in leaps and bounds. I couldn't really believe what I was seeing. The dreadful strange hives all over his face and body started to fade pretty speedily and I could see his puffy face returning close to normal. I was desperate for Richard to finish his snooze (yes, those of you who know him will know that actually, that was kinda wishful thinking. Richard and waking up aren't usually in the same sentence - apart from when I have sent the children on a mission to wake him up!) so that he could walk into Harry's room and see him pretty much restored to his former self.

During hour two of the IVIG, the boy who has not eaten since Monday morning - 6 days - asked me for some mushroom soup, some pasta, some cucumber and apple juice. I found it and he ate it all - straight up. I honestly couldn't believe my eyes. His recovery curve has been astonishing. Quite miraculous. Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers. We all appreciate them so much. All of us.

So, today closes with the girls and me leaving the two boys in the hospital (I WILL wake up to my alarm in the small hours, I will!). Harry is busy telling the nurses when the tubes feel loose on his hand, and please could they tuck him in, please could they find him some music with drums and guitars and not have the television switched on! Sounds like he's near normal then!

Shadows of his peculiar target lesions do still remain, but I wonder if that is almost like a type of bruising. I'll ask tomorrow.

I can go to bed tonight not dreading tomorrow.

Although the treatment should work this time, we are always going to have to be careful with infections - we all have to have the 'flu jab now, he shouldn't go to any toddler groups/preschool for a long time and he will need ECGs frequently because his heart may have a reaction to his present medication, at any time in the future, weird thought it may seem. He is on massive doses of asprin, larger than adult's, to kick start another part of the treatment and he has to continue having small doses of it for quite a while to keep his blood thin. It is also entirely possible in the future that another episode like this could happen again. For now, however, we are all just simply delighted, over the moon, thankful and grateful that it looks like Harry will be out of hospital by the end of this week.

Thank you again for your loving thoughts, prayers and communications with us. You are all super friends and family. Lots of love. Noo xxx

Saturday 29th August 2009. Still in Calgary.

Ok. Here's the next bit of news. I went in to the hospital just before 5 this morning (bit of a scary walk - albeit a short one, but it was v. dark and no one was about. Perfect scene for a spine chiller....) and seeing my poor little boy was a shock to me. I have been by his side since Monday when all this started and then coming away for a few hours sleep and then going in to see him fresh again was a bit of a shock (I know that sounds silly, I did know what to expect, but it still made me gulp). He and Richard had a fairly good sleep though as Harry was administered codine for the first time , which really helped him with the joint pain.

He was so very stiff that his position hadn't changed from when I left him late last night and his joints had swollen even more. He still can't open his eyes though I'm pretty sure he acn see us through his lashes.

Fairly early on in the morning, two specialists in Tropical and infectious diseases came to see me. One was heavily pregnant and in teetering in high heels and the chap, the more senior of the two was hearing a Hawaian shirt and cowboy boots. I couldn't help a little mental guffaw as they walked in! Good job everyone is on a high state of alert and wearing gowns, masks, gloves and the works or I wouldn't have been able to concentrate on what he was saying!

Now, to what he was saying. It was an enormous relief to hear him say that he can narrow down what Harry has to two things. No one up to this point has been too sure and therefore have been unable to treat him accordinly. The two options are Kawasaki Disease and Stephen Johnson's Syndrome. The former is the more likely of the two, but one of the main symptoms is that the child has to have an extremely high fever for at least 5 days so they had to leave Harry burning up in order to see. Well, he's exceeded the five days now so they are please (so to speak) with that. Harry had more bloods and various horrid swabs taken today so that he can do further testing adn at the moment he is going to treat him for the Kawasaki. This consists of a massively high dose of asprin and then a continuous flow, for 12 hours of white blood cells - that is if his body doeesn't reject and show an allergic reaction to them (possible because the cells are from multiple donors).

So, the treatment began this evening, the asprin was successfully administered so they started on the intravenous immunoglobulin. Sadly, and most frustratingly, he has had a reaction to this and his blood pressure (which was high) has dropped quickly and far too much, so the treatment has had to be stopped. The docs are working right now to get his blood pressure back up again and I have left the hospital (I SO didn't want to, but the girls were beyond tired - and now they are having to wait while I write this) with the medical team working on how to administer the much needed white platelets without Harry's blood pressure dropping. RIchard is there now waiting to see what they decide.

So that's all the news today chaps. He did say a few words today, the first being "play the drums like Jon and Benj" (you know who you are, you two - oh such heros!). Generally though, he just lies there stiff , swollen and unable to be touched. How I would love to give him a cuddle. It hurts him even to hold his hand. Singing to him though seems to be soothing (though I think the ward are now a little sick with "Doe a Deer, a female Deer" - in two or three part harmony, which ever you prefer, with Lizzie and Lexi! Bit of in house entertainment!).

So, off I shall go and catch some ZZZs now. These girls need it too. They are being so good, but are so bored. There's a great deal of tv watching, junk food eating and staying up late going on - they've never had it so good!

Thank you everyone for your messages. It really is so lovely to hear from you. We feel very far away from home at the moment, so coming away from the hospital and then sitting down to write this, only to find lots of messages from friends is really really lovely. Thank you.

Love from Noo.xxx

P.S. SOrry for any spelling errors and typos. I'm typing as fast as I can without checking so you just have to fill in the gaps and use your imagination, I'm afraid! x

Message for Sue (in pink this time!).
Thanks so much for asking Anna - plese could you possibly tell her one more thing? There's certainly no connection with the chicken pox, it's just that the consultant wanted to know absolutely every virus etc that I could come up with that he might have been in contact so that they can cross reference etc. My sister's little girl had Scarlet fever when we said goodbye to them the day after you. He also wants to know when we last had colds etc.. He just wants the fullest picture he can get. Nothing more than that! So please tell her not to worry or anything - I'm just information gathering!xxxx P.S. Your "comments" are reaching me.xx

Hi Everybody, this is going to be short and sweet.

The canadians have been fab and have put us up in a Ronald MacDonald house(!) 100 yards from the hospital in Calgary (5 hours from our home). It's the most amazing place with every facility from a gym, craft room,computer room, library etc to a kitchen (complete with KitchenAids to use!). So we do have somewhere to stay which is good......

If you read my blog, the last you will know is that the docs thought Harry had a mutant form of measles. The nigth I wrote that though, he took a turn for the worse so we took him to hospital and he was admitted. They have done countless blood tests etc on him and can come up with nothing so far. The poor little thing is covered in what looks like massive hives - deep purple with a red circumference. Every joint in his body is very swollen and he is extremely stiff. He can't be moved without screaming. His beautiful little face is swollen in every place, he can't open his eyes anymore, his mouth is dry and cracked, his nose is like a blob of putty. It breaks my heart to see him like this. He can't be picked up and cuddled becasue it hurts too much.

Things aren't good and all the doctors are scratching their heads. This is a university hospital though so we have the best brains on the job. His temperature is constantly high and keeps peaking to 105, which isn't good. The girls are now here with us (H and I got the air ambulance today from Med Hat Hosp to Calgary and R drove the long journey behind me). SO there we are, that's what's going on here. But I have to say the cleanliness, helpfulness and efficiency of the Canadians has been super. Really super. Thank you all for your prayers. That little boy needs every one he can get at the moment. He's in a bad way. Lots of love to you all, and I am REALLY sorry not to have repied individually. We only have internet connection in the temp housing on the base when I can naughtily gain access to someone else's Wifi (!). Being in the MacDonald house is the first time I have had a proper connection and time to write.

I have averaged 3 hours sleep or less each nigth this week,so now Richard is here he's taking the nigth shift and I'm in this plush accom with the sprogs. Wish we didn't have to be here at all though.......


Oh,lastly, most frlightening for litle Harry apart from the prodding and poking and now not being able to see properly is that everyone who enters his room has to put on special gowns, masks, gloves, visors etc as they don't know how contagious he is (not very I shouldn't think as we all seem to be fine) or how depleted his immune system is. They are starting to err towards some sort of auto immune problem. Will let you know more as I do.


Lots of love Noo.xxx

MESSAGE FOR SUE PALMER: Sue, just seen you are following this - do you know if Anna's children were diagnosed with chicken pox or anything that week we left. She mentioned to me that she thought Tibby had it the day we said goodbye. The docs have said I do need to find out, just so they can rule out all sorts of things. I don't have my uk mob with her number in it with me so really hope you get this. If you are possibly able to reply asap, it would, because of the time difference, I might be able to go in with an answer for them tomorrow morning..... thank you. xx

Tuesday 25th August 2009. A grotty day.

What a day it’s been today.

Yesterday lunchtime, I noticed a few spots on Harry’s back and by mid afternoon he had a really high temperature, so off I trotted to the doctor (except it wasn’t that easy – the doc is on the other part of this base, where Richard works and a security pass is needed to enter. Of course, I don’t have a pass yet. Not only that, we are not yet registered with the med centre. To top it off, surgery had finished and no one was answering the ‘phone. So....I called Richard out of a conference (yes, I was most popular), he had to come and collect us as we only have one car at the mo and he was able to use his pass to get us through. The place was closed but I managed to persuade a nurse just leaving to get a doctor to see Harry. The doctor told us he was pretty sure it was chicken pox and to do the normal stuff one does with that. So we went home but I kept saying to Richard that I just didn’t think it was that – something didn’t seem right. It just didn't seem like chicken pox.

Anyway as today progressed Harry looked far worse, so we had to go through the whole getting onto the camp rigmarole again where the doc told me that he was fairly sure that Harry had measles! It’s definitely some sort of viral infection and probably measles (a slightly mutated form) but because of the vaccine programme in Great Britain he hadn’t seen a case for 25 years so had to call in another doc for a second opinion. He then sent us on our way to Medicine Hat hospital having been in touch with ER asking for Harry to be admitted recommending blood tests, fluid drip and something to bring down his temperature of just under 105*F. So.....back home we went, kitted myself out with an overnight bag (GP reckoned we’d be in hosp there for 2 days).

Well, we spent the whole afternoon and part of the evening in the in hospital with Harry under observation (the girlies were so good, it was really boring for them). They gave me the choice of giving him the tests and staying in overnight but I was reluctant. Confirmation or not of measles, he will still need the same care and meds as it is a viral infection. It would also save Harry being poked and pierced, which wouldn't be nice. So we brought him home and as long as I can keep his temperature down he can stay at home. The second he becomes floppy as he was earlier in the day we have to dash back to the hospital where they’ll test in earnest. Poor wee thing, he is covered in large flat blotches each with a deep red circumference, the whites of his eyes are red, the skin surrounding his eyes is purple and he just looks terrible. So....we need to get through tonight and pray that tomorrow is a turning point.

Just to add a little excitement to an otherwise dull and uneventful day........ when we finally returned from hospital, we sent Lexi fro a shower. A few moments later, we heard a thud and then a blood curdling scream. On dashing in, we were presented with poor little Lexi standing in the shower, shattered glass all over the floor and blood all around her feet. Bit of a shocker, I have to say, and her frightened screams weren’t helping with the overall picture, but with a huge amount of patience and calm (!) Richard managed to tweezer out all the tiny shards of glass from her feet. When we finally got her out of the cubicle, she was shaking and jittering in shock, poor little thing. She has since been read chapter and verse on why it's not that good an idea to take a glass into the shower .....

Quite a day!

Most tragic of all (!) is we have been invited to a cocktail party at the end of this week and neither of us have the right attire with us – it’s all still in packing boxes somewhere on a ship!

Sunday 23rd August 2009

Well, here we are a few days later – it’s Sunday – and we are starting to find our feet. The girls no longer have jet lag but Harry is still waking up in the night. Until last night he was waking at 3am (and making a fuss unless released from his cot) and just staying awake for the rest of the day! Needless to say, I feel a little ragged around the edges now! Also, just to keep me on my toes, I decided to potty train Harry 2 days ago. And guess what.......he’s done. HURRAH! (Yes, Annabel, that’s 2 days!! Sorry! Don’t worry, it took weeks and weeks with Lizzie.x).
We seem to be haemorrhaging money at the moment. We’ve bought car seats, extra bedding (ours in still in boxes waiting for our permanent house), really expensive food – that is until we found Costco yesterday. We’ve bought the car (see pic – it’s absolutely massive – makes my people carrier at home feel like a nippy little town car!). When purchasing a car over here, before being allowed to drive it off the forecourt, you have to take the bill of sale to a registry office (over the other side of town) with the insurance cover note, where they then verify your licence and then having departed with lots more money they give you a licence plate to take back to put on the car and THEN you can drive away! It’s quite a length process compared with being able to do it all on line at home.
I drove into Med Hat yesterday. As most of you will know, I am not exactly a timid driver and have been known to have one or two (!) points on my licence, but yesterday, I was making up every excuse under the sun not to have to drive. I started by having a quick (slow) drive round Ralston Village. All went well until I parked up to fiddle with the seat position, started up again and promptly drove off on the incorrect side of the road – Richard had kittens (loud, shouty ones!). There are lots of little extra rules and regs to remember when driving here. You have to stop for 3 seconds at a cross road (even if you can see there’s nothing coming – or the police will have you!), you can turn right when the traffic lights are red and everyone, absolutely everyone sticks to the speed limits (?????). Even on the open, boring, lonnnnng trans Canadian highway. Such a wasted opportunity!
Well, I shall try to post this doc on the blog this afternoon. I’ll go into Richard’s office while it’s quiet and I hope I’ll be able to attach some photographs this time. The internet connection in Stabuck’s, where I did the last blog entry , wasn’t fast enough to be able to do that.
The girls go for a taster day at school on Monday, so, grandparents and God parents, I shall let you know how it goes in the next Natter!

21st August 2008

We arrived here on Tuesday and on Wednesday afternoon we went to a barbeque at the Flight (Richard’s work). It was nice to meet people, although it was mostly chaps from work. It was great for the children because really they could run about as far as they wanted. The prairie is so flat and open that they could just run and run and we’d never lose sight of them! We only stayed a couple of hours because it felt like midnight to us when the BBQ started, so we were on our knees with drooping eyelids by the time we left!
Richard started work almost immediately and was in the office getting to grips with running the Flight (an independent unit consisting of pilots, ground crew and maintainers) as well being on Casevac standby – launch within 30 minutes. Casevac (Casualty Evacuation) is for the soldiers on exercise on the prairie. The helicopter takes a doctor to the casualty and then on to hospital if necessary. Having Richard round the house in the evening, dressed for flying, attached to his mob waiting for the call, takes me back 13 years to when we were first married and living in Northern Ireland and he just lived in his flying suit. Poor chap, it’s really hot at the moment – hot enough for the children to be down at the splash park all the time, and he’s having to wear a poloneck, flying suit, thick Army socks and heavy Army boots!
One of the wives showed me around on Friday – the base is MUCH more compact than I thought! The walk to school will be about 1 minute! I haven’t got out and done anything on the base yet as we have been so busy just getting the home set up. We’re still a little in limbo as I don’t want to fill the cupboards with cooking ingredients yet as we still have a hotel to stay in before we move into our permanent house. So the food situation here at the moment feels a little like we are on holiday - there’s a lot of repetition going on!
Things are very different here. The way of shopping is different – it seems there are a lot of what we would think of as industrial parks in which are superstores. It is set up that the shopper drives between each one. We haven’t yet found anything resembling a high street. It is all extremely spread out – but there definitely is room to do that here! I’m not one for shopping in supermarkets really, I like using independent shops (apart from my all time favourite at home – Lidl!), so now I am trying to get to grips with these simply enormous stores. All dairy products seem to be priced through the roof but fruit and veg is cheap (yey!). The meat is delish – hurrah! The Canadians don’t sell alcohol in their supermarkets and only in liquor stores (I just love saying “liquor” – feels like I’m in a Country and Western movie!). We joined at Costco yesterday and it’s fantastic. Guess what – they sell Kitchen Aids! Yes, my brownie making, bread proving, cake baking friends, all is not lost! I will be back in normal cooking mode soon (well, once I can persuade Richard that it really is a very good idea to get one..... I’m, three quarters of the way there.........(another good reason – I’m going to be making my own bread again as not only is bread very pricey here, but I don’t want to have to travel all the way into Medicine Hat to get it).
Well, I have managed to fill up some more space talking about pretty much nothing (you’ll be glad to hear I haven’t changed at all then!). Just thought you might like to know roughly how things are going...........XX

The Beginning

An awful lot seems to have happened in the last 36 hours! We left my family in Shenley on Monday lunch time to get to Heathrow for our 5.30pm flight. This whole move had seemed a little dream-like until that point, but saying goodbye to everyone at home was particularly difficult. I could hardly talk when I reluctantly got into the taxi. The driver must have thought me a pretty rude passenger, poor chap. The journey kicked off with Richard and Lizzie having to travel in a separate car to the rest of us because the firm didn’t have a vehicle large enough to take a family of 5 with international luggage. Anyway, the journey round the M25 to Heathrow was a good one. Not a single hitch so we arrived with plenty of time to spare (yes, I know you all can’t really believe that I, Noo, would be early anywhere – not exactly what I am known for. The reason: I wasn’t relying on my supersonic driving to get us there and had therefore planned enough time for a sensible taxi driver and the havoc caused by the dreaded M25 roadworks up in Hertfordshire. In the event, the road was clear. Hurrah).

So, arriving at 1pm,we had a lot of time to spare, and of course, the way I saw fit to best fill that time (and most sensibly, Richard agreed) was to go and find some food. But not just any old airport food. No. In Terminal 5 there is a new Gordon Ramsay restaurant – going in was a no brainer for both of us. No crusty old curled up sarnies, but instead for me, braised duck with red wine and clove jus with mustard mash, for Richard, pork something or other (looked super – see photo!), Lizzie had wild mushroom and rocket risotto, Harry a pasta dish and Lexi did choose a sandwich but one of the nicest I have seen- super ham, Emmentaal and quail’s eggs! Hee hee! Poshest airport lunch ever and, most superbly, courtesy of Her Mag!

The Army also fly us out here Club Class – so we were able to use the super duper lounge. It was great. There was a part of the lounge walled off in glass in which had been placed computers with internet access, some sort of computer console thing (yup, that’s right, can’t tell the difference between any of those boy type computer game playing things), games, TV, the works. So the girls were happy. Harry however, did a complete U turn and behaved in a way I have never known before and ran up and down the huge (hushed, filled with business men) lounge/Champagne bar screaming – for no reason. I hadn’t realised quite how fast the little blighter could run until I was forced into a faintly comedic chase across about 50 yards (Richard wasn’t there but heard it outside!). Deep joy.

I have only travelled Cattle Class on flights before, so when we were led to the front of the ‘plane I was pretty delighted to see how we would be travelling. The super comfy chair/bed things were excellent and nothing was too much trouble for the crew. They kept coming round offering Champagne (it would have been rude to say no), snacks, any drinks, hot towels, games for the children and a pretty good menu (honestly!) from which to chose our supper. I had the pea jelly with parmesan biscuits (Harry and Lexi loved it, Lizzie went for the smoked salmon). I’m going to have a go at making it at some point. It looked pretty good on the plate. The rest of the grub was good too.

The flight to Calgary was nine and a half hours long, so I was dreading the whole Harry aspect of things, but after a few hours and a huge amount of hard work, he went to sleep and slept until we landed. The giries however, stayed awake the entire time – we landed at 3am GMT. Not bad stamina! We weren’t able to leave the airport straight away as we were held back in Customs for an hour, which was a bit of a drag at that time of night, but the whole thing was helped along considerable by an Army chap who met us straight off the ‘plane and walked us through everything including taking us to our room in the airport hotel. When we walked into the reception of the hotel, we were met with the smell of chlorine (which the children clocked straight away!). The hotel reception area had a swimming pool in it! It looked super, but it was an absolute pain in the neck for us because, of course, all three sprogs kept begging to be allowed to go for a swim – despite it being 4am GMT.

After being the most mean parents in the world, making the children go to bed without a swim, we snatched about four hours sleep and were then up and ready for an early morning flight from Calgary to Medicine Hat – our nearest town. The ‘plane was SO titchy. It seated 14 and boy did it shake about. Harry thought it was marvellous – I suppose to a two year old, a ‘plane with two propellers and being able to look down the aisle to see the pilot flying it is far more real than the first huge aeroplane. Before boarding this ‘plane however, we were told at the Gate that one of our bags was 7 lbs and another 4 lbs over the weight limit. All our others were under, but it apparently made no difference. So Richard had to go and buy a small bag whilst I unpacked our bags, weighing piles of the contents in order to redistribute. It was a bit of a pest and a not one of the most calm moments of our journey.

We were collected by a military driver from the airport and brought straight to BATUS (British Army Training Unit Suffield), or I think, more commonly known here as Ralston Village. We have been allocated the Welfare House. It’s a pretty decent sized three bed bungalow and will be absolutely fine for the next couple of weeks. We have been aware for a while that our house is not going to be available until 12th September but on arrival we were informed that the chap moving out has had his leaving date postponed so we are not quite sure when we will now move in. We are hopeful that it will still be during September though.......

Well, we have had a good wander around the Patch, and there seems to be quite a bit for the children to do here, which is fab. There are about ten nice little play parks dotted around, the best being at the school. It’s nice that it is open to be used during the holidays. There’s the library, coffee shop, leisure centre, ice rink and lots more, but I am most delighted with the spaciousness of the place. It’s just so open.

Richard and I have decided that we are going to try and give the children a lot more freedom whilst living here. I, particularly, have always been rather terrible at letting the girls go out by themselves – even on the Middle Wallop base, but we reckon here is so jolly safe and so completely remote, we are going to be able to have a more free way of living. We started today by letting the girls go to the splash park by themselves. They were really chuffed! It’s a play park which has water sprinkling everywhere, rather like the one at LegoLand in Windsor. It has been so warm here today though that they dried off pretty quickly.
Richard starts work tomorrow (a touch too soon I reckon) but we’re off into Medicine Hat before he does to buy car seats, pick up our new car (yey!) and fill the cupboards with food (we had to go to the Canex – the shop on the base – to buy food just for today. Pizzas were about £9! Just bog standard, soggy frozen pizzas!).
So, here we are in Canada. I will try to find an internet cafe tomorrow so I can move this text from Word to my blog. I am not at all web savvy so I don’t know if I can (I hear several of you laughing at my hopelessness now!). I think internet access is going to be a bit hit and miss until we move into own home. We won’t have a ‘phone until then either......
I am aware this first post has been rather a mammoth one (I’ve always been one keen to chat!) but rest assured, I am quite certain as time goes on and everything becomes familiar and normal, there will be less and less to say!
Love Noo xx