Posts

This last week was mostly spent…. getting a tan, and getting my head round children’s after school activities. It seems that American moms spend the whole day driving their kids from appointment to appointment and managing their kids’ schedules. There are so many activities, clubs, societies, volunteer organisations…. it’ll take a while to figure it […]

Not much to be said about the last few days – except sun, summer, suntan lotion, swimming pool. Aaaaahhhh… We’re conserving our energy for the big move next week. I’d almost forgotten we have to move AGAIN.

F’s Mom’s Day celebration at pre-school. Ah bless….. After pre-school and school pick-up we go up into the hills for E’s horse riding lesson. She is in a group with 3 other girls, all at least 11 or 12, and the horses are quite a bit bigger than the ones she’s used to riding. She’s […]

Went to see author Isabel Allende last night, in the local Books Inc. bookshop just down the road. She came to present her new book, “Island Beneath the Sea”, read parts of it and answered a few questions and signed autographs. What a beautiful, warm, intelligent, inspiring woman! I have read a few of her […]

The kids are doing really well now. E loves her school and seems to mingle well. She even went on her first “play date” yesterday. These are different than in the UK: as school finishes at half past 2, the afternoon is longer, which means the play date usually ends at 5, or before dinnertime, […]

First day of school and pre-school today. After a bit of a mad dash this morning (we have to leave the house half an hour earlier than back in the UK, which doesn’t sound much, but believe me, it is crazy), we drive to school. It’s fantastic how the roads around the schools are so […]

Went over to the coast to Santa Cruz today. A stunning day, and only 45 minutes’ drive. I’d read in the guide somewhere that Santa Cruz has a huge amusement park along its famous boardwalk, and it is just that: huge. And noisy and straight out of an 80s teen movie. Fantastically corny, and so […]

The idea of writing an online diary about our experience in the US has been brewing for a while. I kind of always wanted to write about what it’s like living in a country you weren’t born in, but never got around to actually doing that while I was living in the UK. Such a […]