Christmans Message 2014

So, another year has gone and this one has been no less hectic than all the others.

The year started with both boys still very happy in their last 6 months together in kindergarten. For the first time as a family we treated ourselves to a traditional "winter holiday" and rented a chalet for a week in Vierli up on Hardangervidda. We had a great time. We finally built the Lego Campervan that we had bought Easter 2013 during our visit to Legoland. We dug out a snow cave and made a snow castle and did lots of cross country skiing. Unes' skiing abilities came on with leaps and bounds and during the week he managed a trip of 9km which took him over the 50km total for the season he needed to be awarded "gull barneskimerke" (gold distance).

 

Not long after, Mari, who had a temporary 80% position at the National public health institute in Oslo landed a full time and permanent job as an advisor in epidemiology for the public Health group in Vestfold fylkeskommunen (Vestfold county council). This job is based in the nearby town of Tønsberg, a welcome end of four hours a day spent commuting. She is enjoying having the possibility to work on long term issues with the knowledge that she will be able to follow them all the way to the end.

During the summer, after a long drive through Europe, we enjoyed a fantastic 2 weeks in Cockermouth. Together with the rest of my now very extend family and Peggy, who enjoy returning home, we rented Woodhall.

This is a lovely country house and gardens which had space for all of us. During our time there we discovered all the fun things to do in Cumbria that we hadn't done during the years we lived there. Both children and parents had a fantastic time and one of the highlights was hanging off the side of Conister on the "via ferrata", while the rest of the Family visited the slate mine!

I continue my running and cycling and our trip to Cumbria coincided with the Lakeland Marathon in Coniston. Mari and I, together with 3 other members of the "family" ran the half distance and enjoyed a tough but spectacular outing in the fells.

Later in the year, I joined my younger brother Stephen and a couple of mates and ran the Bacchus marathon in Dorking in September. My time was an unimpressive 4:39, but in my defence I had my week old broken nose straighten 2 days before the race. Also, Bacchus is off road and not flat with a winning time over 3 hours.

 

Une, now 6, started school in September, and whilst the change from Kindergarten has been a challenge, he is loving learning and his reading is really starting to develop. Liam, 3, has not missed his big brother in kindergarten too much and really enjoys being one of the bigger boys. Une started swimming this autumn and continues to play football. Liam, has been doing Gymnastics, which he really loves.

As ever, the list of projects started this year is longer than the list of projects completed. one job that did get finshed was building Maris new bike, a foldable full size 26" mountain with a "Changebike" frame purchased from Taiwan. Mari folds it up and puts it in the boot of the car so that she can park outside the toll ring and cycle the last bit into work.

Another project, which has taken up a lot of time during the spring and the Autumn was changing the roof on the lowest part of the barn. It was a job that had to be done, but turned out to be even bigger than anticipated and the extent of the job and the scope was perhaps not fully understood and agreed, still the roof is now on and it's no longer leaking or liable to disappear in a gust of Wind.

 

Otherwise, as you can see in some other posts, we started work with an architect earlier in the year and are now underway with an extension and substantial internal changes on the house. It's going to be a process that takes a number of years, but we are looking forward to adding our own touch to the house.

We still have 3 of our Bengals, Asia, Anitra and Amazing. They are getting older but still healthy and highly active. Peggy is showing signs of her 13+ years and has had a few scares. Just now she is doing OK, but is quite deaf (although this is partially selectable).

Wishing you all a very merry Christmas and all the best for 2015!

House Improvements #28. Foundations, heating cables, windows and doors.

Around the beginning of October, a few men and a digger turned up and proceeded to remove part of the front of the house. Before they arrived, it looked like this.

 

And after a day, there was a small bit of the house and a large chunk of the garden missing!

I must say that, even though I prefer to do things myself, it is quite fun to come home each day and see that other people have been there and that the job has progressed. The new foundation walls went up quite quickly, but due to the contractor using his head instead of the drawings and our late decision to have heating cables in the external steps and entrance finishing the job took a bit longer than planned.

But here it is, foundations complete. The delays meant that the next part of the construction will not start until the week after new year. That's no real problem, we're not in that much of a rush and the window supplier has agreed to hold the windows until the are needed early in February. Good news, the barns already full without having to find space for 8 windows and 2 balcony doors!