One Year in London

One year ago today Jason, Charlotte and I moved to London.  Things were so stressful in the days before the move:  I had a lot of concerts leading up to the big day, we had to sell our house, our car and many of our belongings, we said goodbye to our cats, said goodbye to our friends, oh, and we had a newborn baby to care for!  We had no furniture in our house for the last few weeks we lived there (our things wouldn't arrive in London for another two months . . . ) and we moved in with friends for the last week.  It was absolute craziness.  

Even in the midst of all the craziness, however, our decision to move felt like the right one.  We were never in love with DC and we wanted to do something fun and adventurous!  The following print (which I plan to order for the house) sums things up how we feel quite nicely:

And it has been a great adventure so far.  There are certainly people and things we miss, but we're making it work.  Between Skype and our fantastic international phone plan (thanks, O2!) we are in regular contact with our loved ones and all the things we left behind are slowly being replaced by other things.  We have just moved into an amazingly gorgeous new flat and are enjoying spending time with our new friends and exploring our lovely city.

I can't believe it has been an entire year.  I still catch myself telling people that we've "just moved here" but that really isn't true anymore!

Holidaymakers

Charlie and I are on our way to the States!  I've set this to publish during our flight, so you can imagine us somewhere over the arctic, having a tea (me), being a good baby (Charlotte) and excitedly anticipating our reunion with Bethie, as well as with family and friends.

It's hard to believe that Charlie and I haven't been away from Greater London (aside from a brief-but-wonderful visit to Paris with my lovely bride) since we arrived here almost nine months ago.  When she became a UK resident, Charlie wasn't much older than this:

(finally, fulfilment of an old promise)

 We've had a good few weeks together, enjoying our first December in London.  

There's something magical about big cities at Christmas, and London is no exception.  It's lovely here.  

Even if it is a bit chilly at times.

And next year we may celebrate the day itself here, all three of us together.

But for now, we've packed our bags and are headed on holiday.  Take a look at this kid: she put the box of formula in the empty suitcase while I wasn't looking.  Charlie has her priorities....

And right now, at 35,000 feet, I'm hopefully with a Charlie who's less like this:

And more like this:

 See you soon, America!

News From Mrs. Allen's House

Jason and I lucked out when we were able to sell our house (without an agent) to the first people that saw the house.  In fact, we had two full-priced offers on the house within three days of putting it on the market!  The young couple that ended up buying the house reminded us a lot of ourselves a few years ago (read:  pre-Charlotte) and we were so happy to see our house go to a couple who seemed to love it as much as we did.  The most remarkable part of the sale was that they didn't only buy our house, but also our car, a lot of our furniture, and all the tools in the shed.  They even took over the care of our precious cats, Milton and Cowboy. 

A few days ago they sent me an email full of pictures of the house and cats along with an update on what they've been working on around the house.  I thought I would share some of the pictures with you.

They've painted the front door red, and removed the stump from the fallen tree:

 The living room is more modern, but still very warm and welcoming:

See our old wine rack and TV?  I think that might be our old mirror over the fireplace as well. (UPDATE:  Jason said that isn't actually our TV.  They must have put ours in the bedroom!)

I was so happy when they asked if they could buy the claw-foot table!  A lot of blood sweat and tears went into fixing that up!

 For reference, here is what the room looked like when we were there:

They've had a number of trees removed:

 It's a good thing, too.  Nobody wants this to happen again:

Summer storm, 2010

We LOVED seeing pictures of our dear house, but were most happy to see pictures of the boys.  We miss them so incredibly much.  In fact, it is hard for me to think of them without tearing up.  We're so relieved we were able to find a good home for them.

Milton and Cowboy

A Half English

As of this weekend, Charlotte has officially lived in the UK longer than she has lived in the US.  It is a funny coincidence that this weekend also marks the commemoration of the US declaring its independence from the UK!  Happy Fourth of July, everyone!

We'll be celebrating tomorrow with some other expats in Clapham Common.  Jason is going to make some of his famous fried chicken (Thomas Keller's recipe!).  No fireworks, but maybe we can find some pop-its or snakes somewhere . . . 

A good choice

The three of us celebrated a minor milestone yesterday as it was two months since we moved to London. We enjoyed spending a few moments thinking back to those last few hectic days in Washington:

bidding farewell to our lovingly renovated home,

our well-used car,

and our dear companions Milton and Cowboy;

saying good-bye-for-nows to great friends;

and saying to one another countless times, "can you believe we're moving to London in three days (two days, tomorrow, today)?"

And we recalled how we felt sitting at Dulles, our half-dozen-plus bags checked, waiting for our flight to depart. It felt a bit like we were going on vacation, but it was made surreal by the knowledge that we weren't coming back. I think I said something like,

"It feels like we're moving to Jamaica, but permanently."

To which Bethie replied, "no, it doesn't."

"But you know, I mean because we're going somewhere we would ordinarily consider a vacation destination, but we're just staying there."

"Well, and the weather's the same. Beaches, too. And everyone calls you 'mon.'"

"Right, OK."

We felt liberated--a bit like it was the last day of school--but in hindsight it would have been more reasonable to be scared out of our minds. But we weren't.

And we still aren't, two months on.

As we hope is clear from these pages, we're having a marvelous time.

And the best part is that it feels like home, not vacation. Sure, we have more people to meet and more days to pass before London doesn't feel like a new place, and we miss our friends back in DC, but London already feels comfortable.

And sometimes on those occasions when we talk about where we might buy a flat someday or where Charlotte could go to school, we smile at the possibility that moving here was a very good choice.

What we've learned so far (part 2)

-Branston "pickle" is my new favorite condiment.

-Apparently you can drink in public. Go to your fridge and get a beer and go on a walk.

-Cookies are cookies if they are flat, round and full of chips, nuts
and what have you. Any other cookie is a biscuit.

-"Cake" seems to refer to any sort of sweet, raised pastry (donuts, muffins, etc.)

-they don't use the term "noon" here.

-Most coffee shops offer a "flat white" which, as far as we can tell, is just a latte with less milk.

-People here dislike American football for the same reason most
Americans dislike soccer: they think it's boring

-"Tea time" here doesn't necessarily mean time to drink tea; it seems more to refer to an afternoon snack. Charlotte got a book from the library about a polar bear family and it ends with "mum brought a fish home for tea!".

-News headlines take some getting used to. If a person falls off a
balcony during a party, the headline could be, "PARTY FALL GIRL IN
HOSPITAL."

-Dates are written with the day first, then the month and then the year. I forgot to do this when I applied for Charlotte's daycare and they thought I wanted to begin December 4 and not April 12!

-Ribena is a drink of choice.

-Umbrellas can apparently be called brollies, which is adorable.

-People here think it is amazing (and not in a good way) that most
people in the States are left to pay for their college educations and
health care pretty much on their own.

-There are a lot if stores whose main three products are alcohol,
cigarettes, and fresh fruit.

-"Streaky bacon" is what we would consider bacon. Their standard bacon is flavorless and bland in comparison to what we're used to!


VOCAB:

squash=juice from concentrate (you call it this even after it is made)
stroller=pushchair/pram/buggy
diaper=nappy
pacifier=dummy
tank top=vest
hob=stove top
the letter "z"=zed
the letter "h"=haych


This website is a great resource for newcomers to London. I wish I had discovered this earlier:
http://www.awclondon.org/newcomers.html

Moving Day

After living for more than a month in our unfurnished flat, we have finally moved in! The movers came yesterday (a day early!) and unpacked our pallet of furniture and boxes.


As part of the service, they unpacked the boxes and put all of the items in the boxes on flat surfaces.


While this made for some messy spaces, we are grateful that we don't have to waste time unpacking boxes and flattening cardboard!


They also arranged our furniture where we wanted it to go and even hung the curtains. Okay, they didn't hang the curtains, but they really did arrange the furniture.


Having our furniture and other things really makes it feel more like home here. As for Charlotte, she's just happy to have Sophie the Giraffe back.

Laundry

Doing our laundry here in London is completely different than doing laundry in the states. We have an all-in-one washer/dryer in our kitchen like most other flats here. The washer (once I was finally able to figure out how to use it!) functions like any other washer. The dryer, however, is basically non-functional. The one time we tried to use it to dry a towel (yes, a single towel) it took two hours. After the two hours the towel still wasn't even close to being dry. It was nice and hot, but not dry. I assume this is because there is no vent to the dryer. I imagine it would take hours on end to dry anything in there; it is much easier to just line dry everything.


It sounds horrible, but it really isn't that bad. Just about everyone here line dries their clothes. Anyone with a yard has clothes hanging in it and most windows you pass have clothes hanging in them.

(On a side note, our washer is currently out of commission while a new part is being ordered and so we've had to take our items to the laundromat across the street. I asked how much the dryer costs to use and I was told £5 per 10 minutes. It would cost a small fortune to dry an entire load of laundry!!)

Since we use cloth diapers, we have even more laundry to hang than the average family. We're making it work for now, but I think we'll both be grateful when we're able to upgrade to a place with an American style clothes dryer!

In the meantime, our clothes situation will drastically improve when we receive our container shipment tomorrow. We shipped our things mid-March and have each had only one suitcase of clothes for the past two months! Poor Jason had to use most of his suitcase to pack work clothes and has been surviving on three t-shirts to wear in the evenings and on the weekends. As I continue to drop my baby weight (woo hoo!) fewer and fewer of the items I packed fit. I feel like I'm wearing the same thing just about every day. As for Charlotte, she has already outgrown about half of what I packed for her. (I still can't believe she's already wearing 6-9 month sizes!)

Our Shipping Container Arrives on Friday!

It has been almost two months since the movers came to pack up our belongings. We had a few weeks without furniture in DC and have spent well over a month in London without furniture. It is hard to believe we will have all of our things in one place in just a handful of days!

We didn't ship very much furniture, but are very much looking forward to receiving the few items that are on their way. Jason and I agreed that we are both most looking forward to our rug. Wood floors are lovely, but a rug really makes a room feel so much more homey (or homely as they say here!).

The only items we shipped in this photo are the rocking chair, rug and large picture on the wall.


We're also anxious to get Charlotte's crib up and running! She's been sleeping in our bed or in a little travel cot that a friend lent us. The changing table will also be a welcome addition:


As part of the moving service, they will move all of our things into their designated rooms, unwrap all of our furniture, unpack everything onto flat surfaces, and remove all of the boxes. We will have a lot of work ahead of us to get the house into a livable condition, but we are looking forward to it! I'll be sure to post pics of the chaos once the movers arrive.

We Got a Couch!

Most flats in London are offered furnished. This would be great if they had decent looking furniture, but most furnished flats (in our experience) seem to have cheap, outdated furniture. Our flat was offered furnished or unfurnished. After seeing the overstuffed, white leather couches they had in the living room, we were quick to ask for it unfurnished (aside from a bed, so we'd have something to sleep on!).

The day we arrived we headed out shopping and eventually found a lovely couch at John Lewis. It folds down to comfortably accommodate two sleeping adults (yes, we laid on it in the store) and makes for a stylish, modern couch when upright.




The fabric is a dark gray made up of small black and gray checks:



The best part of this couch, is that we no longer have to eat our meals on our bed!

What I've learned so far . . .

-John Lewis department stores far surpass any other department store I've been to. They have seven floors of shops and restaurants. We purchased our couch there. (It should be arriving on Tuesday! Woo hoo!)

-I have no idea how to work my washing machine. Not a clue. It is currently full of clothes and detergent but I can't get it to work. It lights up, but won't turn on. Blergh.

-Ikea is just the same in the UK as it is in the US except they offer donuts instead of cinnamon rolls. Oh, and they deliver!

-Coffee makers are a bit hard to find here. There were about four or five at John Lewis. If you are looking for an electric kettle, however, you will have no problem finding the perfect one. There were well over twenty different options.

-There are lots of kids and babies in our neighborhood.

-To touch on the previous observation, I will also note that if your child is screaming on your afternoon walk (despite having recently eaten and having recently had a diaper change), and there is no obvious place to sit and nurse her (without going into a cafe) it appears to be okay to nurse her in your local Sainsburys.

-I can't find the battery charger for the camera and the camera is dead. :(

-Alba Pizza is some of the best pizza I've ever had.

-I have no idea how to regulate the temperature in my shower. I think it is just going to be easier to stick to baths (good thing I'm bath person!).

-If you lock the door to our flat from the outside, there is no way to open it from the inside unless you have a key. This could be a problem if someone is ringing your doorbell (to deliver your new iPhones) and you can't find a set of keys!

-Last, but not least, I've learned that Charlotte's playmat allows me to get a shower AND breakfast! I have even had time to do a little organizing, emailing and blogging. :)

Cheerio!

We made it to London safe and sound! Charlotte did a great job on the flight and we were all able to get a little sleep (although they had such a great selection of "on demand" movies to watch, it was tempting to just stay awake!) We got to our flat and all napped for an hour or two before heading out on the town. We didn't get as many errands done as we had hoped, but we did pick up some pots and pans and ordered our sofa-bed! We also got to know our neighborhood a little bit better. It is really a cute/fun area! We're looking forward to exploring a bit more. Now we are back in our flat and are going to pick up a pizza from down the street for dinner. Looks like a cute place.

One big lesson we learned today is that the tube isn't as convenient to take a baby on as is the DC metro. Many of the stations don't have elevators so we one of us would carry the stroller while the other carried Charlotte in her carrier. It was a hassle with two people but it would be too much to handle with just one. Next time we take the tube with Charlotte it will probably be in a baby carrier!

We won't get our internet hooked up until next week, but we've decided to pay to join a local network until we get our own service. We also don't have phones yet, but the plan is to get some iPhones within the next couple of days. In fact, we tried to get them tonight, but they were all out! Jason reserved some online tonight and we should get them tomorrow (along with an American number for all y'all to call us on!).

Time to go pick up our pizza! Here's the description. Sounds yummy: mushrooms, mozzarella, olives, olive oil, garlic and herbs with tomato sauce.

Here we go . . .

In the last few days, Jason and I have sold our house, our car, much of our furniture and many of our worldly belongings. We have also put our cats in the care of the lovely couple who purchased our house. At this point in our new adventure there is the potential for things to feel all wrong. Especially when saying goodbye to our friends. (That, by far, has been the most difficult part of moving overseas.) Yet, things still feel right and good. This is something Jason and I have always wanted to do and we are finally making it happen.

We won't have internet for a few days after we arrive but there is an internet cafe just up the street that we will use until it is set up. We also won't have phones right away, but we will contact family with our UK numbers ASAP. We will have a great international phone plan with American phone numbers that will ring to our UK phones so family and friends can call us without worrying about making international phone calls. We also plan on skyping quite a bit so get your accounts set up now: www.skype.com. We'll plan on always having Skype open on the computer so you can call us anytime and it will ring our computer like a phone.

Our flight leaves at 6:00 today from Dulles International Airport outside of DC. Jason is going into work to fill out some paperwork this morning and Charlotte and I are going to try to finish packing. We'll probably leave here around 2:00 in order to get there with plenty of time to spare. We are so excited to start this new adventure together and we'll be back with an update soon!

Milton and Cowboy

Jason and I have spent the last six months preparing our cats to immigrate to the UK. There were lots of vet visits and loads of paperwork involved. At one of their more recent vet visits however, we learned that Cowboy's heart murmur had gotten worse. The vet suggested that with his weak heart, the plane flight could cause a problem for him. He didn't say not to travel with them, but it started us talking about what would be in their best interest. We came to the realization that they would probably be happier not having to go through the stress of being in cages for 12+ hours and enduring a long plane flight. We were heartbroken at the thought of leaving them and we would both end up in tears whenever we would try to talk about it.

We had some friends offer to help find them homes, but no one came forward offering to give them permanent homes. We decided we would just take them with us if it came down to it, but we were still holding out hope that we could find a good solution. I mentioned our predicament to the couple that bought our house and they said that they might *might* be able to take them. The thought of them being able to stay in their own home, with their own yard to run around in made us happy beyond belief. It would be the absolute perfect solution! I wrote up this little presentation to help woo them:

Meet Milton:

Milton loves to lounge:

And cuddle:

And roll around being cute:

He also enjoys a good cup of coffee:

Meet Cowboy:

Cowsy loves being outside:

He enjoys long, cute snoozes:

He LOVES playing under the sheets when it's time to make the bed:

He had a thing for martinis early on, but now mostly sticks to water.

If you choose to keep Milton and Cowboy, they will provide the following:

Lots of cuddles for you and for each other:

In fact, they'll cuddle you even when you're not looking your best:

They'll make you laugh:

And they'll be unbearably cute:

Just, FYI. ;)

Amazingly, they agreed to take the cats and seem to be looking forward to getting to know them. In fact, when they were over the other day the woman said to Milton, "I'm going to be your new mommy!". It breaks my heart to think that I will no longer be their mommy, but I know that they will be in excellent hands. The couple that purchased our house is really wonderful and I know that they will provide a happy, loving home for our sweet boys. We hope that they will send us updates now and then. We will miss them so much.