Mish Mash

All still going well here - we went for lunch with Dan's new church friend Ethan today and then randomly met some nearish neighbours at the park, who are going to do a drinks party for us in the next couple of weeks so that we can meet a few more locals........

Dan and Ethan

Guest room almost painted - ceiling needed a 2nd coat as we originally did it at night then in daylight realised we'd missed a HUGE chunk! Ready for our first guests (mum and dad) in a couple of weeks - v exciting - they will have beds but no sheets or covers if we don't get our act together! Our next door neighbours (who used to own this house and are clean and tidy FREAKS) are coming for dinner on Fri night so I guess I'm cleaning for the next 2 days.
Dan started his 'settling in' at school this week - he seems to be happy enough but as ever can never remember a single thing he's done whilst there. (At least he's not playing power rangers......yet......)
We've just uploaded some photos from my mobile (which still contained pics of us at Beverley Rd!) so I'm afraid the selection is a bit random but does include one of the Minnesota State fair complete with downtown Minneapolis skyline (above). Larry will fill you in about the fair in his next post. Lots of lovexxxxxxx

Becky's first haircut (3 weeks ago)

Dan's first school day

The Minnesota State Fair - On A Stick

So on Saturday we went to the Minnesota state fair which is a kind of showcase of all things Minnesotan. If you've ever seen the episode of Father Ted with the Craggy Island Fair its kind of like that on a massive scale but slightly better. It is one of the largest state fairs in the US and if you click on the photo below you'll get some idea of how large it is as the photo was taken from a tower inside the fair; you can also see Minneapolis in the background.

Click on the picture for closer view

See, it is quite big! The fair is held in the capital of Minnesota which is
A) Minneapolis
B) Minnesota
C) St Paul
D) St John
E) St Hubbins

For the correct answer read on to the end of the blog - there are big prizes for the winners. Or not.

Sadly our camera ran out of juice just after taking the above picture so you'll have to use your imagination a bit, or if you just like looking at pictures then just give up now and wait for the next blog.

Popular Things you will see at the State Fair
Pork Chops on a Stick
Chicken on a Stick
Walleye Salmon on a stick
Corndogs on a stick (hotdog wrapped in cornbread)
Turkey legs (not on a stick but the bone is a good stick substitute)

There was also 'all you can drink' normal and chocolate milk for a dollar - you just keep the cup and go back for more whenever you feel like it - which was several times.

There was a good funfair which Dan was just tall enough to really enjoy, so we went on petrol go-karts together, high chair swings, a spinning upside-down ride, a throwing you around ride and a scary rollercoaster (scary as in 'will it fall to piece when I'm on top of it scary' rather than 'super g-force tall and fast scary' - think the Mousetrap in Littlehampton.

There were also huge barns full of various livestock, cows (with people hairdrying them to give them a shiny coat for the competitions), pigs, goats, sheep, horses etc.. and not just a few of each, there were probably well over a hundred cows - and Andy was very brave and didn't show her fear that they might suddenly develop a vicious herd mentality and trample her to death.

There are also indoor areas where they have 'apples from Minnesota', 'Why Corn is important' and that sort of thing.

We eventually had to leave when Becky was sick, she hadn't been very well all day but had done well, we were certainly glad to have made it to the fair, a good if slightly odd day out for all the family.

Correct answer to multiple choice question is C) St Paul

Bring your kids to work day

So BestBuy had a bring your kids to work day last Wednesday. Andy dropped Dan and I off at work and went off for some quality girl time together. I mistakenly thought that there would be lots of supervised activities - but this was just me assuming everything would be easy - it turned out that I had to stay with Dan but I was also fully booked out with meetings :-(

Luckily Debbie had a gap in her schedule and agreed to look after Dan for a bit

Here's Dan losing to Debbie at draughts (or checkers as they say here)

Fortunately my 9-11am meeting was so dull that I was able to take Dan into the second part of it and let him play games on my phone, so some pretty dry conversations about financial benefit models were punctuated by occasional screams of 'Level 4' or 'I got lasers Dad'.

I got even luckier for my next meeting where someone was a no show so I took the opportunity of getting Dan to help me move offices - all of BestBuy Mobile will be sitting together for the first time. I had to move between building so Dan sat on my swivel chair and I pushed him along the underground corridors that join the buildings together. We then hung around my desk where Dan decided to climb on all the furniture

and take photos of some of my work colleagues


Like Jorg who is our main contact with Accenture and is trying to help us adjust our thinking to the BestBuy mentality - he had a full head of hair 6 weeks ago.

And Bob who is the Chief Technologist for BestBuy and obviously a very serious sort of person, I spent some time with him in Rome where we had some whiskies - Bob is into his whisky and when I was telling him about my current favourite, a 10 yr old cask strength McCallan proclaimed 'I never met a McCallan I didn't like'.

And here is me looking relaxed in my natural habitat

Then it was time for lunch which was all free!

Dan was still very protective of his dessert though.
Here is a shot of the patio area which shows one of the four buildings that form the HQ in the background

Then it was (more than) time for Dan to head home so I could try to recover my day, Andy and Becky picked Dan up and I headed back to the office slightly worn out and mentally trying to recall of the people I needed to apologise to.

New Friends

A peek at our front garden..................

Well this is my first post so apologies for the paucity of wit and totally random facts as seen in Larry's previous blogs! Life here seems to be going quite well - we are really enjoying decorating our own house at last and are very proud of our newly finished bedroom (just boring beige - Emma W I hope you are proud! - but we love it). We now also have our new bedroom furniture - our bed is stupidly large (it didn't look that big in the showroom) and we may have made a mistake as we will never be able to afford a house with a bedroom big enough when we return to England!


Last Sunday we tried a different church which we liked and was so friendly that we ended up having dinner that very evening with two couples from the church. Dan also now has a friend his own age - Ethan - who came over to play today with his two sisters. Dan starts school on Monday (in the usual Lorden fashion we have yet to purchase a full set of uniform). The school is 5 miles away from our house so I'll definately need to get my act together with the driving. (incidentally - Larry got 97% in his driving theory test - what a swot!).

I have not been out and about much with the kids this week as the weather has been grey and wet (similar to home i hear).
We are very contented but do miss all our family and friends at home - thankyou for all your support - we have had lots of cards, calls and e-mails. One downside is that we have had 2 maggot incidents - one each for Larry and myself......................................................................................
Becky's first taste of British choc in 3 weeks........................................
.


Another of Dan's new friends.........................................................

Neighbours and Cake

This blog is out of chronological order but better late than never, it actually happened on Thursday 16th Aug if you must know.

I took the day off work so we could get some things sorted and we drove 50 miles! to a furniture shop. - we would never even consider doing this in the UK but it seems more doable here - I think because you know you're not going to get stuck in traffic for 3 hours.

The journey got off to a fast/slow start as I got pulled over for speeding before we left our road, doing 51 in a 35 zone. Fortunately the cop took one look at my license and must have thought it not worth the hassle as he let us go - I shall keep my UK license handy even when I have my MN one.

Anyway we got to the furniture shop, bought some beds for downstairs, some lights for downstairs and swapped or mattress as it was a little too firm and then headed home via a lakeside beach. We didn't have swimwear so were just going to paddle but Dan had stripped off and was splashing around naked before we realised. We eventually dragged them away from the beach and headed for the Mall of America where we took the kids to the Aquarium which was pretty cool and bought yet more stuff.

When we got home the next door neighbours pulled into our driveway after us and their daughter Mackenzie had baked us a cake to say Welcome


which we all enjoyed

but that she wasn't allowed to touch until we'd cleaned her up from her spagetti bolognaise.

Farmer's Market

Today Debbie (our new Minnesotan friend and work colleague of mine) took us to the farmer's market where the done thing is to eat sweetcorn or Brats (German sausage) for breakfast. The kids did OK on the breakfast but Dan got really cross when the sausage man gave him a lollipop and we made him wait before he had it - which makes the next picture (of Debbie and Dan) quite appropriate

Becky certainly liked her lollipop!
You may have noticed the weather is pretty bad, it rained all day today so it looks as though we must have smuggled some British weather through customs.

The real reason we're so bad at posting

Well truth be told we're not updating our blog as often as we would like, however there is a reason for this. The most common time to do the update is long after Dan and Becky have gone to sleep (which could be pretty late as we have taken to taking them late night shop;ping with us as it is the only way the two of us can choose things together when I have been at work).

By this time it is usually dark and we need to turn on the lights to do the blog.

This would not normally be a problem but the computer is in the kitchen.
In a normal house this would not be an issue, but for some reason our house is (dah-dah-dah)

The House of 1,000 Switches!!!

So it takes us an hour to turn on the correct light by which time it is too late to do a proper blog - don't believe me, see for yourself, these are the light switches in our kitchen alone.





















Which by my reckoning is 37 light switches - it's like Simon for geniuses trying to turn off the lights before you go to bed.

Well we finally got internet up and running here so the blogging can start in earnest. Before we get into the US stuff we'll just leave Blighty behind with some memories of the leaving process. The number one tip for this part if to have good friends around who can help with the chaos.

On Friday some nice men came to our house and did this to it.


Literally everything, including bicycles, pillows and mattresses got put into boxes.

See if you can spot Dan hidden among the boxes.

We couldn't either :-)





Thus begins our week of living out of suitcases.

Sunday was pretty manic, Becky was sick a few times in the morning which meant I had to go to church by myself on our last Sunday. Bizarrely loads of one of the early CYFA people were there, Claire, Becky D, Laura and Matt. It was a really good service; the Welsh's had put together a photo album of pictures of people in the church past and present, many of whom had written mini essays too. Couldn't read it at church as it was a 'bit emotional'. The sermon was excellent too - only kidding, but it was good to have it done too, I don't think I'd really thought it through when I agreed to do it. There is simply so much to do that if I stopped and thought about it I'd just panic and not be able to do anything.

The afternoon was spent doing one of my favourite unwinding activities as Bill and I moved and installed 3 washing machines.

At the end of the day we had a great bit of respite as Michelle and Dave had us to stay at their house and made us extremely welcome - after the day we'd had to have a roast chicken dinner was just bliss; not sure what we would have done if it hadn't been for them.

On Monday the men came back again and put the boxes into a bigger box. Seeing the container made me realise that we weren't just moving down the road. I think Andy and I need to draw up a list of pros and cons and decide if this is a good idea after all.

It was certainly all too much for Becky who fell asleep in the garden (I think she was just trying to get out of having to help move the piano)


The men left by about 3pm which left us 22 hours to get the house spick and span ready for the inspection by the landlord. A few trips to the dump later (shifting the structural equivalent of belly button fluff) and the house was clear at least and the true extent of the damage Dan and Becky had wrought became apparent. Over the next few hours we had some extremely necessary help from Michelle, Nicky and David and finally got the place half decent (which is 10% better than it was when we moved in). The inspector came (still don't know what percentage of our deposit we'll get back) and we gave the keys back - a nice feeling as the house had been somewhat of a burden of late - plus it was a pretty shabby place.

So now we have 36 hours to pack, cancel all of our UK services (about 20 of them), sell the car, say goodbye to loads of people - we got some things done and here's a picture of us with Karen, Andy, Will and Emma to prove it.

So then came the day of the final compacting into suitcases - we have 12 check in items and 4 carry on, so we're at the limit, and that's with putting Dan's scooter in a suitcase.

Lesson #43 on international travel - Better to travel cattle class alone than business class with kids. At least in the formar case you can watch a film and not have drinks spilt all over you. Despite the perils of 8+ hours in a box with Dan and Becky we arrived in reasonable shape on Thursday, none of our luggage got lost and we managed to get it all into our minivan at the other end. Andy got the kids settled and I went off in search of something to sleep on, finding a king sized airbed which I made the mistake of buying without a pump, so we spend the evening sitting on the floor trying to not to pass out from lack of oxygen and trying to see if it had inflated at all.

Friday 3rd Aug - Day 1
We have no furniture at all, not even a chair, so all meals are on the floor at the moment.
Furniture is a priority so we spend a while going around furniture shops and trying in vain to stop the kids jumping on the beds before we reach breaking point and give up.

Over the next few days we get some chairs and resort to the use of films


and cake to placate Dan and Becky. Just to be semi-educational this photo is taken in the Southdale Mall, which was the first ever mall in America, and is about half a mile from our house. For bonus fact power, this is a Carribou coffee, much more popular than Starbucks around here, and also the busiest Carribou coffee in the whole of America is the one in my office at BestBuy.

In writing this blog I discovered over 20, shall we say 'abstract' photos. Fortunately one of them gave away the guilty party. The woods that Dan is photographing are actually part of our land, which I didn't realise before, we'll have to explore and see if we can make use of them at all.