Jacobs Family Moves to England

Visit with Father Christmas

2008-12-19T03:21:00.000-08:00

We went to see Father Christmas.

People have asked about Christmas here.

We don't see as many houses decorated on the outside as in the US. There might be a strand of lights around the inside window. Occasionally you will see lights around a tree. It could be because electricity here is tricky to manage.

If there are candle light in the window, this is the only type I have seen

As with any holiday, food is a major part of it. I am not sure if there is one traditonal meal but turkey is definately a part of it. I imagine like anywhere, families have their traditions. Stuffing seems to be often done in small pieces like meatball size or small muffin tins. I am not sure how it is cooked. Mincemeat pies are big. I never cared for them till I had one here. They are done in small size about the size of cupcake. They are excellent. I think they also have liquer in them which gives an extra zip. Maybe that is why they are small. There is also a type of pudding which we would probably describe as more of a dense cake. Again the one I had was excellent and it had liquer in it plus it was suggested to pour small amount on top. That was excellent too.

Day after Christmas is Boxing Day which is equally as important. Places like the grocerys are closed. The tradition came from years ago, servants at the estate houses were given a box of food day after Christmas as a gift. I don't know if this is true but read it was often left overs of the family Christmas meal. They also might have been given some money.

The other thing people do on Christmas and Boxing day is a family walk. It will be in their neighborhood or go to a favorite park for a walk. I read someplace was even taking reservations for this walk.

I have several books with maps of local paths to take and sites you will see along the way. I am hoping we can explore some of these while Stan is off for the holidays. Today we are heading to park mainly to revisit Winnie the Poohs Hundred Acre Wood that Lauren loved so much. It also has a nice hour long hike through the woods that the girls and I did before.

2008-11-04T01:11:00.000-08:00

We went to Paris over the weekend! The girls were out of school and Stan was having meeting so we took the train from London on Friday. We got 4 seats, with 2 on each side and table in the center. It takes just a couple of hours and is very reasonable when booked in advance. Since we had such a short time, we went decided to see the high points and focus on some things Anna and Lauren were studying in school. Forecast for Saturday was rain so we decided to save it for indoor sights. When we arrived Friday afternoon we went first to the Eiffel Tower which was short walk from the hotel.

It was cloudy this day but still wanted to go to the top.

This was the actual view from the top!

This is a short video clip. I say in it that we are at the top but actually we are at a lower level with a better view. One thing that is interesting in Paris is that all the buildings are pretty much the same color.

There are carousels all over central London. Lauren enjoyed riding one. I guess Anna has outgrown this.

The Eiffel Tower from our hotel room at night.

Saturday we visited the Louvre. This is the most beautiful building. It started out as a place in 12th century. In 1674 Louis the XIV chose the Palace of Versailles as his home and left the Louvre to display the Royal Collection. It opened as a museum in 1793. It was amazing to see art the art first hand.

We crossed the Seine to visit another museum which has impressionists artists like Monet. These are artists the girls are studying in school so thought it would be good to see.

We went on to see Notre-Dame. The size and detail on it are amazing. While we were there Lauren asked why the candles were burning. Stan explained it people had lit the candles in memory of someone. She asked if we could light one for Grammy so we did.

Sunday we did not have much time so we just walked around a bit. Stan was staying for his meeting and the girls and I were going back to London on the train by ourselves. It easy enough but I was used to Stan handling all the details so was nervous about the whole thing. We made it though and was good learning experience. The train is the way to go. We enjoyed Paris a lot and are looking forward to going again.

Anna Plays Hansel

2008-06-28T14:02:00.000-07:00

Annas school put on the play Hansel and Gretel where she played the part of Hansel. This is a short clip from the play.

London Weekend

2008-06-02T03:13:00.000-07:00

We went to London for the weekend staying at the Hilton Tower Bridge. We visited the Tower of London and saw the Royal Jewels. Also went to see the King Tutankhamun Exhibit. These pictures are from our walk over to the Tower of London.

These are pictures of City Hall. The Tower of London was built to put fear and submission into the unruly citizens of London in 1070. I am not sure what statement this building is making.

This is something new. It is set up as a tunnel that supposedly allows you to see people in New York City. It must be done with some sort of webcam but you can see people in NYC through it. People will make arrangement of set time and see friends and family through it. It was an hour wait so we did not actually look through it.

Some of the interesting streets in the area.

We stopped for lunch.

For some reason, Anna and Lauren are always a bit nervous getting to close to these guards to have their picture taken. I think he actually smiled listening to my trying to get the girls to stand a bit closer.

This is the castle which later became the prison.

Day in the Park

2008-05-31T13:59:00.001-07:00

The girls have been off this week for midterm break. Stan worked from home on Friday so in the afternoon we went to the park. Weather was wonderful and we had a great time. Most of these are video's. If you see a black box, try clicking on it to get it started.

Anna and Lauren have learned to ride bikes. Lauren is wearing helmet because we have not found one for Anna yet.

Trip to Windsor

2008-05-30T13:05:00.000-07:00

I am finally getting our pictures on of trip we took while back to Windsor. Anna and Lauren were out of school and Stan was traveling. With the aid of our wonderful navigator we took off to Windsor which is about 45 minutes from us.

It was great day with nice weather and hardly anyone there. I was surprised to see how close the town is to the castle. We had a great time strolling through the castle. We got headphones to guide us through. They had special ones for children. The girls loved it and were very interested in things they saw.

Below are some pictures of the interior. It is beautiful. It surprised me how comfortable it felt. I think it is because the guides are so warm and friendly and not at all tense about people especially the children.

For some reason, Anna and Lauren were nervous about the guards and would not stand close to them.

2008-01-27T09:01:00.000-08:00

Hi –

Some of you have been waiting to hear about this weekend because it was the weekend Stan wore a kilt. We were invited to a Burns Night which is a celebration of the life of Scottish poet Robert Burns.

Robert Burns wrote over 500 poems including Auld Lang Syne and Red Red Rose – Oh my Luve’s like a red, red rose. People will get together to remember with dinner, toasts, dance and song. It is often a very formal event, with traditional itinerary including order of toasts, foods served and dances. Often money is raised for particular charity.

In this case, family that works at Hilton, Mike Ashton, invited us. It was partly to raise funds for their daughters trip to Borneo where she will live for 21 days helping to build water system for a village. It was a bit formal so Stan rented a kilt. We spent the night at the Ashtons so the grandmother could watch the girls. The event was held at the village community center with people making traditional Burns night dishes. – haggis, turnips, potatoes and cockle soup. Haggis are made of beef liver, lamb kidneys and shoulder, beef suet, onions, oatmeal, stock and salt and pepper. When we told people we were going to a Burns night, they all mentioned the haggis wondering if we would like them. I guess not everybody does but we loved it. It is the main event of the meal because they were brought in on plates, held high to bagpipe music.

After dinner the speeches begin with people talking about why we celebrate Robert Burns, toasts to him, the laddies and the lassies. Then the dancing starts. These are folk dances a little bit like square dancing without the caller. We had attending a practice session but still had hard time with it. We did not feel too bad because there were others having just as much trouble but it was fun. At the end they sing Auld Lang Syne which also end up in sort of a dance.

You can read more about Robert Burns and Burns nights here
http://www.robertburns.org/

We spent the night at the Ashtons. This is pretty much an adult event so the Mrs. Ashtons mother was visiting and watched the girls. They had great fun with Nana as they called her.

It was a great weekend. It was fun to be included in this traditional Scottish event held in small English village.

Stan actually had a good time wearing the kilt. The only part that was uncomfortable was the belt. The piece you see in front is actually used to hold things since it has no pockets. You can't see it but it comes with a knife to be worn in the socks - plastic in this case.

This is Mike Ashton who Stan works with and a true Scotsman.

Lauren Takes on Skiing

2008-01-17T11:30:00.000-08:00

I drove by this hill the other day and could not believe what I was seeing. Few days after that Lauren was invited to birthday party her to learn to ski.

They don't have snow but some sort of material that seems to be a pretty good substitute.

They lined the kids up on the bunny hill to start the lesson.

Lauren looks good here but she is skiing backwards!

She got it! She loved it!

Then they switched to toboggans. That was a pretty good size hill to go down.

This was a party for just Laurens class. I can see us going back and try it as a family.

Stans Trip to Turkey

2008-01-17T02:04:00.001-08:00

Hey there!
Photos from my recent trip to Adana, Turkey, located in the southern part of the country near the Mediterranean coast and the Syrian border. The Mosque located across the river from the hotel is one of the largest in Turkey and in the world. The stone bridge across the river I could view from the window of my room was build around the year 550 AD

What also surprised me was how beautiful the countryside was of Turkey. Snow capped mountains in the interior of the country and then lots of orchards and farming when you get out of the cities. Interesting country also, in that it borders some of the more newsworthy countries these days, Iraq, Iran, China, Syria, Georgia and probably a few others I am forgetting. So they are pretty much in the middle of it all!Love, Stan

Christmas Eve

2007-12-24T14:44:00.001-08:00

It is Christmas Eve and the little ones are all snug in their beds. There is banana bread baking in the oven. Stanta is putting their packages under the tree. There are cookies and milk for Stanta and carrots for the reindeer. We also sprinkled some magic dust in the yard to guide the reindeer to our new house.

Today we walked to our Town Center where most of the shopping is, for the first time. It is about a 10 minute walk. We did some shopping and had lunch.

Christmas day we are going to celebrate an English Christmas at some folks from Stans office. He also plays guitar and has asked Stan to bring his. It should be lot of fun.

Hope you all have a wonderful day.

Christmas Tree Farm

2007-12-22T14:33:00.000-08:00

We are finally getting our Christmas tree on December 22.

We went to a Christmas Tree farm to get a live tree. The farm was about 20 minutes away. It was a new area for us. We went through some of the neatest little towns.
Afterwards we stopped for lunch at a cute pub that we had noticed on the way. It was fun to get away from the unpacking for a bit.

Part of the reason we went to this farm was that they had lights too so we did not have to make another stop for those. It was a nice little shop with these animated animals including Santa.

Anna and Lauren Visit with Santa

2007-12-14T16:30:00.000-08:00

Today we got a chance to visit with Santa. The girls were so happy to see him.

Furniture Arrives!

2007-12-13T09:42:00.000-08:00

The MG and other things that were on the truck with the MG arrived on Monday.

Wednesday the other truck arrived. You can see from the picture it is a full truck. This was the same truck that was loaded at our house in Carrollton. It was so nice not having our stuff go to storage.

It was cold day but sunny. It took them all day to unload the truck.

Some of our furniture, like the dinning room table, we had crated. Here they are unpacking them.

We were not able to get some of the furniture up the stairs but most of it worked.

The house has lot of storage but still not has much as our Texas house. Also kitchen cabinets are not as deep. Our everyday dishes barely fit.
More of of the pans fit in oven then what I thought. It is a very narrow oven.

Anna and Lauren helped some but of course had to play some too.

On the second day, they came back to assemble some of the items that were taken apart and to take the paper off items that had been wrapped. They took away the paper and boxes we had unwrapped. They will come back to get anything else we have.

I joined a couple of email groups for buying and selling and giving away things for free. To the free group, I posted about the boxes and family moving to US came to pick up what they could.

We are still staying in the hotel this weekend till we can get beds set up and things a bit more organized. Stan has to go to Italy tomorrow - Friday - and will return late Saturday. We will probably be moving over to house on Sunday.

We have had major trouble getting a phone set up at the house. They are supposed to come on Monday so hopefully it will work this time. We will not have internet access till Tuesday! Also no television setup yet. It may be another week for that.

We are going to try and get a Christmas tree set up. Stan will be in town after next week and then may take some days off. He is also busy getting ready for January and Februay travel. He will be traveling most of those months.

Anna and Lauren Attend School in their Uniforms

2007-12-11T09:32:00.000-08:00

Anna and Lauren attended their new school - Abbots Hill Girls school - in their uniforms. It seems like a very good school. They looked so grown up in their uniforms. I did not get any pictures of the school but here is link to website which has some pictures.
http://www.abbotshill.herts.sch.uk/

Schools here are about a year ahead of US schools. Annas age level has been writing in cursive as has Laurens. I am not sure they even do printing. Annas level is also doing multiplication. The school suggested they go back a level so they could build a strong foundation. We understood and thought it was best too.

They just attended for couple of days but will start after the Holidays on January 7th.

MG Arrives!

2007-12-10T09:08:00.000-08:00

It is always an exciting day when the MG arrives. It all went off without any problems.

Stan was there to assist.

Lauren was too!

The MG in its new home. It is also fun that there is an MG dealership not far from us. We did not realize they were still being made.

Day at the Park

2007-11-14T14:59:00.000-08:00

People walk everywhere here so decided today to do the same. We walked to our neighborhood pub, then to the village of Boxmoor, then to the playground.

The village is very small and not has thriving with business as some we have seen. It has several hair salons, real estate offices, frame shop, general store, liquor store and fish shop which appears to only be open few hours a day, and another pub. The sign on front says there has been a pub on this site since 1765. I love all the old houses. Everywhere you look there is something interesting.

The playground is at the end of a huge moor as they call it. There are footpaths that connect throughout the city of Hemel Hempstead. There is sign up that shows the paths and history along the way. Their is a canal that runs along the edge of the moor that goes all the way to Birmingham which is quite far. Lady at the park told me you could rent canal boats to take for ride.

Girls had bit of hard time with this teeter totter in that they did not have enough weight to hold it down so they both got on one side and I got on the other.

At first this thing did not look like much but when they got on it they realized it was to spin around. This was probably their favorite.

This slide was great and quite high.

They could climb this in all sorts of ways.

You can see in the background some of the houses and the moor in this one.

It was another fun day.

Our Air Shipment Arrives!

2007-11-14T03:59:00.000-08:00

Our shipment arrived in fine shape.

Anna and Lauren had great time with the extra paper and boxes.

Here is link to the pictures. Let me know if it does not work.
http://picasaweb.google.com/jakesjag/AirShipmentArrives02?authkey=k34mMcV0iQU

They expect the rest of our household to arrive Dec. 3. Living in hotel is going OK but looking forward to being in the house.

Marilyn

Visited Winnie the Pooh 100 Aker Woods

2007-11-09T13:14:00.000-08:00

One of the parks close by has several hiking trails including one for Winnie the Poohs 100 Akre Woods. It was so much fun to spend time here.

http://picasaweb.google.com/jakesjag/HikeAt100AkreWoodInHertfordshire?authkey=ZPzOPqvgmuk

Almost a Week in England

2007-11-05T15:07:00.000-08:00

We are coming on a week here in England.

First thing I had to overcome was the driving and am well on my way. When we were here in July, I was very uncomfortable driving. When Stan went into office Friday, the girls and I spent most of the day in the car. We had heard about some villages in area behind hotel so started there and just kept going. At one point I followed a student driver car for several miles to see how they handled the roundabouts.

It also helped that we got with the rental car a gadget that gives us directions. We just enter the address, postal code, or some things like the hotel, are preprogrammed into it, and it directs us with voice and pictures to where we want to go. That makes it so much easier.

I still think I may take some driving lessons to learn exactly what to do on roundabouts and reading the street signs.

Today we went to library by our house to get library cards - even Anna and Lauren got their first library cards. They are so proud. We also had lunch at our neighborhood pub. Turns out own has dog that is their too which Lauren loves.

I took more pictures of the house. What I find most interesting is that their are no open rooms, each room has its own door. This was tradition years ago from what I understand so they would not have to heat all the rooms. This house is only 3 years old though. Also house has coils in floor so floor is heated.

I like the house and grounds a lot. The kitchen is the largest room in the house with lots of storage and wonderful gas stove. Only problem is, again as many had told me, it is too narrow for our size cookie sheets and pans.

I am worried how we are going to get furniture up and down the stairs which are narrow and sharp turns. Moving in day should be interesting.

Stan has been in Shanghai this week.

Here is link to new pictures of house and our neighborhood pub.
http://picasaweb.google.com/jakesjag/PicturesFromHouse?authkey=iDk5PidQfDw

First Day in England

2007-11-01T16:04:00.000-07:00

We arrived in England just fine - tired but all our luggage and Simba arrived.

We arrived about 7:30 in the morning. By the time we got through customs, picked up Simba and got to hotel via taxi it was about 11:00. We had showers then went for lunch in hotel. I was suggesting to Stan we should go ahead and rent the car. We could not reach the car rental place by phone so there was some time while we tried to figure out what to do. I layed down and was asleep before my head hit the pillow! Slept for 3 hours! Stan took the girls swimming in the indoor pool.

I have tried to put link of time and weather on this site with no success. There must be a way to do it and will continue to research it so you will always know what time and weather is here. It has been perfect weather to me with high of 60 degrees and partly cloudy. It gets down to the 40's at night. Supposed to be like that for the rest of the week.

Today we met with landlord at our house. I took camera and tape measure and used neither. There was someone from company who looks over the house and documents any problems or potential problems. He took us around inside and out to point out any problems. The landlord was there too showing us details of how things work. He and his wife lived in house next door and then built this one to live in so they know the house and the neighbors. It was great to talk with them.

I love the house and the neighborhood. We are up a little bit of hill and tucked back in end of street. The garage is bit smaller then ours but also has great loft or attic area as does the house. The kitchen is huge with plenty of storage. Landlord was on phone when he saw me looking bit startled. He knew I was looking for dishwasher and walked over to open the door.

Another interesting thing is that each room has seperate door that closes - even the living room. I had seen people talk about this on groups I am on. They do it to help with heating. However in this house he put coil heating throughout the floor too. Because they also like cooler house, they would just turn this on and it keeps the house pretty warm.

The rooms are small but they have made good use of storage. I wish I had sold off more furniture. I asked about garage sales and he said they really don't do that in this area. There is huge flea market in spring that everyone attends. It is good we did sell our living room furniture.

The back yard or garden as they call it is so nice. There is a stone patio area outside the living room area. Steps on either side go up to grassy area across the top. It is just wonderful.

I am so sorry I did not take pictures. I was just soaking it all in.

There are several pubs close by. Pubs in England are more about eating then drinking. They are also where neighbors meet. Landlord told us about the best one close to us and knew one of our neighbors stopped there every day after walking his dogs. Again I wished I had taken pictures because it is everything you think of in a British pub.

Afterwards we stopped at ASDA owned by Walmart to pick up some swimming goggles for Lauren. Also found a magazine on Hertfordshire the county we are living in. Great information about all the little villages in area.

The firs 24 hours have gone very well. I think I will enjoy our time in England.

Flight to England

2007-10-31T15:54:00.000-07:00

We had so many things to do the last couple of days after furniture left. On Tuesday we had to be at airport by noon to drop off Simba. We still had so many last minute things that came up we had list to do on Tuesday morning. We got most of them done and made to airport on time.

I can only put so many pictures on this blog at a time so have put them at google with this link. Hopefully all you have to do is to click on this link to see pictures of our trip and editorial comments.
http://picasaweb.google.com/jakesjag/PicturesOfMoveToEngland?authkey=D89rkUSoKq8

Last Days

2007-10-29T14:36:00.000-07:00

The time has come to say good by to our friends. The first started with the Chinese school the girls have been attending longer then any of their schools. They handled it very well but as we turned the corner from the school, Anna said I miss Mrs. Fang already. I think they handled it all very well. I am the one that it was hard. They have had such wonderful teachers.

Their friends and teachers at Mary Immaculate put together wonderful books with pictures done by the students. We will treasure them.

Finally we had going away party at home of friends with friends from Mary Immaculate school. We will miss them all so much.

Here is link to pictures

http://picasaweb.google.com/jakesjag/LastDayPictures?authkey=RTK1r5YVD0I

Trucks Arrive

2007-10-27T15:13:00.000-07:00

The trucks and packers arrive to start packing our house. It was an unbelievable process. We could have some items shipped by air to arrive in couple of weeks. We had these seperated out. It was hard to try and anticipate what we would need over next 2 months. It took 5 days to pack and load. Items were loaded like the truck in back. MG was also put on another truck like this with other items. They were sealed. Unless they are opened by customs, items will go directly to our house where we will break the seal showing that items stayed on this container. The container goes to Houston where it will be put on boat. It should take 6-8 weeks before they arrive.

Jacobs Family Is Moving to England

2007-10-09T18:23:00.000-07:00

We are on the road again! After almost 13 years in Dallas, we are moving to England. Stan received promotion with Hilton Hotels to Vice President of International Brand Support for the Hilton Family hotels which include Hilton, Doubletree, Garden Inns, Embassey Suites, Hampton, Homewood Suites. The Hilton office is in Watford England but he will be traveling to all countries but the Americas. Next week he travels to Rome, after that to China.

This is a perment move rather then a expat move where there would be a definate time that we would return. We are selling our house here. Movers will be coming October 22 to pack our belongings.

We visited in July for a week with Anna and Lauren. With help of relocation we visited 4 schools and picked one of those. It is called Abbots Hill School and is an all girls school for grades up through high school. It seems like a great school and the girls are looking forward to attending. The school is on southern edge of Hemel Hempstead. Here is link if you would like to see pictures of the school. http://www.abbotshill.herts.sch.uk/index.htm

Watford is northeast of London. We decided to find the school first and then find a house close to the school. I started looking online for houses to rent. I found several while Stan was in England so he went to see them. One turned out to be perfect in that it was 5 minutes from Abbots Hill school with added pluses of having an upstairs and a basement! Also 2 car garage with space for Stans tools. It is in village of Boxmoor but is part of Hemel Hempstead. It has a long history.

House in Boxmoor

Love this kitchen

Bedrooms are small but master is made for English size king and rooms for girls will handle twin bed.

Before movers come we have been trying to downsize. Since the electricity in UK is different we have been getting rid of electrical items. We have had one garage sale and planning another for Oct. 20 before movers come. We will be selling two of our cars but moving the 1960 MGA. Stan gets a car with his position but we also plan on buying a electric car. We are also 5 minutes from train station.

While the movers are here, we will be staying at local hotel. Hopefully furniture will be on its way by Oct. 26. We will be flying on Oct. 30. We will have few days before Stan has to leave for China. Furniture will take 4-6 weeks to arrive but will be able to air ship some things which will arrive shortly after we do. We will have access to the house but will be staying at Watford Hilton till furniture arrives. Girls start to school week of Nov. 19.