Thanksgiving

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, the thing I have have been most thankful for on our first Thanksgiving is the school holiday. The kids have just done 13 weeks non-stop at school and they are tired. This long term would be a hard enough slog for them in a familiar setting, but it has been a big change especially as they didn't get much of a holiday over the summer with the move. I'm very proud of how well they have adapted, taken on the challenge, made new friends and settled in, as it hasn't always been easy. Suffice to say this week has been a welcome break. I'm also thankful for having chosen such a friendly and welcoming neighbourhood as our new home, although when I think about it, the list of things to be thankful for is very long.

I don't think the Pilgrims and Wampanoags would
have had pink biscuits Evan.

First grade Pilgrim Fathers and Wampanoags

Thanksgiving dates back to a shared meal celebrating a good harvest between the pilgrim fathers and native Americans from the Wampanoag tribe at Plymouth Plantation in 1621. This story was relayed by the first graders at Rockenbaugh followed by some songs about turkeys going 'gobble gobble'. The kids then got to have their own little Thanksgiving feast in their classrooms, which they throughly enjoyed.

As well as celebrating Thanksgiving at school with Evan, I also joined David for his Thanksgiving lunch at Rockenbaugh - although in true David style he had his sandwiches. At Eubanks I had a Thanksgiving school dinner with Alice, which was better than it looked as it was served on a ploystyrene tray.

Alice with her Thanksgiving lunch

Turkey, stuffing, mash, gravy, green beans & brioche?

We began Thanksgiving Day with an unofficial fun run named the 'Turkey Trot', which is organised by a group of friends on the Rockenbaugh playing field. Coffee, doughnuts and run or walk as many laps as you want to do around the playing field. David set out to beat the record for most number of laps set by his friend Alex, and managed to with 20 laps (about 4 miles), it was reminiscent of Forrest Gump! We had a great time, and again the weather was glorious.

Doing the laps

Evan sports his race number

The young Turkey Trotters

Having worked up an appetite, I set out to cook a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. We had turkey, stuffing, mash, green beans, gravy (OK, I did cheat and use Bisto, my anglo twist on a Thanksgiving dinner) and corn bread. Corn bread is more like a kind of gritty madeira cake, which was an unusual accompaniment to a roast dinner as it's sweet, but it went down well with certain members of the family. For dessert I made a pumpkin pie, of course!

Rob dishes up the corn bread

Cheers!

Pumpkin pie!

Pioneer spirit for making the corn bread.

Visitors from the Taff to Texas

Our first visitors, also from Wales, were my parents. They stayed for two weeks and it was great to have them here - and not just because Rob & I managed to get a weekend off in New Orleans (more on that to follow)! The main aim of their visit was just to see where we are and I think they really enjoyed spending time with their grandkids and pottering around the local area. We did manage to cram in some touristy things too, like the obligatory trip to the Stockyards to see the cattle drive and rodeo in Cowtown Coliseum.

Monopoly, Newport style!

 

And my kids say I'm embarrassing!
(Only joking Dad, it's one of my favourite pictures of 2014)

Cowboy action in Cowtown Coliseum

Last night dinner at The Cheesecake Factory, yum!

Missing people is a funny thing. Alice asked me when we'd only been here a few weeks if I missed people from home and I had to think about it, which made me realise that I had to think about them to miss them as they are not as such 'missing' from my day-to-day life. I'm not expecting to see someone in a particular place, to then be jarred by their absence; they don't exist in this world, there is no constant reminder. Communication is also easy these days, Skype, Facetime and Facebook condense the miles. So it was strange when Mum and Dad left, we'd got used to having them around.  The day after they left I went in to the closet in their bedroom where they had hung their clothes, it smelled of their washing powder and I was instantly back in their house in Wales. It's all in the little things.

It's snowing!

Well I didn't think I'd be moving to Texas to see snow in November! OK, there wasn't much of it but I have seen UK schools closed with less snowfall. Mind you, had they closed, they have bad weather back-up days on the school calendar so kids, teachers and parents can catch up on their work. I wonder how that would go down back in the UK?

New Orleans

We have been keen to visit New Orleans for some time and considered it as a destination for Rob's 40th birthday, which falls around the time of Mardi Gras, but as his birthday drew closer the move to Texas appeared on the horizon, so we decided to wait. Our 13th wedding anniversary coincided with my parents visit so we took the opportunity of having babysitters and booked a weekend away.

New Orleans is one of those rare places in the USA with a long and rich history that is written all over it's streets and cultures. The city of New Orleans was founded in 1718, although archaelogical evidence shows the area was populated by native Americans as far back as 400AD. The position of New Orleans at the mouth of the Mississippi has made it both economically and strategically important, which goes some way to explain why it has gone through French and Spanish hands before being sold by Napoleon (along with an enormous swathe of north America between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains reaching up into Canada) to the Union in the Louisiana purchase in 1803. The port of New Orleans has been an entry point for the African slave trade, and is the site of the last battle of the War of 1812, in which the American forces defeated a British naval invasion 200 years ago. Although flooded numerous times over the years, in 2005 New Orleans was hit by Hurricane Katrina, the levees were breached and the city was extensively flooded. The scale of the disaster and the poor response of the Bush Administration (let's face it, 'W' was not exactly the best product of Texas), made international headlines for months, and the effects are still ongoing today.

New Orleans by day. We spent most of our time walking and chatting to locals in the art galleries.

Bourbon Street mayhem

This melting pot of native Americans, Africans and Europeans, has lead to the diverse culture, cuisine and architecture the city has to offer. The food was great, and the choices endless. We managed to forget to pack our Lonely Planet guidebook for New Orleans so we just followed our noses and ended up trying alligator sausages and traditional Creole gumbo's.

Of course New Orleans is probably most famous for being the birthplace of jazz. I was never a huge fan of jazz - I dipped my toe at Ronnie Scott's in London once but it was all a bit to stuffy for me, but New Orleans jazz is different, it's funky and you can dance to it. Music is everywhere you go in the city. We had a great time going from bar to bar, or simply standing in the street listening to the various club, street and marching bands. It really is a fantastic place for a night out, very casual but totally buzzing. New Orleans is the least 'American' place I have ever been to in the states and I loved it. We didn't get to see the Mardi Gras Indians though, maybe next time.

Music everywhere

Winter's here.

Winter seems to have arrived in Southlake. On Monday afternoon it was 27C, my parents dined al fresco in the town square, by Tuesday we were down to 6C.

We have been asked by our landlord to put the 'hose protectors' on, these are a polystyrene box that has a plastic drawstring to hook on the tap and pull the box snuggly over it to be flush with the wall, apparently this will stop the taps freezing and splitting. I thought we moved from a cold country but this is a new one for me!

By all accounts it's unseasonably cold for mid-November, but it's not raining, so no complaints from me, even if the Texans do look like they are going on a polar expedition when they venture out of their cars. Now where did we put those hats and gloves...