I am not really sure if it is possible to write about everything we have done since arriving here in Missouri. We have only been here for a few weeks but we have been so very busy that I cannot possibly cover everything. So I guess I will try to give you an overview.
I am sat curled up in my enormous circular, cushioned rocking chair looking out at my balcony, the dense woodland behind our house and the selection of bird feeders we have set up. This includes 2 syrupy red hummingbird feeders, a birdseed holder and a peanut and suet block that is hung from suction cups and attached to our window. The barometer is reading 99 F/39 C and it is 2.30 in the afternoon (this is not the hottest day we have had), hence the fact I am sat inside in the air conditioning.
We arrived at our new house in the dark, feeling absolutely shattered and were met by our predecessors. They chatted to us for a bit and then left to let us get some rest. Because we only overlapped with our predecessors by 2 days they had set up a pretty punishing schedule for us. This included getting our ID cards, setting up all of our bills, driving around the area, meeting far too many people to possibly remember their names and generally trying to sort everything out.
We were told before we moved over that our house was not one of the best in our road and I will admit that from the outside it is not all that impressive but inside we really like it. The outside of our house looks like wood panelling but it is actually a sort of plastic/carbon fibre. Inside we have a large open plan kitchen, dining, sitting room area. A u\tility room that leads into our double garage, 2 decent size single/small double bedrooms, a bathroom and our master bedroom which is very big and has the most enormous wardrobes ever and I am totally in love with them and an en-suite. Then downstairs we have 2 more double bedrooms, a bathroom, storm shelter and a very big ‘family room’. To be honest the downstairs still doesn’t really feel like part of our house, I don’t go down there very often and somehow it feels a lot bigger and emptier than upstairs but Daddy Monkey has big plans for the space which includes a pool table, darts board etc. We have inherited a jumbled selection of furniture that is owned by the embassy but has been purchased by various different people over the last decade or so. There is a mix of styles, quality and condition but luckily we have enough stuff that we kind of like to furnish upstairs and then all of the other stuff is either downstairs or stacked up in the storm shelter. This area is quite hilly and most of our garden is on a reasonably steep slope. The hill from our house up to the main road is very steep (I have walked up pushing Mini Monkey in her pushchair a few times and regretted it as I was dripping with sweat by the time I got to the top) and apparently in the winter we will not be able to get our car up the hill in the icy or snowy weather. We have been advised to make friends with someone who lives at the top of the hill and park our car at their house.
Our local town is called St Robert and is basically a long string of large shops widely spaced along a busy dual carriageway. Lots of towns around here seem to be similar in that the shops are placed along a busy road and so far apart that you have to drive between them. It is not pretty and there is certainly no character here. Being so close to a military instillation the majority of the shops seem to be martial arts studios, pawn shops, hunting and fishing shops, tattoo parlours, hardware and DIY stores, car/pick-up retailers and restaurants/fast food outlets. There is an absolutely enormous Walmart that pretty much sells everything that you could ever want, outdoor stuff, indoor stuff, rifles – yes rifles, clothes, food, electricals, opticians, hairdresser, photographers etc etc. In reality it is the only shop that I really use around here.
There is an abundance of wildlife around here and I will have a quick go at trying to remember them all. Obviously the dreaded snakes and spiders, luckily the only evidence I have found of these is a long dead and dried-up snake and several yuckily large but not poisonous spiders. We asked our landlord to move a large pile of old railway sleepers from our garden and he found a snake in there but I didn’t see it. There are wild tortoises (the Americans call them turtles) that like to sunbathe on the roads, I have seen several. Armadillos I have unfortunately only seen as road kill but there must be a lot of them, skunks and racoons – generally regarded as pests, I am yet to see them. Stick insects, crickets, preying mantis, frogs, cicadas I have seen lots of. There are lots of beautiful birds, I don’t know all of their names but there are woodpeckers, bright red birds, mustard yellow birds, bright blue with red tummy, grey with pink tummy and my favourite is the humming birds which are tiny and brilliant green when they catch the sunlight right.
Apparently there are deer in our woods but usually they are closely pursued by hunters; deer hunting and shooting animals of all types is very popular over here. There are adverts up for the thanksgiving turkey shoot. There are also a lot of people who hunt with cross bows, our neighbours had a plastic deer outside their house the other day and were showing their children how to shoot it with a cross bow. There are also lots of very realistic plastic rifles and guns for young children to play with. At a neighbour’s house Mini Monkey played with a yellow and red rifle that you could cock, load cartridges in, aim and actually fire!
The camp is 7 miles in a straight line from our house and is huge. There is pretty much every type of facility you could want. Child care, full size hospital with A&E, shopping, sports pitches, several gyms, airport, playparks, rivers etc. It is around 17miles to drive straight through the middle of it and apparently takes around half and hour due to the speed restrictions.
The international community of other exchange officers has been really friendly and welcoming and we have been invited to several functions at their houses. We have often found that our weekends are so full of watching their children play American Football, going to BBQ’s and parties that we have just not found the time to explore some of the other towns that are 40-90 mins away which apparently are much more interesting than where we live. We have however managed to get over to the large retail outlet about an hour from here and hit the Ralph Lauren and Tommy Hilfiger shops, in fact we were so impressed that we decided to go back the next day whilst the sales were still on. Designer family here we come!
I have taken up quilting, it is really popular over here, and I have bought myself a sewing machine so that I can make some quilts. I am making a sampler quilt first which consists of 9 blocks of fabric each constructed differently using a different technique of sewing and cutting. Not sure that I will manage anything much more complicated than that just yet though!
About 2 weeks after we arrived it was Labour Day weekend and Joe had a 4 day weekend so we decided to head off to Memphis!
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