Slowly feeling like home

It has been an eventful week for our little family.  We finally got our internet and phone hooked up, we have had a parent-teacher interview about Morgan's progress, we have a bank account and a paycheck in it, and I passed my crazy Bermudian driving test.  We are rockin' (that was a cheezy reference to the photo of the boys playing in our backyard).

  

Slowing Down

We have had a complete taste of life in Bermuda over the past little while. Our furniture and belongings finally arrived and we have spent hours finding places for what we brought as well as wondering why we made some of the decisions to leave certain items behind (how much space does an iron really take up?). It has been like Christmas all over again for Morgan and Quinn who have set up huge train tracks throughout the house, made farms, zoos and a variety of structures with all the toys that they missed having over the month of our transition.

We have also spent hours trying to deal with the many boxes our stuff came in. While the movers said, “Darlin’, just give us a call and we’ll be back to pick up the trash”, it took over a week of calling each day for them to finally make it all the way back to our part of the island. Our next challenge is to get our phone and internet installed. Though we went to their office the day after we arrived at the end of December, their visit to our house was scheduled for last Thursday. Unfortunately it was raining when they came and..., “We can’t work in the rain, sweetheart” was their response. They are set to come next Wednesday – let’s hope for sun.

Everything just seems to take a much longer process than we have been used to in Toronto. Jim’s new barbeque took 45 minutes to buy, not because I asked so many questions but because the sales woman knew so many people that she needed to chat with while she was helping me. We have spent a week trying to open a bank account because they seem to need everything except a blood sample and I am still working on getting my driver’s license (it doesn’t seem to matter that I have driven in Canada for almost 20 years!). We knew that the pace in Bermuda would be different when we made the decision to come...and we are being proven right every day.

The Adventure Begins

It has been one week since we arrived on this little island and we have been very busy the entire time. For the first couple of days we stayed in the luxury of the Hamilton Princess hotel where we had internet access, room service and beds. We were anxious to move into our new house (as was our bank account!), but because our shipment for Toronto had not yet arrived, we needed to rely on the kindness of strangers right away. A few people came to the rescue and offered mattresses for the floor, sheets and blankets, lawn chairs and a little table to put in our dining room, and one pot. With those things and some plastic plates and cutlery, we have quite nicely camped our way through the beginning of 2009. We are hopeful that all of our belongings will arrive on Thursday and we can start getting even more settled. In the meantime, we have enjoyed beautiful 70 degree weather, stunning views of the ocean, visits to see the dolphins and the zoo, and a very successful first day of school. Check out the picture of our boy in “P1”, as his grade is called.