Review of 2023

Well, 2023 is nearly over, and it's that time of year again, when I look back through all our photos and try to summarise what we've been up to in just1 page! So here goes...

The beginning of the year was fairly quiet, apart from an evening watching Abba Voyage (a belated birthday treat for Fee) which was incredible, and an afternoon Segway experience in a local park.

In March, Fee took a class of 30 year 6 kids on a week's trip to France. With visits to some WW1 memorials, museums, bakeries and a chocolate museum, it was great to see all the children practising the French they'd been taught, and Fee learnt a few new phrases too, after spending a day in A & E with one of the girls!

In April, Lucy undertook a week's work experience in a café-boutique in Lille.  She had a fantastic time and it really helped to improve her French, ready for her A level French exam. 

May and June were a little bit tense in the McCusker household, as Lucy was doing her A-Levels and Adam his GCSEs.  However, we managed to de-stress by doing lots of sport, including canoe trips and a canoe safety and rescue course, plus a bit of family skiing at Xscape.  The cricket season was also well under way for Adam (his first year of playing with the adults, which he really enjoyed).

Fee and Bri also had a night out at the Royal Albert Hall, seeing James in concert for Bri's birthday.

 After their exams had finished, Adam celebrated by going to see a county cricket match with his friend, and Lucy and Fee spent 2 days in Lille, shopping, sightseeing and visiting the café where Lucy had worked at Easter. 

July was a busy month, which started with Fee's cousin's wedding up in Scotland - a lovely weekend spent catching up with family and celebrating with the happy couple. We were then treated to the most amazing production of Les Misérables at Adam's school. Adam played the role of Javert and made us very proud!

 

Adam also had his end of year 11 prom. Lucy didn't have a year 13 prom but enjoyed some nights out with her friends to celebrate the end of her school days!

July was quite a momentous month for Fee, as she left the school she had been teaching at for 18 years, after successfully obtaining a job at a middle school to teach French. It was an emotional last day but definitely the right time to move on.

Fee and Bri celebrated the start of the summer holidays with one of Fee's 50th birthday presents, a gin workshop, where we made our own gin and tasted a few too many samples! Fee also had the amazing experience of singing with her choir in Covent Garden. Despite the rain, there were big crowds and it was great fun.

In August, we celebrated the kids' A level and GCSE results with a holiday of a lifetime: a cruise around Japan and South Korea.

Those of you on Facebook will probably have seen all the photos and read all about our amazing experiences, the highlights of which were Mt Fuji, a ride on the bullet train, the amazing food, the contrast of old and new in Tokyo, the Gamcheon cultural village in Busan and being served our dinner by a cat robot! It truly was an amazing trip and one we will never forget.

As soon as we got back home, Fee started her new job (which so far is going well, although has been a very steep learning curve) and Adam started his A levels. He's still at the same school and is studying Computer Science, Film Studies and Creative Digital Media.

Lucy is taking a gap year before studying Psychology at UEA in Norwich. She is currently working at a cafe/bar in town, which she is loving, despite the odd awkward customer.

Brian is getting his teeth into some new projects for Fujitsu and is now going back into the office a bit more. 

Other Autumn highlights included a day at the Canoe World Slalom championships and several weekends away for Brian, canoeing and ongoing training for Midshires Search and Rescue. He has now qualified as a team leader and is helping to train new Search and Rescue technicians.  Adam has started a part time job at Halfords and Fee has been singing at lots of local Christmas events, including bringing some much needed Christmas cheer to the elderly patients in Bedford Hospital.    

We hope you are all well and looking forward to eating lots of mince pies and chocolate!  Merry Christmas and a happy and healthy New Year 2024!

Review of 2022

Well, we can't believe it's already mid December...where has this year gone? After 2 quieter years, this year seems to have been pretty full on!                                                                                                             
January was fairly quiet, although Fee joined a newly formed choir in Biggleswade called 'Somewhere 2 Sing', which she is thoroughly enjoying.  

February saw our canoe club's 40th anniversary dinner and dance, which Fee had been busy organising since Christmas. It was a great evening, with nearly 80 members and ex club members attending. Adam and his friends also managed a trip to Wembley to see rapper KSI. Unfortunately, as they were under 16, they had to be accompanied by an adult so Adam had nominated Brian to take them (who was secretly quite chuffed that he'd been considered the only dad cool enough to go!)

In March, Lucy passed her driving test and both kids were busy with drama performances: the first was a new play called 'Chatback' which they performed at the Royal and Derngate theatre in Northampton for the National Youth Theatre festival. Their second was a fantastic performance of Blood Brothers. Brian spent 4 days in North Wales for a Swift Water Rescue course, to help with his Search and Rescue work. He is still enjoying volunteering with Mid Shires Search and Rescue and it certainly keeps him busy! In between all that, Bri, Fee and Lucy all caught Covid (Adam escaped this time, having had it last year) but fortunately we weren't hit too badly with it. 

In April we finally got to go on our cancelled ski trip from 2 years ago. It was an amazing holiday and so much fun, made even better by lots of free activities at the top of each mountain such as trampolining, face painting, graffiti walls, ice mazes and skim boarding!

In May, Adam completed his Bronze Duke of Edinburgh expedition and we all spent a hilarious day in London, taking part in a 'Faulty Towers' dining experience for Brian's birthday. The actors were amazing and we didn't stop laughing from the moment we arrived until the end. Basil insulted several guests, Sybil sang a special birthday song to Brian, but Manuel was the funniest - 'serving' us nibbles with a tennis racket, spoon feeding Adam his vegetables and combing Fee's hair with a fork!

In June we celebrated the Queen's Platinum Jubilee by watching the Beacon lighting in town and having drinks with the neighbours in the street.

In July, Adam took part in his school show: 'A night at the musicals', which was fantastic. Fee also got a chance to perform as her choir put on 2 concerts in a local concert hall. The culmination of Adam's cricket season this year involved a nail-biting match in which Adam's team were 1 run behind with 1 ball left to be bowled. Luckily, they scored 4 runs off the last ball to win!  July also marked the start of university open days for Lucy, with visits to Warwick and Lincoln (the latter scoring highly in Lucy's ratings) to look at their Psychology courses.

August was lots of fun: we had a lovely relaxing holiday in France - on a campsite about an hour south of Bordeaux, on the Atlantic Coast. After a busy end of term, we did very little apart from reading, swimming, having fun on the waterslides, BBQing, eating, drinking and sleeping!

We also spent a day in Paris on the way home. Adam then went off to Explorer Camp in Oxford, Lucy went to stay with Grandma, and Fee and Bri went white water canoeing in North Wales for a weekend. Fee's still not sure about white water paddling (having not done it for 20 years) but the scenery was beautiful and it was a fun weekend with good friends from the canoe club.

In September, Adam started in year 11 and Lucy went into her final year of sixth form (GCSES and A levels for them next summer). No sooner than we had settled back into term again, Lucy turned 18. We celebrated as a family with a trip to see 'Dear Evan Hansen' in the West End, and Lucy had a night out in Cambridge with her friends, eating, drinking and singing karaoke!  

We also attended more Uni open days, including Portsmouth, Nottingham, Chichester and Worcester. As well as being keen to find out about the courses on offer and what the accommodation was like, we became curious to find out which places provided the best coffee. Free tea and coffee seemed to be a trend, but Chichester Uni went above and beyond, offering all visitors free waffles as well!

In October, Fee and Bri spent a lovely weekend with some of Fee's University friends in York, to celebrate 30 years since they had started there in 1992! We then had a visit from Fee's brother and family and spent a fascinating day at Bletchley Park, learning all about the code breaking that went on there during the war. We also went pumpkin picking, and who knew that a simple wheelbarrow could provide so much entertainment for the boys!  

November was a reasonably quiet month, although we had a visit from Fee's mum, who took us out for a delicious Sunday lunch as an early birthday celebration for Fee's upcoming 'big' birthday. We also visited UEA in Norwich, which Lucy loved. She has now submitted her UCAS form and has applied to study Psychology starting in September 2024, as she is planning on having a gap year to do some working and travelling.

And here we are in December. The first 10 days of this month have been incredibly busy, starting with the kids' murder mystery play (in which Lucy's character turned out to be the murderer, stabbing someone with a Christmas candy cane!) The following day, Fee had the amazing opportunity of singing in a Christmas concert in St Alban's cathedral with her choir. It was truly magical and something she'll never forget. The weekend ended with a house full of Fee's friends, celebrating her 50th birthday with an afternoon tea party. Unfortunately she had to work on her actual birthday but Bri and
the kids spoilt her in the evening with birthday cake and a lovely dinner.  Brian has been away this weekend, canoeing and walking in Devon. Despite temperatures below freezing, he seems to have had a great time!

Earlier this week, we were treated to some amazing singing, dancing and acting in Adam's school pantomime. Adam played the part of the dame's cat and thoroughly enjoyed it. 

Fortunately, things are a little calmer between now and Christmas so we have a bit of time to finish Christmas shopping and get ready for the big day. Both Fee and Bri's mums are joining us for Christmas day and we're hoping to meet up with the rest of both sides of the family after Christmas.

We hope you all have a lovely festive season and hope to catch up with more of you next year :)

Lots of love from

Fee, Bri, Lucy and Adam. xxx

Review of 2021

Well, here we are almost at the end of 2021, learning to live with Covid-19 and slowly beginning to resume some of the things we used to take for granted pre-Covid. It's not been the most exciting of years, but we've still managed to have some fun moments.

January started with a bit of a shock, as schools were suddenly given less than 24 hours notice that the children would not be returning the following day and we would be back to online learning. Adam was quite happy about this, although Lucy was sad not to be going back to see her friends. Fee still had to go in to teach the keyworker and vulnerable children, as well as setting and marking online learning for the rest of the class but, not having had the vaccine at this point, was quite relieved to be teaching a smaller, socially distanced class.  Brian was still working from home, as he had been since the beginning of the pandemic.

February and March were obviously quite uneventful. Adam celebrated his 14th birthday in lockdown and, shortly afterwards, he and Lucy returned to school. 

April arrived and, during the Easter holidays, we finally managed to catch up with Fee's side of the family to celebrate Christmas and exchange presents. We had a lovely day at a country park near Newbury and thoroughly enjoyed our Christmas dinner of sausage sandwiches!

After Easter, Fee took on a new role at school, going back to being a class teacher again, as the year 3 teacher had left . She thoroughly enjoyed it as a short term role, but one term of 55-60 hour weeks as well as keeping on top of the housework and family stuff was enough for now!

With GCSEs being cancelled, Lucy got stuck into her forty something assessments (to give the teachers enough evidence to give them teacher assessed grades) and, at the end of May, had her last day of school. As her end of year prom had been cancelled, they were allowed to dress up for their last day.

Also in May, Lucy managed to finally complete her Bronze Duke of Edinburgh expedition (which she almost admitted to enjoying!)  then decided to get her hair cut and donate it to the Little Princess Trust to make into wigs for cancer sufferers.

We celebrated Brian's birthday (and the first day of being allowed to eat inside at pubs and restaurants) with a meal at a local pub. It was so nice to be able to do something normal again, despite the large plastic screens between tables. Another return to normality came with the cricket season, and it was amazing to be back watching Adam and his team play matches again.

June passed by pretty quickly, and soon it was the summer holidays. Fee, Bri and Adam went to see the 'Hundred' cricket at Lords. We watched the ladies' match in the morning, before the heavens opened, forcing the cancellation of the mens' match in the afternoon. Still, at least we got to see a bit of play! July also saw our first canoe polo tournament in over a year. It was a perfect day for being out on a lake, with temperatures of 28 degrees C. We even persuaded Adam to give it a go.

With foreign travel still very difficult, and requiring quarantining on arrival back in the UK, we booked a caravan in Hastings for a week. The weather wasn't exactly what you'd call 'glorious sunshine' but we only had one day of rain, so were able to get out and visit some places such as Battle, where the battle of Hastings took place, and a crime museum. We rode in the clifftop funicular, went for a few bike rides and ate fish and chips on the beach (although sadly, we couldn't go in the sea due to a sewage leak!)   In August we celebrated Lucy's fantastic GCSE results and also spent a nice few days in Bristol.

In September, Fee got a new job (in the same school) as joint English subject lead.  She is enjoying the new challenges of the role as well as still teaching French and music across the school for 2 and a half days a week.

Adam started his GCSE courses, having picked Computer Science, Music, French and History for his options. And Lucy started her A levels at Long Road Sixth Form College in Cambridge  - studying French, Media Studies and Psychology. She found it a bit of a shock to the system at first, with long days and numerous train cancellations. However, she has now settled into it and is enjoying being a bit more independent. Shortly after starting back at school, we celebrated Lucy's 17th birthday, which of course meant she could learn to drive. She seems to be enjoying her lessons and - apart from breaking down the first time Fee took her out to practise - she's doing well.

November seemed to be focused on Adam's scouting activities. He decided to apply for the 2023 World Scout Jamboree in South Korea and made it through to the selection weekend. Unfortunately, he didn't make the final cut but had a great weekend and it was all good life experience!  The following weekend he had a survival camp, sleeping in home-made shelters in temperatures of -1 degrees C, 40 mph winds and sleet. Not my idea of fun but he seemed to enjoy it!

In other news, Brian is still volunteering for Mid Shires Search and Rescue and has been out on numerous searches this year. He's also still running and has entered a couple of races this Autumn. Lucy is still coaching gymnastics (but now getting paid for it) and Adam has started helping out at Beavers for part of his Duke of Edinburgh Award. He's also taken up Parkour which is definitely keeping him fit!

We've just enjoyed a fantastic trip to London for Fee's birthday, to see the musical 'Come from Away' and we went to watch Adam's school pantomime last week. We're off to Bristol over Christmas and will be catching up with Brian's side of the family too.

Hope you are all keeping safe and well, and have a lovely festive season.

Love and best wishes from

Fee, Bri, Lucy and Adam. xxxx  

Review of 2020

Well, 2020 has been a strange and very different year for all of us. As we sit here writing this, we feel very fortunate that, unlike some, we have not been affected too badly by the pandemic and are still fit and healthy. When we look back at some of the things we have done this year, we realise that a lot of these things would never have happened, had it not been for Covid-19. Although a lot of our plans such as holidays, the kids' annual theatre show and Adam's middle school leavers events were cancelled, we have still managed to make some positive memories this year. 

During February half term (before Coronavirus struck) we had a lovely few days in Bristol, celebrating Fee's mum's 75th birthday. 

On Mothers day we went for a lovely walk at the Swiss Garden near Biggleswade, to see all the daffodils in bloom.

In March, Brian's mum celebrated her 80th birthday. Unfortunately we weren't allowed to visit her so, instead, the kids made a birthday banner and we waved it for her as she stood on her balcony.

We got into quite a lockdown routine, with the weekly clapping for carers and virtual pub quizzes, as well as home-learning for the kids (which was a bit of a struggle at times) and our daily walks.

After 2 months of lockdown, Adam

desperately needed a haircut (didn't we all?!),
and Lucy was quick to volunteer. She actually did quite a good job!

For the 75th anniversary of VE day, we had

a socially distanced tea party in our front gardens

with all our lovely neighbours.

We also entered the 'World Backyard rolling Championship' (doing eskimo rolls in our kayaks on dry land, in the garden). Unfortunately, we didn't make the medals but had lots of fun giving it a go!

Once outdoor sports were allowed 

again, Lucy and Fee took advantage
of the beautiful sunny weather and
went kayaking.

Fee joined Gareth Malone's 'Great British Home Chorus' and, along with hundreds of the other choir members, now features on a CD which made it to number 1 in the classical charts.

In the summer holidays, we had a lovely weekend with Fee's Auntie Isobel, in Dunbar, Scotland, followed by a few days in a static caravan in Blackpool. The weather wasn't great so we ended up playing lots of Uno in the caravan but we managed to get out and see the Blackpool tower, eat fish and chips, and go for a couple of cycle rides.

We also had a lovely week with Fee's mum in Bristol, and Adam also got to finally experience part of his birthday present (Wakeboarding) at a local outdoor watersports centre.

September saw Adam starting Upper School,
which he seems to be enjoying so far.

It was also

Lucy's 16th birthday. 

She wasn't able to have a big party, 

but fortunately, meals out with up to

6 people from different households 
were allowed, so she and a few of 
her friends went out to a local 
pizza restaurant for the evening.

In October, we finally got to catch up with Fee's brother and family (we hadn't managed to see them when we went to Bristol in the summer as they had been to France and therefore had to quarantine for 14 days).

Since March, Brian has been working from home, with just the occasional day in the office. He's been out on several Search and Rescue missions (which have obviously still been going ahead, despite Covid) and has continued with his running.  Fee was working on a rota system during the first lockdown, going into school to look after the keyworker children, and working from home setting work, phoning families etc the other days. She went back for the last 2 weeks of the summer term, teaching a bubble of eight year 1 children and, since September, has been back to work as normal (well, the new normal anyway).  The kids have carried on with the majority of their activities online; we've had Scouts challenges galore and they even performed and recorded an online murder mystery play with their drama group.

Fee's mum is coming to stay for Christmas, and we're hoping to see Brian's older brother and his family too, but it doesn't look like we'll see many other people this festive season. Let's hope that we'll be able to make up for it next Christmas.

We hope you all manage to enjoy your Christmas, despite the restrictions, and we wish you all a happy and healthy New Year.

Lots of love from us all. xxx

Review of 2019

I can hardly believe December has come around again; this year seems to have flown by! Anyway, here's a quick round up of our year and a few photos of the highlights.



The first 3 months of the year started reasonably quietly. Brian managed a week away snowboarding with some friends, something the kids weren't particularly impressed about as they were desperate to go again, so Lucy spent the next month taking every opportunity to make sure he paid for it ("Don't offer Dad the last slice of bacon...he went snowboarding!")

We had a nice trip to Bristol to see Fee's family in February, followed by the kids' annual theatre show in March. After Adam's great performance as the Artful dodger last year, this year was Lucy's chance to shine and she had us all in stitches playing the part of Ryan in High School Musical.

In April we spent a fantastic week in Amsterdam, visiting Anne Frank's house, climbing the A'dam tower (which provided good photo opportunities for Adam!) and fulfilling one of Fee's lifetime dreams - seeing the tulips in bloom at the Keukenhof                                                                                                                          Gardens. They were absolutely
                                                  breathtaking and choosing just

one photo for this blog               
                                                      was really tricky!

 In May and June we had a few family days out, firstly to London to see Brian run the London 10k again. This was followed by a fabulous viewing of Wallace and Gromit at the Barbican, accompanied by a live orchestra which was conducted by Adam's friend's dad.

We also spent a wet afternoon at Wicksteed Park, watching a Soapbox race, which was good fun, and spent another rainy day watching the Canoe Slalom World Cup at the Olympic slalom course.

Luckily, the weather warmed up a bit for our annual trip to Hunstanton with lots of our Biggleswade friends, and it stayed warm and dry for our canoe trip on the River Ouse.



Sadly, at the end of June, Brian's dad, Joe, passed away.  We were all very sad to lose him but he had been getting quite frail and, at the grand age of 92, he had certainly had a good innings.

His funeral was attended by lots of family and friends, and we all remembered the happy times we had spent with him.








July was busy as usual with Adam starring as Omar
(Aladdin's best friend) in his school production of Aladdin, and the year 9 Awards evening for Lucy.

This summer, Adam's Scout troop had organised for their summer camp to be spent at a watersports centre in the South of France, so Adam spent an amazing week, sailing, paddle boarding and lots more. Whilst he was away, Lucy and Fee decided to book a 2 night break to Salzburg. Brian wasn't allowed to come ("You went snowboarding, Dad!") so he stayed at home to look after the cat! Salzburg was fantastic and the highlight was the Sound of Music Tour, taking in all the famous film locations, seeing beautiful mountain scenery, and joining in with cheesy singalongs on the coach!

With Fee, Lucy and Adam feeling a bit guilty that we had all been away and left Brian at home, and Lucy finally forgiving him for going snowboarding without us, we decided to have a family holiday in Corfu. We spent a lovely, relaxing week in a great apartment, soaking up the sun on the beach, enjoying the waterslides and relaxing by the pool.

September came round all too quickly and we were all back to school and work. However, a week later we had the annual Interclub Canoe Slalom championships. This year, Lucy entered for the first time. She was very happy to make it down the course without capsizing, and even made it through all the gates! Adam did a great job of cheering us all on and has been inspired to give it a go next year.

October and November were busy with work and Lucy's school production of Sister Act, which was very entertaining. We also visited several local schools with Adam as he will be moving up to Upper School next September.  Fee's brother and family came to stay for a weekend and we spent a great day in London, walking across the glass floor on Tower Bridge and climbing the Monument.

In other news, Brian is now a fully qualified Search and Rescue Technician with Mid Shires Search and Rescue and has recently been out on several active searches. He's thoroughly enjoying it and it's certainly keeping him fit. Fee is still playing canoe polo and doing pilates, as well as being secretary for the canoe club, which keeps her very busy in between work. Lucy has started coaching at her old gymnastics club and is working towards her Bronze Duke of Edinburgh Award. Adam is still loving his electric guitar playing and has just taken his grade 2 exam. He's also got really into his badminton this year and plays with the local club once a week.

We hope you all have a lovely Christmas, wherever you are, and hope to catch up with some more of you in 2020.
Lots of love from
The McCuskers. xxx

Review of 2018

Well, here we are again, a week into December and, this year, we are completely disorganised for Christmas! We still need to get a tree, decorate the house and do our Christmas shopping.  However, we couldn't not do a Christmas blog this year so here it is:

We spent New Year with our friends in Durham, visiting Tim Peake's spacecraft, ice-skating, and playing Trivial Pursuit!  The remainder of January and February was fairly quiet, although we spent a lovely few days in Bristol with Fee's Mum and Dad, where we enjoyed meeting up with family for a nice pub meal.

March was a month of very mixed emotions.  Sadly, Fee's dad passed away, after a short illness.  He died peacefully at home, and Fee, her mum and her brother were all able to be there with him for his last few days. His funeral was a lovely celebration of his life and I'm sure he was smiling down on us as we remembered lots of happy memories.  A week later, we watched proudly (albeit a bit emotionally) as Lucy and Adam starred as Mrs Sowerberry and The Artful Dodger in their drama school production of Oliver. They were both fantastic and it was a great show!


At the beginning of April we set off for La Plagne, France, on our first family ski holiday.  The children had been looking forward to this for a long time, as they had both done some skiing on dry slopes and artificial snow. We arrived to find freshly fallen snow, a beautiful modern apartment and a reasonable weather forecast for the week. The kids were booked into ski school every morning, so Fee and Bri used this time to explore the harder slopes (and the mountain top cafés) on their own.  We had (naïvely) thought the afternoons would be a bit more relaxed, whilst the kids were gaining confidence.  However, from about the second day, the kids were zooming ahead and waiting for us at the bottom of the lift!  All in all, it was a fantastic week, and will definitely be something we do again.

The summer term saw us all competing in our various sports.  Bri entered the London 10k running race again, and ran 'alongside' Mo Farah and Seb Coe, as well as Fee's Auntie and cousin.   Adam continued to play cricket and moved up to playing hard ball.  Watching him and his friends try to run with all their gear on was quite entertaining at first, but they soon got the hang of it and did really well in their league, with Adam being awarded the Player's player trophy for the season.
Fee and her canoe polo team entered the Hull International again and were very pleased with a top 10 finish. And Lucy's cheer leading team came back with two silver medals from the County Championships.




July also marked the 10th birthday of Fee's Funky French business so we celebrated with a garden party for a selection of Fee's former pupils.

The end of term was busy as ever, with Adam going off on a school residential trip to Norfolk and Lucy getting all dressed up for her end of Middle School prom.





For our summer holiday, we were fortunate to be able to stay in a friend's house in South West Normandy.  Having no wifi for a week was liberating, and we all read lots of books.  We also visited Mont St Michel, went on cycle rides, visited a biscuit factory and walked to waterfalls.  We drove home via Paris and spent a great 2 days sightseeing and, of course, climbed the Eiffel Tower.

 In September, Lucy started Upper School and Adam went into year 7 at the middle school.  Both seem to be enjoying school so far this term.  Adam has taken on the responsibility of being a Junior Assistant Network Administrator (JANA), which means he's responsible for delivering the i-pads and laptops to different classes around the school. We're not sure whether his motivation for becoming a JANA stemmed from his love of IT, or his dislike of assemblies (he gets to miss them to carry out the role)!
Lucy has been busy practising for her school production of School of Rock. She has had several all day rehearsals and has 4 shows this week so will be pretty tired by the time Sunday arrives, but she's absolutely loved every minute so far, which is great.


The majority of Bri and Fee's time for the past 4 or 5 months has been taken up with planning and overseeing the installation of our new kitchen. We started by knocking down the wall between our kitchen and dining room, which has really opened up the space.  We spent a long time planning what we wanted, and getting quotes from various kitchen companies, before deciding on the handleless design you can see in the picture. The kitchen should've been finished at the end of October but, with various issues, (mainly mistakes with measurements etc) it has taken an extra month to get everything sorted, and has caused a great deal of frustration. Luckily, it is now all done (we just need to add some colour with a blind and cooker splashback) and we're really pleased with it.  It's now all ready for us to entertain the family at Christmas!

In other news, Bri has started training to be a volunteer for the Mid Shires Search and Rescue Organisation which specialises in finding missing persons and assists in emergency civil situations. He's yet to attend a proper search but is enjoying his training so far.  Fee has taken on more hours teaching in her main school and dropped her second school, due to the logistical issues and pressures of working for 2 different schools.  However, she has also been doing some work in a local lower school, interpreting and providing 1:1 support for a German girl with very little English.  This is proving to be very rewarding and Fee has enjoyed trying to remember all her German (although the Viking day vocabulary was a bit of a challenge!)

We hope you all have a lovely Christmas and get to spend time with family and friends. Happy Christmas, Happy New Year and hope to catch up with you soon.

Love from The McCuskers. x