Where do I start? Bali chapter one...

CHAPTER ONE: THE MOVE: Bali; Paradise?

Bye Bye Currumbin House!

Ok so we havent been the greatest bloggers this year and I have so much to catch up on! Three Little Trees has given us so many opportunities, but i can safely say that moving to Bali has been the most life changing eye opening experience that we could possibly give our young family. Please keep in mind while reading each chapter, that we are totally happy now and Bali is a wonderful place

I am going to back track a few months until we can catch up.

Ok so the long 7 weeks of the Christmas school holidays was spent packing, cleaning, beach, renovating, more packing and then finally we moved! This felt very strange as we had lived in our house for the past 7 and a half years and it was the only house my 2 children knew! I think Lily realised what was going on but I think Kai felt that it was going to be one BIG holiday and I was getting worried about when reality was going to set in! We left our house and spent the next few weeks like modern day gypsys! We had sold our family car and were now driving around in what was actually my first car that turned into my husbands surfing run about! It had no air conditioning, rust and only 3 doors...which isnt very practical with 2 kids! ha ha

We went from one friends place to another trying to slip into their households without causing too much disturbance. We then met my best friend at a holiday resort for 5 nights to try and break up the visiting. I remember one day stopping at the traffic lights and looking out of the window of our rusty mobil the few days before we left thinking, "omg this is so embarrassing!" I had a washing basket with clothes and towels on the front seat, a few pillows and a doona and an esky in between the kids in the back. The windows were all down because we were so stinkin hot and we had no air, so we were all red faced and dripping of sweat! On top of that school had gone back the day before so it also looked like we were homeless and my kids werent even going to school! ha ha..... maybe i was getting just a bit paranoid!

We woke up very early the morning of The 1st February 2011...this was it..this was the day we were leaving Australia indefinitely and moving into the unknown of Bali!! The kids were so excited! Our airport transfer was picking Kate up at 4.30am and then us at 4.45am! The trip started very smoothly.. laughter, smiles and beaming faces.....

The flight 5 hours later wasn't quite as enjoyable! We had 4 kids that had been up since 4 am on a 6 hour flight smack bang in the middle of the day, the week that school went back so there were absolutely no other kids on the flight! I can tell you now that over excited kids in a 2 m squared space does not work!!!! OMG by the time we got to Bali Kate and I were ready to kill them! BUT all i kept thinking about was seeing our gorgeous new home and sitting down and having an ice cold drink by the pool! aaah breathe we were now in Bali all will be ok in an hour!

So after a 50 minute taxi ride we were here! I opened the front door and looked up...there was a pile of furniture in the middle of the lounge room, unmade beds with plastic and dust still over them...and worst of all there was no fridge and no air conditioners installed as per the lease agreement! It was 5pm and the kids were hungry thirsty and tired! Thank God for a very generous American friend, Nikky from down the road who welcomed us shortly after arriving with a hamper of fresh fruit, muffins and nibbles. It thankfully bought us enough time to unpack a little before thinking about going to dinner.

With no car, we walked to the cafe dragging our feet ate quickly so it wasnt too dark for the walk home; the kids were now wasted...we just wanted to go home and put them to bed and chill out with a Bintang. Bali however had different ideas....we got home to a lounge room full of darting, flying, squawking, rabies infested bats! ha ha...we thought the day could not get any worse! We tried clapping, screaming and swinging the pool scoop around but there was nothing we could do, it was like they had inhabited our home for the past 6

months and there was no way they were going anywhere. So the end of our first day in Bali was spent ducking through the hallway, being head butted by the fury little vermont creatures into our bedroom, where we tried to sleep in the sweltering un air conditioned stuffy heat.

Stay tuned for the Chapter Two...getting sorted!

The freaking bats flying around our ceiling! look closely.