Exeter

We have been in Exeter for 6 days, having a lovely time with the family and thoroughly enjoying the boys.  The weather has not been kind to us - cold and wet - but the house is warm and we have generated a fair bit of heat most evenings playing various games on the Wii, which we brought with us.  Even little Joe had a go, scoring a strike on his first attempt at bowls but after that not quite sure how he had done it.  I know the feeling!

At the weekend Mary-Ann and I took Joe to Exeter to shop for school clothes, and we now have everything to hand except a school bag and a sports bag, both of which we think may be available from school.  I have labelled most of his clothes and two pairs of shoes, but am having to take the grey socks a couple of pairs at a time.  How did Mum and Nan manage to label all my socks?  If you stretch the rib while you are sewing the label is bumpy when contracted, and if you don't the stitches or rib is in danger of splitting.

Now I can broadcast what is happening to the Knee family within the next few months: they are moving to Norfolk!  They have decided to come and live with us and share our lives while I am still around and able to enjoy them.  They will rent out their house and try to get career breaks from their jobs.  Dom already has, but Mary-Ann's is more complicated.  There have already been redundancies in her department, albeit voluntary, and so the timing needs to be right to avoid someone losing that and having to re-think the rest of their lives.  She actually thinks that further cuts are unavoidable, so it is unlikely that Devon will want to hold her job open for her when other people are being forced out.  She says there is no possibility of a job like hers in Norfolk, as most counties are actually having to close down this service, but hopes to get supply work initially.  That will come hard.  I am not all that happy about it, no pension and uncertain income, but they are both convinced that this is the right thing for them at the moment.  Poor little Joe will have yet another change of school, and there is no certainty that we will get him in to Toftwood as apparently all the applications have to go directly to County Hall.  Dom is going to see how he takes to boiler servicing.  He is not that happy in his desk job, and this is the chance for him to learn a skill that is particularly suitable to rural life.  Hardly any of the villages round us are on mains gas, so oil is the favoured option.  He enjoys exams, so will do well with OFTEC once Dave has had a few months with him.

Well, we'll see how it all goes.  Basically they are going to have our upstairs, for sleeping and a lounge as a family bolt-hole, and we will use the annexe for the same.  The garden, kitchen, dining room, conservatory, utility and living room wil be shared areas just as we have done when they have been here on holiday.  Guests will no longer have sole use of the annexe, but at least it will be used to its full potential.  Mary-Ann and Dom have a futon with a memory-foam topper which we are sleeping on quite comfortably at present, and will use this in their upstairs lounge for family visitors, while the caravan should also be available provided there is room for it when the plot is sold. 

Hopefully this will happen before Easter.  I've got about 3 weeks once we get home to get things organised, before they start to do things either surgical or chemical to me.  Daunting but exciting, and infinitely better than thinking about cancer all the time.  They are being incredibly generous and brave, and I just hope I can stay around long enough for it to have been worth their while.  Dom's family are being very supportive too, having had Dom back in Devon for just four years.  They are very family-minded, which means both that they will miss Dom and Mary-ann and the children terribly but will also understand.