When we were young

One of the great things about our lives here is the amount of time we get to spend together as a family. Of course weekends are filled with sports events and kids parties and seeing our mates and the occasional grown up evening out just as they were in London. We enjoy hanging out at home and doing the things we have always done - garden football, tree climbing, bug hunting (although when Katie called me to come quickly the other day because she'd found a snake in the garden I did wonder about the wisdom of this. - luckily it was just a little one!) cooking, reading, lego and lots of screen time.

We are also all still in exploring mood and know how important it is for our sanity to get out of Nairobi from time to time so we have lots of fun eating out together, checking out our adopted elephant and going away to Naivasha or the beach every so often. And we have found some good places for the kids to go horse riding and for Sunday walks and swims.

We see lots more of each other in the week too. Being able to be outside most days and having help with the domestics is great and leaves more time for doing things we enjoy, individually or together. Tim's working day is still long but he's generally home by 7 and sometimes much earlier to miss the traffic and finish his working day at home. Work travel for both of us is mainly in the region so means relatively short periods away, and even if some of the flight times leave us a little wiped out, we are at least home for the kids more than we were. And I am lucky enough to be able to manage my working day so I get to watch some rugby and hockey and cricket and football matches and sit and do homework sometimes with Katie on the terrace outside the school cafe whilst the boys train. Of course this does mean lots more time for rows about homework, the screen (often connected) and the general petty bickering of family life. But it also means we know more about what everyone is up to, and on balance that's definitely a plus.

Anne