Christmas Day!

Posted on December 31, 2013 by livingtheturkishdream

Well, it was nearly a week ago, but we had a nice Christmas.

Dad was working nights on Christmas eve, so me, Berkay and my step-mum were on ‘constuction duty’ helping Father Christmas build and deliver his presents… We were up til gone 1am helping him.

My very exicted little sister left Father Christmas a mince pie, a cupcake, a glass of milk and a carrot for Rudolph, we tried to convince her to leave a glass of baileys out, but she wasn’t having any of it..

This is what we all woke up to on Christmas morning, Father Christmas even wrapped up the living room doors so no little people could get downstairs into the presents before Dad got home… Little did we know that neither of the ‘little’ people would wake up til gone 9.30!

We all went up to Dad’s room and opened our stockings, me and Berkay had our own ones, which you can tell her was thrilled about! Apparently Father Christmas knows Berkay loves Nandos, as his stocking contained 7 bottles of Nandos sauce!

After crumpets and the traditional Bucks fizz for breakfast, my brother and sister ran through the wrapping paper into the living room and were greeted with presents. It took a good few hours to open them all, my little sister was amazed by it all and wanted to play with everything before opening the next.. I miss being a little kid, but have great fun playing with all her toys myself!

Berkay got me some lovely presents, one being a traditional Turkish cay kettle, and another this Fethiyespor shirt, I wanted one before I left in September but didn’t have a chance to get one, now I can wear it with pride! He also had a skirt specially made for me, I had one similiar before that was my favourite, but it had holes in it and was ruined so he took it to a dress maker and got a new one made, how thoughtful! Bless.

After presents it was dinner time, Berkay tested out one of his new bottles of sauce and ended up using about a quarter of it on his potatoes, he must be the only person in the country who has Nandos hot sauce on their Christmas dinner!!

After dinner we went to my step-mum’s Dad’s house for a buffet and a little evening together, poor Berkay didn’t enjoy it very much as pig was pretty much the only thing on the menu, bless him.

Hope you all had a lovely Christmas and a very happy New Year to everyone, we’re off to London tomorrow to watch the fireworks along embankment, wish us luck, I expect we will end up very wet, very cold and very squashed, it’s all part of the fun!!

Early Christmas..

Posted on December 22, 2013 by livingtheturkishdream

3 more days til Santa, but Christmas came early for us today, as we celebrated at Mum’s house.

We woke up this morning after a night of sharing the sofa bed with the dog, who was also feeling very festive.

We had crumpets for breakfast and then opened our presents, while still in our pajamas, as per Christmas tradition 😉

Even Boncuk got some presents, she wasn’t forgotten! 🙂
We ate a huge Christmas dinner cooked by my mum’s partner (apparently having pickled onions with roast dinner is not normal?!) and had yummy dessert along with countless chocolates and other treats.

Of course we all had Christmas crackers and wore our cracker hats too, everyone has to have a silly cracker hat photo, right?

We’re currently watching rubbish films on TV, and waiting to go back to dad’s house soon. Work tomorrow and Christmas Eve, time is flying. Berkay has been here a week tomorrow already… Crazy.

He’s here for 2 more weeks until the 5th Jan, which I suspect will also pass by very quickly, unfortunately. Poor Berkay is bored out of his mind and probably can’t wait to go home 😦 I’ll have to get Dad to find him some jobs to do while I’m at work all day tomorrow, he’s already washed the car and done some babysitting duties, bless, anything to keep him amused!

BERKAYS FAVOURITE PLACE – NANDOS

Posted on December 21, 2013 by livingtheturkishdream

Nandos is most definitely Berkay’s favourite thing about England. He absolutely loves it.

After work on Friday, we had a spare couple of hours before we had to babysit my brother & sister, so we took a detour to spicy chicken heaven, Nandos.

Being a Turk, Berkay loves spicy stuff. Very spicy. Not content with the hot chicken he had, he tipped loads of extra hot sauce over his garlic bread, pitta, chicken and chips. How he eats it without smoke coming out of his ears I have no idea, good job you get free refills for the drinks!

Nandos is my favourite too. Red pepper dip, chicken in pitta, spicy chips… yummy.
Afterwards we got the bus home, but not before stopping to take a photo of this pretty tree.
3 days til Christmas 🙂
Writing this post is making me so hungry, Im going out with my friends for dinner tonight and table isn’t booked til 8pm… mmmmm, We’re spending the weekend back in Essex in mums house, we are celebrating Christmas tomorrow here, 3 days early, as we won’t see her, so lots of festive photos coming tomorrow!

🙂

A Christmassy afternoon out!

Posted on December 20, 2013 by livingtheturkishdream

We all got well and truely into the Christmas spirit yesterday, as after I finished work we all went to see Father Christmas at his grotto in Polhill, Sevenoaks.

Obviously we only went for my little sister (yeah right 😉 ) even if she was scared and refused a photo with Father Christmas, bless. She did sit in his sleigh though, and made Berkay hop in for a photo too!
Personally I loved the cute. but slightly scary talking bears, owl, reindeer and trees… we had to pose for a photo with Rudolph to capture the moment 😉

Father Christmas told us all a little story about a poor tiny Christmas tree that nobody wanted.. bless. He was a little bit scary, I can see why my sister didn’t want to be anywhere near him!
After wandering around the rest of the garden centre (we came away with nothing more than 3 bars of chocolate and a bag of oranges!) we went to a nearby Toby Carvery and had a yummy roast Turkey dinner. It was all very Christmassy!

6 more sleeps til Santa…

Reunited!!

Posted on December 18, 2013 by livingtheturkishdream

We picked Berkay up from the airport last night!! 🙂

His flight landed at 22.45 and about 45 minutes later he appeared! Me and Dad stood right by the arrivals door so we could see him coming around the corner, we were getting rather impatient but eventually he came wandering through, after apparently being stopped and having all his suitcase searched! He must have looked dodgy 😉

A quick hug, kiss and a photo later, we made our way to the car and Berkay got greeted by the lovely, typical British weather, it was peeing down with rain!

We got home at 1.30am, and went straight to sleep. At 7am this morning when my alarm went off, I really didn’t want to get up and go to work. Berkay was all nice and cosy in bed and I had to leave him to go to work all day. It’s usually the other way around! 😉

He stayed at home all day and was reunited with my little sister, who adores him. Apparently she had been crying when she realised Berkay was still asleep earlier in the day as she wanted to see him so badly, bless. As soon as he woke up she made up for lost time and had him straight on the floor doing puzzles, building megablock houses and doing some colouring. She’s like his little sheep at the moment, it’s cute. Before she went to bed tonight she said ‘night night Berkay, are you going back to Turkey?’… I think she just wanted to make sure he’d still be here in the morning when she wakes up!

We had a mini belated birthday celebration, as it was Berkay’s birthday on Friday. My sister and step-mum made little Mr Men fairy cakes and we stuck sparkly candles in them. He opened his presents and cards and we had a lovely Chinese for dinner.

Tomorrow I’m only working in the morning so we can spend the afternoon together, we’re all going to see Father Christmas, I wonder if he’ll think Berkay has been naughty or nice 😉

One more sleep!!

Posted on December 16, 2013 by livingtheturkishdream

Yes, ONE.MORE.SLEEP.

One more night of star-fishing in my bed alone until Berkay will be here to join me!

It’s been nearly 13 weeks since I saw him, still can’t believe I’ve been back that long. I was looking back at my old posts on here the other day and it seems like a whole different world away to life now.

It was Berkay’s birthday last Friday, unfortunately he wasn’t here to celebrate so I’ve got his presents all wrapped and ready and my little sister informs me she wishes to make cakes as a belated celebration, we’ll see. 🙂

What with it being winter, there are very few direct flights to Dalaman, so he has to fly from Antalya instead, there were also no cheap direct flights either, so it involves a stop over at Istanbul. He starts the long 4 hour journey from Fethiye to Analya tomorrow morning, 2 buses later he’ll be at the airport with a few hours to spare, hopefully, before his 17.15 flight to Istanbul, where he’ll wait for 2.5 hours before boarding the 4 hour flight to London! Poor Berkay will be knackered! Me and my dad will be picking him up from the airport 11pm tomorrow night, less than 24 hours … I can’t wait!!

I’m so excited to see him of course, I just wish I wasn’t juggling two jobs so I could see him more. What a great feeling it will be to have him waiting at home for me when I get in though! 🙂

He’s here for 3 weeks, and most importantly, for Christmas and New Year. Friends will be staying in the hotel and looking after Boncuk, so she won’t be alone, she’ll be well looked after and has a ton of Christmas presents for Berkay to bring back for her! Spoilt doggy.

I apologise for not updating this blog as much as I should, I’m hoping to do daily updates when Berkay is here, time permitting!

Thanks for all the support as always, I’ve had tons of people messaging me saying they’re so excited for me after following my little facebook countdown 😉 I’m off to bed now and the ‘1 more sleep’ is about to become 0!

As I type, the song ‘Driving home for Christmas’ has just come on the music channel, I’ve been playing this song a lot recently, it seems very appropriate. I heard it play when I walked into Tesco the other day, and now on the TV as I was about to press ‘publish’ on this post! It’s a sign, I’m certain ! 🙂
xxx

December countdown..

Posted on December 6, 2013 by livingtheturkishdream

It’s the 5th of December already, as my advent calendar reminded me this morning, which means only 11 more sleeps until Berkay is here! (:

Still cant quite believe that its December already, or that I have been back for 10 weeks. Its crazy!

I’m still at my job, and have found another temporary job at an office, as of next week I’ll be doing 2 jobs working up to 12 hours a day, going to be bloody hard! Both jobs are temporary until January. The most frustrating part is that any money I earn won’t count for anything towards helping Berkay get his visa to live here, I have to be earning £18,600 a year for 6 months for that, feel like I’m stuck and not getting anywhere fast, but it could be worse…

Berkay has been looking for work since the beginning of November, and has been getting pretty desperate as he had to buy new food for Boncuk, luckily he found a job and started yesterday, working 15+ hours a day, starting at lunchtime and finishing after 4am. All that work and all those hours for just 25tl a day, the equivalent to £7.50 a day. Ridiculous. 😦 It’s mad to think we ever survived on that.

Boncuk is settled in nicely and enjoying her home in the hotel with Berkay, she’ll miss him when he comes here for a few weeks, but our good friend is looking after her so I know she’s going to be well looked after (:

Hopefully I’ll be back with another post again soon, just finding it hard to think of things to write, and struggling to find time to write them.

Happy Christmas shopping everyone 😉