Places I have lived

I've lived in different places all round England and Northern Ireland but the best place I have lived is Osnabruck Germany.
I was born in Cardiff Wales, and live there until I was five. Due to my dads job we moved to Southampton as he worked in customs and excise. After Southampton we moved to Weymouth, Dorset where I spent most of my teen age years, great place if you like sea and sand. I had my first pony then and enjoyed a lot of horse riding on the beach.Then after seven years, up we went again and off to Biggin Hill in Kent, we only lived here a short time but this was where I was reacquainted with my husband to be Chris.We moved then to Peterborough which was a very brief stay maybe a year, can't remember.Then Chris asked me to marry him and off to Tidworth we went. This was a army posting and we stayed here 9 months until we moved to Germany

We lived in Berlin about 2 years in 1986 before the wall came down that was a experience. We used to go over to East Berlin. To me then it looked very drab, sad and depressing. We would eat in the restaurant's over there, and people would be queueing to get a table, but when the waiters saw that we were British soldiers, as our husbands had to ware uniform when visiting East Germany, we would get ushered to the front of the queue. As they knew new that we would be able to tip generously being in the army. I always felt bad about this, as there was not a lot of money in the east and it looked as if we were getting special treatment which did not seem fair. I remember watching families that had been spilt up by the divide of the wall shouting and waving to each other over the wall and no mans land. I was surprised to see crosses on the west side in no mans land where people had died trying to escape over the wall from the east. It was quite moving to see this as it brought it home to me that the war had been so real.

More to follow....................

In 1987 we had our first baby Emma She was born in the Berlin Military Hospital. This Hospital was for all service personnel and one Floor was isolated for Hess, he had this complete floor to himself.
When he was ill he was escorted to BMH by who ever was guarding him in Spandau prison as the British,Russians and Americans would take it in turns to guard the whole of the prison even though he was the only one there. Hess did die when we were in Berlin and the Prison was shortly pulled down. We left Berlin in 1989 and it was not that long before the wall came down and families and friends were reunited after such a long time of being apart.
More to follow..............

After Berlin we moved to Northern Ireland, in the heat of the troubles. We lived in Bally Kelly which was just a camp on the main road between Belfast and Londonderry.
Even though we were at risk living here, life in Ireland was no different to anywhere else we had lived. The only difference was you had to be aware all the time, this meant checking under your car before you got in and making sure you did not throw anything away with your name and address on. My husband had to leave work different times, never a routine and always ware his civi clothers, not his army uniform.
We tried to live our lives as we would anywhere else.

After Northern Ireland we moved to Caterrick, we lived here for about 6 years. William came along in Catterick but because my husband was in Belize, I decided to go and stay with my parents in Eastbourne. William was born in Eastbourne and luckily Chris arrived home just in time. Life in Catterick was not very eventful and we found it very wet and cold.

Are next posting was Ternhill in Shropshire. We moved into army quarters but because my husbands time in the army was finishing, we decided to look for a house in Market Drayton, a small market town not Far from Tern hill.
More to come..........

Once we had bought our new house and both the children were in full time school, I started to work for a small cleaning business called Squeaky Clean. After a couple of months the people decided to sell the business and offered it to me. I took on the business with 5 employee's and set to make our client list bigger. After 2 years we had 25 clients which included,a manor house, small domestic houses, a small catering company, factory offices, builders cleans, and also the contract for all the empty quarters in TernHill and Leak.
Unfortunately I had to finish the business when Chris had a brill offer to join the long service list and we were then posted again to Sandhurst Academy. This meant that we could carry on in the army until he is 55.

We moved to Sandhurst and Chris became The Band Coordinators meant he looked after all the bands that came to do their tour,in the Academy. He also had quite a few other jobs, so he worked very hard.
I spent most of the time working in the Polo yard, which I loved and met lots of royal people.
We lived there for 4 years and we were then told are next posting was Osnabruck Germany.

We have now been living here nearly 3 years and love it. We have a good lifestyle with plenty of social life.We spend a lot of time eating out, looking after and breaking in our nearly 4 year old Lilly,walking our dogs and lots of bike rides. Our life is like a permanent holiday. Life can't be any better with, with our family Friend's and animals around us.