Sean, Nicolette and Stuart

Hi Everyone,

It’s hard to believe that another year has gone by in our lives. It’s been a very full year for the Ryan’s.

This time last year we were in South Africa enjoying a fantastic vacation in Cape Town with my family and in Jhb with Sean’s family. What a great way to end one year and start a New Year with family.

Stuart has had a great year albeit one of big change. At school he continued to do well, with Violin and choir definitely being a highlight. Stuart has a gift for music and has an ear for it. He took part in a few concerts and recitals during the year both as a member of the strings orchestra and the choir. He has a beautiful voice. You can see some short video clips of him on our Blog which Sean have started to up again after not doing anything for a long time. Check it out @  Http://www.sryan.biz

The move to Portland has had a bigger impact on Stuart that both Sean and I expected. He was very upset to be moving and leaving his friends that he has been at school with for 7 years since ELC3. He constantly reminds us that we said we were going to be in the US for 2 years and that he can’t wait to go back. He misses his friends a lot. But life goes on…

He is in a very small private Catholic school, only one class per grade. From an academic perspective he finished his first term of 5th Grade having missed the last 3 months of 4th Grade and the 1st of 5th with flying colours. He cracked mostly A’s with an A+ and a few B’s. He complains that the homework is double what he had to do in Australia – we have told him that’s what happens when you go up a Grade.

We have enrolled him with a private Violin tutor so we are keeping us with his musical development. We bought him a small electric keyboard for his birthday and were amazed at how he was playing tunes within minutes – mmm was it a good idea to sell the piano?

Stuart has joined the Nike Ninja’s swim team and swims in the Nike squad 3 times a week and took part in his first swim meet a few weeks ago. His next one is in Jan which he is looking forward to.

Other than that Stuarts great love is all things electronic – DS, computer, iTouch,  etc and if not controlled he would spend every waking (and sleeping moment I think) in front of a screen.

Sean has had a big year too – it’s a recurring theme

Luckily Sean managed to get a transfer with RIM (BlackBerry) to the States so from a work perspective he has some continuity. He is still working from home which is a huge advantage for us as he can pick Stuart up every day from school. He has had a few trips for work this year mainly Canada and Hong Kong.

The biggest impact – well there are two really – first leaving his mates. Sean is a very sociable person (unlike his wife ) so he misses his friends tremendously. Working from home in the US does not help either as he does not get to meet many people. When spring arrives, “when” being the operative word, he will hopefully be able to get out with some cycling groups and should get to know more people.

The second is his squash. The time we have been out of Australia is the longest Sean has ever not played squash in more than twenty years   It is killing him. There is not a very big squash community in Portland and those that play are not strong enough to compete . On that note Sean won the Australian over 40 squash title this year and is committed to going back to Australia next year to defend his title – might have to practice a bit before then…..

Another highlight for us this year was Roxanne’s visit this year. She lived with us for 4 months. It was great having her with us so that we could all get to spend time together. Rox finished high school at the end of 2009 with 4 A’s – great result and took a gap year. Next year she will go to Stellenbosch to study a BSC and then move into medicine.

For me, well I dragged the Ryan family literally across the World to work at Nike WHQ. It’s strange going from the first to wake up globally (well nearly, NZ has a slight lead) to being last to wake up – yes last!!!

The change has been interesting. Work is great with the biggest change being adapting to the American culture. I think (I hope) I have nearly got it after 4 months.

My New job is Planning Director for Emerging markets which includes Australia, NZ, Korea, India, SEA, Brazil, SOCO (Southern cone of S America), Mexico and Latin distributors – rest of South America, and last but not least South Africa.

Without a doubt one of the biggest benefits is travelling to all the countries and getting to experience all the different cultures. I have been to Argentina – Buenos Aires, Brazil, Mexico and South East Asia (SEA) this year. In Jan I am on my way to Uruguay (Punta Del Este), then Cape Town and in March to India. It makes it a very interesting role as each day is different.

From a Nike perspective we are the fastest growing Geography (Nike’s name for collection of countries) and hopefully soon we will contend to be the third biggest.  I could wax on but to ensure I don’t bore you I will just say that I am truly lucky to work for one of the greatest Brands in the world and one of the greatest companies.

On a home front it was also a very busy year. I convinced Sean, yet again, to extend our house in Australia and to put a pool in. It was a longer process than we originally envisaged but the end result is fantastic. Unfortunately our timing was off with the move to Portland so we only got to enjoy our pool and house for a very short time, BUT we are going back so all is not lost.

Our move to Portland was not without a little drama. The house we had first chosen to rent turned out to be not what we expected so we were set back a few weeks while we looked for a new one. We found a very nice house, slightly big for us but the houses were either too small or too big in Portland.

Portland is probably one of the easiest cities to relocate to. We have managed to find our way around pretty easily. It’s always the little things that take a while, like finding the right bread and butter, but we are getting there. Most importantly we have at least 3 good coffee shops to go to.

The weather is not the best. The phrase “constant rainfall” has taken on a whole new meaning for us! On a positive note the ski season has started. Sean and Stuart have already taken their first trip up the mountain (I was working) and they had a blast. As soon as we get back we are going up together. The mountain is only an hour and a half away so day trips are easy.

As always we have been very lucky to have some awesome holidays. We went to Phuket in July for 8 days which was great. In August we went skiing for a few days in Australia. We are now sitting in Cancun Mexico for 8 days. Great times!!  In February we are going skiing in Austria with some really good friends from S Africa and then I have a few plans brewing for the rest of the year so more good times ahead for us.

For all the photographs of our travel and good times again you can go to Sean’s website/Blog as we have them there and he is adding them all slowly.

Feel free to make a comment or send wishes or messages via the Blog.

Http://www.sryan.biz

To all our friends we miss you and hope to see you all sometime this year.

Nicolette, Sean and Master Stuart