My little niece lost her two front teeth this week. But she's a pragmatic sort of kid, and she has kept smiling gummily as she waits for a whopping great cash injection from the tooth fairy.

That tooth fairy must be on the brink of financial disaster, given what inflation has done for payouts per incisor.

I seem to remember getting sixpence a tooth in those far-off days when, full of hope, I left my baby teeth under my pillow; nowadays, you're talking about a trip to the cash dispenser.

Anyway, I digress.

The reason I know my niece has lost her teeth is not because I popped round to see her mum last night.

It's because I got an email from New Zealand, where my sister and her family emigrated last November.

Thanks to the wonders of a truly worldwide web, I got a virtual tour of the family's new home, on a picturesque stretch of the North Island coastline.

The characterful clapboard house is set out with all their Old Country furniture (which has just arrived on a massive container ship from Britain).

Through the email, I saw the kids' room with its view over the ocean, and in the sitting-room was my nephew, as ever lounging on the sofa and glued to the telly, probably in front of Coronation Street. Apparently, you can't escape everything when you emigrate.

I saw the kitchen full of familiar gadgets; the expensive chrome toaster that somehow only ever did one side of your bread, and the old enamel bread bin my sister got from one of the rummage shops she could never be dragged out of.

I also got a private view of the lavatory, presumably in case I thought such modern conveniences had yet to reach the colonies.

I saw the whole family standing on the beach that's just a stone's throw from the balcony of their lovely house.

They look tanned and happy on the threshold of their new life.

Things are taking off for my sister and her family now. I get texts saying how my brother-in-law is getting on in his new job, how the kids have settled in at school and how my sister is setting about making the new place her own.

It's the new start they wanted for years now, especially for the kids.

If I'm honest, I probably keep in touch more with my sister now than when she lived 30 miles down the road in Bradford. I certainly hear more regular updates about her life.

And mum and dad and the rest of us will be seeing the Robinsons soon enough. Probably sooner than they realise, as we are already saving up for air tickets to escape the British winter and catch up with them.

Strangely enough, that email didn't show the spare room at their new house...

In the meantime, we keep in touch through the gadgets that have shrunk the world so much that I can see my niece's gap-toothed grin from 11,000 miles away, within hours of her teeth being kissed out.

Who knows, if we all set up a web cam we will actually be able to sit down in our respective homes and have a face-to-face conversation.

But can those clever inventors ever come up with a gizmo that can fill the gap that you feel when you think of loved ones who live so far away? Don't bank on it!

Updated: 10:49 Wednesday, March 17, 2004