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Trip to England – July 2013

In July, we took a long-anticipated trip to England, mostly to see our family, but also to see the sites. Brit had never been overseas before, so it was quite exciting for us to have her go. She’s just 12, hadn’t left America (except for Canada) and hadn’t met her English grandparents and auntie before.

We spent half of our time in North Walsham, where Ian’s dad and stepmom live. It was near the sea, so we spent some time at the sea, ate fish and chips, enjoyed the market, and got to play with Jack the cat. My sister-in-law, Jen and my nephew Hayden made the long trip to the coast to spend family time with us. It was nice to be together.

We loved the weather at the coast. It was relatively cool at night, enough for a sweatshirt, although somewhat warm or hot during the day.

[See a picture album]

We spent the second week in Royston, visiting Ian’s mom and stepdad. It was much hotter there, but we had easy access to London via the train and the tube. We got to see the infamous King’s Cross Station and visit lots of places in London. I’ve never seen London. It’s massiveness was impressive. We spent ages taking it all in… the hustle and bustle, the tourists of every nationality, the people hanging around the river trying to amaze (and maybe take the money of) the tourists with their guessing tricks (lol).

The first trip to London (on my birthday!), we rode the London Eye and went through the London Dungeons Tour. “Do you like raaaats? I loooove raaaaats!”, says Maeve, the crazy girl who’s “locked up in the Dungeon for being crazy”. It was essentially several skits involving the story of Jack the Ripper, Sweeney Todd, and the methods of torture in the dungeons. The actors and actresses were brilliant.

After much walking and sweating (the weather was unusually warm), we went back to Ian’s mum’s house for the day and relaxed. The next day, the Royal Baby was born, His Royal Highness Prince George of Cambridge. So amazing. Loved the coverage once the birth happened. Amazed that the Duchess made it out of bed the next day to show off the new baby. They look so happy.

We then spent some time in Milton Keynes with my friend Jane, who met us at the Snow Dome (or tracked us down, as the case would be) and we spent quality time shopping. It was her first time meeting Brittany and they got along famously. It’s funny with friends. Even if you’re physically apart for almost 4 years, you’re still the same close friends you always have been when you’re back together. It was so good to see her again. We always wish for more time.

The next day, it was back to London, where we saw Buckingham Palace, St. James Park and toured Westminter Abbey. We saw the changing of the guard at the castle, and of course, all the media tents, due to the Royal Baby being born. We saw PELICANS in St. James park. I’ve never seen a pelican before. Westminster Abbey was incredible. I touched the tomb of Edward the Confessor an many others.

Did you know when there is a marriage or funeral at Westminster, the people are surrounded by all of the previous kings and queens buried there? It’s so historic, and we have nothing like this in America, of course. We saw the Coronation chair, where the Sovereign is crowned. We visited Poet’s Corner where Tennyson and Charles Dickens, several Poets Laureate and many other writers and poets are buried. Their words were engraved on their burial places. It was like being lost in time for a moment.

Food! Being a family of foodies, we enjoyed the food we can’t get in America, like amazing fish and chips, carvery at a pub, several cakes and Walker’s crips and authentic Mediterranean food. We enjoyed Pret a Manger, which makes the best sandwiches on fresh baguettes, Nando’s which has amazing chicken and several others. We enjoyed salad for dinner at home and an English breakfast.

Not all on the same day.

We walked a lot to work it off. My feet were killing me many days. Trust me. I miss the walking.

Anyway, lovely trip. Hoping to go back soon, as we miss everyone when we’re gone, and there are many more friends we’d like to visit! Two weeks is never enough.

Saying “So Long” to Summer

It’s been an interesting summer for Brit, I think, shuffling around from summer program to summer program, instead of sticking with one thing all summer. This week marks the end of The Rose Theater program, which has lasted for 3 weeks. The program involved benraku puppetry, and she seemed to be really excited about it. Unfortunately, an illness is not allowing her to be in today’s performances, but I think she’ll be ready to go on Saturday.

In July, was a week of band camp, where kids from all over the school district came together to learn and perform together. It was very cool to see the final performance and how well they learned 3 new pieces within a course of a week.

Before that was 3 weeks of summer school. The reading portion didn’t go over so well, but the computer graphics half of the day was something Brit was pretty excited about. We learned new things from it, too. Let’s face it, there are a lot of fun sites computer graphics people know about that regular geeks do not. Or I may just be speaking for myself. 🙂

So, next week, it’s back to school. It’s a whole new year in middle school, learning things like foreign languages and industrial arts, cooking, and participating in band AND choir. Sounds like a busy year.

爱搞视频 will be here before we know it, then it’s off to Seattle, and hopefully a daytrip to Canada. Yay!

Good weekend

We spent a few hours Saturday at the Summer Arts Festival. It was interesting to walk through the artist’s stalls and see what they had for sale. Brit bought a signed photograph taken of a polar bear underwater. We’ve framed it and hung it on the wall.

The band at the festival was a Native American rock band called Brulé. We took video but the background noise really took away our ability to do their music justice. So you can read about them here: http://www.brulerecords.com/isis/promovid3.html and here: http://www.brulerecords.com/home.html.

We spent an hour or so on Sunday at the Omaha Farmer’s Market in Aksarben Village. There are a lot of people walking their dogs there, and it’s always nice to meet them. We bought a few things, like a new collar for Molly, our mini-schnauzer, and some ground beef from Thistle and Clover. We’re cooking some burgers for dinner (when I say “we”, I mean “Ian”) and topping them with chèvre and some habanero paste from JPaste.

My parents are on their way back to Italy. They’ve had loads of travelling in the last week. When they get back, I bet work will be relaxing. We’ll see. I always get incredible jetlag (in a flu-sort of way) going that direction.

It was good to see them. I hope we’ll see them again soon!

A visit from my parents

My parents flew out from Italy. It’s been their first trip to the US since they moved to Italy (temporarily) last year. It was nice to catch up with them and show them around the bits of Omaha they hadn’t seen yet.

This is us (sorry, Ian is taking the picture) laughing because Brit kept laughing.

We ate at a really nice restaurant called Firebirds, which has wonderful steak, by the way. Ian cooked an amazing dinner of pork chops, potato salad, potato wedges (for those against eating potato salad.. is there anyone? Oh.. Brittany!), and a lovely salad with homemade vinaigrette.

We toured Village Point’s shopping area, went to Kohl’s to do some shopping, then my dad bought loads of Jiffy cake mix and other various things to send back to Italy.

Oh, and we couldn’t miss going down to the Missouri River to see how overflowing it was.

Week in Review

So, I’m still amazed with last night’s season finale of Grey’s Anatomy. The finale was just amazing and had me on the edge of my seat throughout. If I had to pick a favorite spot, it was where (spoiler alert) Christina was operating and Owen told the shooter, “This is the woman I love and if you hurt her, I’ll kill you!”. Owen becomes Christina’s man again, and that’s perfect.

Also, Jackson unplugging the heart sensors. Brilliant.

Anyway, we have an interesting weekend planned. Sunday, we’re going to Adventureland with the Girl Scouts. I’ve not been for several years, and they seem to have quite a few more rides, so I’m really looking forward to it. I think Ian is a bit terrified, but I’m sure he’ll have a blast. 🙂

Next week: Two days of work, two days of Crystal Reports class and 4 days in Texas (yay!) It will be fun taking 10 hour road trip. It will be nice to have the GPS along the way, as well, since going south often messes up my inner compass. We are going to see my brother and sister-in-law, and their 35 children (ok, 5). It will be nice to catch up and enjoy the hot Texas weather.

Our 6-month anniversary is coming. In the US, they have a very elaborate method of celebrating a 6-month wedding anniversary, involving major purchases at the jewelry store and a week away in Hawaii. Right? (shh)

Flying Away

Weather permitting, we’ll be boarding a plane and heading to Virginia Beach this week. The weather between the two of us is snowy, so I’m hoping it holds up so we can at least fly there and get back as planned. I’m sure it will be fine.

This will be the first time Ian and I have flown together. We’ve done a bit of flying to see the other, but never have been on the same plane together.

He was surprised that we can’t fly directly to Virginia Beach. We have a stop-over in Detroit. 🙂

My Parents

are wandering off to Italy for 3 years for a new job assignment. It will be an exciting place to visit, in addition to England. I have still not seen London. We’ve always been so busy seeing people, that we’ve found it less important to see the scenery. Funny, eh?

Odd Dream

I had a dream that I was in some airport, catching a flight with my daughter to see Ian. I forgot to print off my boarding pass, so at the last minute, I went to the counter to have it printed. In the back of my head, I was thinking “I hope the seats aren’t all assigned already!”

Starting to panic, I attempted to speak to the counter girl. She decided it was humour day and I just wasn’t getting it. She finally saw that I was humour-free and actually had a mission to complete in a very short amount of time, so she shifted me off to a counter across the room. Everyone seemed busy helping other customers. It was finally my turn to speak to someone.

He thought he was funny, too. I indicated that my flight was about to leave and I needed a boarding pass, and one to board my flight in Chicago, too. As he handed me a boarding pass for the flight to Chicago, he wrote down the name of some car rental company and handed it to me (it’s because dreams don’t need to make sense, I guess) as a resource for getting my boarding passes onward from Chicago.

I looked forever for my black luggage so I could wheel it to the gate (because who needs baggage check-in, eh?) I finally found the luggage, which I remembered putting in a particular spot as I was speaking to my grandfather (who passed on years ago, but was seeing me off at the airport).

So, collected my bags, corralled my daughter and proceeded to the gate.

Oh crap! I forgot to get her boarding pass. I’ll just plead totally daft at the gate…. where they ended up just letting her on the plane without question.

I’m sure this all means something. LOL

Happy Easter, people!