How to get a Christmas tree home.....

In and out of being sick, we were able to get to the city centre for our Christmas tree.

Then the question arose as to how we were going to get it home. I'm still on a "no car" kick which does make things like this......well, challenging.

We explained the need to Emma of sharing her trailer with the tree. She kind of looked at us funny. Then I said to her, "it's kind of like sharing your space in the trailer with Eddy. You don't really want to share the space, but you really want him to come over for a play day." Well, that seemed to work! So, we squeezed Emma and the tree in for the ride home. And we all made it safely. It was a bit "pokey" for Emma but she managed well. In fact, I couldn't believe our luck with how they put netting around the trees to get them home! So convenient!

So, the tree is up and decorated. It even has a few gifts under it. Emma has made a beauitful wrapped picture for me (hiding in an envelope but clearly pointed out) and she has decorated Christmas trees to put under it. They are actually the pointed parts in the egg cartons and are green. She glued decorations on them and they turned out pretty cute! See what happens when you're sick for TOO long? You get creative with what you have at home!

We leave this Friday afternoon for Germany. We are all excited for this! We'll stay at Philip's parent's home and have his sister and family to visit with as well. It will be fun to watch Emma and Philip's two nephews play. They did great last year, so it will be interesting again. Gregor is a couple of days older than Emma and Lawrence is 2 years younger. They are "boys" so I'm sure Emma will tattle on them a bit.......

I think that's it for now. Emma has her Christmas party at school tomorrow: we're bringing napkins and jelly sandwiches (they are serious about this "no peanut butter" rule.). I'll let you know how this party compares to parties in the states!

Hope you are all well and enjoying the holiday season!

Sick.......again and again!

Ok, well most of you know Emma had Scarlet Fever and then I had Strep. Well, Philip has been sick this week too. And, what do you know.....Emma is home again today with a fever! 101.48. So another cozy day at home feeling miserable. I'm still on my antibiotics, Emma finished hers yesterday and now we've all got a nasty cold or something. Ugh!

I promise to post more later and add some photos. We got our Christmas tree over the past weekend and wandered around the city some. It's been frosty cold at night and in the mornings, which makes it feel like Christmas is almost here. Oh yeah, it is!

The only thing I've done is get some cards mailed out, ruin my first batch of fudge (with the ONLY jar of marshmallow creme....they don't sell it here!) and have done NO shopping. I did a tiny bit in California.....tiny!

We're just wishing for a healthy holiday now. We leave on the 19th. Let's hope for the best!!!!!

International Evening

International Evening at Emma's school was a huge success! The turnout was great and the diversity wonderful! Emma and I went to the Tchaikovsky ballet of Sleeping Beauty earlier and had a great time. After the 3 hour show I was getting tired. Emma loved it tremendously and sat through the entire performance watching the production and loving sitting 3 rows from the orchestra. It was an impressive performance!
We headed to International Evening next. They had a school assembly first and included many, many children to say "hello" in all different languages. I heard reports of 70+ to 100+ different languages. Regardless, it was something I had never seen. There were children dressed and speaking in Chinese, Hebrew, Italian, Spanish (from Spain.....although I thought Emma could bring tacos and say Hola for California....ha ha ha ha), Hungarian (Big John: we thought of you as the little boy was dressed in traditional clothing and I wondered and laughed if you dressed like it ever!), French, Urdu and many, many other languages I hadn't even ever heard of!
After the school assembly we went to Emma's classroom to share in the food. Can I just say, FABULOUS! We had Israeli food to yummy sushi to Danish meatballs, German bread, and our famous Rice Krispie Treats. There were many foods we tried that we didn't even know what they were! The first (top) photo is not the best of the night, but it shows how wonderfully some of the children dressed for the evening. Momo is Japanese and wore the pink kimono....she has a little sister (Coco) who is just walking and wore one too. These girls are so sweet and Emma loves their names! Way cute! The other girl was dressed nicely as well, Yasmin. The little boy, Aidan, is the younger brother of Kai who is in Emma's class. Their mother is from Namibia and both boys are incredibly sweet. Aidan has started calling me Auntie!

This will probably be my last post for two weeks. We are heading back to California to visit with family and friends this Friday. Hurray! Keep the warm sunshine there for us (ok, for me....I really miss it and am already tired of being cold!).

England playground!

Enough Said???? This was a "sunny" day!

Weekend with a CAR!

If you've ever taken Astronomy, you'll have had the same draw that I did to wanting to see Stonehenge. We rented a car and drove there. It wasn't too terribly far (1 1/2 hours or so), but this had the challenge of me driving on the wrong side of the road with a manual transmission.....left handed.

It was a beautiful day and Stonehenge was great! It was in the middle of nowhere, literally. It was bizarre. You're able to walk completely around all of Stonehenge (in a big circle). I thought it was all fenced off and protected, but it just has simple ropes to keep people away. You're still able to get close and see the beauty of this "world wonder." It was fun...and then we headed to the southern coast. Wow was that gorgeous.

Lulworth Cove was where we headed at the coast. The roads were smaller than most of you can even imagine, so it took longer than I thought (another 2-3 hours). I closed my eyes for the most part when the roads got really narrow and a car was coming up . I didn't think we could fit past some of the cars, but they zoom by you! The roads were originally made for horses obviously (and that may be the best way to travel still!).

But it was well worth it! Here's a picture of the Atlantic Ocean just beyond the hill from the cove we spent the afternoon at. It was just gorgeous! And, we were really lucky with the weather. Emma went in the water....in her underwear. I didn't bring her swimsuit as who would've ever imagined she would touch it with more than her big toe! But, that's Emma! The way home was long and dark! Sometimes I miss good old Highway 101. There's something so simple to just driving straight and taking your exit. There's something really frustrating to roundabouts and losing ALL sense of direction from going around in circles. Well, we made it home. And, I couldn't wait to drop the car off. But, we had it for another day as rental car companies are closed on Sundays.

We headed out for a "short" day trip to the Cotswolds. These are ancient villages not too far from Oxford. We wandered around and had lunch at a pub and then headed to a terrific farm. I haven't seen or heard of any "amusements parks" so this would be the Disneyland of the village life! Emma had a blast! From holding rabbits and guinea pigs, to petting pigs and trying to milk a goat (pretend one), to seeing beautiful highland cattle and many other forms of "farm" animals. It was fun and exciting for all of us.

Bike Riding is Motivating.....to a 4 year old!

Everybody and their brother ride their bikes here. Well, and their sister, mother and father. It's just packed with bikes. No matter what the weather is. There are more bikes and pedestrians, even on horrible rainy/windy days than cars. And if you haven't tried to ride your bike on a windy day, try it. You'll have a huge amount of respect for how difficult it is. I did it. I hardly moved forward. It took the wind changing direction (thankfully it does that too) before I could move forward!

But this Sunday was the day. Emma was determined and ready to ride her bike. This was the day for the training wheels to come off. Did she do it? Yes! Emma had practiced all week in our neighborhood and Philip "finally" got back from his work meeting in Iceland to remove the "stabilizers." Up and down, round and round. She rode her bike that is nearly 2 years old. Thank you Grandma Cathy for this 3rd birthday gift that is finally being put to REALLY good use!



During the past weeks, her training wheels finally broke on one side. It forced Emma to really learn to balance or to just give up and stick with her scooter. She is stubborn and did it and did it well. She fell many times, but always had the determination to get back on. Woo hoo!



She's looking forward to picking out a bike lock and a bike bell when we're in California. I figured it was a safe bet to make her wait until then....otherwise, she'd be wanting to ride her bike to school. I'm finally getting used to her riding her scooter to school, but none of us are ready for the bike! Not only do drivers have the right of way (can you even believe that????), but Emma does not have street sense yet. I barely do! Everything is backwards.....ok, maybe not backwards, but it's all on the left. All of it is opposite for me. And the roundabouts! Geez! These people have got to give me a break! Oh and zebra humps (I think that's what they're called). These are crossings for pedestrians and "bumps" for cars. Needless to say, the poor kid will have to wait until her "street challenged" mom works up the confidence first.



We tried going to the Port Meadow yesterday for a bike ride (it would've been a bit more entertaining than going round and round and round our circle/oval neighborhood). Emma made it up to the top of the bridge, but was very hesitant to go down the hill. Even knowing that she could see Sheila (one of the horses she's named and adopted). So, we turned around and went back, up and down, round and round our neighborhood. Maybe next time!



I'll keep you posted on the bike riding adventures as I'm sure there will be many!

London anyone???? Friday, October 10th

A busy, but great day! Emma was out of school at 11:30 and we rushed (on the bike of course) to the train station. It took all of 7 minutes to get there, get the bike and trailer locked up and get in line for our ticket to "the city." We got on the fast train at 12:01. You don't want to get on any other! The fast train just stops once, maybe twice. The slow trains, are like the Greyhound Bus. They stop at every little nook and cranny on the way!

We met Harry & Cathy (Emma's great uncle & aunt) at Paddington Station. It had been a year since we saw them and Emma got a bit confused! She insisted that Harry was Cathy and Cathy was Harry. When I speak of them, I guess it's always as "one unit: Harry and Cathy." Not as individuals.

We ate lunch on the canal at a wonderful restaurant called the Boathouse. Lovely! We shared a nice bottle of wine and had salmon...what else! Fish here is just fresh and fabulous. Maybe I'm still paranoid about local fish in California since the oil spill! Anyway, it was wonderful! We finished it off with dessert: creme brulee. Well, Emma finished it off and I got a taste of it!

We walked around that section of London. We went into a beautiful garden......a tree was merely about $1,700 there! Emma attached to Cathy (the real one) and held her hand and had to stop and smell all different flowers, plants and leaves. Cathy is such a sport that she actually smelled them all!

We wandered along the canal back towards the station. Cath and I had some tea, which Emma of course spilled a bit of......she is her mother's daughter! Then, we found the Krispy Kreme. Yes indeed! It may have closed down in Santa Rosa, but it is up and running and FABULOUS at Paddington Station in London. I also found one in Oxford. Well, I found it online, and it will be one of my challenges for the week to actually find it, go in and not over indulge!