Thursday, July 22, 2010

The National Gallery and King's Cross Station


Today was my first time taking the kids into London alone. At ages 9, 6, and 3 this is somewhat of a challenge, especially considering the stroller that needs to be carried up all those stairs and escalators we encountered, as well as hands of little ones that need to be held, tickets to be distributed, collected, and redistributed (we counted 11 times today)! We take a short, 5-minute train to Slough, transfer to get on a 20 min train to London-Paddington, and from there hop on whatever Tube will take us to where we need to go. We also decided to go to King's Cross/St. Pancras in the late afternoon so Skylar could see her beloved Platform 9 3/4, being the Harry Potter fan that she is! One thing I learned is do not, I repeat do not decide to go home during rush hour! I did not even pay attention to the time when I realized that we were in literally a sea of people in the Tube stations...when I realized that it was 5 pm, aka quittin' time for all the workin' folks downtown, it was too late as we were already engulfed--and we better move! So, our first stop at our arrival in London was Trafalgar Square where the National Gallery is located. The Gallery is free (a big plus in this expensive city!) and full of beautiful, old, and interesting art. I have to say Skylar, age 9, was somewhat interested, although after a while painting after painting of strange-looking people (admit it, they were weird looking 500 years ago!) was getting a little monotonous even for an art-lover like her. Braden, age 6, was another story...he liked a few but I think he had his fill of naked cherub's early on! Miss Ava, well, I guess you can't expect a 3-year-old to appreciate the paintings after about 5 minutes! But let's not forget about mom! Mom has an opinion, too! I loved it! I could have stayed for hours. I loved how some artists are able to perfectly capture light. Others bring facial expressions to life. The impressionist art section was my favorite. I absolutely love Claude Monet's paintings, with the water lillies and Japanese bridge being my favorite:



We also saw a drawing from Leondaro da Vinci, which was incredible as well. A funny one was of a jolly old man with white hair and beard (are you picturing Santa? 'Cause that is *just* what he looked like!) only he was NAKED and falling over drunk! The kids laughed out loud and asked what Santa was doing? I finally said, let's go! I do love art, but sometimes even I don't "appreciate" it! From there I had a coffee at the cafe while the kids dined on water and jellybeans. While relaxing, I whipped out my uber handy London Children's map...Skylar had been wanting to visit King's Cross/St. Pancras station to see the famous platform 9 3/4 that takes you to Hogwart's. We figured out how to get there via Tube Thankfully a worker there happily showed us exactly where to go! It was really cool to see! She was in awe that this was the station that J.K. Rowling drew her inspiration from. S at King's Cross Station We had just enough picture taking and oohing and ahhing time before a large group found it and started their picture taking escapades so we decided it was time to head home. Three tube transfers and two train transfers later we are home sweet home...well home for now. We felt a relief when we got off at the calm Windsor station, compared to the hustle and bustle of London. It was so nice and peaceful and familiar. Funny enough Skylar just said today, "this feels like home"...

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Londontown, Hampton Court Palace, and LegoLand!


These past few days we've been on-the-go. Saturday, Mike, the kids, and I went to London and toured it via a red double-decker bus. I highly recommend this to tour the city as we got great commentary to learn about the city and landmarks and we could hop-off and hop-on at any stop we wished. My favorite thing to see was Big Ben, which is actually neither the clock, nor the tower, but the large bell inside. Buckingham Palace was less "grandiose" than I expected...it is actually sitting on 42 acres, but appears to be so close to the road...I suppose I expect all Palaces to be on lush, green property, set back far from any traffic. The busiest thing we saw was Picadilly Circus. And I had a twinge of homesickness when we zoomed pass the American Embassy, which the guide mentioned is the only American Embassy on rented property. Seeing the American flag fly high above made me smile :) On Sunday we visited Hampton Court Palace, which was one of Henry VIII's favorite palaces. The funny thing Henry VIII seized it from Thomas Wolsey once Thomas fell from Henry's favor. Paintings of Henry's beloved son and much-desired heir-to-the-throne, Prince Edward, his parents, King Henry VII and Elizabeth, and his grandmother hung in his state apartments. This Palace really felt like an real, old castle. The wine cellar was replicated with faux wine barrels, stored in a naturally climate-controlled environemtn. Once down in the cellar you could feel the cool castle air and smell the cool dirt beneath the flooring - it was almost a little scary to the kids! The Tudor kitchens were interesting, too--they had faux food out that looked extremely real, one room was the butcher room where red meat layed around waiting for the butcher to chop it smaller. Another vast room held many herbs (real) perfect for smelling and getting a taste for what the real thing tasted like. A real wood fire was burning and large cast iron skewers made for cooking large amounts of meat were ready to cook (for real!) The kitchens were massive and were made to feed the 600 people of the court allowed to eat twice daily.

Here's a video from youtube if you are interested in seeing more:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIIPQnQgFqI&feature=channel Today the kids and I hit up LegoLand Windsor (Lego-themed themepark) for a day of fun in the sun, roller-coaster riding, and even some Lego shopping. The entrance is built atop a large hill so you get a grand view of Windsor, Heathrow, and London in the distance. My favorite part was Miniland, which is Europe and the USA recreated in millions of little Legos. No pictures here as I didn't want to haul my camera along for this day of fun! We have been so busy these last few days that I think I may need a vacation from vacation :)

Friday, July 16, 2010

Windsor Castle and The Windsor Wheel


Today we toured the oldest and largest occupied castle in the world, Windsor Castle. It is one of Queen Elizabeth II's favorite residences and is over 900 years old. We all got the audio headsets which made it a fun and educational experience. I just love castles -- the mystery and history -- thinking back to all those people who once lived and dined and danced and carried on. Some are now buried at St. George's Chapel which is on the castle grounds. My absolute favorite part was seeing King Henry VIII's suit of armor, all short and stubby! That guy was insane, however for some reason I find him intriguing as well. Queen Mary's dollhouse was amazing to say the least. Also Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret's doll collection and clothes (including some designed by Dior) puts American Girl to shame! The girls oohed and ahhed over that section. Six-year-old Braden was so impressed with all the swords and guns from knights of an era gone by. The way the swords, guns, and armor were displayed took up many state apartments. Everywhere you turned were suits of armor of one kind or another. There were gigantic tapestries on the walls, not only to be displayed as a piece of art (as they were intricately designed and actually looked more like paintings than tapestries) but in the days before the castle had heat it helped to keep the cold out.

The drawing and photograph collection were on display -- my favorite was witnessing the incredible talent of Leonardo da Vinci's drawings. The professional photographs of Queen Elizabeth as a child through adulthood with her own children, Charles and Anne, were touching as well.

Lastly, we stopped into St. George's Chapel, which is also the church Prince Edward and Sophie got married in among many other famous unions. Several funerals have taken place there as well, and many royals are buried there, including Henry VIII. In fact, we stood right above his remains! In the evening, once Mike got home, we went on The Windsor Wheel, a ferris wheel near the River Thames. It was a beautiful view from up there, but I almost didn't go, yet I couldn't just pack my family on without me! So I put on my (not so) brave face and actually enjoyed it--luckily I had my camera to play with till it was over ;-)

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Jet Lag(ging) behind

So I'm still not on schedule yet and neither are the kids. I woke up at NOON today...I don't think I've ever woken up that late before in my life! It sure felt strange to eat breakfast at noon! Lunch was at 3 pm and now we just finished dinner at 9 pm...so I sort of caught up but all the meals were squished together today! Well since it would be too late to tour anything today we opted to walk into the town centre again and look at some different shops. We went to two parks today, which the kids enjoyed exploring as the equipment is quite a bit different than typical American playgrounds. We stopped for a nice strong cup of European coffee--mmmmm! The family at the table next to us chatted us up for a while and let me know that they sell Chicago-style cheesecake somewhere nearby. Which isn't it "New York" cheesecake? She said there was a Chicago pizza place somewhere around here, too. Her kids (4 and maybe 2) took an interest in my kids, which is funny because they must sound strange to them...and I have to say I love hearing the little kids in their accents! Although I suppose we're the ones with the accents now... I still don't have the washer dryer figured out completely--it's taken all day to wash/dry this one load...hopefully soon I'll have it figured out!

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

From sparks to water...a nerve-testing day

Well today started off with a *bang*...literally! I plugged my blowdryer into the adapter and that into the converter and turned it on--and barely a wind came out of it. So I turned to "high"...and POOF -- sparks flew out of that socket like no other. Not only that but it blew the fuse on the microwave, dishwasher (mid-cycle), washing/dryer (mid-cycle--argh!), and the fridge! My blowdryer is toast and it was soooo worth it as once we were out and about it rained quite heavily -- can you sense my sarcasm here?? So preparing for a bad hair day I didn't want to venture far. We needed a few things from the grocery store and I desperately needed some coffee by that point so we settled into Starbuck's for a mid-morning snack. I ordered a mocha, although it tasted different than home, as near everything has so far. Of course this couldn't be without incident as the stroller had to tip backwards twice with Ava in it, of course, and the one and only teeny bathroom did not lock. When a line had formed poor little Ava was still on the potty when the lock-less door was opened! I was sweating by the time we left there! On to the supermarket where the stroller once again tipped...it is just so heavy with the grocery bags, umbrellas and jackets, even when I enlisted Braden, age 6, and Skylar, age 9, for carrying help. Once we had our purchases I felt all must go well from here...and then we stepped out into a downpour. Well, what's a little rain, I figured, after a day like today!? It felt very Seattle-esque in that it was simply "rain" and not the crazy thunderstorms we experienced this summer back home. Obviously rain doesn't phase the Londoners as they bike, smoke, walk, and carry-on. It sure felt good to get out of our waterlogged clothing once home! After Mike got home, we put our nerves to the test as he drove for the first time here and we headed to Tesco, which is similar to Walmart. Not only is it strange to 1.) drive on the other side of the car, but it's even more strange to 2.) drive on the other side of the road, and 3.) it's hard to drive somewhere where you are completely unfamiliar! After several roundabouts and motorways, a couple U-turns and many red-light runnings, we arrived at our destination. Phew! After the drive I felt my brain was fried so trying to sort through all these different products took some time, as none looked familiar. We did find some soy and rice milk and even soy yogurt and pudding. I'm still holding out to visit Waitrose for some more products, but am happy that I found what I did. A couple things to note--the traffic lights are a bit different. When the light is just about to turn green it blinks yellow and then cars start accelerating. There are several word differences, of course, such as buggy instead of stroller, trolley instead of shopping cart, and car park instead of parking lot. I have also been approached a couple times for directions, which means I must look like I know where I'm going. After I tried my best to help them (or so I think) they happily thanked me with "Cheers!" On that note, I have some chores to do and absolutely must take the rubbish out straightaway. Cheers!

Monday, July 12, 2010

Walking Windsor -- Day One


Well, we're all settled in our temporary flat here in Windsor. We'll be moving this weekend again to our bigger 3-bedroom flat. We are still experiencing bouts of jet lag, but the kids are sure bouncing back quickly! The flight was around 8 hours and they did fantastic! They happily watched a couple movies (Toy Story 2 and Diary of a Wimpy Kid), read, slept, and ate. The kids all have food allergies so I planned their food ahead - pre-planning their meals and bringing our soft-sided cooler on board ended up working out perfectly! We're discovering some of the differences from home already--the washer/dryer combo is in the kitchen and I'll surely need to read the manual to figure out how to use it! The convection oven (in Celcius) also needed some manual reading. Another thing that I love are that the windows are without screens as there are no bugs! Now if only I could figure out how to dry my load of towels in the washer and use my converter to charge my laptop--arghh! Today we made like true Europeans and walked to a grocery store. That's right, no minivan pulling up to a ginormous grocery store with endless options! We simply walked about a mile to Peascod Street to the local Marks & Spencer. While trying to grab a "trolley" (that's a shopping cart to us Americans) we realized they were all locked up. We inquired with the cashier who informed us we needed to insert Pounds to unlock it--luckily I had brought along some reusable shopping bags so we opted for that instead. After stocking up on a few things, we walked around Windsor and ate just outside Windsor Castle on one of the several benches, which is amazingly HUGE, I really can't believe how big it is. But the odd thing is it is set literally *right* on the road...I figured it would have more land around it. Windsor is such a neat town to walk around, although the stroller on the cobblestone streets made for quite the bumpy ride for Miss Ava! All in all it was a good first day and so fun to watch the kids' excitement about everything. Even if Braden does still think people talk "London" and use "London Money" ;-)