Marriage

Kent is very concerned about marriage. He asks who he is going to marry all the time. The conversation usually starts out with questions about why he can't marry his brother.

"Mom, are you SURE I can't marry Cohen?"

"Yes honey, I am very sure you can't marry Cohen"

Then he discusses who he might marry. Sometimes he thinks it will be his friend Abby. Sometimes he thinks it will be his other friend Lauren. He told Pete this morning, "(Sigh) there's just so many girls to choose from!" He cracks me up! I keep assuring him that he really doesn't need to decide this now, but he keeps asking me when, WHEN. So, today I gave him a deadline. I let him know that people do not decide who they are going to marry till they are in college. That stopped the questions for a few minutes. Then he responded, "Mommy, if I marry Lauren, then she will have to leave her family and move in with us." I let him know that he would probably move out when he gets married, because married people like to live in their own houses. He completely freaked out saying, "Mommy, I don't EVER want to move out of our house!

I hope he always feels this way! I told him that he could live with me as long as he wanted it was all smiles again.

First Day of School

Thursday was Kent and my first day of school! I love the beginning of school. While many parents dread this day, I love the first day of school. I guess that is good since I have been going to a school every single year of my life since I started preschool. Seriously. I love the structure of school, a set schedule, new supplies, rules that are followed, lunch at the same time everyday...made for me, even! Someone else even cleans my room each afternoon. Don't get me wrong, my love of the beginning of school does wane some, somewhere around faculty meetings, grading piles of work, morning detentions, computing data... you get the picture.

I have been so excited for Kent to start school. Of course he has too. Every day this summer he asked if it was time to go to his new school. All he talks about are all the science projects that he wants to do. When Thursday finally came, we all woke up early for the big day, got ready and loaded ALL of our bags into the car. Pete and Kent headed out to his school and Cohen and I followed behind. We were all there to walk him to class and say goodbye. His teacher even emailed us halfway through the day to let us know how great of a day he was having. In the afternoon, Kent rode the bus home to my Mom's house where Pete and Mom were waiting for him at the bus stop. Pete said he was so excited to ride the bus and he had a huge smile on his face. We still haven't been able to get too many details from him about how school is going. He says he likes it, has not done any science projects yet, but the bus is great! If I try to ask anything too specific, he just responds with, "I don't remember!" We all love his teacher so far and the school nurse says that he has a big smile on his face every time she sees him. He even asked why we couln't go to school today, which is Saturday. Hopefully he will feel the same in ten years when he's fifteen!?!

A great day all around! 

Summer Pictures

My good friend Elizabeth took these for us. Check her out at elizabethduvallphotography.blogspot.com.

Life of the Party

Cohen saw a different use for the cones that were marking the race track at a friend's birthday party.

Pizza Time

Kent has been begging for pizza forever. I still don't have the dairy free cheese yet (it's like 20 bucks!!!) so we made it without. Can we still really call it pizza? I ordered the crust from an online grocery store that I sometime get things for Kent from- when I'm feeling wealthy...this little pizza crust cost $6 plus shipping! Thank goodness he can have regular pizza sauce and pepperoni. I just kept wondering if he was really going to eat it. He did try a pepperoni before the pizza went in the oven and said it was really spicy. I should have seen the forshadowing...

Cohen ate half the bag, no problem. Here you see him tearing into some salami.

The finished pie.

And the verdict...

He likes it.

Well, not so fast. By the third bite, Kent had decided that it was just ok and he didn't want anymore. Oh well. I really don't know if I can blame him. You should have smelled that thing cooking. No cheese, rice flour pizza crust = BLECH!!!!

Europe- On the way to London part 2

After leaving all things Shakespearean, we continued on our journey to London. We stopped in the afternoon in Oxford.

Oxford is really unique. It really is a college town. I can't remember exactly how many schools are in Oxford besides, well Oxford, but there are a lot of them. The city itself is a medieval town full of Gothic architecture. Every corner you turn is another place where part of a Harry Potter movie was filmed and many famous people have lived, taught or gone to school in Oxford. Some of the names I remember are Oscar Wilde, Lewis Carroll, J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis.

We walked into a little square courtyard inside a group of buildings. Apparently it was the entrance to all of Oxford's libraries. There were doors everywhere you looked leading to different libraries covering all topics- religion, philosophy, science, math, etc... You have to be really quiet in the square, whispering only. We didn't go in to any of the libraries, but you have seen at least one of them in one of the Harry Potter movies. I meant to take some pictures of the square, but I spent most of my time sitting on the ground trying to get a picture of this cool facade.

We didn't stay for long, just a couple of hours. We did go on a walking tour of the city, shopped, watched street performers, got lost in the crowds, and waited for a really, really long time in line for milkshakes. I got a ferrero roche milkshake and Pete got one called a jammie dodger. It was strawberry jam and biscuit flavored. Kind of like strawberry shortcake. Here is a cool shot of the street performer that one of my students got. I seriously was terrified he was going to light someone on fire!

Apparently it was some kind of holiday and there was a race of some kind, so it was CROWDED. We had to maneuver our way through the crowd to get back to the bus. Thankfully everyone was late so we weren't to blame...this time.

Europe- On the way to London

After we left Llandudno, we were on our way to London. The trip from North Wales to London was beautiful and we stopped in several places. Our first stop was Stratford-upon-Avon, you know, where Shakespeare was born. We stopped for lunch there and toured Shakespeare's birth home.

It was really neat to see how people lived in the 16th century. We couldn't take pictures inside of course. The rooms were so small and the entire family (8 children!) slept in the same room. The kids all slept on a trundle that rolled out from under the main bed. I'm sure some of those kids found their way into the big bed- I mean that NEVER happens now-a-days, right!?! Seriously, the room was just a little bigger than Pete's and my bedroom and I seriously cannot imagine 10 people living in there!!!! By the way, the trundle that the kids slept on didn't have a mattress, it just had a weaving of rope stretched across under blankets that the kids would lay on. The rope would have to be retightened each evening because most kids move around a lot at night. This is where the saying "Goodnight, Sleep Tight" comes from. As for the rest of the saying, I will have you know that I certainly DID NOT want to have bed bug bites from any of our hotels on our trip. Good thing Pete always inspects for those pesky critters whenever we go anywhere. He's got skills that way. Can't be too careful since they are making a comeback! Not everyone is so lucky on their travels...Oh another story, for another time.

Most of the original belongings to the house are in another museum so you can pay two entrance fees to see it all. They did have some period pieces in the house so it wasn't empty and it gave you an idea of how it looked. One of the neatest things was an original window that visitors used to carve their names on- you know, so and so's been here. It was crazy to see Mark Twain, Charles Dickens and other famous writers' signatures on there.

The garden outside the house is so pretty. I wish I could have a garden like that one day. Sadly, as of now, gardening is not one of my hobbies. Wait, what are hobbies again?
They have flowers and herbs popular from the time period arranged in a way that was popular then. In the middle of the garden there were performers dressed in period apparel performing different Shakespeare selections.

Shakespeare, by the way, was not such a great guy. Wonder who all the romantic lines were for since he left his wife Anne Hathaway after three years of marriage, with three little children (two were twins) to seek his fame and fortune in London! He did return to her though. It was about thirty years later when he was in his late forties. Wonder how that reunion went! I'm sure it was a tragedy- he died three years later.

I really liked wandering the streets of Stratford. It's very pretty with flowers and shops, street vendors and performers. No one would be wandering the streets in Shakespeare's time with everyone throwing their waste in the streets and all. Thankfully that custom has gone out of style! We had the best lunch of the trip there. Fish and chips, but the BEST fish and chips EVER!!! Here are some of the old wooden framed buildings in the Tudor style that were few and far between. Brick building would replace this style as it is naturally more fire resistant. These old buildings just look so cool.

These were the windows of the restaurant we ate at.

After we left Stratford we drove a mile down the road to Shottery to see Anne Hathaway's cottage.

Ever since seeing Sleeping Beauty as a little girl, I thought it would be fun to live in a little thatched roof cottage. Well, I no longer ever want to live in anything with a thatched roof after this trip! We learned that EVERYTHING will live with you in your pretty thatched roof. Rats, mice, cockroaches, fleas, mites, you name, they are in there. The lady at Anne Hathaway's cottage says they are still living in there, long after the Hathaway's or anyone else for that matter, has lived there. Gross. Thatch roofs are open to the living space, so if you have critters in the roof, their droppings-all droppings, would drop down onto you! Super gross. When they turned this into a museum that sealed the roof and made a ceiling so tourists would not get any extra souvenirs on them as they walked through. Thank goodness for that! The house itself is in the same wood framed Tudor style and it really is just the cutest cottage with the most beautiful gardens! Saying it is a cottage is deceiving, because it is actually huge! Something like twelve rooms. Originally the floor plan was much more open. Great big rooms separated by a pass through that had fire walls. Another problem with thatched roofs is that they catch on fire very easily. Sparks and ash would fly up to the ceiling and every now and then would still be burning causing the thatch to catch on fire. Then the burning thatch would start falling on whoever was below. The women and children were supposed to run to the pass through while the men would pull the unburning thatch down to try and stop the fire. If all else failed, the fire wall would stop it and only half the house would be destroyed. Interesting, huh!?!

Also, check out those scarecrowey things in the garden above. I thought it was genius- a strung potato with feathers stuck in it. It spins in the wind and scares off the birds.

After we toured the house and the gardens, we walked through a large sculpture garden on the property. I want one of those too, one day. This sculpture garden had hedges with a maze cut into it in the center. I particularly do not like these things. Especially since this one had that country, kind of overgrown look to it.

Pete said we had to do it though. Then he left me. Never follow a boy into a maze, they just can't resist playing around. I was lost in the hedges, but eventually found my way out complete with stinging scratches all over my legs. Pete was scratch free, but he did find a tick on him later! HA!

Europe- Wales

Before we took the trip, I never really knew we were going to Wales. I knew that we would have to travel from Dublin to London, but I didn't know we would be traveling through the most beautiful place ever!!! It was so excited to just come upon the surprise.

We woke up sooo early to make our 7 am sailing time. I knew we were taking a ferry across the Irish Sea, but when they said ferry, they really meant cruise ship. Now, I have never been on a cruise, but this seriously was not just a ferry.

The thing had three floors of things to do and you could go out on top of the boat and catch the view (if you didn't mind being blown away- it was windy out there!)

                            

After we got off the boat in Wales, we got on a coach bus that would take us to London. We would be making many stops along the way across the BEAUTIFUL countryside. This is what we saw out the window on our way to our first stop.

One look at this and I was sold. I wanted to move into that little white house on the right and disappear for a month. I had to stop taking pictures so I could sit back and enjoy the view. All the little white dots are sheep. Our guide said this was what most of the English countryside looks like and that made me happy, because this is exactly what I've always imagined while reading Pride and Prejudice.  

                        

Our first stop (and potty break) was at Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch. That was not a typo. It is the smallest little town with the longest name in the world. It's Welsh and I have come to know that words in Welsh have lots of consonants which makes it very hard for this American girl to try to pronounce anything! In English, it means: the church of Mary in the hollow of the white hazel near the fierce whirlpool and the church of Tysilio by the red cave. It was a cute little town with a great shop, good food and a fun stamp for your passport!

We drove for another couple of hours while I stared out the window with my mouth open. (There may have been some sleeping with my mouth open, but you will not see those picture here!) My students thought it was really funny to take pictures of me sleeping while I was definitely NOT looking like a sweet sleeping angel. I was very nice and never took any wide open, gaping mouth, sleeping photos of anyone....just for the record!

Our guide decided we should stop at an old slate quarry that she knew about. We were all so glad she did, well maybe just my group-the artsy ones. We were always ready for a great photo op.   
                         

After we left the slate quarry we were on the road again through Snowdonia National Park, which has got to be one of the most breathtaking places. We found ourselves winding through the mountains gasping at these vistas.

I absolutely fell in love with it up here. We stopped and got to get out and Pete and I immediately walked the opposite direction from our group to experience this view! I just had to lay down to take it all in. I LOVE mountains with no trees. Some of you know how much I dislike trees. They are messy and they block my view. I like nothing more than wide open space. Here is the view as I was laying down.

Pete and I decided to climb up the side of one of the mountains to get some good pictures. We perched on a rock pretty high up. I know this doesn't look very high, but trust me- it was!

Those darn power lines. I was blind to them when taking the pictures.

Our next stop was a seaside city by the name of Llandudno. We all fell in love with this little town. Our guide told us that Llandudno was the UK's less warm and smaller version of the French Riviera. It is a Victorian era holiday destination that hasn't really changed much over the years. We stayed in a really old hotel, which definitely was the least updated of anywhere we stayed. No air conditioning, but lots of character. We kept getting lost in the windy hallways. It also had a great chef, so the food was really good! There was so much to see that we didn't stay in the hotel too much- we were only going to be there that one afternoon. Right after getting our stuff dropped off in our rooms we headed out to the shore. Most of the beach is pebbly, but there was a sandy beach area too.

                         

The main drag is called the promenade. It runs along the coastline and has wide sidewalks with palm trees. All the hotels along the promenade are varying shades of white, cream and beige. The town is more than the promenade, but we didn't really explore the city. Everything closes early, which is common in Europe. Everyone just wants to get off work so they can relax. After we explored the beach we walked down to the long boardwalk. Peak tourist time for Llandudno is July, so a lot of the carnival rides and games were still closed. We really didn't mind, because without all the vacationers, we really had the place to ourselves.

                         

Old wrought iron from the boardwalk.

Here's what it looked like a hundred and fifty years ago or so. I know this looks pretty similar to old pictures of Coney Island that you have seen before, but I just cannot imaging taking my children to the beach and schlepping all the stuff in my dress, corset, boots and hat!

Then and now.

Along the boardwalk we got a great view of the Great Orme of Llandudno, which is a big hunk of limestone that juts out. We even found our way down to a little secluded beach area where there were caves and all kinds of colorful rocks.

The girls in front of the cave. I did not go in. I did not want to meet a bat... or something worse!

Looking up we saw the remains of some kind of medieval structure. I learned after we got home that the rest fell into the ocean and this is all that is left.

                                       

Up on top of the Great Orme is a beautiful garden area with walking paths and a spectacular view. My three female students all want to come to Llandudno on their honeymoons and my male student thought it was "really cool" as well. Funny enough, I came across on some British guy's blog that had a photo of Llandudno with a caption under it that says, "it's not quite Florida, but it'll do." Crazy, huh!?!? I guess everyone gets tired of the vacation spots near them. I love Florida too, but Llandudno is so much cooler than Daytona, Destin, Miami Beach and Key West combined! Well friends, can you believe this entire post was all in one day!?! I'm exhausted just remembering it!