Christmas Trip to the Midwest

One of the things the girls looked forward to most (Abby remembered this from the last two winters) was sledding! Luckily, Minnesota got snow for us just in time and we were able to go a couple of times. Sophie had never been before and she loved it too. It was nice to have the time to do something as a family of four that we all enjoyed.

Here is Hero Daddy with his girls. He was a good sport and did a lot of carrying and pulling up the hill with his girls in tow. I wasn't as generous. Typical. :) Cute picture, though!

Here we stayed closer to our house for a quick little of the snow. Thanks to Chois for some snow gear for Abby and thanks to Noni and Papa for storing the snow gear that fit Sophie, Tim and me. We have winter jackets and fleece hats and mittens for the winter here in London, but that's it. Boots and waterproof winter gear isn't needed (except for the last week, if you have been watching international weather - we have experienced the worst winter weather in 30 years here).

Two days after we arrived in MN we had a birthday party scheduled for Sophie. It wouldn't be her actual birthday for another week, but I was afraid that it is too close to Christmas for us to have a big party on her day. I am more of a planner for these events than just one giant shopping trip to Target the day before, but this time we pulled it together quickly! Here Sophie was a bit overwhelmed by the group standing around her singing "Happy Birthday" or maybe she was nervous about getting both candles out on the first try.

Our friends and family have experienced a baby boom recently: Karla has a brand new baby girl, Aliza, Julia and 8 month old Colin and Pam with almost two year old Avery!

Daddy and the birthday girl in the living room at my parents' house. They were kind enough to provide the house for several get togethers during our time in MN.

You'd think since I write this blog I might be a bit more discerning with the pictures I choose of myself. Anyway, Sophie really enjoyed opening presents this year and got pretty good at it by the end of all the birthday and Christmas festivities. Abby and Liam are helping her out here.

We were so happy that the Sieberts were able to join us from Hudson. Last year many people weren't able to make it due to a snow storm - not this year! We always love seeing Molly, Derek, Aidan and Liam. Hopefully this year their drive was a bit shorter - just to Maplewood instead of Eagan. What cute boys!

Uncles Hyung and Tones (with Baby Aliza) hanging out by the food.

Mr. and Mrs. Claus paid a visit to the girls at Noni and Papa's house. They were fantastic and gave Abby and Sophie tasty candy canes and awesome golden reindeer antlers headbands that they wore through the rest of the holidays (including a doctor office visit). We took a picture of the Claus' with the girls, but it magically disappeared from the blog posting. Apparently the someone wanted the evidence to be minimal.

Due to the snow, we had to completely reschedule the Iowa part of the trip. Instead of traveling down to Ames late on Christmas Eve and continuing down to the Quad Cities on Christmas Day, we made the entire trip down on the 23rd. This long trip made us nervous both because of the age of the girls and the fact that Sophie gets carsick. We loaded her up with her medicine and off we went! By the way, my family couldn't have been more wonderful about us completely skipping Christmas with them. We felt like if we didn't leave when we did, we may not have gotten down to Iowa at all and my sister, Hyung and my parents were very understanding.

Sophie enjoyed playing with Mommy's winter hat as a form of entertainment for awhile.

Eventually both girls were talked into a nap and Tim and I got a little peace and quiet for awhile. However, it is important to point out that they were fantastic the whole trip. In fact, as we were nearing the exit for Davenport Tim and I both praise the girls for being so nice to each other during the 6 hour car ride (Abby had just shared her beloved Baby with Sophie) and Abby piped up, with matching hand motions: "It IS a Christmas miracle!" Yes, yes it was...

The not-getting-carsick-Sophie with her beloved Otter, aka "Ah-Ya". Her only complaint throughout the day was her left ear. She'd stick her teeny finger in her ear and say "A yittle bit hurt". I brought her to urgent care that evening and she had a nasty double ear infection. Poor little monkey. Thank goodness for travel insurance!

Jennifer, Julia and Tim plus their families all went to visit Grandpa Mike on Christmas Eve. We did a few things around the house for him and opened presents too.

There was a dogpile on Grandpa Mike's couch. Sophie decided it was a good idea to stick close to Uncle Ray through the entire visit. Abby, as usual, liked Ben's lap and Ben was happy to oblige.

Grandma Anne and her grandkids: Ben (11), Sophie (2), Colin (8 mos), Katherine (8) and Abby (4)

I brought a giant box of Christmas crackers in our luggage from England and forgot to do them on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. I finally remembered them on the 26 so we kept the Christmas spirit alive one more day! Auntie Jennifer and Abby thought they looked pretty cute in their crowns and so did I so I snapped a picture of the buddies.

When we returned back to MN after our time in IA/IL we were able to spend more time with Maya and Henry because they were still off school. It was cold and nasty out so the best idea was to hit the pool. Papa played dolphin and gave rides in the deeper water and I played with the kids in the shallow water.

The Chois and my parents were flexible enough to reschedule Christmas. The day before we left to go back to London Kristin and Hyung left work a bit early to come to my parent's for dinner and presents. It was a great time!

Maya and her favorite, umm... only, Auntie! Me and my favorite present from my cute niece!

Sophie was busy showing Papa her new dress from the Chois - although the little bloomers that came with it were being used for pure silliness. Oh my goodness!

Because of the snow the week before, we also had to reschedule our annual Christmas celebration with the Selbitschka family. They were kind enough to come over and have yummy Chipotle with us for our Christmas meal. Yum yum yum!

The Farrell and Selbitschka girls. Weren't Tones and Karla brave with little 3 month old Aliza? I think so!

Sophie with possibly her favorite think she received. A little baby care center with all sorts of little baby things like wipes, bottles, fake shampoo, etc. As you can see, she uses it for her otter nursery instead of a baby. We think this makes sense.

Auntie Sarah and gorgeous little Aliza. I love her hair.

Tony and Greta! Thanks for taking one of your precious days off to spend part of it with us and say good-bye. Thanks to everyone elso - all our fantastic family and friends who rearranged their schedule to spend time with us. We feel so loved. See you all soon!

T'was the Week before Christmas

Although we are just about ready to fly home to celebrate Christmas with our family and friends tomorrow, I wanted to share with you some things we have done recently to get into the Christmas spirit in London. It finally is beginning to feel a bit like Christmas here as it is snowing as I type this. Of course the temperature is a bit different than what its been in MN and IA - its 32 degrees today and the Londoners are whining! I hope you enjoy the pictures and little stories. See you soon!

A couple of Sundays ago, we make the little trek to Regent Street (the famous shopping street in central London). We got off the tube at Oxford Circus and walked down to Piccadilly Circus with a stop on the way at McDonalds for dinner. It was busy, cold and cool to be in the London hustle and bustle at Christmas. The lights were pretty great too.
Some of the lights on Regent Street.

Sophie has a self-imposed restricted diet. Anytime she will try anything new is a major accomplishment. Here was the mess after the first time she devoured a chocolate covered coookie (how is she possibly related to me?).

Another Christmas treat: her first sucker (a lollipop here). We went to a little Street fair in Chiswick one Saturday afternoon. It is near where the girls take their dance classes, so we popped in to look at all the fairy princess gear pictured in the background.

Southfield Primary had their Infant Nativity (Christmas Program) last week. All the classes had a song to sing and the older kids had a few speaking parts to reinact the birth of Jesus. Yes, Abby goes to a public school. No, there is no separation of church and state here. I would estimate that about 40% of the kids there are not Christian. It doesn't upset me at all, since we obviously celebrate Christmas, but as a former social studies teacher I take issue with the principle. Anyway, I know this isn't a great picture, but its with my night vision feature on my camera. I wanted to show you how Abby looked the ENTIRE time of the Christmas program, although usually she was actually waving to me and Sophie instead of just looking to make sure I was watching. See the bottom of this post for a video of her class' performance.

Here is Abby just after her triumphant 2nd ever stage performance. She loves the attention and was so proud! Also on the docket at Southfield Primary that week was the famed Christmas Bazaar where all the kids get to go shopping for presents for their family and see Santa as well. They bring pocket change and the proceeds go to the PTA. I was able to help out (as I have joined the PTA) and see Abby with her 6th grade "elves" helping her shop for us. It was fantastic. It is important to note that she did buy presents for all of us, but found a My Pretty Pony that she couldn't resist getting for herself without any guiding presence of a parent! She's played with it everyday since. :)

Here we are at our family Christmas. Sophie had been sick all weekend but perked up long enough to open a few larger presents that we aren't packing to bring to MN/IA. She also loved the jingle bells the most she stole off the front door. As you can see, we all dressed up for the occasion!

Some of the highlights were a set of exciting and motorized kitchen appliances to be added to the gourmet restaurant in the playroom. Even when Sophie was too tired or weak to sit from her being sick, she still wanted to play with the blender while she was laying down! That takes dedication - good job Auntie Kristin on the gift! Abby also got an electronic piano she had been eyeing that has several different sounds, beats, a working microphone and a record feature. I'll post from video of that perhaps on my next post. Sophie got a pretty cool ladybug play tent from Ikea. The rest has to wait until Christmas!

I think the picture of me next to Henry VIII at Hampton Court Palace now falls to second place for bad pictures I am somehow willing to post of myself. I just wanted to show the "Sunday Roast" I was able to pull off for our mini-Christmas celebration. It included a pork loin in a brown sugar glaze, roast parsips (which I constantly called turnips), peas, gravy and yummy Yorkshire puddings!

On December 3rd, Tim had his first of two work holiday parties. I had only met a couple of people that work with Tim, so I was the sole spouse invited to come along. The party was in nearby Ealing at a Polish restaurant. Not surprisingly, it was more raucus than the Christmas parties I have attended for work. Of course its been a long time since I have done group shots of vodka too.

No, that's not Polish Santa. That's Ian. He took a bet that he could change clothes with the server before the end of the night. We accepted the candy-pelting Santa instead. By the way, the server got all the wagered money for being a great sport.

No, that's not a Polish Grandma. That's Ian. This has to do with the first bet. And no, this wasn't the server's outfit either.

Tim's team near the beginning of the night!

Here is a little video of Abby singing at her "Infant Nativity" at school. Forgive me. This is the first time that I have both edited a video and uploaded it onto Blogger successfully. Its not difficult, but its my first time regardless!

Halloween Princess and Cat

Although it is clear Halloween isn't nearly as big of deal here in London, there were still plenty of activities for us to do and get in a spooky mood! On Tuesday we went to a local kitchen store to decorate cookies. The girls had a great time with our friends Shelly and Sarah slathering frosting all over yummy spider and bat cookies.

The week leading up to Halloween was also Half Term, which means there was a week off from school because Autumn Term was half over. There were a lot of kids everywhere, but also many things for us to do. The local branch of the public library even had a craft (glueing glitter to a styrofoam ball to make spiders, no less) so we were busier than a normal week.

They were so proud of their sweet creations! But loved eating them more. When we first moved to the UK, neither of them liked gingerbread, now both chow it down.

Sophie dressed up as our cat, Charlie. I couldn't talk her into putting on her paws or giving up a magic wand... so not an exact replica.

There they are, my two little goblins. We dressed up twice Halloween week - once for a friend's party on Wednesday and then, of course, for Halloween.

I can't tell you how much I love Abby. I wish she always acted the way she looks in this picture. She doesn't. Sometimes I think she is too smart for her own good but I guess a little spice in a girl is a good thing. Her little friend Ines who was in Teddies daycare and then in her afternoon nursery at Southfield Primary left to go to morning nursery. I asked Abby who she played with now that Ines is gone - she said a boy named Aaron. I asked her if he was nice to her and she said "yes, he does whatever I tell him to do". Oops, maybe I have created a monster! I then asked if she was nice to him. She said yes.

Halloween night we decorated cookies and ate a few too many right before bed. It was a late night, but a special treat. It was an all day project, as I was rolling out the gingerbread that I made the day before all afternoon while we were doing Halloween Skype calls with Tim's family.

Here is Miss Abby's gorgeous creation. Before the artwork was completed, it was a gingerbread jack-o-lantern with cut-out eyes, nose and mouth. Those holes quickly were filled up with sugar and butter and food coloring.

I think Sophie was literally crying over spilled milk in this picture. After a long day we almost didn't go trick or treating. We decided to go on the way to pick up Thai take-out. It sounds horrible, but there were only a few houses on our street that were open for business anyway. Halloween night wasn't the same as in MN!

Gran Canaria

While my parents were here in early October, they encouraged Tim and I to take a short vacation without the girls. And, while we love Abby and Sophie dearly, they didn't need to mention this idea twice. Off we went to the Canary Islands (Spain) off the coast of Africa. We left at the crack of dawn on a Friday and returned late on the following Tuesday. It was fantastic with perfect weather and friendly people.

Tim and I enjoyed nightly walks along the boardwalk above the ocean. The sunsets were spectacular and the lows were in the 70s. No sweaters at night were required!

Here is part of our giant resort that we stayed at. The Lopesan Villa del Conde. It had 5 pools, one was salt water and a full spa that we took advantage of. Sunday morning we laid by the pool for a couple of hours after breakfast and then went to the spa. We decided to go on the relaxation curcuit which was 4 different "stations" around the spa: a vitality pool, a kniepp pool (very cold water while you walk on rocks), 2 steam rooms and a sauna with aromatherapy and finally a gravity pool with the same salinity as the Dead Sea. While we waited for our final treatment, a couples massage in a cabana looking out on the ocean, we had fruit smoothies and sandwiches in the sun.

The rest of the time, we really just slept in and read a couple of books each (by the pool, of course)!

However, this is as close as Tim and I got to the ocean. It really was a pool vacation, based on our location on the island.

Enjoying another sunset.

Our first successful self portrait (after we discovered the "self-portrait setting" on our camera. Who knew?