London and Henry

A few weeks ago I took a day trip to London leaving very early in the morning and returning late that night. This trip was part of my "reward" for taking care of the kids on my own for a month this summer, one of which had a broken arm that required surgery. I need to post about that whole ordeal sometime but it is all still a little to traumatic! Anyways, I digress....So, I headed to London to see Windsor Castle where my man Henry VIII is buried, to visit the Victoria and Albert Museum and to see Kate's wedding dress which is on display at Buckingham Palace.

Getting to Windsor was a bit of a challenge as it is off the regular central London tube system that I feel pretty comfortable with. To get to Windsor from the airport I could either take an expensive cab ride or find a bus. I stopped off at the info desk to find where to catch my bus and found myself in an argument with the info lady who would not tell me anything until I gave her my full days' itinerary. She then proceded to tell me that there was no possible way to do all of those things in one day. I smiled politely and assured her that this was not my first time to London and I felt pretty confident with my schedule. After about five minutes of, oh no, no you won't have time/yes, yes I will's back and forth I caved and admitted to my folly of planning too much for one day and was able to attain the directions to my bus. Not to brag, but I had time and then some to see everything :)

Windsor is where the queen spends her weekends when she is in London, it is a fully functioning castle and was once lived in by the King John of the Robin Hood tales although I should note that that story is not at all how it happened. A lot of the "newer" portions of the castle and surrounding walls were built from the bricks obtained from the destruction of the monestaries when Henry VIII tossed the Catholic church by the wayside to marry Anne Boleyn. But, most importantly of all it is where this man, whith whom I have an unnatural obsession with is buried. I found his tomb in the chapel of this castle. This was no easy feat as it is nothing more than a black marble square in the floor. Apparently the actual coffin is under the floor in the crypt and yes, you can access it but only the high priest ever goes down there. And no, they never let anyone else down there no matter how much it would mean to them. And yes, when they say the gate to the crypt is locked, it really is. Even if you push on it really hard when no one is looking. You could totally climb the gate though if no one was around to care...I wonder what the least busiest day is at Windsor? Things to ponder, things to ponder.

While at Windsor I got to see the changing of the guard. I have not seen this at Buckingham where I think most people watch but it was kind of cool anyways. I do not know how they expect to protect anyone from anything when they can barely see out of those big, furry hats.

From Windsor it was on to central London. This was a bit trickier than coming from the airport but I got there and have included a picture from one of my train changes 'cause I was pretty proud that I did not have to resort to taking a cab. I went straight to the V&A museum and I don't know if my early morning was catching up to me but I found it....boring. It seemed disorganized and sprawling and there was way to much sculpture. On the plus side entry is free so at least I wasn't out any money. From the V&A I popped into Harrods to have some lunch. My dessert was the most amazing concoction I have ever seen and was worthy of a picture before I gobbled it up! I then jogged over to Buckingham to see the dress. I have already toured the palace and have seen the crown jewels and just wanted to see the dress. NOT because I was in a hurry or cutting it close on time(ok, info lady, I was a little bit, I stress the word little) but mostly because once was just enough! My jealousy of Kate and the fact that she will one day be queen was not helped by seeing her beautiful and very tiny waisted dress on display. I do have to laugh though when I think of the her showing the queen her wedding dress display and the queen saying she found it "creepy". Queen El II cracks me up, she is such a pill!

From Buckingham I headed back to the airport and had a nice kid free flight back to Dusseldorf. In a way I feel sorry for people who have never flown with small children, they have no horrible flight experiences of kids throwing up on them or crying the entire time to make flying by themselves so blissful. It was a great day and I will miss being able to do this when we no longer live here. Thanks to Ryan for taking the kids while I was gone!

A Beautiful Day

I took this photo today after I dropped James off at his preschool. This is in the forest where he goes to school and where I go walking. It is probably the most beautiful piece of land I have ever been on. It is so peaceful and quiet in there. All I can hear are sounds of nature with the birds chirping and the wind through the trees. When I think of things I will miss when we go back home, this place is pretty high up on the list!

Scotland

As promised here are some pics from Scotland. We had such a great time on this trip! We spent the first half on the SW coast and the golf resort Turnberry and the second half in Edinburg. We flew to Scotland and then rented a car when we got there as Ryan and I both wanted to have the experience of driving on the other side of the road from the other side of the car. It was awesome and just a little bit scary! It's kinda hard to judge where you are on the road when you are on the other side of the car but I think we both did really well! Our hotel in Turnberry was beautiful and had a great view of the coast. Each night at 6:30 a man in full Scottish dress came out to the back porch and played the bagpipes for 30 minutes. Groan if you wish but I loved it, so much so that I bought a CD of bagpipe music that I made everyone listen to on the way to Edinburg. Odd though that I haven't seen that CD since....Ryan? Any comments? Suggestions as to where it might be?
While at Turnberry the boys got to do a little bit of horsebackriding, except for James who was TERRIFIED of the horses. We walked along the coast where somehow Adam fell in the water and got completely soaked! I had my first fish and chips, it was delish! So much so I included a picture :) The boys did a golf clinic with Dad and no European trip would be complete without a tip to a castle. We did not hit any cathedrals this time though to the boys' immense relief! I absolutely LOVED the Scottish people. Everywhere we went they were so sweet and friendly and willing to have a chat with you. All in all it was one of my favorite trips so far and we have definite plans to head back to Turnberry some day.

Hoe gaat het

I have to say, I love the Netherlands and I love the Dutch and their crazy language. We get a few Dutch radio stations and are often crossing the border into the Netherlands to pick up groceries as they have a much larger selection of goods than can be found in Germany. I don't really know how to describe how Dutch sounds except to say that it sounds kinda like gibberish. The title of this post is pronounced: who got it and it's how you say how's it going. Some other Dutch favorites are: soap=zeep and pudding=vla. I mean come on, vla! That's not a word! Please pass the vla! I have met several Dutch people over the last two years from our travels and from friends at the boys' school and I think they are fun, friendly people. The all speak English really well partly because there is no Dutch tv. They watch tv in English with Dutch subtitles. We took a trip to Amsterdam last summer and really enjoyed it. The whole city has a canal system and we were able to purchase a family hop on hop off ticket for the canal boats to take us around the city. We toured around the city, ate some good food, avoided the "coffee shops" and the red light district....although I found it immensely amusing that there are late night tours offered through the red light district that are led by former prostitutes. Reading through the reviews of this tour on my favorite go-to website www.viator.com for figuring out what to do where when we travel was intertaining! My favorite review was short and to the point and said: very informative! Yes, I'm sure it was.

This last Saturday we loaded the fam up in the VW Touran to spend the day in Roermond, NL. This little city is about 40 min from where we live. It has an excellent grocery store and a good movie theater with a large selection of movies shown in English. We took the kids to see Zookeeper (I'll save you the time and the money, you can pass on this one) picked up some tasty Dutch goods, swung through KFC and headed home. Thanks Roermond for another great day trip, dank je wel (kinda sounds like donkey vell).

Back in the Saddle

Ok, so it has been a really long time since I have posted anything. I guess we were just busy living for awhile! But, I have since realized that we are making some pretty incredible memories here that I don't want to forget! So, quick recap: last year was our second year here in Dusseldorf. Last school year went really well and we had some amazing travels. We went to Paris with Ryan's parents, showed my parents around Dusseldorf and went on what has been one of my favorite trips so far to Scotland! I'm hoping this blogger motivation stays with me long enough to post some pics from these trips. But the best part about last year was that somewhere around March we came to really love being here in good ol' Deutschland. We have loved the travel aspect all along but have found our living situation....difficult. So many things went into the way we felt about living here but I think one of the biggest things was just how different life is here compared to life in America and apparently I am not as good with change as I thought I was :) We have grown so much closer as a family and have learned to rely on each other living here. We have also learned to appreciate a slower and less complicated way of life. All of the little things that used to drive me crazy I have come to see in a different light and I can now see some major advantages to the way things are done here. I still say that it is hard work being a German and I will hate till the day I die my very, very small and very, very slow washing machine and dryer but, I have found so much beauty and so much to love in this place! So as we start what will most likely be our last year in Dusseldorf I hope to soak up ever little bit that Germany and Europe have to offer before we head back to Colorado.