Meeting a celebrity

If you have read any of our posts, you know that B is crazy about the musical, WICKED. We had a brush with greatness on Sunday. We were in the city with our guests and happened to be in Leichester Square during an event called West End Live where acts from all the big shows perform on a stage set up in the middle of the square. Right when we walked up, Kerry Ellis started singing one of her songs from WICKED. She is B's FAVORITE character, the green witch, AKA the Wicked Witch of the West from the Wizard of Oz story. Immediately after she sang, B decided she wanted to get her autograph. I let her walk to the side of the stage and low and behold, Kerry was out there signing a few autographs. B was wearing her WICKED tshirt and she was so happy that Kerry autographed it for her. It was definitely a highlight of our stay here. I have included a photo.

PS. we had to go see the show again last night. 3rd time this summer :)

School's Out for Summer (finally)

Being from the great state of Texas, we are accustomed to getting out of school in May, so attending school until the end of June has been a real adjustment for the kids and Mom! But finally we are out!!! The last day of school was sad because so many families are moving away, as they do each semester. The kids and parents are all saying good-bye on the last day while knowing they may never see each other again. Both B and L had friends that were moving over the weekend, but they seemed to recover from the day better than I thought they might. It was helped by the fact that one of B's friends was arriving from Dallas the next morning and L and DA were leaving for a 4 day trip to Normandy, France for "everything you ever wanted to know about Dday" tour. I included some photos of B with her friends. The 2 boys in the photo have already moved, but B really liked playing with them. One of L's friends moved to Dallas, but he forgot to get his new phone number and address for us to call him when we visited home.

Flag Day

Well, in case you missed it on your calendar, today is USA Flag Day. What does that mean to us in the UK, well at our school, it means they fly the American flag over the school for the day. There is a ceremony by the flagpole, and all the American kids come dressed up in their red, white and blue. My kids were very excited to wear their Uncle Sam hats we got in the mail last week in a 4th of July party pack (from our sweet friends, the Barnes). B was wearing a flag shirt her friend brought her in May so they were all decked out and thinking of home. Lest you think our school is biased towards Americans, there is a flag flying day for every country represented at the school- which there are MANY.

Weekend activities

On Friday night we decided to continue our "tour" of London's musicals and took the family to see Les Miserable, the longest running musical in the WORLD as they like to say. We had great seats and all enjoyed it. B thought it ran a little long and decided to take a 5 min nap in the 2nd act, but she perked up when young Cosette came onstage to sing. B has decided she wants to act and has requested acting lessons. I'll have to research that. She may arrive back in the States quoting Shakespeare with an English accent.

On Saturday, we took a drive down to Stonehenge to walk around and "appreciate" the site. I had heard mixed reviews about going, but being so close, we just had to go. It is about 1.5 hr from our house. DA and I thought "very interesting, L thought "very cool" and B - well she thought "whatever". The fact it was built 5,000 years ago was lost on her. She thinks everything around here is old, but Stonehenge is really old.

We continued on to Wells to tour the Wookey Hole caves. They are somewhat similar to Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, but the walkways are much more primative and there is a river that runs through the caves that is 100 ft. deep. Divers were in the water and fortunately we had been warned and were not shocked at seeing something moving in the water. Guide said one lady about had a heart attack earlier when one of the divers emerged from the water while she was telling the spooky witch legend. It was a fun place to tour with the kids. Once again, it was a very old place, but B didnt seem to mind. They also age cheese in the caves which smelled pretty stinky. They are about to ship thousands of pounds of that cheese to the States, so if any of you Central Market shoppers come across cave-aged cheese from Dorset or Somerset - then we can vouch for it - definitely cave aged!

Visitors, YEAH!

As you can see, one of B's best friends came to visit !!!! what a great time we had hosting them. They experienced quite a range in weather while here from coat and gloves cold, to shorts and flip-flops hot. One photo is of the girls wearing 1 rain jacket while riding on the Tube. We joined a double decker bus tour of the city and sat up on the open top in the pouring rain. Moms sat up top too, while the dads enjoyed the dry, lower level. The girls decided they would rather share a rain jacket, so hence the double headed blonde cutie walking down the London streets. We also rode the London Eye, did a walking tour by Westminster Abbey, Downing Street, Trafalgar Sq, Picadilly Circus, Buckingham Palace amongst other places, but mainly we just enjoyed visiting. One of the highlights was taking the girls to see Wicked - yes my 2nd time in 1 week, but they LOVED it. In fact, on their last night together, the girls performed all 19 songs from the soundtrack with costume changes, props, witch's hat, flying broom, and magic spell book. It was precious. We were so impressed that they figured out how to rig the broom to the ceiling and lower it down at the right time. I must say, after hearing the sound track so many times lately, I can recite the entire show. Idena Menzel, watch out!

With the kids still in school and our guests back in the States, it is a little too quiet around here---next guests dont arrive for a couple of weeks - so, anybody up for a quick trip to London?