Abilene Wylie won!

Go Bulldogs!
Go Bulldogs!!
Go Bulldogs!!

Wish we could see a live game.

(ACU lost, bummer. Especially after such a nice write up in the NYTimes about the quarterback)
But Wylie won. Yeah.

Watching the Cowboys on Thanksgiving made us a little homesick. Seeing the stadium when they showed the aerial view - just makes us want to buy a ticket to Big D.

Happy Thanksgiving

Wishing you a Happy Thanksgiving!
We are having just a "normal" day here. School, work, basketball practice, etc are all still ON. We are doing our big meal on Saturday with some friends. I don't have to cook a turkey this year with the feathers still attached, YEAH!
I went into the city with several friends for the American Thanksgiving service at St. Paul's cathedral. The cathedral was packed full of people. I still think it is one of the most beautiful building interiors in the world. The ceilings are gorgeous. US Ambassador Tuttle presided over his last Thanksgiving service. With a change in Presidents comes a change in Ambassadors. The minister from the church we attend was the main speaker. He did a great job. One of our friends' sons said a prayer at the service. It was fun knowing people who were up there. It makes you realize how far we as a family have come that I can sit in that service full of people from all around the world and know folks sitting in almost every section. Strange sensation.
I still get a little choked up when the Marines march the American flag by while we are singing "purple mountains majesty...". Feels very patriotic.
Tonight we are headed out for a very "unThanksgiving" Italian meal. The guys are trying to get home in time from work to join us. I hope DA catches the early train. I would hate to have our Italian Thanksgiving meal without him.
We are thinking of all our family and friends back home. Looking forward to seeing you all very soon. Happy Thanksgiving.
Here is a link to a NYTimes article about the service.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/28/world/europe/28cathedral.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

American food

My kids and their American taste buds. I recently bought L a treat at a local farm store that sells a few American products. He really likes the pop tarts in the BLUE box that are the brown sugar flavor. I rarely buy them because they are so expensive, but I thought it would be a treat since he had worked hard at school. He was so excited to see them in the cupboard. He could not believe I found some of the "right" flavor. Little does he know, they are available most of the time, I'm just too cheap to buy them on a regular basis. I mean how many 5$ pop tarts does a kid need? He told me that next time I am headed to that store, I must come get him out of school (as if..) take him home to get his wallet and HE will buy the poptarts with his own money. Poor kid. I know how he feels though. We are counting the days until we can be in Dallas and eat at Mi Cocina and Houstons. I think I'll make a run by the grocery in Dallas and buy him a few boxes to wrap up for Christmas. It will probably be his favorite gift.

congrats to my favorite Abilene teams

yeah, Wylie Bulldogs!
Yeah, Abilene Christian!
Both teams still winning this fall. Nice news to see upon waking up this morning. ACU even made my front page of Yahoo sports. Very impressive.
Havent seen a live football game since Fall 2006. Reading Wylie's online play by play is as close as we get.
Go Bulldogs. Go Wildcats.

Time for lights?

By the title you think I'm talking about Christmas lights right? nope. Not Christmas yet. Gotta get Thanksgiving celebrated. What I'm talking about is "what time do you turn on the lights?" Seriously. Every day here that time gets earlier and earlier. Today the kids and I went out to lunch after church. (Wagamama, my favorite) DA was sick AGAIN. I swear riding on the tube makes him sick on a weekly basis. We left the restaurant at 2:00 pm and it felt like it was after dinner. It wasn't dark exactly, but it felt like evening with the sun so low in the sky. We were home by 3:00, and I had to actually turn on the lights in the house so that we could see. 3:00 people. that is just too darn early. So just think of us at 3:oo your time today. Do you have to turn on all the lights yet? nope? see, TOO DARK IN LONDON!!! that is the biggest problem living here - well at least for us vitamin D (pronounced with "it" not "ite") deficient folks. Maybe that's DA's problem. Not enough vitamin D to keep him well. Where is the summer time? - the sunshine til 10:00pm? This is why no one visits London in the winter.
Just my daily winching about the darkness (they don't say "whining" here). The darkness drives me crazy!!!!

kids had successful week

Some weeks are better than others, but this was a good week. L found out on Friday that he made the middle school basketball team. He was thrilled. Lots of boys tried out, so he wasn't sure if he'd be selected or not. He also received his first report card of the year and made some really good grades. yeah! One surprising side effect of all this good news was that he was begging me that we would stay here through the NEXT school year. ????!!!!!!

B finished her soccer league playing well. It was freezing (literally) at the field, so all the girls were having to be talked into staying out on the field. She was glad it was over so she could buy some American candy at the candy tent at the field. She really wanted skittles, but when she came back she had a "airhead" in her hand. She said, "I know I can get skittle's at another store, but I cant get any Airheads, so I got them since this is my last chance to buy them." Made me laugh that she knows exactly which American candy we can and cannot find in England.

One other great thing about today - the sun came out for about an hour. It was so nice. Freezing temps tolerable when the sun is shining. We are expecting snow in the morning. "I'm dreaming of a white Thanksgiving"

Tour of Big Ben

ok, what I should be typing here is about my great tour of Big Ben tower, BUT I missed it!!

Such a bummer. Getting a tour of Big Ben is for residents only. Must have a UK address to make arrangements for the tour. I have one friend who, very graciously, made arrangements for a group of us to receive a tour. We have to go through our "MP" which is similar to your State Representative in Washington. We all had to turn in our details: place of birth, legal name.....etc. A real pain to get organized. Anyway, my tour was for Monday at 11:30. Very strict appointment time and date. I had a doctor's appointment that morning in Chertsey that I had moved up so I could make my train. Was going to have a 23 min window after I arrived at Waterloo station to get over to the government building by Big Ben. Close timing, but doable. I Got to the train station on time, bought my ticket after a VERY SLOW man who was buying a senior rail card - took forever. Anyway, my train was a couple of minutes late -- not good -- cutting into my 23 min window. train Actually departed 10 min late --- really not good-- and by the time we arrived in Waterloo and I made a mad dash through the train station --- I arrived at 11:35. the tour had already departed and the door guard would NOT let me go through, nor would he escort me to the tour. I was turned away. I was dejected and mad at the train company. How dare they!

SO, If I ever get to see the bell at the top of Big Ben I will write about how cool it is, but for now here's a photo.

Note: this photo was NOT taken this week. We are in the humm drums of grey winter skies in which the sun sets at like 10AM so just know that we are not experiencing such pretty blue, clear weather.

Games Day

Saturday happened to be a day of games. Our church sponsored an "Amazing Race" through London. The exciting thing is that the Amazing Race is my absolute favorite TV show. I would love to be on the real show so I was very excited to do a small scale family version through London. Only problem - our buddy family was English/Dutch and had never even heard of the Amazing Race and they had no idea we needed to hurry, get the challenges completed and move onto the next clue. I was so frustrated. I wanted to WIN. Unfortunately, we came in 4th out of 6 teams. The kids did great though. They walked ALL over London. No tube rides for us.
That evening we hurried back home only to get to our next event of Quiz night through the American Women's group. Our friends challenged the wives against the husbands. We thought we would ROCK. but, came in next to last out of 7 groups. Major bummer. We did great on the British History category only to blow it on the American History. We also did poorly on the Olympics section.
Fun games day - but I wanted to win! Need to brush up on my US Presidents.

English cooking disaster # 7,365,484

When will I learn... all efforts at cooking here are just laughable. Tonight I made my first attempt at a traditional English apricot pudding (their version of cake - not baked, but steamed). This is how it worked out

DISASTER! but smells really good. Should look like a cake made in a jello mold turned out on a plate with toffee coating. think this falls under "complete failure"!
Very disappointing since pudding takes forever to cook on the stovetop (1.5 hrs +)
I know what my problem is though. One part of the recipe calls for baking soda and the other part calls for baking powder. I mixed them up and since I dont really understand the science of baking soda/powder, I didn't know how to counteract my mess-up. It's very confusing since the English version of soda is half strength, so if you are making US recipes with UK ingredients, you must double soda. If making UK recipe with US ingredients, I might need to half it. (that might even be wrong. It could be baking powder that is half/double strength.)
Regardless, it was a complete, globby mess. The real kicker is that I went to a cooking class and watched a lady make the same recipe, so I thought I had all the odds working on my side. Think again, Bridget!

Hope your dinner turns out well tonight.

Remembrance Day

http://www.freefoto.com/preview/9904-11-12?ffid=9904-11-12

Today Remembrance Day was celebrated in England. It is the basic equivalent to Veteran's Day in the USA. It is marked by wearing a poppy such as this on your lapel. This year is the 90th annual commemoration of the end of WWI which is always done on the Sunday closest to the 11 day of the 11 month of the 11th hour. The whole country has a 2 min. moment of silence at 11:00am to remember the end of WWI in addition to paying respect to all the families who sacrificed for that great war plus all the other conflicts which have happened since. We had our moment of silence during church and they read off some statistics that seemed poignant.
In the "British Empire" as it was called at the time, they mobilized almost 5.5 million people and suffered almost 2.5 million casualties of either wounded or dead. France mobilized 7.5 million people with almost 4.3 million casualties of wounded or dead, and the US, which joined the war later, also suffered significant casualties with over 300,000 wounded or dead.
The English gentleman leading the memorial gave much respect and credit to the US for helping end the war so quickly.
I guess living here and traveling through Europe - even visiting the American Cemetary in Normandy, it has opened my eyes to realize how WWI and WWII deeply affected the people, landscape, and entire societies of the whole world. Millions dead or wounded. It's just mind boggling. Even to this day you can see bomb damage in London that happened during the blitz of WWII.
I know I studied WWI during school, but I guess I've always heard more about the second world war. It is interesting to hear about history from another perspective and to learn what is significant to them. I appreciate having these opportunities to understand and see first hand the history of Europe.

No funny quips today, just commemorating Remembrance Day.
I guess the endless days of rain, grey skies and darkness just zap the "funny" right out of me.

My American moment

We have a running joke here that anytime we do anything "American" that we should know better NOT to do anymore - we call it having our "American Moment" of the day.
Usually referred to when DA drives on the right side of the road - not to be confused with the correct side of the road that he should be on to avoid having a wreck.
Anyway, today I went to a grocery store I have only been in once before. I didnt know where things were located. I was distracted when walking into the store - reading some vouchers (coupons) that had been handed to me as I walked in. Unusual because they dont use coupons here, so I was a little dazed by knowing what to do with them ;-)
I was shopping for 1 thing - eggs. I immediately looked up around the top part of the walls for the big EGGS sign. Didnt see it, started walking down the refrigerated aisle. Didnt see them, walked to other end of store for more refrigerated section when I remembered!!!! after being here for almost 2 years that eggs are NEVER sold in the refrigerated section. They were located, as usual, in the middle of the cereal aisle. I could not believe after all this time that I had a mental block and actually looked in several places in the store for refrigerated eggs. How dare I think that eggs should actually be cold (or white or without feathers and bits on them!) It's those kind of moments that make me shake my head and realize that no matter how long I'm here, the oddball habits are hard to break.
Moments later I also had sticker shock - 2 dozen eggs cost 8 GPS. That seemed outrageous to me. Are they that much in Dallas?

Oh - update on the eco milk sold in the bag. They now have a plastic carton that they sell right next to the milk for you to put your milk into to dispense it - obviously - but this new eco solution is so much more expensive than the regular milk. How can "eco" milk in a bag be more expensive than milk in a carton? Crazy.

The Hills are Alive...

The hills are alive... with the sound of off key singing!!!!
For half term break we did a driving tour of southern Germany and Austria. Got to do some really fun stuff which included a tour of all the Sound of Music movie sites in Salzburg, Austria. DA made us recreate some of the scenes. Here are a couple.

"Doe, ray, me.." cue Julie Andrews for the high note, cause we surely cant hit it.

"I am 16 going on..." the gazebo is locked due to a grandma jumping from bench to bench - she fell and sued for damages, hence no more jumping from bench to bench.
Our decision to drive across Germany/Austria was based partly on the fact it is fairly easy to do, the scenery is beautiful and since it is low season, there really aren't many professional tours we could have joined anyway. Driving ourselves to our own schedule was great except for --- they drive on the right side of the road! DA had to drive a stick shift - on the right side of the road- and we were driving straight up narrow roads in the Alps. Scary! He drove on the wrong side so, so, so many times. And then he kept stalling the car. He did a much better job than I ever could have, but it was still nerve wracking. If it weren't for the TomTom (satNav) we would still be driving around the border looking for signs we could read.
We ended up making our trip safely. Surprisingly, we had some friends who ended up being on our same flights and were going to some of the same towns as we were. Very strange to run into someone you know (unexpectedly) on top of a mountain in Germany. The kids were pumped seeing their friends, made the trip just that much more fun.
Here are some highlights:
Neuschwanstein castle in Germany. Supposedly this castle inspired Walt Disney's Cinderella castle.
Our hotel at the top of the mountain - the building on the right. The hotel was just below the ruins of Falkenstein castle. I held my breath the entire time we drove up the 1 lane road to get to the top - stalling the car made it so memorable!
Me at the top of Falkenstein castle ruins. I'm the one waving!Salzburg, Austria. One of my favorite things - the iron signs lining the old town. They are so picturesque. Even McDonald's has a fancy sign.

We visited the salt mines outside of Salzburg. (get it? Salz = Salt. The $ from the salt mines paid for the building of Salzburg)
The salt mine tour was really cool. We were so far underground (at least 750 meters straight into a mountain). We even crossed the German/Austrian border while underground.
We had to wear these dorky white overalls - to protect our clothes from the narrow cave walls and also to protect our legs on the cool slides they had which allowed us to get from one level to another within the mine.
We rode this train into the mine - too far to walk!Innsbruck, Austria Olympic ski jump. I'll never understand how those jumpers get the nerve to jump the first time.
My family on the Olympic medal stand in Innsbruck at the bobsled track.


The first snow of the season happened while we were there. Had to get out of the car and throw a few snowballs.

Munich, Germany.
The Marienplatz and the glockenspiel. B was soooo over it by this point. We'd been to one old building too many.
B looking out over Munich. It was absolutely freezing in Munich, but it was warmer than London which had ice at the time.

This was the weirdest site of the whole trip - entire stores devoted to decorated eggs- thousands of them. They were mainly Easter themed, but had Christmas and Halloween ones too. They cost 6.50 Euro per egg, so they weren't cheap. Family - this is what you're getting for Christmas gifts.... NOT!

Happy Halloween and Guy Fawkes!

Happy Halloween. We celebrated last week with a big trunk or treat event at the kid's school. B was a "colorful Fairy" and L was a punk rocker.

B and friends at their costume parade at school.
On the 31st we stayed home and handed out some candy. The concept of trick or treating isnt as ingrained here as it is in the States. I answered the door one time to a group of kids and no one said anything when I opened the door. I said, "no trick or treat?" they just looked at me and held out their bags. Instead of "thank you" I got the British "cheers." Our funniest trick or treater costume was a boy dressed in dark clothes with a woman's bra and panties on top. Instead of carrying a bag for his candy, he stuffed his goodies into his bra. It was so funny.

Today started the Guy Fawkes celebration. They light fireworks for about 2 weeks straight. We have had about 3 hours worth already tonight. It seems every home with a decent sized garden buys fancy fireworks and shoots them off sometime over the next couple of weeks.

I'm not sure if they ever wish anyone this, but "happy Guy Fawkes" to you all.