London: Day One

We flew out Thursday, May 24 at 6 pm. We left Madison around noon, drove to Chris's, and Matthew so kindly took us to the airport so we didn't have to deal with the hassle (and expense!) of parking. The flight was actually ok; it was about 7 hours, maybe a bit more, but the food was surprisingly good, and I slept for about 3.5 hours, so when we arrived at 8 am (even though it was 2 am our time), I wasn't too terribly tired. Poor Dan was, though, since he didn't sleep at all!

We took the Heathrow Express to Paddington Station; it was only a 15-minute trip, and once we got off the train, our hotel was only a block away. Our room wasn't quite ready yet, but they took our luggage while we strolled around the neighborhood. We ate breakfast at this place called Mimo's Cafe. It was pretty good, but Dan didn't like that the breakfast had beans, not potatoes (and I must agree, beans don't exactly seem like a breakfast food!) and unless you specify your eggs scrambled, they come out fried and very, very runny. Oh well, live and learn, I guess. That's what travel is about, right?

After breakfast, we went back to the hotel, and our room was ready around 11, which was nice, since we could shower and change after that long plane ride. We then decided to go to Kensington Palace, which was very interesting. It wasn't a place I had originally planned to go, but we thought it sounded interesting, and we wanted to do something so that we weren't tempted to sleep! (But we didn't want to do one of our must-sees, since we were worried that we'd be too tired to fully enjoy it. So this was the perfect compromise).

Kensington Palace was great. We saw the apartments of the King William & Queen Mary, and we also saw Victoria and Albert's apartments, Victoria's wedding dress, etc. It was very interesting! We wished we had time to see the gardens as well, as the gardens there are supposed to be beautiful, but after three hours wandering around the palace, we were sooo tired, so the hotel it was!

That night, we ate at this very good pub called Sawyers Arms. Dan had the fish and chips (what else?) and I had this great chicken covered in bacon and an aged cheddar. The food was really good; not at all the blah, bland, British food England is known for!

A hotel employee coming to tell Dan our room was ready

 Our beautiful hotel room

 The bathroom

 The closet, with complimentary bottled water in the fridge; yay!

 The patio; we were one of the only rooms that had a patio. It was so beautiful to sit out there at night (although we only did about half the time) and talk and plan our following day.

Me outside the start of this courtiers' game at Kensington Palace. It was quite interesting; you had to gather three cards, and then once you made a match of three (three diamonds, spades, etc.) you looked for the hidden letters and it told you what your station at the court was. So I, for example, found the cards with BEW, which meant I was an esteemed physician. Nice! Dan, however, was just a ragamuffin. Hmmph.

 Some awesome dresses we saw displayed. Am I the only one who wishes we still dressed like this??

 This dress was worn by a duchess when they celebrated Queen Victoria's coronation. They were supposed to be people from different time periods, so that is why her dress looks like it's from the third-century era in Syria.

 Queen Victoria's wedding dress; beautiful! 

A picture of Queen Victoria. I think she looks JUST like Rori will look when she's older; in fact, it quite freaks me out (in a good way!)

Me on Friday night, after Kensington Palace, planning out our next few days via the Rick Steves guide while sitting on our beautiful hotel patio.

The zoo!

Kate & I went to the zoo today and had a fantastic time! Sadly, I did not bring the camera. But we had a blast. We got there before 10 am, which apparently is the time to get there if you want to see the animals in action (well, except for the lions; they were just lazing about again like always). But we loved seeing the orangutans; we spent several minutes watching them outside before heading in to see them from another angle. One orangutan rolled right up to the glass as he was playing with the ball and looked at us for several minutes. It was so neat to see him so up-close! Then we feel like we hit the jackpot because the bears were also out. The bears never seem to be out! The grizzly bear went in his little pool and would pop his head up from time to time, almost like he was intentionally playing peek-a-boo with the spectators. There was this little girl around 7 or so standing next to us, and she was laughing at the bear's antics, so that made Kate laugh hysterically, too. The polar bear was fun to see, too. Funny how bears don't scare me when there's a nice, deep ravine and a rock wall between us ;)


Of course we also went on the carousel (she chose a tiger) and played on the playground for a little bit, although this time she seemed more interested in seeing the animals than playing on the playground (even though, since it was only in the high 60s, it was a much better day, temperature-wise, to play on the playground than some other days we've been there. Oh well!) Then we went to the Laurel for lunch; apparently we're considered regulars there now because when the waitress saw us, she said, "Is it Friday already?" Ha!

When I typed up my post a couple days ago detailing some of the things Kate has been saying, I forgot quite a few! So here are some more Kate-isms:

• She doesn't quite have the concept of "don't"/"not"/etc. So if she wants to make some things negative, she'll just shake her head as she's saying her piece. For example, if she's talking about Gaston, who is bad, and she wants to convey the fact that she doesn't like him, she'll say, "Like him" as she's shaking her head. Or lately, if I can't understand what she's saying, I'll smile and say "Honey, I don't know what you're talking about." So if she's trying to say something, I'll try to guess what she means, but if after a few tries I get it wrong, she'll shake her head and say "Talk about!" It's so cute!
• Any mention of snakes is immediately followed by an "Ewww!!" and a big smile (which seems kind of contradictory). Anything that could be considered ambiguous (like butterflies, caterpillars, bees) but she actually does like is followed by a "Not ew."
• Sesame Street is really the only TV show we watch on a regular basis. Elmo (Kate's favorite character) has a goldfish, Dorothy. He'll always ask the kids, "Dorothy wants to know, how do you get dressed/brush your teeth/etc." Then the kids will say, "This is how I brush my teeth, Dorothy," or whatever. Lately out of the blue, Kate will say something and follow it up with Dorothy (except it sounds like Dort-ee.) The other day, she was saying, "I hungry too, Dort-ee!" or "I have shoes too, Dort-ee!" It is so funny to me what she picks up!
• I always say "Hi, sweetie!" so now she says that to me (except sweetie sounds like fwee-tee.) She'll run up to me and say, "Hi, fwee-tee!" Silly girl.
• Whenever she hears a phone ring, she'll put her hand up to her ear and say, "Hello? Oh, hi." Ready for the teen years already, I see (except I guess most teens today just text, unlike in my day...).
• Last night, after Rori's recital, we were cuddling in bed as we turned in for the night and she threw her arms around me and said, "I love you!" I said, "I love you, too!" and she squeezed me tighter and said, "very much." I can honestly say that was one of the highlights of my life, as simple a moment as it seems.

Springtime Fun!

Kate & I have been loving this spring weather! We (well, I, and Kate had no objections) made it our goal to do something outside every day this week. Tuesday we met Meghan and Adelaide at the zoo, Wednesday we spent a ton of time at one of Kate's favorite parks by Olbrich Gardens (and I like it because it's shaded, so the slides don't get too hot) before meeting Tracy for lunch, and Thursday Kate & I spent the morning at Olbrich Gardens itself. She loves all the flowers; she goes up to every single one, sniffs it, and says, "Mmm. Smells good!" Friday we had our last art class, so afterward we went to the Laurel for "hot-hots" and then after lunch, we noticed there was an awesome park right by the restaurant. We had never seen it before, but thought, "Why not? Let's check it out!" So Kate & I spent a good hour after lunch on Friday playing at this beautiful park. She loved the merry-go-round (I haven't seen one of those in years!) and the Little Tikes red car. I loved the fact that there was a gorgeous view of the lake, framed by some beautiful trees. So pretty and peaceful! Kate did not want to leave at naptime; the only way I could get her to calm down was to promise we'd come back sometime with Daddy.

Saturday we went as a family to Olbrich Gardens again; Kate loves this one fountain in the rose garden. She just runs up to every spout, touches it, gets all wet, and laughs hysterically. Then Sunday was the perfect lazy springtime morning; we sat out on our patio and had breakfast while Kate climbed the hill, and then we headed to the park before going to lunch at Outback. Then it was home for nap, and then off to Rori's dance recital at six. Kate was in heaven at the recital; I can't wait until we can get her into classes of her own! She sat so nice and watched the whole recital (of course she liked the dances with Rori in them the best!) until the second to last dance. It was "Footloose" and she just wiggled down from my lap and started dancing like crazy. Kirsti, Dan & Dan Hines were just laughing right along with me; she was so happy to be dancing and actually kept the beat quite well! How a person that tiny has that much energy, I will never know.... Rori did an amazing job, by the way. She is so talented, and she looked so beautiful in her costumes! I actually got kind of teary during the ballet one; it was this cool version of What Child Is This? and I just thought back to how I remember when she was born and now she's nine; where did the time go?

So there was our week in a nutshell! I tell ya, I am so looking forward to our London trip, but I honestly have so much fun just doing little local things with Kate that I don't really know how I'm going to handle being away from her for eight days! I know she'll be in great hands with Nana, but I am going to miss her like crazy. I utterly adore spending time with my little girl and going out and about on our little adventures. She's such a good little companion and helper; I am so blessed I get to spend my days with her!

Our Olbrich adventure on Thursday; I told her that she could pick where we went, and she had so much fun being the leader and choosing which gardens we would go to.

 Hmmm, which way now?

Ahhh... just relaxing.

 Ok, enough relaxation. I've got places to go! 

On Saturday. Good thing it was 80 degrees by 10 am, because this little girl got soaked! She didn't seem to mind, though...

 I love this silly, cheesy grin!

She would just put her face completely over the spout and then pop up laughing, which is so weird, considering she doesn't like to get her face wet at all in the bath!

 Look how wet I am, Mom!

 "Mmm... smells good!"

 At the park on Sunday

 Helping (or hindering, whichever) Daddy as he tries to build a house of cards... er, coasters... at the Outback

 According to Dan, it is impossible to build a house of coasters with a two-year-old next to you

 After Rori's dance recital.

 I love both my daughter AND my goddaughter so much!

Art Class

Here are some shots from art class two weeks ago, when we were making masks. Kate just wanted to sort her products into various buckets and ice cube trays, so I had to make the mask. Hmmph.

 Yep, that's my edgy, artistic, lion mask. Not much better than what Kate could do, huh? ;)

Here's a shot of her running wild at music class; it's so blurry because she wouldn't hold still! Oh well, at least she likes it, right?

And because I also use this blog as a journal (since I'm terrible about keeping up with her baby book!) I wanted to jot down some of the cute things Kate's been doing/saying. She's already changed so much in these two years; I want to remember all of the things she did/said when she was this age.

• I always tell her, "I love you very much!" so when she wants to tell me she loves me, she'll come up and hug me and say, "Very much!" She almost sounds worried when she says it; I think she's trying to sound soothing like I do when I say it, but it's funny because it ends up sounding like she's worried.
• Now that we've been watching the Disney movies a lot, everyone is characterized as "good" or "bad". So she'll often say, "Mama good!" or "Belle good!" or "May-May and Adelaide good!" and then sometimes she'll focus more on the evil side of humanity, saying, "Gaston bad!" or "Mif-cent [Maleficent] bad!" She just brings it up out of nowhere, which is funny. 
• Every dress she wears now (or even her shirts); if they can be twirled, it's a "pretty dress." 
• She can count to 10 without skipping any numbers; yay!
• Sometimes I'll ask her if she wants a little brother or sister, meaning "Do you want a sibling?" but she just emphatically replies, "Sister! No brother!" Ok, then; we'll see what we can do about that.
•  She has been talking more and more in close-to-complete sentences. Last night, for example, we were sitting on our patio as she went up and down the little hill between our patio and our neighbor's yard. She kept saying, "I climbing hill!" Or she'll say, "Baby eating lunch!" or "Kate reading book!" It's so crazy that just in the span of a few months she went from saying just two words together (Mama driving, Daddy work, Baby bath, etc.) to saying, for all intents and purposes, full sentences. The funniest was one day when I had given her a little chocolate, and she wanted some more, but I said there wasn't any more (meaning I didn't want her to have any more since she'd already had enough.) She looked at me for a moment and then said, "Go store, get more choc-choc." I was just amazed that she could put that thought process together and actually make a coherent sentence out of it! My little baby is sure growing up.

Summer's Here!

Well, maybe not according to the calendar, but if going by the weather is any indication, summer is here in full swing. You know what they say about spring in Wisconsin (that there is none....); it seemed like we had a few beautiful weeks of moderate weather and sunshine, and now it's HOT. Oh well, Kate & I are loving it; we can't wait until our pool opens up!

Today we had music class in the morning, which Kate loved as much as ever, and then we met Meghan and Adelaide at the zoo. We did our usual carousel and playground routine, and even managed to squeeze in looking at a few animals, too. Kate & Adelaide are so cute together; it's so fun to see them play and interact. After the zoo, we walked over to Zuzu Cafe; both girls loved it because there was a nice toy section to play in after lunch. Then we headed home, and Kate is still napping right now while I do some work (and, uh, update this blog), and then I think we'll head to the park before getting some groceries for dinner. We love being outside, and since Wisconsin isn't exactly known for year-round excellent weather, we want to take advantage of it while it's here!

 Ready for music class! 

 "Am I done having my picture taken inside this stupid frame yet?"