Well, August seems so far away that I can barely remember what happened. I do remember that our old high school friend Stephanie Vlachos got married and Perry and Anna and Leola went back to Vancouver to celebrate. Leola was in Canada for her first birthday, but on their return Perry & Anna hosted a little brunch for us and Chris so we could all get together to celebrate little Lion turning one!
At the end of the month Jannel was here to pay us a visit and that was wonderful to see her. I had to work all week, but Jannel, Sarah, and the boys managed quite a few outings and enjoyed everything on offer! We took Jannel on our "patented" London walk for first-timers, they visited the Tower of London, Windsor & Windsor Castle, and I managed and evening playing defence with with boys so they could go on a Jack the Ripper walk and cap it off at Gordon's! I even managed with them both while Sarah & Jannel spent the day in Brighton. They said it was quite nice to have the time to themselves and enjoy the city by the sea.
After Jannel made her way home, it was not very long at all until Doug & Debby arrived. While they have been here, we have been equally busy, but not always in a traveling way. The grandparents took off for Herefordshire only a few days after arriving in from Berlin, and on the first weekend we were all together we picked up a rental car (a lovely 7-seater people carrier) and headed out to Stonehenge & Bath. I drove the entire way, and managed not to contribute in any way to traffic backlogs or generate any disapproving comments from native Englishmen. Stonehenge was impressive, although I really would have liked to go right up to the stones as you used to be able to in a previous generation. I think that really would have wowed me if I could have been that close and walked among them. Bath was impressive; we toured the Roman baths for quite some time, and enjoyed the sleepy city's architecture that played host to the summer gentry in nearly every Jane Austin novel Sarah has ever read and then told me about. We stayed at a gorgeous cottage just a 10 minute drive from the city itself, a real country getaway - and I could easily see myself living in that little cottage! Sorry mom, it took me about 3 seconds after walking in to turn around and ask Sarah if we could try to put an offer on the place and move in for good! It was such a nice place!
After our trip to bath was a few weeks at home, settling back in to a routine. And then just last weekend Sarah and I jetted off for a trip to Rome! Yes, we were deliberately taking advantage of the fact that we had free babysitting in the form of Granny & Gramps, and we weren't ashamed to admit it. We had a wonderful time. We toured the Coliseum at night, with only about 100 other people there (and we witnessed a proposal for the second time on vacation now!); we took the hop-on, hop-off bus tour, went through the Vatican Museums & Sistine Chapel, St. Peter's Basilica; we went and took in Piazza Navona, Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps, and more. And we even had time for one morning of indulgent over sleeping (I can't remember the last time I slept until 11am without a shred of guilt), some movies on the iPad with the best prosciutto and parma ham on crusty bread with red wine, and a couples massage to relax at the end of the whole four days. Amazing!
While we were away, Chris started school! He goes to nursery at the local C of E primary school here, and so far it's a toss up as to whether or not he really likes it. He was quite lucky to stumble into a tour of the fire hall during his first week thanks to Granny, but even that hasn't swayed him entirely to the idea that school will be OK without mom there. We'll see how it goes, but man! does he look cute in his little uniform!
Tomorrow we're set to meet Lorne and Uta who are coming through London on their way back to Canada from France where they have been touring the countryside. Hooray!
Take care!