Amsterdam...

Chris and I took a quick flight over to Amsterdam to celebrate my birthday the day after Christmas. The flight took less than an hour! It was a little odd to fly "all" the way to Europe in less than an hour... not what we are used to at all. Our hotel was perfectly situated in the middle of the city and the thermometer was not so perfectly situated around 30 degrees! To put it mildly... it was FREEZING! And I mean that very literally as some of the canals were freezing over! We did our best not to allow the weather to hold as back and went out for a walk in the city the night we arrived. Chris and I spent most of the time reminiscing about our high school and college days. And Chris had fun remembering various places from his semester at sea in 2000. It was fun to remember all the milestones that Chris and I have crossed together... graduating from high school, our 1st year of college, turning 21, graduating from UF, our 1st years as employed and responsible adults, our engagement and wedding, the day we bought our 1st house, the day we bought our 1st dining room table and now turning thirty. This was by far my best birthday celebration ever... except for the year I had a Cabbage Patch Kid birthday cake : )

Here are some pictures from our trip... enjoy!

This is a pretty typical canal bridge.

This is the restaurant we celebrated my birthday at across the street from our hotel. The picture is terrible but during the day the gas lanterns were not lit and the place lost some of it's charm. It was one of the most delicious meals I have ever enjoyed! I had mussels in a parsnip broth as a starter and sea bass with polenta and spinach for dinner. I also destroyed a chocolate tarte with clementine sorbet with a candle! DELICIOUS!!!

There were bicycles everywhere! We would have loved to rent some and tour the city but it was too cold for bike riding.

Workin' hard at Heinekin! We had a great time at the brewery and were able to enjoy the fruits of our labor.

The dome in the left top of this picture is the conference center of our hotel.




Our last few hours in Amsterdam... leave it to us to find a quiet pub with great Belgium beers.

Thirty

Here I am at the Heineken Brewery as a 29 year old...

And the very next day... I am thirty!

More pictures to come...
Until then, XOXO

What a Christmas!

It has been a whirlwind of activity the last 4 days. I can hardly believe that Christmas has come and almost gone! Tomorrow we leave for Amsterdam for a few days to celebrate my big three-0. We decided that we wanted to be lazy all day today so I cooked our Christmas dinner for Christmas Eve. We started with roasted red bell pepper soup and then I made a lemon pepper roasted chicken, sweet potatoes with praline topping and green beans with toasted pecans. We finished things with a homemade pumpkin pie... yes, we had pumpkin pie for Christmas. We didn't have it for Thanksgiving and when Chris was flipping through the cook book and saw the recipe he decided I had to make it! Everything turned out delicious. However, we had to do dishes every fifteen minutes because I kept running out of bowls, plates, utensils, etc! Chris loved the food but I think he was going to cry if I asked him to wash another dish.

After dinner we headed to St. Paul's Cathedral for Christmas Eve Midnight Eucharist. Neither Chris nor I are practising Christians or even all that religious, but St. Paul's is a landmark in London and Christmas services are known to be amazing. We got there around 10:15 pm and there was a queue of people down the side of the church and around the block! Services didn't start until 11:30 pm and I think Chris and I were both almost asleep. The church is breathtaking and it is amazing to think that they have been having services at the same sight since 604 AD. I don't think I have been to too many places with that much history. The men's choir sang throughout the services and I was shocked by the acoustics. They sounded splendid but we couldn't understand a word because they were singing in Latin! We even had the words (in Latin) in front of us and couldn't follow along. There were about 1000 (perhaps more, I can never figure this type of thing out) people at the mass and about 998 stood to take communion. About 15 minutes into communion we decided to make our sneaky exit and catch a taxi home. Unfortunately, sneaky was not in the books as I wore high heels and the floors are marble. I tried to tip toe but that just made me look silly so I clicked and clacked my way to the exit with Chris turning red behind me!

Father Christmas (aka Santa) had visited us while we were gone so we felt obliged to open our stockings. It is amazing how Santa always knows just what I want! We finally made it to sleep around 2 am... Only to get up at 9 am to open presents! Isn't it funny how Christmas morning instantly reverts us back to age 10?!? Chris and I both get giddy and giggly. I was ready to strangle him this morning because he insisted on having his coffee ready before we opened any presents! The coffee maker has never brewed slower... I think it was taunting me!

We are finishing our wonderful Christmas off with a yummy meat and cheese board with fig jam and Belgium beer... I love Christmas!

The Only Way to Shop

In preparation for our Christmas Eve feast, I went to the Whole Foods in Kensington this afternoon. We had been one other time before but just to have a look around. Much like in the States, Whole Foods is on the expensive side for everyday shopping. However, since it is Christmas I figured we could splurge. I walked through the park to the store, it was about a 15 minutes walk. Then I spent nearly 2 hours shopping. I had a painstakingly thorough list with all my ingredients and measures converted into grams. I had some trouble finding a few things but nothing that I couldn't work around. Now, I have said that I was going to adjust my shopping style to prevent having to carry everything home on foot. And this is something I will do...next time. Today I took advantage of the free home delivery! This is truly the only way to shop in a city like London. I finished my shopping, paid and gave them my address. The walk home through the park was brilliant and bagless! I may have to splurge more often ; )

One hundred... and one

It is hard to believe that today is Christmas Eve eve eve... or should I say that it is hard to believe that Christmas is only 3 days away! It feels like just yesterday it was May 27th and I was posting my first blog entry about moving to London. But here we are 101 entries into it, living in London and about to celebrate Christmas. We have sold our house, our cars and most of our belongings and started a new life, in a new country. What an adventure it has been and it is only just starting! Here's to a hundred and one more!

Portobello Winterfest

Over the last 6 months Chris and I watched as music fest after music fest came through London. We love concerts and listening to live music so it was painful to miss out on so many good opportunities. So imagine our delight when we saw a winter music fest advertised in the paper. Even better there was free entry before 7 pm!

We started our day with a run through the park. The sun was shining and it was 54 degrees! Brilliant weather for a run. Unfortunately, the wind was at our backs on the way out. Eventually, we both made it home ... needless to say Chris had an easier time of it than I did! After the run, we made a yummy breakfast of scrambled eggs, mushrooms, sun dried tomatoes, green peppers and coriander (aka cilantro).

Then we headed down to Carnaby Street for some Christmas shopping. This area is a very trendy outdoor mall that was absolutely packed with shoppers. I find it very hard to believe that retail sales are as low as they say. Every person we saw had bags and bags of stuff... then again all the after Christmas sales have come early so I guess that is the problem... We didn't do much buying but I dropped plenty of very obvious hints to Chris (like "you should come back and buy this for me.") And as I type this, Chris is out shopping for me!

What goes better with an afternoon of shopping than Belgium beer and mussels? So we headed to Belgo. We had never been there but it has been recommended several times. The mussels were delicious but the beer selection left a little to be desired. They only had 3 or 4 beers that we had never tried and the 1st one Chris ordered was sold out. And when our beers finally arrived they were in the wrong glasses. Now that may not seem like much to anyone else but if you advertise yourself as a Belgium Beer establishment you should get it right! Oh well, I guess we will just have to go back to Belgium for the true experience...darn ; )

Afterwards, we jumped on the train to Portobello Road for the music fest. It was smaller than I expected but they had a great market set with with jewelry, clothes and other goodies. The entire event was outside under a bridge, next to the train tracks. There was some amazing graffiti (if you like the sorta thing which we do).

My pictures are pretty bad because it was dark but here you go...

The music was okay. The first band was pretty entertaining but probably not in the way they had intended. The singer was very into himself and looked beyond bored being on the stage. The guitarist was (as Chris aptly described) in a completely different band. He was dancing and really getting in to the music, just not to music we were hearing!?! There was a photographer trying to get his picture and every time the guitarist would turn his back to the audience and put his butt in the photographer's face! Too funny... Chris and I really enjoyed ourselves watching them ; )

The next band looked a little odd but they were really good. Ebony Bones put on quite a production and I couldn't resist snapping a few pictures...

First, there was the guitarist...

And then the back up singers...

Followed by the lead singer...

All together, they are Ebony Bones!

Chris and I decided to call it a night after Ebony Bones. Both of us thought it was around midnight and didn't want to miss the last train home. However, as it turns out it was only 8:30 and we were home and in our p.js by 9:15!

How sad is that?!?

More Proper English

Operating Theater: This is what we would refer to as an operating room or OR. The Brits just say theater. I guess it makes the idea of having an operation kind of fun...you could say "no, I can't have lunch tomorrow because I am going to the theater."

Boot: Trunk of the car.

Bonnet: Hood.

Cattery: A kennel for cats.

Coriander: Cilantro.

Sellotape: Scotch tape (you should have seen me asking store clerks for scotch tape and then trying to describe it... grin and nod, grin and nod.)

999: comparable to 911 in the US.