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Life (In London), Medicated

Five Days of Family

Filed under: Aaron, BackBlogging, Blah Blah Blah, Elena, Family, Food, Friends, Liam, Life In London, Mommyhood, Projects — Heidi at 11:29 pm on Sunday, June 1, 2008

My mom and sis were here this week. It was lovely and relaxing.k

Some things we did:

  • Babysat for Jenn and Noah.
  • Purchased and put together what Aaron has termed “the white trash Howard Johnson’s play set” for the kids.




  • Had afternoon tea at the Lanesborough.
  • Saw Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, and Parliament.
  • Drank three bottles of wine and two liters of Bailey’s.
  • Ate a lot of chocolate brownies with coffee frosting.
  • Went to ToysRUs and Tesco.
  • Walked down the the main street to change money and go to the bus station to get pictures of the buses for Ethan.
  • Played with the kids.
  • Ignored the kids. (Or was he ignoring us?)
  • Nothing.

Some things we did not do:

  • Leave the sidewalk where we were standing to actually cross over to go look at Buckingham Palace.
  • Feel one bit guilty about counting seeing the tips of Westminster Abbey and Parliament over the treetops as actually seeing them.
  • Realize that the Lanesborough was across the street from our Tube stop until we’d walked almost to the next stop.
  • Go to tea on the day of our reservation because I was SURE I’d made the reservation for Saturday.
  • Realize that my mother was walking around with her skirt tucked in her underwear as we were waiting to be seated for tea. (Fortunately a nice woman did whisper in her ear that she “had a problem with her skirt.” I must be blind…I was walking behind her as she came out of the bathroom and didn’t even notice.)

Oh, and Elena clarified a few things for us.

These are “Gwammy’s e-ah-wings,”

and these are “Gwammy’s noo-sies.”



She also showed us Liam’s, mine, and Aaron’s when I asked her where they were. Heather’s was by far the best though: she was tickling E and E got into nursing position by accident. She looked at Heather’s face…and looked at her boobs and looked at her face…and looked back at her boobs, and finally declared “Auntie Heh-dah’s NOOSIES!!!”  She was quite pleased with herself.

More Family Christmas Festivities - Or Maybe Just Family Activites

Filed under: Aaron, Bday/Anniv/Holiday, Elena, Liam, Life In London, Mommyhood, Projects — Heidi at 9:47 pm on Sunday, December 16, 2007

It was chilly today, but we headed out shortly after 10 (I got to sleep in this morning.) for the outing AJ planned. 

Unfortunately, it wasn’t what we expected.   

But the ducks were enjoyable!  I fed them crackers.  Well, actually I fed the gulls.  They horned in and stole from the swans and ducks.  Not funny.

We didn’t last long after that because it was pretty darn cold.  L was complaining, so we went to the car.  (Note that I didn’t complain that we had to leave.  A told me that the average winter temp here is 35.  I hope we’re getting over the “under average” part of that pretty soon. 

The only other item of note?  We worked on GB houses.  Oh and L made the biggest mess he’s ever made in his room.  There are Legos EVERYWHERE.

L also spent some time hanging out with Aaron watching their favorite show, Top Gear

It wasn’t tonight, but at some point during one of the shows, Jeremy said “cack” emphatically.  And now Liam tells me occasionally that “Jeremy said CACK!!

And he always says it more than once.  I’m so laughing on the inside.

Gingerbread Houses

Filed under: Aaron, Bday/Anniv/Holiday, Blah Blah Blah, Elena, Food, Liam, Life In London, Mommyhood, Projects — Heidi at 3:33 pm on Saturday, December 15, 2007

I planned a little weekend holiday fest for the fam.

The plan was to do gingerbread houses, make caramel corn and chocolate covered pretzels, and drink hot chocolate while listening to holiday music.

A wanted to take L to see trains, so we decided he should do that this morning and I would go pick up the remaining items I needed to make caramel corn and candy for the gingerbread houses.

E and I walked to Tesco and couldn’t find light corn syrup.  BUT, being the smart lass that I am and having been thwarted by the British grocery in the past, I had located a replacement recipe before we left home, so I was still in good shape.  The candy, on the other hand, SUCKED.  There wasn’t any fun holiday stuff.  And the candy here is crap, anyway.  I had to pull out my stash of candy corn that A brought back from Omaha!

But, we came home, let A and L in the house since they’d locked themselves out, and I got everything ready to go.

I think Liam had fun while it lasted.  I didn’t expect it to last all that long, but we had to cut it short earlier than I anticipated because L was licking the tips of the icing bags.

 

 

Here’s the finished product.  The candy corn pieces are lights.

 

Aaron provided festive music and kept E busy.  (Doing stuff like this isn’t really his thing, but he planned an outing for us tomorrow to a Christmas Fair.  See, he’s all into the holidays too…just not the same way I am.)

And, by the way, the gingerbread houses were all we accomplished today.  (I also managed to make the light corn syrup substitute.  It looks nothing like light corn syrup.  I hope it works.)  I didn’t really have time to prepare for anything else.  I should have planned better - and L should have been in a better mood - and E should have napped longer - and blah blah blah….

 

Hey there, Shugah.

Filed under: Aaron, Bday/Anniv/Holiday, Elena, Food, Liam, Life In London, Mommyhood, Projects — Heidi at 10:52 pm on Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Well, L missed school today because he had a fever in the night.  He slept with me and did pretty well for the most part, but we had drama about the medicine again.  I finally told him I didn’t care if he took it or not, but if he was going to be sick he needed to be sick in his own room because he was keeping me awake.  About 20 seconds later he chugged it.

E is still doing well and I am feeling better - not quite 100%, but it’s a significant difference.  But Aaron is home!  He made it through all of the crazy weather and it’s nice to have another adult around.

L and I decorated the sugar cookies we made last night.  (He took a looooong nap yesterday afternoon and didn’t go to bed until 10 so we had time on our hands to bake them.)  Some of them are scary.

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We’re taking them to the xmas party at school tomorrow.  We’re not sure what time it starts, so we’re winging it.  We do that a lot here, it seems.

 

The house is clean, I’m decluttering, and recluttering with good stuff.

Filed under: Aaron, BackBlogging, Elena, Liam, Projects, Travel — Heidi at 11:14 pm on Thursday, November 29, 2007

The day in review.

On Tuesday, A and I made a decision to send our laundry out to be washed and dried. I packed it all up (lights and darks only) and waited for the dude to come pick it up on Wednesday. He never came. So, I called them today and he told me he’d come around noon. He came…but he told me I can’t have it back until Monday. This pissed me off because it was his fault I can’t have it tomorrow. I told him as much and he said he’d give me a discount. It amounted to 10 pounds. I’m no longer that pissed.

Anne (pronounced Ah-nee) made her second visit. She was eager to please. I’m mostly pleased. It just sucks for her that my attention to detail is higher than hers. I do really like her though. She’s so peppy and young. She enjoys the kids and I enjoy hearing about her life in Bulgaria…though our communication is mostly in signs.

Liam was a freak show this morning and I kept him home from school as punishment.  (How long will this tactic work?) I didn’t want the teachers to have to deal with him.

Finally finished unpacking the suitcases and got everything (mostly) put away. We can now walk through the hallways and in to the dressing room. (It was actually kind of nice that they lost our luggage since it delayed unpacking a bit.)

L and I started a Christmas card project for his friends at school. His play and party are in a week and a half and we need to have cards for everyone in his class, and I’m going to make cookies…maybe I’ll try my luck with sugar cookies. Not sure though. I’m still kind of afraid of the oven. It bakes completely differently than ours in the U.S. did. Anyway, I had an AMAZING time messing around with all of my crafty stuff with L. I hope I can do more of it. It makes me so happy!
Hung out with Elena again this evening. I really think that she’s going to get her time straightened out about the time we head back for xmas. Fortunately the rest of us don’t have to travel like A does in the next two weeks. He is going to Bucharest, Romania on Saturday to pick up a few frequent flier miles so he can be the pimp daddy in the fast line at the airport and get us into the Red Carpet Club, and to Omaha for a few days for work. It is interesting how we view his trips: he’s bummed that he has to do all of that flying alone; I’m bummed that I don’t get to do all of that flying alone.


 
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