The Last Day

After about 14 hours of total travel time yesterday, KJ and I arrived home.  We were greeted by our children gallivanting around the front yard.  It is very good to be home, though at the moment I feel somewhere caught in the middle between vacation and a British time zone and all the many responsibilities of home and family and the time zone of my current location.  There is a lot of settling in to be done with laundry and unpacking and catching up on school and church activities and delivering all the cookie dough that came in during our absence.  But, it's rather nice to have plenty to do.

I did take some time to go trough a few pictures from our last day in London for your viewing pleasure.  Our trip needed a proper ending.  

Sunday morning we took the Underground to this famous intersection,

where we went to this famous church.

After the service we visited a copy of Shakespeare's Globe,

where we were reminded of just how many phrases 

that man coined.  It's quite impressive.

Amazing.

We then visited London Bridge,

which is not like the original and was a bit disappointing.

What a nice concrete affair.

But maybe they just didn't want it to outshine it's near neighbor,

The Tower Bridge.

I discovered that The Tower of London was a misnomer,

considering it's a castle and not just a mere tower.

I liked this picture because, not to be too morbid,

surely there would have been a lot of crows about in yesteryear.

Not many who went into the tower left with their head

if you know what I mean.

Then we went to a now famous station,

where KJ asked directions to this now famous platform.

Unlike the attendant Harry asked, this lady could actually give us directions.

After dinner at McDonald's (such authentic British food),

and despite the fact that darkness had fallen,

we traveled to Abbey Road and set up the tripod.

Are passing cars cooler than the Beatles?

One last trek across the city brought us past the palace.

Then we boarded our train and went back to our hotel,

where we collapsed with exhaustion.

The adventure begins.

I can't believe we're doing this.  We're here at the airport, and it all feels very surreal.  Here are a few thoughts I've had so far:

• I feel so light and free.  I took Delta's policies on carry-ons ultra-conservatively and opted for my camera bag to be my only carry-on.  KJ is carrying all my little items that would be in a purse in his backpack.  I was walking through the airport with a camera backpack and my e-reader in hand.  That's it.  That's a big deal for mothers of little children, you know.
• I have butterflies in my stomach.  I can't believe we're going away together for two whole weeks to a place I've always dreamed of.  Have I mentioned we haven't been on a week-long vacation since our honeymoon?  My brain can't even fathom all of this uninterrupted time together.
• I love free WI-FI!
• I love that free WI-FI enables me to begin blogging immediately.  We still have an hour to wait for our flight.
• I love my children, but I'm glad we're not traveling overseas with them.  Watching the people in front of us with a little boy in a stroller hollering the way James would be if he was confined made me think all plane rides with children are several years down the road.  Ella would be great, though, of course.

We will arrive in London at 7:15 a.m. their time, which is 1:15 a.m. here.  Unless I am completely dead on my feet by the time we get to our inn, I will try to write a brief summary of our day.  We'll be doing so much that I want to write things down so I won't forget.  We plan to spend the day in London tomorrow, and Wednesday we will head to Brighton.  "Oh, I long to go to Brighton!"  "A little sea-bathing would set me up forever."  Name that movie.

a very dark airport picture

The goal was to get the airplane in the background, but you know. 

The Last Night

I have done all that I can do today.

Only 26 hours until we land!

That is very hard to believe.

Please pray for our safe travel tomorrow and for our children

and the wonderful grandparents keeping them.

I know they will have a wonderful time.

Here's a couple of my favorite pictures from this weekend.

This is before his grown-up haircut Debbo gave him.
He's so happy.
Please pray for him and his allergies.  The aforementioned snotty nose
has been joined by a cough.  Poor little guy.

And this girl...
she's so lovely in every way, so grown-up, kind, and caring.
Pray for her, too.


KJ took that picture.  

Celebrate good times...C'mon!

This year marks the last year in my 20s as well as my seventh year of marriage.  These two facts are going to be the cause (and probably the excuse) for a whole lot of celebrating around our house.  If anything good happens to me, or if there's anything in particular I want to do, I'll just smile and say, "It's the Year of Jubilee." (To be accurate, both KJ and I did some reading and were reminded that the year of Jubilee was actually the 49th year and not the seventh; however, all debts were forgiven during the seventh year.  If you have no idea what I'm talking about, you can catch up on your reading in Leviticus later on tonight.)  But putting accuracy aside, we're celebrating our seventh year in a big-time way.  I think it's worth celebrating.  So far, we have painted the kitchen, and today I got a DSLR camera!  


I am extremely excited about learning how to use it.  Sadly, it was a rainy day here, so I couldn't go outside, but here are my favorite pictures from today.

My lovely girl

James woke up from his morning nap giving 

sweet kisses to his sister.  Precious.

I couldn't go outside today, 

but here is the view from my front door.

And this picture?  I'm not sure if there are words.

But this is my boy.