We are wishing everyone a Happy Thanksgiving!! We are thinking of all the family back in the states and miss being with you today. Enjoy each other and don't eat too much!! Good luck in all of your shopping tomorrow. I wish I could be there to shop with you and of course Stacey I will miss our ritual Olive Garden trip(we will make it up when I come home). We are very thankful that we have your love and support. We love all of you!! We will see everyone soon....only two weeks to go!

A Thanksgiving Feast

Last Sunday we got together with all of the ISE (International Service Employee) families here in England for a Thanksgiving feast. England doesn't celebrate this holiday so it was nice to get together with the other Americans who do. There were about 130 of us. Each family brought a hot dish or dessert to share. It was a huge buffet line with wonderful tasting food. The kids had a seperate room where they could play with toys and run around. Below is a picture that I offered to take of the whole group. It was a challenge to squeeze everyone together so they could be seen, but with everyones help it was a success. If you would like to view it up close just click on the picture.

Playing in the Snow

Let It Snow

We woke up this morning with snow coming down! The kids as you can imagine were so excited. They imediately wanted to run outside to play. Tyler started screaming to Bryce "We can leave now, its almost Christmas." For some reason when it snows he thinks Christmas is near..... like tomorrow. We of course explained that we only have two more weeks until we leave, so the count down has officially begun.

Rock Star Day

Last Friday at school was rock star day. The kids were to come dressed up as a rock star. They thought they were pretty cool with their guitar shirts and spiked up hair. They told us that they did a little karaoke at school and had a blast.

Of course I couldn't leave Kylie out so here are a few pictures of her I took one day after we dropped off the kids from school.

She wanted me to take a picture of her because she says it is starting to get "burr" cold. She is definitely going to be our little drama queen!

Our Trip To Paris

Where should we begin? First, we had a wonderful time seeing all the sites and learning so much about each one of them. The Eiffel Tower was amazing. The best time to see it is at night when it shines a bright blue color and at the beginning of every hour it sparkles. The Arc De Triomphe was much bigger than I had imagined. When you drive down the street, all you see in the middle is this huge monument. It really makes you say wow. Although be prepared to climb many steps to get to the top. The Notre Dame cathedral was another wow. The stained glass windows and vaulted ceilings took your breath away. The Louvre was fascinating with all its wonderful works of art from famous artists and the outstanding glass pyramids. There were little cafes practically on every corner. The food was good, especially the bread. We also can say that the kids had a lot of fun at Disney. We rode a lot of new rides (compared to Disney in Florida) and had a lot of fun at the Halloween party.



Now that you have heard the good side of our trip let us fill everone in on how the other half of our trip went. It all began when our back pack got stolen. Yes you read right....STOLEN! We were at the Eiffel Tower, Steve was in line getting a snack for the kids. I took the three kids to a bench to sit and to get out the gloves. It was at night and the wind had picked up so it was getting cold. I took off the backpack, got the gloves out and as I reached over to put Kylie's gloves on her someone came by and took the bag. The bag was half on my lap and half on the bench. I stood up and yeld at Steve to come. He came and off I went running to the security. They didn't really seem to want to do anything at that time but escort us over to the police area. We explained to them what happened and they said we needed to go to the police station to file a report. They kindly escorted us in their police cars with the sirens and lights on to the police station. The worst thing that was in the backpack was all 5 of our passports! The rest was silly things like coloring books, crayons, wipes, and my wallet with 60 euros. The joke is on them I guess because the only thing they could have used was the money. Luckily Steve had the bag with the cameras and important stuff. The next day we spent 4 hours at the US Embassy getting emergency passports which are good for one year. We must now take these passports to the U.S. Embassy in London to exchange them for the regular passports we need. You would think that this would be all, right? Oh no, there is more. We then proceed to travel to Disney. Disney in Paris is the most unorganized place I have ever seen! Europeans do not know what it means to wait in line or to wait for their turn. No, they have to push people out of their way to get what they want. There is no standing in line to wait your turn to see a character....it is whoever gets there first and if they don't they will walk right in front of you and get their picture. Very frustrating!! Do remember we really did have a great holiday!



Our next obstacle was getting back home. We arrived at the train station to catch our 1:00 train, but wasn't allowed on the train because we couldn't get through customs. Our temporary passports didn't have that special page that showed we are residents of the UK....our visas. We were taken aside and they told us to wait because they had to do some investigating. Of course we missed our train, but luckily they did switch our tickets to a later train after they found out we were good to go. They also stamped our passports saying we have only 2 months to get this all fixed and if we don't within those two months we won't be allowed back into the country (UK). Now we have to get to London very quickly to exchange our passports and then we will probably have to mail all the passports to get our visas put into them. Since we are leaving in a month we don't have much time. I am being very optimistic that all this will work out and everything will be just fine.

We went up to the top of the Eiffel Tower at night. We figured it would be neat to see the city at night instead of the day time, so this is looking down from the top.

We had to get a picture of Kylie with her Eiffel Tower shirt!

At night the Eiffel Tower would sparkle at the beginning of every hour. It was amazing to see something this big do that.....beautiful!

When it wasn't sparkling it would look like this.

This was just an area next to the Louvre. We did stop and eat at a cafe for lunch here.

The Mona Lisa was much smaller than I expected. It was in such a huge room and it was the only thing that actually hung on this wall. A glass case enclosed the painting to protect it.

Ok...you are going to laugh at this one. While we waited to get a picture of the Mona Lisa a big group from Japan was standing next to us. There were at least 25-30 of them. They all were dressed in their Kimonos and wore sandals with white socks. They kept starring at us and we obviously didn't know what they were saying. This lady came over to us and started talking to our children. She wanted her family to take a picture of them with her so we did as well. Then the rest of her family came to get pictures with our kids. It was like they never saw American children before. They were the sweetest people and we enjoyed our short visit with them.
You seriously would have thought that we were some type of celebrities.

This was the ceiling inside the Louvre where Picasso's paintings were located. They wouldn't allow any pictures of his work so I thought this was pretty cool.

We ate at the Hard Rock Cafe one evening.

The Notre Dame Cathedral was amazing. With its stained glass windows and vaulted ceilings it was for sure a site to see! We even went back to the hotel that night and the kids watched The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

This was looking down at the city from the Arc De Triomphe.

Boys standing in front of the Arc De Triomphe.

Our Visit to DisneyLand Paris

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Rugby Festival

Two days ago Bryce had a field trip at the Peterborough Rugby Football Club in Fengate. They were holding a rugby festival and many other schools were also there participating. Luckily this was tag rugby and not tackle rugby. In the morning the children had a coaching session and after lunch is when they had the matches. Steve, Kylie and I went to watch. Bryce was very excited to learn how to play and he even made a score as you will see in the picture when he has the ball. That of course sent him to cloud nine! The kids did a great job huddling together to form their strategies and his teacher was involved too. A teacher informed us that the U.S. is the reigning Olympic gold medal winning champion in rugby...this was in 1924 and was the last year of rugby in the olympics. When Bryce came home he told us how this is one of his best days ever.

Tyler had a class assembly today and this is one of the songs he learned after seeing the play "The tiger who came to tea." They were so cute singing in their English accents. The video came out a little blurry, but you can still see it ok.

Our visit to Warwick Castle

Last weekend we went to Warwick Castle. It was about an hour and a half away and it was well worth the drive. This castle started to be built in 1068 on the orders of William the Conqueror and was completed in 1395. We were able to climb up to the top of the tower and the view up there was amazing. With the leaves changing color it was a site to see. The kids had a lot of fun playing in leaves, seeing the inside of the castle, and playing at the playground. We will definitely go back!

We were at the river inside Warwick Castle. It was beautiful!

Kylie had fun playing in the leaves.

The tower you see in the picture was Guy’s Tower. It was built in the 14th century. It is twelve-sided, stands 39 metres high and has five stories.
The first four stories consist of a central stone-vaulted chamber with two small side rooms – one a gardrobe (toilet), the other probably a bedchamber.
The fifth storey is a hexagonal guardroom. During the Civil War the windows here were enlarged so that they could take small hand-held cannons.
The walkways that run along the curtain walls meant that crossbowmen and archers could move swiftly to quell danger at any point on the perimeter.
Once in position they could pick off the enemy from the battlements. These consist of solid sections of wall, called merlons, and gaps, known as embrasures.
The tops of the towers are encircled by parapets that added a further layer to the castle's defences.

We are working our way up to the top of the tower. We had to climb over 500 steps to get there.The view is amazing!
Here is a church we saw from the top of the tower.
Bryce and Tyler are having lots of fun playing at the playground.