Windsor Castle

After a little lunch on the bus ride and an hour or so later, we made it to our next destination of the day: Windsor Castle!

It was so neat to pull up and see a ginormous ferris wheel and a view of the castle. We were so excited to go and check it out. And my favorite...take pictures! :)

We had about 3 hours to explore before all of us had to meet back up at the bus to return back to Lakenheath. My friend Emma once again saved the day and helped me with my children. The kids really loved having her around with us! And again, I missed my hubby and wished he was enjoying this day with me!

After we climbed off the bus, we went up an elevator and walked down the side of a train track to this...

The Queen! Andrew LOVES trains so this was the best thing to see of all time on this trip in his opinion! :)

And here it is...a view of the castle. So huge! And our FIRST castle to ever see in person! It was pretty much awesome! But it also felt a bit unreal to actually be standing face to face with an actual castle.

And here is where our adventure through the castle began. There's quite literally a town surrounding the castle walls...

Tons of shops and restaurants!

{A statue of Queen Elizabeth.}

Turning onto the street to the left takes you up to the front entrance to the castle.

We paid the entrance fee, walked through what felt like an airport security gate (metal detectors, etc) and then we kind of wandered around for a bit and took in the view. It then occured to us once we saw the British flag flying above the castle, that that meant someone from the Royal party was home. We of course didn't know who was there but it was still pretty neat to know!

I loved seeing all of the detail all over the castle!

The entrance to the front of the castle where Royalty live.

Closer view

And oh my were the gardens surrounding the castle beautiful!!!

The Royal Guard

And this is at the point that Aubrey, Jocelyn and I took a tour through Queen Mary's Doll House and a brief walk through the State Department where we saw the Waterloo, King & Queen's bed chambers, armory and shields on the wall, etc. We couldn't unfortunately take any inside photos of the castle. Those darn rules - obviously necessary, but still! :) I guess you'll have to just use your imagination.

While the boys snoozed, us girls had our picture taken next to the Guard.

We had a quick bite to eat before heading back to the bus. Smoothies, lemonades and yummy treats!

It was a FUN (and exhausting!) day! I'm so glad I got to experience this day with my children. :)

And then we made it back to the hotel JUST in time to see this beautiful sunset.

Stonehenge

Being in England for John's work conference allowed us spouses and children to take a few trips throughout our week's stay in Lakenheath. While John was away for all day meetings, the kids and I piled onto the bus and made our first stop to Stonehenge. It was quite the adventure with just myself and my four kids but I knew we may not have the opportunity to see it again so I kept my focus on that to get through the day. Trust me, it was A LOT of work! Thankfully, my new and dear friend Emma helped me out with my kids when needed and offered to push the stroller for me when I wanted to take photos or to tend to my kid's needs. She's awesome and I'm so grateful for people who stand up and help without being asked!

Aubrey sat next to her friend and they played ds games much of the bus ride.

Landon played and dosed off and on and was quite the trooper!

Andrew and Jocelyn sat next to me across the isle and weren't always this cute and loving so I did what any Mom would think to do...take a picture to preserve the good moments when they happen. Hahaha These two are wonderful and love each other but being siblings, they aren't always so nice! :)

A few hours later, we arrived at Stonehenge! It was sprinkling the whole bus ride and cleared up just in time for us to take our tour. Still cold and windy but definitely doable!

The rocks were HUGE! And due to them preserving their history, you aren't allowed to go past the gated off area and touch them. Still very neat to see though.

We were given devices for our self walking tour but the kids used them more like walkie talkies. So funny! :) Walking around with the kids and taking photos didn't allow me to hear much but it was a great place to sight see. I decided to buy their tour book and read up on it later. :)

It was so pretty there and I wished the whole time that John was there to join us! With my brother and his family living in England, I'm sure we'll be able to go again while we live in Germany for a few years. And if not, we have pictures! :)

Next up: Windsor's Castle

Open House

{The kids - one: August 2011}

Hello. Welcome to our new home! :)

Once we got here, we were very surprised to see that our house had two levels with lots of open space but we are loving it!! :)

And once we get our household goods and fill the space in, it will feel more like HOME!

So here's a virtual tour of our place.

We'll start at the front entry way.

   Straight ahead is the living room. Let me just start out by saying that we have State Dept housing and the furniture can be brand new or used up to 10 years so it's really the luck of the draw. I'm not complaining - we love the furniture! I just have to say though, that after seeing the sheet list for the amount this furniture costs to replace it...my jaw hit the floor! With four young and active children, we'll be doing everything we can in the next few years to keep things in mint condition! (Our furniture is in storage back in the States!) I'll have to take a trip to Ikea very soon to get some furniture covers!

 Along the side wall in the living room is the entertainment space - where John wants to fill it with a brand new 55" tv. I'm still not keen on that idea! LOL! But we may have to with our tv from the U.S. not being compatible here. I'm sure that breaks my husband's heart to have to get a new tv (ours is only 4 years old)!

 And to back up the other way from the entrance, if you walk to the right, you'll be in our dining room. The table can seat 8 and it's got a very pretty hutch on the side wall.

 After you pass the dining room, the kitchen is next. It's all white and I'm contantly cleaning it but it's built with a TON of storage. And the gas stove is AWESOME! It took a bit to figure out how to get the pilot light to work and convert the degrees from Fahrenheit to Celcius but we're liking it! I think this space for sure needs some color! :)

Another view of the kitchen. I also LOVE that there's a window to look out and bring in some sunlight and a breeze when it's opened.

And the other part of the kitchen has the washer and dryer and more cupboard space.

 Now onto the bedrooms...If you walk past the living room in the other direction from the kitchen, you'll come to the master bedroom.

And here's the room we'll be using for a guest bedroom/office. We're trying to trade out these two beds for a queen size. There's a guest bathroom across the hall but I didn't get a picture of it.

 And the nursery for Landon. This bed will be taken out and his crib is on it's way to replace it - one of the only pieces of furniture we got to ship.

 Here's the master bath. After having a very small bathroom in our townhome for 4.5 years, I'm REALLY loving how much space there is!

And that completes the lower level of our home.

A beautiful staircase leads us to the top floor...(I was shocked when I first saw this - had no idea it was two levels!)

There's a loft space at the top of the stairs that will house the kids toys and books and possibly a tv to watch movies.

 Jocelyn's room:

 Aubrey's room:

 Aubrey's closet (I didn't want to add more pictures than necessary so times this by 3 - each of the kids have a lot of closet space!)

 Andrew's room:

 And their bathroom:

 The kids LOVE LOVE LOVE having their own bedrooms. They shared before in our old house so this has been a treat for them - as you can probably see! :)

That concludes the house tour.

As our rooms get decorated and finishedr, I'll put them up for you to see.

New Country, New Home!

So here we are – a week to the day that we got off the plane and moved to Frankfurt Germany. And it has literally taken just about this entire week to get adjusted to local time – and something that will more than likely take a few more weeks to adjust! Thank goodness for the dark shades on the windows! We’ve been walking around like zombies! I thought THREE hour time changes were hard! This is nuts!

(Frankfurt Airport)

We LOVE our apartment! And all the stairs we have to travel to get up and down our apartment a few times a day will hopefully get us into shape by the time we're done here! (Besides all the walking we are doing here already!) Throughout the home is 18th century style furniture. Two levels with a beautiful turnaround staircase dividing the upper and lower floors. Kids are really enjoying their own rooms. As soon as the front door closed behind us last Monday, they were off and running to explore our new home and all three of the oldest kids claimed their rooms on the upper floor. Kitchen is so nice and spacious and has a TON of storage space along with a washer and dryer! And it looks like I’ll finally be able to leave out my Kitchen Aid mixer on the counter. Speaking of household goods, we should finally be getting our shipment by the end of this month. And our express shipment with clothes and toys should be here even sooner. This house will feel even more like a home after we have our things to personalize it. Kids are bored to tears with hardly anything to do around here. We get them out often – taking them on walks to nearby parks and neighborhoods to explore, have gone on the u-bahn (underground train) to downtown and pretty close by is a playground. The people we have met here so far are really nice! And the kids have made some really cute friends. Not being able to speak the native language or pronounce even the street signs is making me go a bit crazy so I will be taking a class here soon to learn German. John remembers a few things from when he was stationed in Germany before but is a little rusty and would like to relearn the language. We will be teaching the kids as well. I figure why not? We’ll be here for awhile! We’re getting a bit of America’s own taste as well. When people come to the U.S. from other countries, we expect them to a certain extent to speak and undertstand English. (And now I know how they must feel not knowing what people are saying. It can be a bit frustrating!) I don’t want to sit by the side and not take the opportunity to learn something new and as well as helpful.

To back things up a bit, we had quite the experience when we got to the Dulles Airport a week ago Sunday – the 31st of July. We checked in 13 pieces of luggage, each had a back pack, the camera bag, diaper bag and my purse. Oh, and the THREE car seats!!! Can you imagine?? What a workout that was hauling all that stuff through the airport along with Andrew on John’s shoulders and Landon in my arms. I am SO glad that part of the trip is over!! We had saved our phone calls to family back home for when we were all done and checked in. Thing is though, that John accidentally left his phone in our friend’s car so we were without. I quickly got some change for the nearby pay phones. No dial tone! Seriously, I felt defeated as all odds seemed to be against me. We followed each other onto the plane. John had bags on his back as well as two car seats in hand while ushering Jocelyn, Andrew and Aubrey into their seats. I had my bag, diaper bag and Landon asleep in his car seat. So after I shuffled my way through 1st class uncomfortably…I set down his car seat in the aisle AS SOON as I was passed 1st class. I couldn’t go any further. I literally hit my breaking point and stood there about to cry! It was hard enough knowing we were leaving our amazing friends and family behind for the next three years! When people spotted that Landon was in the car seat, a gentleman stood up and offered to help me. I was so close to crying, I couldn’t even speak! So he carted Landon to our row. I kept thanking him over and over. It's so nice to have people about that are so willing to help others in need. Once we got settled in our seats (girls on the side row and John and I and the boys across from them in the middle row), I reached into my bag to get out some magazines before stowing my bag in the overhead compartment, I found a card and box with my name on. I opened it up and it was the sweetest letter from one of my best friends, Heather, and a beautiful beaded friendship bracelet. I laid my head on John’s shoulder and shed a few tears. What a hard and long day! This is going to be a great adventure, but I’m really going to miss back home and all my friends and family. We’ll make the best of it and the home sickness we were stung with once arriving, is getting at least bearable. And I’m sure we’ll also find some awesome friends here too – but not replacements of the old ones we had to leave behind. The more the merrier, right? :)

The plane ride over was a night flight. It didn’t, however, allow us to get a good night’s sleep. Obviously – I knew there’d be noise, lights on in the cabin and uncomfortable seats. But the kids were restless just as much as I was. For me it was all the nerves and emotions from the day that wouldn’t allow me to turn off. For the kids, it was trying to get comfortable sitting upright and sleeping, especially through the noise of people ordering food and drinks or whatnot. I got about 2 hours of sleep! The night flight did however seem to go by fast and we arrived in Frankfurt on Monday August 1st at noon. Everyone had to walk off the stairs of the plane to hop on a bus that taxi'd us over to the gate. Oh – that was another adventure of its own. First, we were the LAST off the plane with flight attendants helping us get our things transferred over. Then, we had to board the already packed full bus. Everyone squeezed together for the 5 minute ride that seemed like an hour. We were expected to meet people from John’s work so it was a bit of a scene like Home Alone rushing through the airport. It was the first time we saw German police as we were passing through Customs. We got to the baggage claim just in time to meet two gentlemen to help us get our things into the van. Once we dragged all of our stuff into our new home, we were given a few hours and then someone came and picked John up and took him to get some groceries. We also got the privilege on Friday to ride the train into town and have dinner at a German restaurant that was built about 500 years ago. Had some really good schnitzel! More on that later. We took a trip to the local grocery store and got a little dose of what we’re going to expect being over here. High prices (Euros are about 70 some cents to our dollar!) and words beyond recognition! A cute older German couple came up to us and I’m assuming how they were talking and smiling at my kids that they were saying nice things but I had NO idea what was being said and it literally frustrated me. All I could do was smile. I am now on the receiving end of what people must feel when they come to America and don’t speak English. I think our family is still like deer in headlights – we’ll have a great time here and have some awesome experiences…just dealing with an obvious culture shock! I have however picked up a few key words like bitte (please), heute (today), siedlung (neighborhood), u-bahn (train), polizei (police) and a few more that I can't remember at the moment. I can’t wait to learn more!

Aubrey’s enrolled into middle school. Jocelyn is unfortunately unable to attend Kindergarten due to her birthdate being in the middle of September and the cut off here is the 1st. So one more year. I’ll do some things at home to get her ready! We are studying to get our German drivers license. The weather has been on the cool side. A few really nice warm days but mostly in the 60s and rainy. Time to seriously bring out the coats! Once we get our car in a few months, we’ll be able to do more travel. We’re relying heavily on public transportation and walking. Even when we DO get our vehicle…it’ll on be for long distances. More to report soon. Right now, we’re waiting on cable, internet and phone to be hooked up so in the mean time, communication and updates are limited. Even loading pictures are SLOW so bear with me. I'll show you around the inside of our house soon.

Next up: A trip to ENGLAND!