paris with children

This is a bridge in front of our hotel.  We couldn't see the Eiffel Tower from our room.  It took us about twenty minutes to walk to it, and the weather was perfect for walking.  The Seine is just on the other side of the trees on the left side of the photo.  The Statue of Liberty is on the bridge over the river.

The park with a carousel.

Instead of just riding around in a circle, the children were given sticks and directed to rings that they could collect as they flew past.

Ready to collect rings!

Looking cool in Paris.

The view.

We took the stairs down and down and down.

The Notre Dame

Paris has always been a special place to Paul and me.  The stylish people and the divine food were lost on them, but they loved the look of the city.  We look forward to taking them back again some day.

birthday boys

Happy Birthday boys!  You fill us crown to toe, top-full of love.

Tim wanted something Pokemon for his birthday cupcakes. The best I could do were Pokey Balls.  I don't understand any of it and hope to keep it that way.

Both Tim and Luke enjoyed the Pinewood Derby.  Tim placed in this one, as you can hear/see.

Barcelona

To help us cope with the lack of daylight and cold weather, we spent four days in the glorious Barcelona sun, soaking it and the culture right up.

Tim took to the idea of his own desk immediately upon getting into our hotel rooms.  We had matching adjoining rooms.  Two toilets.  What a luxury!  We didn't know it when the photo was taken, but Luke was fighting a stomach bug.  You can see it in his face if you zoom in.  Poor little man.  Fortunately, it went through him quickly and he was 100% in about 12 hours.

Using mass transit has become common to Tim and Luke.  Our hotel was on top of the main train station and subway stop.  

The small cafe had empanadas for Paul and cookies on a stick for Tim.  Luke wasn't interested in any of it.

We enjoyed the watching the locals play boules.

Park Guell was our first stop.  We had to buy tickets and return later but found a playground for the boys and had some lunch.  Mostly we just sat in the sun and enjoyed the day.

From the park, we walked and took the subway to Gaudi's masterpiece, La Sagrada Familia.

Conveniently, there was another playground across the street.

The boys were quite taken with the space station theme of the hotel.  This chair was in front of the elevators and very near our room.  Tim hid from me in it one morning and scared an unobservant couple.  He and I enjoyed the moment.

On day two, we walked a main boulevard to see some more Gaudi architecture and eventually get to the beach.

Next door.  Not Gaudi but just as interesting.

We even got to spend a little time in the Picasso museum.

Tim's latest passion is amethyst.  

Typical streets.

Both boys are still very fond of the beach.

christmas 2014

Christmas Eve

Tim did at least half of the decorating this year and most of the eating.

Luke helped for the first time.

No space for a big tree, our fibre optic mini made things festive.  Tim and Luke helped with the streamer.

Tim was more than happy to go to bed on Christmas Eve having worked out that the sooner he fell asleep, the sooner Santa would arrive.

The boys trying out the newest Skylander game.

Luke was quick to combine Angry Birds and Jenga.

Seconds out of the boxes and both boys are deep into Mario on their new Nintendo 3DS game players.

Thank you family for all the wonderful presents for the boys.  This it the first year where batteries were not required, hopefully a new trend.

lights in london

We took a trip into London last week to see the city lit up for Christmas, and we were not disappointed.  We took the train to Waterloo, then the tube to a stop near Regent's Park where Paul likes to walk on his lunch.  We walked through a small section of the beautiful park, then found a pub on Baker Street, just a few doors down from the Sherlock Holmes museum.  We ate dinner and waited for the sun to set, then got on the 139 city double decker bus.  We started out just one seat behind the top front seats and half way through our journey got move to the very front.  What a show!  It was London's night for Santacon and we saw at least 500 people dressed as Santa.  The streets were filled with cars and the crowds were so thick that they were spilling into the roads.  It was great to be above it all.  The bus journey took us down Oxford Street and Regent Street, through Piccadilly Circus, around Trafalgar Square (an Englishwoman behind us told us the story of the Norwegian Christmas tree there), across Waterloo bridge and ended at Waterloo.  We were home by 7PM.