Sightseeing, Sewing, St. Nikolaus, Saxophones, and Snow

Those daily posts in November were a lot of work and I was happy to have made it through the month so I could be finished with it, but then I started to kind of miss writing each day. Anyone else miss my daily ramblings? No, just me? Either way, I'm back at it again! Not daily writing, but it will be good to get back to posting every Sunday. That was my original intention back in 2009 when I started this blog even though it's never been something that has really happened. Sometimes I post more frequently than once a week but usually it's much less than that. 

We're a third of the way through what is arguably the busiest month of the year and we've already managed to pack a ton into ten short days. Strangely, most of what what we did starts with the letter S. We'll cover just the highlights below!

The first exciting thing in December was having a day out in London with Katie!  She's been studying in Seville this semester and we were so happy to hear that she was taking a weekend and coming to the UK. We were even happier that she wanted to spend some of that weekend with us. For our family, seeing your cousins is a big deal because it just doesn't happen that often.

We met Katie at Kings Cross where we visited Platform 9 3/4 and the Harry Potter store before setting out into the city. We spent the morning walking around London. We saw Big Ben, the London Eye, Westminster Abbey, and the Houses of Parliament. It sounds like a lot, but they're all really close to each other. We then headed across the Thames to what looked like a Christmas Market on the south bank of the river. Things were only starting to open as we arrived, but we were still able to do some looking around and buy some yummy snacks (crepes, mini pancakes, and mac and cheese) to fuel our adventures.

I kind of have a thing for graffiti. It's interesting and creative. As long as it's not swear words or crude messages I think it can definitely be considered an art form. Although I guess it's also a little bit illegal to paint just anywhere. Even Picasso might get in trouble if he started painting the concrete columns of an underpass. Anyway, as we were walking along the riverbank we found this stretch that was covered in street art with a big crowd gathering. Obviously, something cool was about to happen so we hung around to see what we could see. After a few minutes a guy on a bicycle rides in and goes down one ramp and up another one, balancing on the top edge of the second ramp, and then turns his bike around and rides back toward us and rides up a ramp and then jumps his bike over a waist high railing into the crowd! And then he did it again. You always see crazy things in London!

After lunch at Five Guys we hopped on the tube and headed toward the Globe Theater. We were scheduled to take a tour of the Globe and learn a little more about what it would have been like in Shakespeare's day. It was pretty cool to be sitting in the Globe and hearing about the history of the theater and then to suddenly have a group of actors come out and start rehearsing a play. You could tell our tour guide didn't know quite what to do because we just sat there for a while waiting for a break so that he could keep talking! 

After the tour we headed to the adjoining Sam Wanamaker Playhouse to see a performance of Romantics Anonymous, a really sweet and slightly magical musical romantic comedy. I honestly can't say enough good things about this production. To begin with, you are handed chocolate by cast members as you're waiting for the performance to begin. And it's not just any chocolate, but magic chocolate! I had my phone out during the opening number, which was a song all about the sweet stuff, just so I could furiously type in the lyrics. A few lines that I loved: "Chocolate makes the darkness somehow bright when it's just right." "More than just a treat, though it's truly bittersweet. Bitterness is what it takes to make the taste complete." "Chocolate holds the world in every bite when it's just right."  Besides being about chocolate, it's about romance and two timid people who take a risk despite their anxiety and fall in love. The story was wonderful, the acting was fantastic, I loved the music, and the set was so cool with lots of neon lighting and edison bulbs. All around a great show and one I'd love to find the music for on iTunes so I can relive the magic!

It was dark by the time we left the theater but we wanted to see a little more of London so we took the tube to St. James' Park and then walked to Buckingham Palace. There were hardly any tourists there that late in the day, which was kind of nice. We were able to see the guards in their tall hats marching back and forth in front of the palace without throngs of people in our way. We took a few pictures and then walked back through the park toward Trafalgar Square where we found a place for dinner. It was almost time to say goodbye to Katie at that point as she had a Jack the Ripper Tour and we had to catch our train home but it was a sweet treat to spend the day together! 

Natalie's coat (which belonged to three sisters before her) has had a small hole in it for almost as long as we've had it. Emily was wearing it when we were having a bonfire in our backyard in Herschberg and a spark from the fire floated up and landed on her coat, burning a little hole right above the chest pocket. I've been saying for literally years that I needed to patch it up and it only took me seven years to do it. We hope Jared doesn't mind that we covered up the hole by sewing on one of his old Boy Scout patches! That little sewing chore, which I would usually not love, brought me a lot of joy in a very stressful week and it reminded me how much I absolutely LOVE to sew.  So I made time, stayed up late, neglected other responsibilities, and did whatever else it took to get some sewing time in this week. The end results were two cute pairs of flannel pajama pants and seven festive pillowcases. And now I just keep thinking to myself, "What should I sew next?"

This week was St. Nikolaustag! The kids put out their shoes before bed on Wednesday hoping that St. Nikolaus would come and fill them with treats. I switched out the tall rain boots Natalie and Samantha chose to place by the door because bigger shoes do not equal more treats. Plus these shoes look better in the photo. I'm glad we've incorporated this German tradition into our family's Christmas celebration, it's one of the kid's favorites.

Samantha had her first band concert this week. She started playing the alto saxophone this year and has really enjoyed it. We were a little surprised at her choice of instrument, but it's actually a good fit for her and she's done well. She even had a little part at the end where she was the only saxophonist playing. You'll have to turn your head sideways to watch it because rotating the phone doesn't rotate the camera, lesson learned!

We got snow today! When we first woke up it was kind of slushy rain but it switched to beautiful, fat snowflakes as the morning wore on and it was just so fantastic. The snowy, slushy roads meant that not many people made it to church today and we only held Sacrament meeting. It was good to see that the girls all felt a little sad about missing the rest of church and wished we were having the full three hour block of meetings. By mid-afternoon the snow had tapered off and the roads were wet on the way home but not snowy at all. I think any hopes of a snow day are in vain. 

And just in case anyone thinks it's all been Christmastime and magic around here, we found this in a corner of Samantha and Natalie's room this week. It actually happened once before but we'd thought it was taken care of, never to return. Apparently we were wrong. These English houses and their terrible ventilation are tricky. Email and photos have been sent to the landlord and our fingers are crossed that it really will be fixed for good this time.

If you've made it all the way to the end of this novel of a post you deserve a big hug, or some chocolate or something. Thanks for reading!