7 days (so far) with Natalie et all....

So last Sunday morning Natalie, Caden, Marcus & grandma Connie arrived at the flat. I was so excited to see them! Poor Caden had the most difficult time getting his body clock switched around. Their flight over sounded somewhat changeling, it's a good thing that we had nothing planned for Monday except going for a walk around the neighborhood and buying some essentials.

Tuesday we went on a half day bus tour of London, saw the guard change at Buckingham & St. James Palace. Which btw was really awesome. AND Exciting news! We saw Prince Charles and Camilla!

Wednesday we went a day trip to Dover, Canterbury & Leeds.
We drove over the Greenwich meridian. We saw Leeds Castle, then stopped off at the beach in Dover for a foggy view of the Cliffs and the Castle on top. Then onward to Canterbury where we had a tour of the Cathedral and some free time in the town.
It was a big day with the 3 kids, but good one and for the most part the babies did pretty well.

Thursday we hired 2 nannies to come look after the 3 kids for the day and we went to Mason & Fortnum for afternoon tea and shopping! Amazing afternoon and I fell in LOVE with that shop! It's just so amazing google it cause I can't explain it :)

Friday was a trip to the London Aquarium which was super busy due to it being a school holiday but we managed and it was really a fantastic place. The aquarium did not disappoint!

Saturday Natalie & Caden did the Tower of London, Grandma Connie did the market on Portobello Road, and I had a restful day with Ben &
Evelyn, some grocery shopping and cooking for Demetri's Halloween Party. I helped with the food and played a little pseudo hostess since his wife is back in home in Toronto.

Today (Sunday) I am taking Evelyn to a children's Halloween/Birthday party. And all of us have dinner reservations for 6pm. Natalie and her crew are going to High Street Kensingston shopping and to Hyde Park to feed the swans.

Tomorrow (Monday) we are going to the Museum of Natural History and Tuesday very early morning they flew back home. I won't know what to do with myself the flat will be so empty and quiet ;)

Now I have seen it all...

Stirup pants.... Really? Who thought they looked good the first time around? They certainly do NOT look good in 2010! Seriously stirup pants??? I feel ill....

Date Night

So as it turns out Ben came down with something that has been going around the set. Aches, pains, dizzy and a fever :( he came home last night went straight to bed and slept/stayed in bed all day today.
Poor Ben :( We still went out for dinner he didn't want to cancel but it wasn't fun as it could have been if he had been feeling better.... he wouldn't let me take his photo... so I took lots of myself instead!

Even in England I found a truss podium ! This was the entry to the restaurant & club we went to tonight.... Babylon aka the Kennsington Rooftop Gardens.

Self photo at the table :)
Self photo at the bar with our cocktails awaiting our table...


My shoes...

Me posing at the flat :)

I LOVE to shop....

I think I was born to shop :) The shops & markets in London are just so much fun I am going to miss it so much when I have to leave. I think it likely that I will have full on shopping withdrawal. I love all the antique furniture, jewelry, !china and silver! and there are SO many wonderful vintage stalls in the market for clothes, hats & purses a girl like me is in heaven :) And of course mixed in with everything old are lots of new stores too, just to mix it up!

But I do have a few comments to make.... I do not know if these styles are coming in back at home in Canada or not perhaps someone could fill me in?

1. Why oh why are super skinny jeans back? the ones with the ankle zippers otherwise you could not get them on over your foot??? I jut had a baby so there is NO way in hell I can pull off skinny jeans actually being a curvy girl I could not do skinny jeans even pre baby but I am really annoyed that I can't buy any normal jeans here...

2. baggy t-shirts with belts at the waist over stretch leggings. I don't know if I like this super sloppy causal look over stretch leggings... but please ladies at least buy a t-shirt or mini dress that covers your ass if you insist on wearing stretch leggings! Fancy lace tights and sheer'ish leggings are NOT pants!

3. Vintage Fur -(anything pre 1960) now this is a look I do happen to like... why not give an old fur a new life? I happen to have my eye on something from the 1950's in very good condition. It's all the rage here... so much so that lots of stores have new furs for sale (copies of vintage styles) and of course for the budget girl lots of faux fur clothing is out there too. I see alot of capes, vests and short jackets, long fur coats are still totally out.

4. 1920's & 1930's Evening Wear Charleston/Flapper girl dresses with the dropped waist are popular and lots of mini dresses with lots and lots of lace to give it a Victorian romantic feel I am not so big on all the lace but I am a sucker for the comfy chic 20's and 30's dresses....

So basically it's weird to see the 1980's are totally back with leg warmers, neon colours, baggy tops and skinny bottoms at the same time as a resurgence of classy 20's & 30's mixed with Victorian to just give old styles a fresh look.
I am not at all okay with the 80's being back oh nooooo.... but gimme some true vintage shops and I could spend spend spend! (btw which I happen to classify the 80's as retro NOT vintage)

Yes so that was my shopping rant...
Stay tuned for photos of me in my new ultra sparkle 4" shoes and new dress I bought for our date night this Saturday and Ben will be wearing his Dior outfit. We're going to look hawt :) I am going to ask the sitter to take a photo of us before we leave.... I will post photos on Sunday!

Sigh.... not so bad afterall

So as it turns out we won't be selling the house and moving to a condo... I think we will be able to make it work. And I really do love my neighborhood and all the great things it has for Evelyn. Ben and I had a pretty long and productive talk last night.
I feel much better now that a few things have been sorted out.
Still no idea when this job is ending and what the next one is though, but it's always like that so nothing new or surprising there.

So it turns out that Ben has this WHOLE weekend off! Yes 2 glorious days in which he can relax and spend some time with Evelyn and me!
And I just discovered that Hatfield House (Palace) where Queen Elizabeth I grew up is closed for the season!!!!! noooooooo..... it closed Sept 30th. It was super hard to get too on my own with the baby since it's a fair bit outside central London so I was very excited that Ben having the day off on Saturday we could go for the afternoon and take the car... so sad now..... So now I have to find something else to do for the afternoon.A
Suggestions Welcome :)

Then Saturday night we are going to the Kensington Roof Gardens to have dinner at Babylon. See the website: www.roofgardens.virgin.com. Our reservations are for 7:30pm and we have hired the babysitter to come and look after Evelyn for the evening :) it will be my first time eating out here in London WITHOUT the baby! Can you tell I am excited to have a nice night out baby free?

Then on Sunday midday Natalie, Caden, Marcus and her grandma Connie arrive for a little over a week to visit and do some sightseeing! Very excited for them to stay!

So this week has been spent mostly preparing for their visit, buying odds and ends to make things comfortable and planning etc... lots of running around!

Okay so it's freezing and after 11:30pm so that means its past my bedtime!!!

Netbook is here and it works!

So I now have a netbook which means I have REAL access to the internet again. Something I have not had since leaving Canada. Its a weird computer though totally different than what I am used too so a bit of a learning curve.

Tomorrow I will try my hand at uploading photos and see how I do. Not going to start the process right now as it's 12:30am and I am in a very bad mood because Ben & I are mad at each other. We each think the other one is too blame about government paperwork, house stuff and things in general that are out of control being as neither of us is living at our house in Toronto.

And I am still trying to get my head around the idea that Ben is most likely going to be home for Christmas for about a week and then gone again until likely May on whatever film comes up next. As much as we would both like him to spend a couple weeks at home that is looking near impossible at this point.
My only thought right now is how can I sell the house and get a new one with Ben out of the country?
What kind of place do I even want to buy and where? Can we sell ours for a decent price? So many things going through my head and I am super upset and stressed out about them all. (note that just a couple short hours ago I was in a good mood)
but now I am upset and stressed out :(

How do I go about buying a new car without him? Another likely event that will have to occur sooner than later.

Just so man things to consider and I know that none of them are on Bens radar.

Mike & Pauline are you back yet?

Okay a better more thorough update tomorrow withe photos I promise!

Happy Thanksgiving!

So it's been a week since my last blog post, sorry! It's just that I was very busy with Jeanette here and then we all got a little sick and we were still trying to make the most of our days.

So last week we went to Preston to visit my grandpas 1st cousin Derek and his wife Sue. We had an amazing time and wish we could have stayed longer! We had the nicest visit with them and they took all around the lake district, Lancaster castle, a Tudor mansion (which was awesome) and it was just a really amazing visit, we were sad to say goodbye.
I hope they are able to come visit me in London for a few days before I go home!

We came home a little overtired and all a little sick. Jeanette had been struggling with her migraines and stomach in Preston and the baby and I caught a cold plus she is really teething now so that maybe contributed to her feeling yucky as well.

Thursday was a sleep in and rest up, do laundry and groceries day. But we did go on the London Eye just before/during sunset and it was really amazing we loved it!

Friday we went to lunch at my new fav restaurant e&o just off Portobello road. We also did a little more shopping an then we dropped Evelyn off with the babysitter and went to see Wicked which was just incredible! Might be the best musical I have ever seen we just enjoyed it so much.

Then Saturday we went for afternoon tea at the Orangery at Kenningston Palace ! It was very yummy I loved the special tea I choose and
the clotted cream with dessert and finger sandwiches. It was just a fun outing. Then we walked around Hyde Park, saw the swans and walked home again.
Sunday we went to the London Dungeon. Which is a spookey experience through Londons dark history but we left the baby at home. We loved it!!!

lol apparently we loved it all because I have used loved it like a million times during this blog I just realized !

Today Jeanette had to fly home I didn't cry when we said goodbye but when I got back to flat I felt an overwhelming homesickness and lonely feeling :(
and I really miss her the flat is too quiet and empty.

So I had a great time with Jeanette we didn't even fight once!!! And shared a whole lot which for how long we were together we would usually have at least one fight or so....
I hope I can post a few photos sometime this week but it depends on when Ben gets home and all last week he had "homework" so he came home from work only to work on the computer for a few hours more :(
speaking of Ben and his work his end date is really up in the air it's anyones guess when they will finish this movie, they are moving really at a snails pace. Nobody has a clue what is happening beyond Dec 22nd.
And offically Ben is now working EVERY Sat and even some Sundays... So much for any weekends away together to Dover or Bath or my overnight castle stay. Very disapointing news.

And to top it all off we the flat has been sold and production didn't try to extend our lease until the deal was done so now we have move out mid November. Don't worry people coming to visit Ben says we will have room at our new place... It won't be as nice it's going to be coperate housing like a glorified hotel but he tells me it will have everything we have here I hope so!!! I am bit upset by this news obviously. But Demetri is living there now (ever since his flat flooded in late Aug) and he likes it okay they have maud service everyday so that's a plus I guess.

So that's all the news for now. More updates sooner than a week I promise!

Catching up and away we go!

Yesterday we went on the hop on hop off bus tour of London. It was really good. Despite a little rain the weather cooperated quite well. It rained the most while we were having fish n chips in a pub and generally didn't rain during the time we were in the bus just a mild spitting now and again and we always got seats up top. Just Jeanette and I went on the tour Ben stayed at the flat with the baby and had some homework to do. When we got home we all went to a nice dinner.

So far it's been great having Jeanette here. We shared lunch (sharing with ones sister what a concept! Lol) and have agreed in everything so far about what we want to do, when and how etc... And of course she's been a great help with the baby.

Today is a travel day - going north on the train to Preston to visit cousins and see when my Grandpa is from. Not sure about Internet access.... Back Wed night!

So soon now!

Jeanette will be here in less than 12 hours!!!! I am not so excited to be meeting her at the airport at 7am though... I hope I can sleep tonight better than last night. There is no denying Evelyn is our child she loves to cuddle and be snuggled in the center between her daddy and me. I could not get her settled in own bed at 2am....

Today was quite cold and rainy but I spent most of the day out and about grocery shopping and trying to get ready for Jeanettes arrival.
I really hope we have a few nice sunny days while she is here.
Ben works tomorrow as per usual. But on Sunday he gets to spend a good part of the day with Evelyn I am going out with Jeanette sightseeing and Ben is going to look after the baby hehehe lol choke gasp lol I hope when I come home they are both still alive and well should be an interesting day I think.....

Okay that's it for today nothing much of interest but I need to go to bed early so I can get Jeanette in the morning!