Hey Blogees,
I am apologising in advance because I just have so much to share today. It was somewhat bittersweet for us to welcome and say goodbye to our last official guests of the year. Yes, as most everyone has asked, it does get tiring and we have seen things multiple times, but for us, every visitor has introduced us to so many fun and different experiences. This is such an opportunity for us to be here and we absolutely have encouraged family and friends to take advantage of that. Yes, we are working and have to continue with our day to day lives, but we have been given this 2 year window to experience as much as possible, and part of that is being able to share this with the people we care most about.
Alright, enough seriousness and I should crack on with the more important details of our last guests, Nick and Jen Dinham. Nick and Jen are awesome friends from my days in Chicago. They arrived a week ago Thursday and stayed with us until last Monday, and my hangover lasted equally as long. As far as touring, we sent them out on their own for the most part. They covered more ground in 4 days than I think most people would cover in 2 weeks. They walked so much that I think that they almost looked malnourished when we sent them home. On their first night, we took them for their first North African meal at Pasha where they were exposed to the truly underwhelming form of British customer service!! It was, however, great food. Friday, we had a booking at a highly recommended restaurant in Notting Hill called "Bumpkin." See, if you have a perverse sense of humour like the 4 of us, you are laughing right now because you just made the same connection to something very similar sounding to bumpkin. If not, please disregard, or "look it up Chris," but do so at your own peril. For those of you that are asking why I continue saying "Look it up Chris," here is that story. Since Ann and I are wannabe "Millennial's" and rely exclusively on the technology in our hands to find immediate answers, we constantly say look it up to each other. If you recall a rap duo in the early 90's called Kriss Kross, you will remember one of their popular lyrics was "Warm it up Chris." Well, after Nick and Jen commented on how often we say look it up, the term "Look it up Chris" was adapted to our situation and adopted possibly for ever. When Ann and I finally get to meet Nick and Jen's 1 year old daughter Sidney, I am holding out hope that those will be her first words to me. We can all hope at least. Back to the story.... the food and ambiance at Bumpkin was incredible and we will definitely be back there again. Saturday brought a lovely pub crawl through Hampstead, Belsize Park, and Camden, and we ended meeting up with some of Nick and Jen's friends that were randomly in town that same weekend. Since Sunday was also the Sr. Director's birthday, there was a lot of celebrating happening all weekend long. I have to give props to Ann because she was quite a trooper that weekend as she powered through a pretty nasty cold on top of all of the festivities. Unfortunately for her though on Saturday, the afternoon pub crawl with multiple shots took quite a toll and we had to send her home early on Saturday evening. The three of us were quite jealous of her on Sunday morning though as she was experiencing nowhere near the level of pain that we were. After a delicious breakfast at Cafe Phillies, we were recovered and ready to take on the day. We took the train out to Wimbledon. That was our first time out there as well and it was so much fun. Beyond the tennis center itself, which was incredible despite not getting to actually see any of the main courts, there was a quaint High Street in Wimbledon and some beautiful green spaces that we ventured through. We wrapped up Sunday with a leisurely stroll down Portobello Road in Notting Hill and then had dinner at our favourite Lebanese restaurant. Nick and Jen, thanks so much for making the trip across the pond to see us. It was an awesome weekend and we love our plan to meet for a weekend once a year when we return to the states. You all left us with some amazing memories.
We hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving weekend. It was very strange to work last Thursday, but we were rewarded with a delicious turkey dinner at a little restaurant near our flat called Ffiona's. It is a well known place for American Expats for a traditional Thanksgiving meal, and it did not disappoint. We had an awesome dinner with our friend Beth and another one of her American friends, and we were able to end the night with talking to each of our families. While we were eating, we were getting live updates on the Packers from Joe in Fondy as well, so it was almost like being at home. We enjoyed a super relaxing weekend and bought a few x-mas decorations to liven up our flat a bit. Since we will be here for x-mas, we had to make it feel as much as home as possible. We will post some pics of our decorated flat as well as around London because the x-mas decorations over here are incredible.
The next two weekends for us are actually here in London with no plans!!! We did book flights to Nuremberg, Germany the weekend before x-mas to check out the much talked about German Christmas Markets. Even more exciting, Ann's little brother Joe is coming to spend 3 weeks of his x-mas break with us and he arrives just a few days before x-mas. It will be so great to have him here with us for the holidays. We also just booked tickets for the 3 of us to spend New Years weekend in Basel, Switzerland and Colmar, France. We can't wait to have that time with Joe. One final note and the biggest excitement of all, Ann's sister Jane is 3cm dilated and 70% effaced, so there is going to be a new baby in Fondy for x-mas. We are so sad that we are going to miss the birth, but we can't wait to meet the Little Mongin!!!!
Happy Almost December
Kevin and Ann
1 comment:
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