2) The Headphones Torture Another Baby.
And, yes, Pearson is standing in that picture and supporting himself by holding onto my knee. Have I mentioned he has figured out how to pull himself forward on his stomach? We have an almost-crawler folks!
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Two Funny Things Today
1) The Package That Went To The Wrong Side Of The World. Literally.
Yep, that blue stamp says 'MISSENT TO MALAYSIA'! No wonder it took so long to get here!
2) The Headphones Torture Another Baby.
OK, not torture. But Brayton decided to put the noise-reducing headphones on Pearson and unlike his two older brothers, he didn't seem to mind.
And, yes, Pearson is standing in that picture and supporting himself by holding onto my knee. Have I mentioned he has figured out how to pull himself forward on his stomach? We have an almost-crawler folks!
2) The Headphones Torture Another Baby.
And, yes, Pearson is standing in that picture and supporting himself by holding onto my knee. Have I mentioned he has figured out how to pull himself forward on his stomach? We have an almost-crawler folks!
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Our Unlucky Journey North: Part Five
Sunday morning we decided to make the most of our last few hours in Edinburgh.
Our first stop was at Canongate Kirk, the sight of the "other" royal wedding this summer (Canongate Kirk also happened to be right in front of our hotel):
We had another brisk morning walk and then I realized I needed a mocha so we stopped at a local cafe:
Did I mention we picked the cafe where Rowling wrote some of the Potter books?
Our final destination was the National Museum of Scotland. Since we were there we had to meet Dolly The Cloned Sheep:
The boys had fun playing with lots of the tech exhibits but the most fun was when they got to design their own race car and then see how well it went around the track:
We also let the boys pick a few things they really wanted to see and McColley chose the Meissen lion (I think because it was a lion):
Unfortunately we had to leave when we ran out of time instead of when we ran out of interest.
We walked back to our hotel to pick up our bags:
We then used the little bit of remaining time on our bus tickets to catch a ride back to the train station.
Once on the train home our luck finally changed! We had been assigned four seats that were not next to each other. However one of the seats was behind another one. We hoped the two people assigned to sit next to those seats would be willing to switch and the first person who was assigned one of those seats did so happily. Then, luckily, the other person never showed up so I was able to use the fourth seat with no issue! It was nice to have something go easily after all the issues we'd had on the trip!
Our first stop was at Canongate Kirk, the sight of the "other" royal wedding this summer (Canongate Kirk also happened to be right in front of our hotel):
We had another brisk morning walk and then I realized I needed a mocha so we stopped at a local cafe:
Did I mention we picked the cafe where Rowling wrote some of the Potter books?
Our final destination was the National Museum of Scotland. Since we were there we had to meet Dolly The Cloned Sheep:
The boys had fun playing with lots of the tech exhibits but the most fun was when they got to design their own race car and then see how well it went around the track:
We also let the boys pick a few things they really wanted to see and McColley chose the Meissen lion (I think because it was a lion):
Unfortunately we had to leave when we ran out of time instead of when we ran out of interest.
We walked back to our hotel to pick up our bags:
We then used the little bit of remaining time on our bus tickets to catch a ride back to the train station.
Once on the train home our luck finally changed! We had been assigned four seats that were not next to each other. However one of the seats was behind another one. We hoped the two people assigned to sit next to those seats would be willing to switch and the first person who was assigned one of those seats did so happily. Then, luckily, the other person never showed up so I was able to use the fourth seat with no issue! It was nice to have something go easily after all the issues we'd had on the trip!
Our Unlucky Journey North: Part Four
Thankfully my fever broke about 2AM and I was definitely better by Saturday morning so we were able to continue with our sightseeing plans.
Our morning walk took us past the new Scottish Parliament building:
Our destination was the Palace of Holyroodhouse - The Queen's Official Residence in Scotland:
We toured the state rooms and also the historic rooms. The historic rooms have been open officially for tours since the 1830's and were Mary, Queen of Scots' rooms during her reign. They are famous because they are where her husband, Lord Darnley, murdered her Italian secretary, Rizzio in front of her.
There are actually abbey ruins attached to the palace (the palace was originally an addition to the abbey, interestingly enough):
We left the palace and headed up the Royal Mile to the castle:
McColley was very excited by all Edinburgh Castle's cannons. He pretended he was ordering them to fire:
We saw The Honours Of Scotland and the royal apartments before heading into the Great Hall. Sir William Kilcaldy of Grange was there telling us all the story of the Lang Siege:
Once back outside we had to get a picture with the overview:
And then we took a series of pictures at McColley's request. First up was a picture with Mons Meg (one of the world's oldest cannons):
Then a picture with the One O'Clock Gun:
And last, a picture with Robert The Bruce:
We left the Castle with enough time to wander into the Museum of Edinburgh for a look around... it helps the Museum was right in front of our hotel!
Our morning walk took us past the new Scottish Parliament building:
Our destination was the Palace of Holyroodhouse - The Queen's Official Residence in Scotland:
We toured the state rooms and also the historic rooms. The historic rooms have been open officially for tours since the 1830's and were Mary, Queen of Scots' rooms during her reign. They are famous because they are where her husband, Lord Darnley, murdered her Italian secretary, Rizzio in front of her.
There are actually abbey ruins attached to the palace (the palace was originally an addition to the abbey, interestingly enough):
We left the palace and headed up the Royal Mile to the castle:
McColley was very excited by all Edinburgh Castle's cannons. He pretended he was ordering them to fire:
We saw The Honours Of Scotland and the royal apartments before heading into the Great Hall. Sir William Kilcaldy of Grange was there telling us all the story of the Lang Siege:
Once back outside we had to get a picture with the overview:
And then we took a series of pictures at McColley's request. First up was a picture with Mons Meg (one of the world's oldest cannons):
Then a picture with the One O'Clock Gun:
And last, a picture with Robert The Bruce:
We left the Castle with enough time to wander into the Museum of Edinburgh for a look around... it helps the Museum was right in front of our hotel!
Monday, February 20, 2012
Our Unlucky Journey North: Part Three
Friday morning started with a short walk out the front of our hotel to Edinburgh's Royal Mile and a tourist bus stop. We bought the 'Royal Ticket' which gave us 48 hours worth of bus use and tickets to three attractions in the city:
We decided to do the farthest away attraction first and headed out to Edinburgh's port:
After lunch we got to board Her Majesty's (now decommissioned) yacht:
The tour takes you on all six decks and through both the sailors' (called Yotties) and royal areas. However, now that the yacht is a museum the royal dining room can be rented - do you want to eat where the Queen entertained the Clintons?
Also, much to McColley's delight, the royal dining room features a narwhal horn:
In the NCO's ward room the boys got to try on some Yottie hats:
Even Pearson got in on the action:
In the sailors' ward room the boys (sort of) learned how to play dominoes:
And when we exited the yacht they had to take a picture with the Yottie statue:
Unfortunately this was the unluckiest day of all because Unlucky Occurrence #2 hit with a vengeance. I went from perfectly fine when we left our hotel to a raging case of mastitis by the time we walked off the yacht. Yeah... I was sick and my only choices were to go to the ER (A&E in the UK) or try and fight it off on my own with some help from acetaminophen (paracetamol in the UK).
I chose the paracetamol option and crossed my fingers...
We decided to do the farthest away attraction first and headed out to Edinburgh's port:
After lunch we got to board Her Majesty's (now decommissioned) yacht:
The tour takes you on all six decks and through both the sailors' (called Yotties) and royal areas. However, now that the yacht is a museum the royal dining room can be rented - do you want to eat where the Queen entertained the Clintons?
Also, much to McColley's delight, the royal dining room features a narwhal horn:
In the NCO's ward room the boys got to try on some Yottie hats:
Even Pearson got in on the action:
In the sailors' ward room the boys (sort of) learned how to play dominoes:
And when we exited the yacht they had to take a picture with the Yottie statue:
Unfortunately this was the unluckiest day of all because Unlucky Occurrence #2 hit with a vengeance. I went from perfectly fine when we left our hotel to a raging case of mastitis by the time we walked off the yacht. Yeah... I was sick and my only choices were to go to the ER (A&E in the UK) or try and fight it off on my own with some help from acetaminophen (paracetamol in the UK).
I chose the paracetamol option and crossed my fingers...
Our Unlucky Journey North: Part Two
Our first stop on Thursday morning was the York wall... OK, it wasn't a stop, more of a stroll:
Our next stop was the Yor.kshire Museum:
Interestingly we had been trying to explain what an empire is to McColley during our walk to the museum and as we entered we were greeted by this map of the Roman Empire. Brian used it to do some explaning:
In honor of York's upcoming Viking festival the museum was holding a belt making session for kids. The boys decorated and I wrote their names in 'Viking':
They were both proud of their artistry:
The museum covered all sorts of topics and the boys were excited to discover those topics included dinosaurs:
We also found out that my mother killed 70% of all ocean species (just kidding!):
After dinosaurs it was on to Romans:
Brayton and McColley created their own take on a mosaic design:
While Daddy and Pearson worked on their lounging skills:
McColley decided to try on a Roman tunic and shoes while Brayton just tried on the shoes:
We finished up the museum and then wandered outside to check out the remains of St. Mary's Abbey - it used to rival the Minster in size and grandeur until it was torn down during the Dissolution:
Our next stop was the Yor.kshire Museum:
Interestingly we had been trying to explain what an empire is to McColley during our walk to the museum and as we entered we were greeted by this map of the Roman Empire. Brian used it to do some explaning:
In honor of York's upcoming Viking festival the museum was holding a belt making session for kids. The boys decorated and I wrote their names in 'Viking':
They were both proud of their artistry:
The museum covered all sorts of topics and the boys were excited to discover those topics included dinosaurs:
We also found out that my mother killed 70% of all ocean species (just kidding!):
After dinosaurs it was on to Romans:
Brayton and McColley created their own take on a mosaic design:
While Daddy and Pearson worked on their lounging skills:
McColley decided to try on a Roman tunic and shoes while Brayton just tried on the shoes:
We finished up the museum and then wandered outside to check out the remains of St. Mary's Abbey - it used to rival the Minster in size and grandeur until it was torn down during the Dissolution:
We then headed back to the train station to catch our train to Edinburgh (that wasn't cancelled!). Unfortunately they changed our platform at the last minute but we made it on and even had seats! Our only real issue was that we COULD NOT find our way out of the Edinburgh station due to construction. When we did finally find an exit it involved stairs. Thankfully a nice Scottish man helped me carry the stroller up them!
Our Unlucky Journey North: Part One
Please enjoy these faces full of shiny happy optimism while you can:
We were so excited, two days in York and three days in Edinburgh awaited us. We had it all planned out and were ready to go. Wednesday morning a cab picked us up and took us to the Hun.tingdon train station. This picture was taken on the train ride from Hunting.don to Peter.borough (one whole stop).
We should have had about 15 minutes to transfer to our train to York. Instead when we looked at the boards our train was cancelled. This was Unlucky Occurrence #1.
I went to information and discovered that not only had a train broken down on the track into King's Cross but that also the actual track was broken farther down the line. Here's a tip about the UK train system: pretty much everything going North/South runs through King's Cross. The trains going south couldn't get through which meant they couldn't turn around and become the northbound trains.
We were told to just wait and hop on any train that made it through and was stopping in York.
We had a platform lunch and kept our eye on the boards:
About an hour after when we were supposed to leave a train showed up going our direction. We hopped on board and discovered that it was the ONLY train going our direction all morning and was therefor jammed with about four trainloads worth of passengers.
We huddled into the train vestibule with about fifteen other people. That wouldn't have been so bad except we were on the way to the cafe car and people kept coming through so we all had to 'face the wall' to make enough space for them to pass through and the boys couldn't sit down. Helpful tip of the day: If you are on an overcrowded train you do not need snacks.
The good thing was that the ride up to York was only an hour fifteen minutes. The bad thing was that Brayton wanted to drink his pop from lunch:
We finally arrived in York and squeezed our way off the train. Ironically, we were going to the National Railway Museum!
The museum was hosting 'Wizard Week' and the first thing we happened upon was the table for making Wizard ID cards:
Both boys got to make their own ID card:
Which were then proudly displayed in special lanyards:
They both did an excellent job drawing self-portraits and telling Daddy what their special talents are:
Then we went out to see our main reason for going to the museum - The Hogwarts Express:
This is the 'real' Hogwarts Express that was used in the movies:
As we waited for our turn to take a ride we got Pearson to show us his second tooth that is pushing through:
We got on board and were finally lucky! We got to sit in one of the passenger cars used in the movie! Do you think we're sitting where Harry, Hermione and Ron sat?
After our ride we explored a bit more of the museum, had dinner and went to bed... our legs were tired after all that standing and walking!
We should have had about 15 minutes to transfer to our train to York. Instead when we looked at the boards our train was cancelled. This was Unlucky Occurrence #1.
I went to information and discovered that not only had a train broken down on the track into King's Cross but that also the actual track was broken farther down the line. Here's a tip about the UK train system: pretty much everything going North/South runs through King's Cross. The trains going south couldn't get through which meant they couldn't turn around and become the northbound trains.
We were told to just wait and hop on any train that made it through and was stopping in York.
We had a platform lunch and kept our eye on the boards:
About an hour after when we were supposed to leave a train showed up going our direction. We hopped on board and discovered that it was the ONLY train going our direction all morning and was therefor jammed with about four trainloads worth of passengers.
We huddled into the train vestibule with about fifteen other people. That wouldn't have been so bad except we were on the way to the cafe car and people kept coming through so we all had to 'face the wall' to make enough space for them to pass through and the boys couldn't sit down. Helpful tip of the day: If you are on an overcrowded train you do not need snacks.
The good thing was that the ride up to York was only an hour fifteen minutes. The bad thing was that Brayton wanted to drink his pop from lunch:
We finally arrived in York and squeezed our way off the train. Ironically, we were going to the National Railway Museum!
The museum was hosting 'Wizard Week' and the first thing we happened upon was the table for making Wizard ID cards:
Both boys got to make their own ID card:
Which were then proudly displayed in special lanyards:
They both did an excellent job drawing self-portraits and telling Daddy what their special talents are:
Then we went out to see our main reason for going to the museum - The Hogwarts Express:
This is the 'real' Hogwarts Express that was used in the movies:
As we waited for our turn to take a ride we got Pearson to show us his second tooth that is pushing through:
We got on board and were finally lucky! We got to sit in one of the passenger cars used in the movie! Do you think we're sitting where Harry, Hermione and Ron sat?
After our ride we explored a bit more of the museum, had dinner and went to bed... our legs were tired after all that standing and walking!
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