blogging from England!

Me and Mom are well into our last night at our hotel here - it's 6:45 on a Friday, so we'll be heading to the airport tomorrow morning. Don't know when we'll have internet again, so I figured I'd post today to talk about all of our adventures in England.  Mom had to work Wednesday and Thursday, so I slept through half of Wednesday and spent the other half exploring. Thursday I spent a lot of time exploring. Friday (today) we went to London, and spent about 7 hours (including time on the train) there. It was a lot of fun, but our feet hurt now. I'll post up some pictures as soon as I figure out how. We went to Buckingham Palace and the Tower of London, among other places, but those were the important ones. I've gotten a couple souvenirs here - including one for my dad! - but the rest will have to wait until Germany, because we're leaving before any of the shops open tomorrow. The shops don't open until 10 here, and they close at 5 or 5:30, it's kind of weird. We got back to St. Albans today just before the shops closed, so we got our usual baguettes and cheese (can it be considered a usual if we've only been having it for a day?). Also, convinced Mom to say something, so...

Mom: We had a great time in London! Our first souvenir was an umbrella. Looking forward to showing Jillian Germany tomorrow.

So that's my post for the day =] I'll post again whenever we get internet in Germany.

European vacation

Jill and Kathy touring Europe- currently in London

catch up

WOW,
sorry for the delay in blogging. here's a quick catch up...
Lets see, Kathy came home for a week for Alex's graduation in May and then went back to Germany.
She found an apartment in Dusseldorf and got her car. The apartment is in Keiserwert- upper Dusseldorf and her car is a little VW Golf. She's all moved into her new place and having fun exploring the new area.
The kids and I went up north over the 4th break- slept-ate- and fished. caught an 18" large mouth bass- First cast off the dock! I had spent 4 hours out on the lake with Cheryl and Craig and didn't catch a thing, came back home- ate dinner and decided to try a couple of casts off the dock- BAM! first cast- which was good because that was my only catch. Cheryl and Craig came over for dinner on the 4th- taco's- not your usual 4th meal but we had already BBQ'd the day before so taco's sounded good- and they were! There were lots of fireworks that night- real ones...not from the taco's! I told Craig about my great catch and I'll be darned if he didn't catch the same fish- I released mine and he cast out to the same place so I'm just guessing it was the same fish- I didn't sign it or anything but it looked like the same one!
Kathy is due home again on the 11th and then she and Jill are headed back to Germany. Jill will be over there until late August. Kathy and Jill will be headed back, Kathy was coming home to help move Alex up to CMU but he has decided to stay home and attend OCC- Oakland community college- which is where Jill has been going. It will be nice to have the company at home. He REALLY wants to go the Michigan State so hopefully he will do well at OCC and then transfer in a couple of years. He's going into graphic arts and they offer a very good program at State- fingers crossed!
Kathy and I plan to head to N.C. for a week at the condo in August. We'll spend a little time walking the beach and hanging out together- NO kids on this trip!
I won't get into all the health issues other than to say I'm back on track and doing well- nothing major- just annoying. New doctor-new dentist and all is well!

Alex s b-day

The family got together for a little pizza and KFC to celebrate Alex's 18th B-day. There were scary movies, itunes, cash, shirts, and of course the flying toys. The flying toys have become a tradition for Alex's b-days. I can't remember exaxtly when the first time was but we have been out pulling toys off the roof for many years. And in case you're wondering about the label, every year we go through the "what do you want this year" question. There is always the threat of socks and underware if he can't give some good suggestions for gifts.

18 - no way

I kept fighting the signs of old age but when your little baby turns 18 its done and over... I'm officially old!
Alex will be celebrating his 18th birthday this weekend. The family will be getting together on Sunday to welcome the 6 foot "man" to adulthood.
I think he's still worried I'm going to follow through with my 18 and out rule- I should have a bunch of bags packed with his name on them and see if he panics- but that would just be cruel.

I'll post some photo's of the get together soon.

temporary apartment

I have received word that Kathy has moved into her temporary apartment. She is waiting for the wifi access to be activated so she can start blogging.
She will start her seach for her apartment soon and have to move again. Hopefully she will settle in and relax a little once she finds her new place and gets her stuff out of storage. She has been eating out a lot which is a new thing for Kathy and not entirely sucessful, at least she found "baked potato chips" so she won't go hungry!

Varsity team

Good news...Alex has just made the Varsity team!
He is on the track and field team where he throws the disk and shot put.
His first meet is on 4-15-09.
Way to go Alex!