It's a Small World...

Yes, we finally caved, and went to Disneyland Paris. We were supposed to go in early April but Owen had his scalding incident and we had to postpone for the obvious reasons. Margot was a good sport about it (since we had been counting down the days for months) and finally, three weeks later, we boarded the EuroStar on our way to kiddie paradise.

I have to say I went with some skepticism, but both kids were ecstatic from the moment we arrived until the moment we left, 2.5 days later. Andy likened it to Vegas, a fun place to visit, but if you stay more than 36 hours, you start to freak out a little bit. Margot asked if we could move there.

Here are some pics.

The Many Faces of Owen

Owen loves dress-up. We finally had to get him some boy dress-up items because - although he's makes a striking Snow White, and there's nothing wrong with that - Margot was getting annoyed that he was always in the best princess outfits.


Peter Pan


Snow White


The Man of Steel


Pillaging Pirate

Please note that all costumes are accessorized with some sort of weapon...even Snow White.

Crisps, Chips, Whatever...

So...they have a thing for funny-flavoured chips here in the UK. Micky is our designated taste tester.



Walker's Crisps recently held a contest to "Do us a Flavour" and come up with a new crisp taste sensation. Out of 1.2 million entries, the finalists were

Cajun Squirrel
Builder's Breakfast
Chili & Chocolate
Onion Bhaji
Crispy Duck & Hoisin
Fish & Chips

The winner was Builder's Breakfast: a chip flavoured with sausage, eggs, bacon and ... wait for it....beans.

As a Kerby, I appreciate this commitment to the art of the crisp. However, I remain a stalwart Nacho Cheese Dorito girl.

P.S.: Before you criticise my use of "our" for flavour and "ise" for criticise, note it's a hold-over from writing all my papers in UK English. I assure you it will be out of my system in no time at all.

Like White on Rice...

So, Janet and Micky came to visit and enjoy London. I was so busy with exams that I could barely acknowledge them. Margot & Owen, however, were ecstatic to have visitors.

You know how cats are strangely attracted to those people who have the most disdain for them? That's exactly how the kids were with Mick. The more ambivalent and non-communicative he was with them, the more obsessed with him they became.

Check out these looks of adoration:

30 Days and Counting

OK, so the blog didn't go so well this year. I suppose that's a good sign. It implies we're so engrossed in our lives and "going native" that we don't need to make wry observations about the differences between life "here" and "there" anymore (which is "here" and which is "there" is anyone's guess at this point).

We're both sad and excited to report that we're moving back to the States as of July 1 - that's 30 days. Yikes.

After a fabulous time last summer at Leete's, we were a little ambivalent about coming back to London. Once here, though, we jumped back in to our regular lives. Margot started full-time nursery and then reception at the fabulous local state school. Owen turned two with full gusto, teetering between extreme joy and diva-like tantrums at a whim. I made a rather spontaneous decision to enter a Master's degree program at City University, grossly underestimating the time commitment, the rather dodgy state of my cognitive abilities and the stress of coursework and exams. Andy came through the banking debacles bloodied and bruised, and is hanging on like a true masochist. So, it's been a busy year but a good one overall (maybe except for Andy).

For our last bittersweet 30 days, we'll try to post lots of little thoughts, photos and musings as we wind down our fabulous London adventure.