Bloody Hell - How Did I Get So Far Behind?????

Good Lord! I am sooooo far behind! Between bloody relatives visiting (kidding!) and milestone birthdays and weekends away and just life, I haven't taken much time to collect my thoughts and make a posting... So sorry to those of you who try to visit the blog regularly :(

So here it goes - let me try to summarize the last couple of months...

Once we came back from our visit to Colorado, Adrian (Pat's "funny" brother) and Andrea (our awesome friend and dental hygienist - also happens to be "funny" brother's girlfriend) came out for a visit. We met up with them in London and spent a weekend hanging out with them, then the following weekend they came out to Northampton and spent a couple (thank God it wasn't longer than that- I can only take so much "funny", you know?!) of days with us.

Hello...
Tower Bridge

ahhhh the love

Chapel in Tower of London

Auds and Pops at Tower of London

The "Gherkin" from Tower of London

motor

Partying in Stratford on Avon with Andrea and Adrian

Seriously though, we had a great time with them - we all get on really well and it was cool having family out to see where we live and what its like for us here - I think they enjoyed themselves - they are threatening to come back again before we move back to the States...

The next weekend was my birthday and Pat surprised me with a weekend at Whittlebury Hall - a hotel and day spa. He kept the girls and me and a friend spent the weekend relaxing, getting massages, sitting in the whirlpool, reading by the swimming pool, drinking too much wine and doing it all over again the next day - it was a wonderful surprise - I loved every minute of the non stop pampering!

Whittlebury Hall - Hotel and Spa

Me and my friend Yvette having dinner after a lovely day of relaxation

The Spa

It's really weird being 40 - its like there is no room left to be considered "young" I mean, I know its just a number, and 40 is the new 30 and all of that crap, but still, it's really a milestone and it was a bit hard to accept. I mean at this stage, you aren't really "old", but you aren't exactly "young" either - I'm not exactly having a mid-life crisis or anything, but you do start to think about things differently somehow... anyway...
The weekend after that we traveled to Kent and visited a few castles (Scotney Castle and Bodiam Castle), went to the site of the Battle of Hastings where William the Conqueror killed King Harold and

Scotney Castle in Kent - LOVELY

Scotney Castle - the main 18th Cent house

Scotney Castle - the ruined 14th century Castle - like a dream!

Big tree and girls at Scotney


More Scotney

More Scotney
became the first Norman King of England - fantastic! We spent the night in Dover and visited Dover Castle the next day - we had a warm clear day and it was brilliant! Dover castle has its origin during William the Conqueror and was in use through WWII! There are all of these cool underground tunnels that the British used during the war to plan the rescue at Dunkirk as well as other important ops during the War. There was also a hospital located underground there - its the damnedest thing seeing windows right in the white cliffs of Dover!

Bodiam Castle

Attack of the killer ducks at Bodiam Castle - they heard Audrey crinkling a crisp packet and the lot of them came RUNNING! Hilarious!
From Dover we popped up to Canterbury and visited the cathedral there... Canterbury was a very important religious center for the nation for many centuries.

More Bodiam

Dover Castle

Medieval tunnels at Dover Castle

Medieval Tunnels at Dover

WWII Era tunnels at Dover

WWII installation at Dover Castle

There were also a set of Medieval tunnels at the other end of the castle which also have a very interesting history.


From Dover we popped up to Canterbury and visited the cathedral there... Canterbury was a very important religious center for the nation for many centuries. The Archbishop or Canterbury was historically a very powerful man - sort of the "Pope" of Britain - of course that was until the Tudor reformation of the church, when Henry the VIII became the reigning religious and secular leader of the country. The cathedral itself is stunning - when we went inside there was a service on and the choir was singing - it was a truly beautiful experience - even for a tremendously agnostic person such as myself, it was an unearthly experience - just beautiful...

Canterbury

Canterbury

Canterbury Cathedral

Elizabeth I in stone at Canterbury

Fan Vaults inside Canterbury Cathedral

The following weekend we stayed pretty close to home - only venturing out to Cannock Chase so Pat could go for a mountain bike ride - the kids had a play at the park and we hiked around while I played with my DSLR camera learning some fun little tricks - but, oh, I have so much to learn!

Then it was suddenly Easter weekend and my sister was on her way for a weeklong visit.

I'll make a separate posting about that visit as this one is getting a bit LONG!

I hope all of you are doing well - we think of all of you all often and miss you always!!!