Daddy-Daughter London Trip

Since Jannica has been 8 years old, she has had a special birthday trip with just her.  Last year Jaimee came too but not this year.  Jannica and I took our first ever Daddy-Daughter weekend birthday trip.  She got to pick the destination and she chose London.  So on Friday we wisked away to the airport and jumped on a flight to London.  Jannica was so excited to be on the plane she was taking a picture of how wide the plane was.  She took a picture of a nice English gentleman who just smiled for the picture.  He just heppened to be in the picture and was a good sport.  He then took a picture of the two of us.  

Now this was a special treat, because we were able to sit in the Business-Elite cabin all the way there and back.  Jannica just loved the on demand movies and TV shows.  So much so that she only got 2-3 hours of sleep on the plane.  We arrived in London at 7am for a full day of excitement.

As soon as we arrived at Victoria Station she started taking picture of everything from the double-decker red buses to the rubbish can (because it's called rubbish, not garbage).  She also took pictures of no trespassing signs and every statue that we passed.  She was just excited to be in London.

Well we jumped on one of those cool double decker red buses and made our way to Big Ben.  She was still very excited taking pictures of everything.  She enjoyed how cool the Parliment building and Westminter Abby looked.  We did not go inside either but did enjoy the outside.

We later walked up the Thames river still taking pictures of everything.  We went and looked at #10 Downing Street to check out where Gordon Brown lives.  Jannica could not have cared less about that.  

Just up the street was Jannica's favorite attraction, the changing of the guards, but not the real one at Buckingham palace.  The little one done by the Horse Guards.  There was not a big crowd and Jannica was able to be right up seeing the whole action.  

After that we went to the real changing of the guards and Jannica was not really interested.  It was too boring and long for her.  She made friends with a few English girls that were amazed that someone from Georgia would come visit them in London.  They just loved Jannica's strange American accent.

After that, we went to Jannica's second favorite activity of the trip.  We went to King's Cross train station with our luggage and owl.  We wandered around looking for our train platform and we couldn't find it.  We went up to a train conducter and asked where platform 9 and 3/4 was.  He looked at us like we were crazy and said go away.  It was ok though because we found this family of redheads that was also looking for platform 9 and 3/4 and they showed us how to get there.  We passed through the wall and caught our train to Hogwarts.

25 simple pleasures

1. Kelly comes home every night.
2. Real lime juice to drink.
3. Breakfast in a little hotel in Latin America.
4. Crest Pro Health mouthwash.
5. Wireless Internet.
6. Sleeping in.
7. Eating without any nausea before or after (I think, is that possible?)
8. Gardening.
9. Cooking experiments that turn out great.
10. Giggling uncontrollably.
11. Comfy sweats.
12. Claw foot bathtubs and HOT water.
13. Reading all day without interruption.
14. Cookie dough.
15. A good pee.
16. My mom's cooking.
17. Feeling a baby kick from the inside.
18. This may shock all of you - Being on time and organized (I guess not so simple).
19. Falling asleep whilst cuddling.
20. Holding a sick kid.
21. Slap-stick comedy.
22. Being told thank you by Ryan the minute the prayer for dinner is finished.
23. Staying in hotels with pools.
24. Couponing/ bargain hunting.
25. Chewing equally on both sides of my mouth.

This was not as hard as I thought it would be. Tag to all of you, my millions of blog followers.

snow pics

Ugliest Snowman Ever?

It snowed today the most that I have ever seen in Atlanta.  And remember, at most we only get one snow storm a year.  We had a good 2 inches, maybe 3.  Not much for all you Utah/Idaho folks, but for us this is huge.  School is cancelled on Monday.  Nobody is driving on the roads.  My carpool is seriously considering taking the day off.  And we get to make a huge snowman.  This is is the snowman that we made with the help from the Denison's.  I'd have to say that it is about 2 feet taller than last year's ugly snowman.  We had more snow this year so we could make a bigger snowman.  I'm not sure which one is uglier.  What do you think?

This year's snowman.

Last year's snowman.

37 Down, 13 More to Go

** Warning - Gratuitous Kissing Scene **

While we were first dating, Jaimee and I developed a goal to kiss on the capital steps of every state capital in the US. Many people have boring goals of visiting every state or even visiting the capitals of every state. But we decided to make out goal a little bit more interesting. Olympia, WA was the first capital to recieve the honors. Not sure exactly how it started but we found ourselves making out on the front steps of the Washington State capital building. Silly things that young dating couples do. Well a few weeks later, we found ourselves in Salt Lake at the capital building. Nothing better to do than kiss on the steps, so we did. Several months later in Honolulu, HA, we found ourselves kissing again at the capital building. So, we made the goal and we've been kissing ever since. Well I'm happy to report that last week we crossed off Baton Rouge, LA and Jackson, MS. 37 capitals is 8 years is not bad. In Baton Rouge, Ryan thought that it would be great to take our picture at the capital. So we prepared to take a nice picture with us facing the camera when she informed us that we had to be kissing for the picture. These little kids really do pay attention to everything that is going on, unfortunatly. So this is the picture that my 3 year old took. Sorry about having to see us kiss but I did warn you. So if anyone is planning a trip to Pierre or Bismark, let us know so we can cross off another capital.

Family Friendly Mardi Gras Parades

So we decided to go to New Orleans for vacation since it was the most nausea-friendly place to visit on Kelly's list. I absolutely did not want to go. The place has always seemed like the craphole of crapholes to visit and completely vice ridden. Kelly, as usual, was able to talk me into going. I said I would go if he promised to build my garden when we got home. He was reluctant to go along with the idea and I could see on his face all of the different ways he was trying to weasle out of it, but finally he agreed and off we went. 

On Sunday morning we sent Jac on her way to Utah/California and the rest of us headed downtown for all the sin and glutony we could handle. We pulled up to our hotel and were pleasantly suprised to find it was pretty nice and right on the parade route. 

It took about two hours for the parade to arrive at us after the parade started.  But once it did, it was great.  It was basically an hour of alternating school bands

/dance teams and floats throwing beaded neckalaces and other stuff.  It was really amazing how many beads they threw at us.  We had to protect Ryan's head from all of the beads that came flying at her face.  It was so much fun.

Kelly took all of the loot back to the hotel and grabbed the camera while we waited for the second parade to come by.  This parade was pretty much exactly the same as the first.  Near the beginning of the parade, a nice lady on the float called Ryan and me to come closer to the float.  As we approached she kept calling over Kelly too.  As he came over, she raised the head of a stuffed animal dog for us to see.  Then she raised the whole thing and threw the dog over the side of the float for us.  

They gave us a stuffed dog that is taller than Jac and wider than our whole family. It was so much fun, but then we quickly remembered that we flew here and that there would be no way to get the dog home.  It barely even fit in the trunk of our rental car.  So we bought some bins and tore out the stuffing so that we could take the dog home in pieces.  No for the fun of putting it back together. 

 We also caught hundreds of beads, small plastic cups, other small stuffed animals, frisbees and other stuff.  Who knows what we will do with all of this junk.

Mardi Gras