Family Weekend in the Peak District

On Saturday morning we loaded up the car with the kids, the pushchair, our travel cot (pack 'n play), a change of clothes (well a couple for the kids), loads of diapers and wipes, some snacks for Addie and the TomTom and we headed out for our first overnight adventure as a family.  Our destination was England's Peak District which is about 2 hours northwest of where we live. Our first stop was the amazing Chatsworth House. The house was built in the 1500's and has been home to the lineage of the Dukes of Devonshire. One person you may be more aware of these days who lived in the house was Georgina Spencer who married the 5th Duke of Devonshire...so why may you ask would you know her???? Well, she is portrayed by Kira Knightly in the new film...The Duchess. It was actually filmed at Chatsworth house as well. Just thought you'ld like to know in case you feel compelled to see the movie.We got to the house about 1PM and it was crazy busy - literally thousands of people where out and about on the grounds and in the gardens. It was a beautiful day and probably the last nice warm day of the year (warm enough to wear shorts yet). We spent a full three hours just walking around the 105 acres of gardens and we didn't even get to see everything.

Addison had a fun time being able to run freely since we've had her cooped up in the car for the past two hours. She is really growing up and starting to look like a little lady.

This water feature is call the Cascade. It is a huge water fountain that flows down what looks like a stairway going up the side of the hill. This is a view from the building at the top of the Cascade looking down at the Chatsworth House.

We took a quick moment to grab a family picture while Harrison was awake so he could be in some pictures.

We attempted to walk through the huge maze, but after spending 30 minutes hitting every dead end I was ready to head on to something else. Kevin still regrets that we didn't master the maze, but he's an engineer and it drives him crazy not finishing a task laid before him.

We rushed into the house with about an hour left before the park and house closed and we didn't allow enough time even though the said it would take an hour. Nice thing was that since they didn't allow strollers in the house they did provide you with back pack carriers...so since Addie was near melt down and didn't want dad to carry her, I ended up toting her around and tried taking pictures as well because Kevin had to carry Harrison. 

Lots of other stately homes don't let you take pictures inside which I kind of sucks when you pay as much as you do to go inside, but at Chatworth I got ask picture crazy as you can with a 20 month old strapped to your back. Many of the rooms in the house are painted with beautiful murals. This is one of my favorites which was on the ceiling of the chapel.

Saturday night we stayed at Arbor Low Bed and Breakfast which actually is on a farm. I thought this was a little daring to pick a place out in the middle of no where but this was a new adventure. The farm was a little sore on the eyes but the room we had was very nice and perfect for a place to lay our heads for the night. We ate a local pub which we ended up sitting by a family who one of the ladies was actually born in IL. Her sister still lives in Joliet, so she knew where Peoria was...small world. Since Addison didn't have a real nap she was starting to melt down and our life saver was the portable DVD player that we were smart enough to bring along with her now all-time favorite movie - Shrek!!! We had a nice meal and headed back to the B&B where we all crashed after about an hour.Since we stayed on a farm, Addison got to see some real baby chicks that the owners raised. She was pretty excited about this. Kevin and I are both farm kids at heart so it was nice to get to "experience" a little English farm life.
Right next to our B&B was a site with the English National Heritage call Arbor Low Stone Circle (aka "The Stonehedge of the North"). Like the real Stonehedge, it was a bunch of rocks in a large circle out in the middle of no where. Never the less, it was some thing to see and a bit of history to be learned.

Sunday morning we headed towards Matlock Bath to a place called the Heights of Abraham. It's kind of touristy type of place but you get to ride over the beautiful river valley in little cable cars. 

As we are riding up in the cable cars, my husband informs me that he is afraid of heights. Sorry honey, there is no turning back now. The view was beautiful though. In the river below they actually had a kaiaking course set up with people actually going through it. 

At the top of the hill are the entrances to two old mining caves, a stone tower, playgrounds for the kids and a few other exhibits.

We got a family picture in the morning while it was still foggy and drizzling rain. There is a castle off in the distance that we thought would be cool to check out but found out that it was built about 100 years ago to a local hosiery manufacturer and it is now going to be converted into apartments.

We walked through an abondoned iron mine which was pretty interesting to do with two little ones but it was pretty cool. Addison wanted to run all over the place and jump in the mud puddles. Needless to say, I was about exhausted after walking up all the steps to get up and out of this place...what a way to burn of that baby fat.

We ended the day with a nice lunch in the cafe with each of us eating a very "English" lunch. I had a cornish pastry with chips. Kevin had a BLT bagette with crisps. This was the kicker though. We shared a half pint glass of fountain soda Pepsi...we were thirsty so we had another. When I went to pay for the second drink I found out that I paid 1.80GBP = $3.60US for a half pint of fountain soda...and now a second. We just spent $7.20 on a pint of Pepsi...Yikes!!!! But it tasted soooooo goooood!!!!! It was a great weekend and a super adventure.

Four Weeks Old Already

Our little boy is already four weeks old and he has grown so much. His little legs are getting chunkier and he is growing little chipmunk cheeks. As you can see in his eyes, Harrison is pretty laid back. He hardly cries unless he's really hungry or if sissy bumps him in the head with one of her books.
He loves to lay on his tummy so I let him take some cat naps that way, but I watch him pretty close. I love to cuddle with him and nuzzle my nose into his little neck. Now that we've gotten over that awkward super newborn stage and moved into the chunky baby stage he seems a little easier to maneuver. I also realize now why I didn't remember Addison being so small when she was born because they only stay that size for about 2 weeks. He's already grown out of some of the newborn outfits I loved putting him in...you know pretty soon he'll be graduating college and getting married and moving to some foreign country with his wife and my only grandchild!!!! (Just kidding, but these are thoughts I get every once in a while.)
Some of my friends have been getting baby fever with little Harrison around, but then the remember the sleepless nights and ask how he is sleeping at night. Right now he is sleeping in 3 - 3 1/2 hours stretches and even though I'm completely exhausted when I get up to feed and change him, I cherish every second of it. Sometimes I end up waking up and realize that I fell asleep while burping him and he had gotten pretty cozy and fell back asleep as well. Our favorite activities are to go on walks with sister in our new pushchair (stroller) and take naps.

Brother and Sister

Well, Weight Watchers says that habits take at least three weeks to develop - good or bad. It's been about four weeks since our house was graced with our new little baby and it seems like we are getting into a routine and everyone, even Addie, is finally getting used to having someone else around.
Addison truly loves her little brother and literally wants to smother him with kisses and hugs. Most mornings while we are getting ready, Addison will sit up on our bed with Harrison and hang out for a while. This morning she helped him get dressed. What a sweet big sister!!!

Rockingham Castle

On Sunday we packed up the kids for our first family "adventure." Kevin and I have both had the itch to get out and discover something new since we got back from Ireland so we thought we needed to get out. We found Rockingham Castle to be a short 50 minutes away. Rockingham Castle has been the home of the Watson family for the past 450 years. Can many of us say our families have lived in a home for that long??? I think not. The castle was built by William the Conqueror like many other large castles in England and throughout English history it has been visited by may monarchs, but was bought by the Watson family for 350 GBP almost 450 years ago. Along with the castle the Lord Watson also purchased much of the land and town of Rockingham, so they continue to own the castle along with 38 buildings in the village including the pub. The Watson's were friends with Charles Dickens, so he frequented the castle very often and dedicated his novel Bleak House to them. An interesting fact about the round towers that you see Addison and Kevin standing by...they started building round towers on fortresses because it was harder to destroy the structure with cannon balls because how they would hit the structure and with squared off towers they could dig under the corners of the towers and they would fall down, not so with the round towers...cool huh?We particularly liked the gardens. There is a wall of yews that have been shaped into what they call the "Elephant Wall" because it is meant to look like a heard of elephants. The amazing thing is that these hedges have been growing and shaped like this for hundreds of years.
They also had beautiful rose gardens and some new gardens that had flowers in it that I had never seen before. We had brought a lunch with us to enjoy in that day and it was great because the sun was shining and the weather was perfect. Kevin even got sunburned...should have remembered the sunscreen.
Another cool thing was that from the high tower of the castle you could see five different counties. I can't remember them all but we really enjoyed the view from the back wall of the castle that overlooked the village below and the farm land all around the castle.
Along the way to the castle we found this awesome brick bridge that seemed to span for a couple miles over the valley. I don't know how old it is or what it is used for because it is over land the whole way but it was really cool. As we stopped to take the pictures of the bridge we noticed loads of blackberries on the side of the road so we had to stop and pick some so we could make more crumble!!!!! Yummm!!!!

Blackberry Picking

Lots of the scenes you see of England are the many hedges that line the roads and countryside. If you get to look really close, many of those hedges are probably blackberry bushes. On the edge of Glinton there are loads of blackberry bushes along the roads and public footpaths and the fruit is available for anyone to pick. We often go for walks on Saturday and Sunday mornings and this past Sunday we decided to pick some berries to make ourselves a blackberry and apple crumble.
Two important things to watch for when blackberry picking: 1) thorns on the branches can really catch your fingers and arms - Ouch!!! 2) Stinging nettles that rub against your ankles and calves and the occasional one the grows up high and gets your arm or fingers. Actually the biggest thing you have to watch for is little Addison Marie because she knows that blackberries taste really good and she gets pretty excited when she sees a huge bunch of berries in her sights. On this day we forgot to bring wipes with us and she really got into eating her berries and decided to rub berry juice all over her coat, trousers, shirt and hair. She was due for a nap when we got home so we wiped up her hands and face and put her down. When she woke up from her nap her hair was stuck straight up from the berry juice she must have gotten in her hair...what a funny looking little girl...so cute though!
We got 2 1/2 pounds of berries picked and made up two crumbles. I got the recipe from Emily's mum, Debbie, and she said crumbles are very traditional English dish and tastes great with vanilla ice cream.

Growing Salsa

Kevin and I love to work out in the garden together and we thought that we would try growing some veggies this year. In particular we wanted to make our own salsa so we decided to grow some tomatoes and peppers. Someone told us that there wasn't any way that we could grow tomatoes in our back garden because it just doesn't get to be tomato growing weather in England. We took this on as a challenge.

We went and bought a tomato growing kit from B&Q and planted them on April 1, 2008. Our kitchen window sill faces south and has great sun.

Nine days later the seedlings were all about 1 inch tall and we thinned them out to 1 or 2 plants per pot. I also started growing some coriander and realized after it came up that it wasn't the plant I thought it was. It looks a lot like cilantro which is the plant I wanted to grow for our salsa...how silly of me. I went back to the store to find cilantro to grow but they didn't have it. Looks like I'll have to buy it in the store when it comes time to make our salsa.

By April 23, we had already put them in bigger plastic cups to grow on their own in the window sill for a couple weeks. Now they were ready to plant outside.

We dug up the little bit of dirt we had available to us that looked like it might get some sun. We had about a 4 ft x 8 ft plot to work with for our tomatoes, peppers, beans and peas. We fertilized it and added some good top soil to the ground and worked it up the old fashion way with shovels and rakes...no tillers here.

With a lot of early cool weather and slugs attacking new seedlings, we only got 3 bean plants to grow and only one of them produced about 3 beans (better luck next year).

The peas did pretty well. About 10 plants grew and we got two dinner servings of peas which we used in some sweet and sour chicken stir fry around July 13th. The tomatoes were doing pretty well, but our pepper plants got hit pretty hard as well by the slugs. I think we put them out in ground too early.

By the first week of September, the weather started turning cool again but our tomato plants were huge and very heavy. We only had canes and wire holding them up and there are loads of tomatoes growing on them. The question is will they all turn red.

Here are a few of the cherry tomatoes that seem to be turning. We picked them in mid September and used them in Kevin's salad for lunch. We'll have to wait a couple more days or a week to see if the big ones will start turning. If they don't turn, my friend Tina just gave me a recipe to make fried green tomatoes. More to come...

Glinton Heritage Days

Today we went up to the village green to check out the Second Annual Glinton Heritage Days. We went last year and enjoyed it very much but this year was even better. They had a band playing outside of the pub and three times as many tractors and cars displayed, there was a "cream tea" at the village hall, and loads of stalls north of the church selling everything from venison burgers to Party Light Candles to home grown fruits and home made jams, and bric-a-brak (used stuff that people can buy and money usually goes to charity). We walked through the stalls first and I bought up some Bramley apples to use in the blackberry and apple crumble I planned on making from the berries we picked earlier that day. Bramely apples are very English and the best baking apple around here. I also picked up some home made raspberry jam. Next we headed up to the village hall to the "cream tea" Addison got an orange squash juice drink and two fairy cakes (cupcakes) at the "cream tea" while daddy got the best cup of tea he said he's ever had and we both got to enjoy some scones...I got one of the scones that Emily's (our baby sitter) Nan (grandma) made...they are lovely.

Next we headed up to the pub where they had a live band playing and loads of old tractors displayed. Addie spent lots of time playing with Emily...Emily is such an amazing person and we are so lucky to know such a special girl who loves our children so much.

Addison got to ride on lots of tractors - red and green ones!!! Here she is last year on the John Deere tractor at seven months old.

Here she is on the same tractor at nineteen months old. Our little girl is growing up sooooo fast.

Kevin got to enjoy a pint with his little "half pint" buddy Harrison and good friend Simon. Since we were out and about longer than we thought we would be, I had to feed our little guy so I popped into the pub to get some privacy. After I got back out, I made a funny by saying that Harrison visited his first pub and Simon followed up to say that he has already had his first drink in the pub...ha ha!!!

I think the coolest part of the whole day was that when we went up to the big gathering...we knew a ton of people there. Neighbors of ours, ladies I met at toddler group, people we met at the ball this past winter and we also met knew people. Harrison will probably even get featured in our Village Tribune as being the youngest person in attendance...he didn't get his picture taken but it will be cool to see his name in the article.

Just Me And The Kiddos This Week

Well we've made it through our first week at home...just me and the 2 kiddos.  We sure missed having Kevin around but it was good to get back into a routine of sorts.  It rained almost everyday so we stayed inside most of the time and watched the three Shrek movies about 5 times each. Min stopped by each day to help me out by playing with Addie and somehow I kept catching her trying to clean up my house. 

I can't believe that our Harrison is already 13 days old!!! He's already gain a whole pound since he was born, so he's now right around 9 pounds and filling out great.  He actually has a little bit more of a bum so his diapers fit better.  We love our little man so much and it has been so wonderful having him around.  He's so laid back and hardly makes a fuss unless I wait too long to feed him.  He has so many little looks that you could spend hours just watching him.  I love to kiss his little cheeks and he smells so good.  He's been sleeping pretty well at night...up usually every three hours to eat and then falls right back asleep.  

He caught a bug earlier this week and got a really bad stuffed up nose.  I brought him to the GP (doctor's office) on Tuesday because he was running a low grade fever and was all out of sorts Monday night.  The GP said there wasn't anything wrong with him and it made me a bit frustrated because I had a rough night along with little Harry who was miserable. I guess he picked up a little virus late last week that gave him a cold.  He seems to be doing much better now, but I felt so helpless not knowing who to call for help in the middle of the night.  I ended up calling my mom and my sister, the nurse, around midnight here...thankfully it was only 6PM in the States.

My midwife came for her final visit this week.  It has been very nice not having to pack up kids and head to a doctor's office for check ups.  Between Ann and Helen they visited me four times in the comfort of my living room.   Also Harrison has a health visitor, Julie, assigned to him who came on Wednesday to check up on him, talk through health options, and set up some follow up appointments for me.   Truly a wonderful part about the NHS system (yes there are good parts) is that they do have a nice follow up system when you have a baby.

Big sister, Addie, is finally getting more used to having him around and now that we've been a little more of a routine she seems to be more content. She is still experimenting with trying to get away with a few things...she really likes trying to swing in the baby swing. She's been doing better with the jealousy fits but she's been pretty restless during the week and has through a few bad "wobblies" (fits) the past couple of days. She actually managed to somehow dive out of her crib during one of them. I set her in her crib to let her blow of some steam and shut the door. As I headed down the stairs I heard a thud amongst the screams and I ran back in her room and found her flopping around on the floor. I have been praying for lots of patience to help me get us all get through this stage.

  

We Are Family...

One of the scariest and saddest parts about taking on an overseas assignment for us was leaving behind our family and friends...all the people who we knew to love and support us. Of course we have truly enjoyed our assignment so far, but there are still those days that we miss family and friends back home.  Obviously when you go through a life changing event (like having a new baby) you really wish your family to be around to share the experience with you and to help you out during this pretty emotional time. Kevin and were pretty nervous about having a baby abroad because family couldn't just hop in the car and drive over like they had with Addison. But I have to tell you all that over the past couple of we have had the greatest experiences with the "family" we have developed here in the UK whilst our own little family grew.

It has been truly amazing to receive so many blessings from so many people that we've really only known for a short while but feel like we've known and loved for a lifetime.  It's truly hard to express how thankful we are for everyone who has called, written emails, stopped by, made dinners, sent gifts, cared for Addison, and done so much more. 

The Free Dictionary defines "family" as "Two or more people who share goals and values, have long-term commitments to one another, and reside usually in the same dwelling place."  There really is an amazing group of people that Kevin, Addison, Harrison and I have met here and shown us that you can have "family" any where in the world.

Here are some of "family" who came to visit Harrison:
 

Yi Xuen and Min Wong

Emily and Madeline Hardy

Emily Beales (our babysitter)

Simon, Sam, and Sarah

Amy Manwaring and Jenny Shoemaker

Debbie Beales (Emily's Mum)

Celebrating Our Six Year Anniversary

Today is Kevin's and my six year wedding anniversary. Wow, I can't believe how time has flown by. I always felt I would meet the man I would marry while I was at college and ended up I meeting Kevin in the fall of our freshman year at Iowa State...eleven years ago when we were two wild and crazy kids. We were introduced essentially by Kevin's best friend Weston who happened to be in all my freshman agronomy classes. Our first time hanging out ended up on accident, but I think it was set up.   A group of us were supposed to be getting together to watch the movie Scream, but it ended up just being Kevin there to greet me.  We really started getting to know each other pretty well after that and went of our very first date to eat at the Chinese buffet at the West Ames Hy-Vee (how romantic...huh?). An amazing thing happened that night though. 

The only other person eating while we were there was an old man who ended up coming up to us and asked if he could visit with us. We didn't want to be rude so we let him sit not know what was in store for us. For the next half hour the man talked to us about the top 10 things that make a marriage successful as he listed them out on a napkin...what a topic to have discussed with you on your first date...I was sure Kevin was going to wig out on me. Well after my first kiss with Kevin I knew he was the one because he was the first guy ever who had asked to kiss me before he did it. As far as the weird guy on our first date...I still have the napkin.

To celebrate our blessed event we loaded up the "kids" in the car and headed out of the house on our first adventure as a family of four. We made our way up to Stamford to visit a little furniture store called The Nook. For the past year we have been using our card table and chairs for a kitchen table until we found something else. I didn't anticipate it taking this long to find something but I knew it was what I wanted as soon as I saw it.  Kevin was also partial to this really cool free standing shelf that was hand made by a gentleman in Bournesmith so we got that as well. We are hoping to build up a nice little collection of unique items to move back home with us so these should be great new additions to our household. For the rest of the day we just hung out with the kids and enjoyed a wonderful traditional Dutch meal provided to us by the Verkiel family!!!

Proud Parents

Today was the first day that I coined the phrase "honey, what should we do with "the kids" today? Wow, that was so cool to say...."the kids". I thought it was amazing to have one child but there is nothing like having the second one come around. We are on our way to reaching that 2.1 average number of kids in a "typical" American family. This week has been pretty amazing. I love the fact that Kevin has been able to spend the whole week with us. Paternity leave is definitely something I think the US should try adopting a little bit more. Obviously it's important for women to get time off to recover physically and bond with the child, but it is so important for the father to get to bond. In the UK, the guys can often get two weeks off to spend with their family and we have been lucky that Kevin got a week to spend with us. We've captured some pretty amazing moments with our kiddos and it has truly been a blessing that we have been able to spend all this time together.