Halloween 2010

Ava didn't really understand Halloween last year because all she wanted to do was stare at a glowing skull hanging from Sis Gowen's van door, instead of Trick or Treating. Well this year was a completely different story. I gave Ava a choice of costumes (pink skeleton PJ's or Princess) and of course she picked princess. We all went to the ward Trunk or Treat party and Ava knew how to get candy! She was so sweet as Dave took her to every car, but she couldn't wait to eat her candy. She would pick out a chocolate and eat it en route to the next car.

After trunk or treating we went inside and played "Cake Walk" a musical chairs style game but with numbers. When Ava's number won she was ecstatic to pick out a cupcake, and was proud of her purple bat ring!

This is Ava's version of donut on a string. Forget the no hands thing, this works so much better.

Ava was too scared to go into the Haunted House. They asked you what level of scary you wanted and then gave you the fright of your life. Dave asked for ultimate and he got ultimate!

Instead I took her to see Sis Geddes, who painted Ava a princess face. She has never had her face painted and wasn't sure about it at first. She kept pulling away, but after she saw the glitter and swirls, she loved it.

We miss our old Bury St Edmunds ward and the people. Halloween Trunk or Treat 2010 was a blast!

On Sunday October 31, Dave had to work so Ava and I went to church by ourselves and then took a nap. I woke up just in time to hand out candy to our first Trick or Treaters! Jessie was going crazy with all the door bell rings and kids. I completely underestimated the number of British/American kids and after 45 minutes I ran out of candy, so I decided to turn off our lights and take Ava to a few houses.

Ava has never gone door to door trick or treating before, but she caught on fast. How cute is this picture? I love her.

Eating her first piece of chocolate the second we got back home.

New Friend Amelia and Library Halloween Party

A new family moved here from Florida who we have fallen in love with. They have a little girl, Amelia who is the same age as Ava. The girls have a typical 2/3 year old friendship, I love you and want to be with you all the time but if you take my toys or boss me around watch out! Amelia lives near a goat farm and one day we got to feed the goats with her.

Then Amelia shared her Cinderella dress and both girls went to the Library Halloween Party. They made spider hats, read books, and got prizes. It was a fun start to the Halloween fun.

English Pumpkin Patch

We had so much fun at the pumpkin patch in Germany last year we decided to do it all again this year in England. I always got to pick my pumpkin from the grocery store, so this is a new exciting experience we get to share with Ava. It was a typical soggy, foggy, chilly day so rain boots and coats were a must. I even had to roll up my pants to make sure I didn't take half the mud home.

Ava looked and looked and finally picked her favorite one!

This tiny little pumpkin. I asked her if she wanted to pick a bigger one and she told me "this is a baby pumpkin, and papa's is a papa pumpkin."

You can really see the difference in size. David's pumpkin clearly visible and Ava's pumpkin only has the stem poking above the wheel barrow.

Sad ending to the pumpkin story though, October was so busy that we never got around to carving our pumpkins. Instead I lit the pumpkin jars (Ava and I made these with modge podge and tissue paper) and left the real ones to look cute in front of our house.

LONDON

At the end of September we decided to try our luck with the Tube. We have lived in England for almost 1 year and have never ventured into London or taken the Tube. It was much easier then we thought and Ava had a blast. We had no specific plans on what we wanted to see or do, which turned out to be the best plan of all. The day was perfect, no rain or wind just sunshine and blue skies. We got off the Tube right under Big Ben, and I mean right under, we walked to the surface and immediately looked to the sky at this beautiful, huge, gold clock! We took our time and just strolled around. We didn't go inside anything (lots of things are pricey, so we thought better save it for visitors) but we did see a lot. We saw most things just by walking which was fun but I didn't wear the best shoes. My whole outfit was a "bust" when I look back at the pictures of me. Dave should have said something like "don't be mad but you do kinda look like an orange pumpkin with a frizzy blonde stem!" Live and learn.

The pictures are in order of what we saw.

The Houses of Parliament

Westminster Abbey (back)

Westminster Abbey (front)

Diana Princess of Wales Memorial Walk. This is a park the runs the entire length of the Mall

Squirrel (this guy was not afraid of humans at all!)

Geese in the park

Ava tried to feed the geese leaves

Buckingham Palace Plaza Statue

Throwing wishes into the Plaza Statue fountain

Ava at Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace. I though the front would have been more ornate, green with garden or grass, but it's an ugly red concrete.

Beautiful Palace Gates

The Palace Foot Guards. The Queen wasn't home on that day or there would have been double the amount of guards out front.

Sweet Canadian Tribute. Yeah Alberta!

Looking back at The Mall

Admiralty Arch

Horse Guards at St James Palace. You can go right up to these guards and their horses.

The boots they wore were amazing! Over the knee, stiff and shiny.

National Gallery at Trafalgar Square

Nelsons Column Guard Lions in Trafalgar Square

Ship in a bottle at Trafalgar

The Tower of London with the Tower Bridge

Tower Bridge

The bridge was being re-painted for the 2012 Olympics

Princess Ruby, waiting to get on the boat for our tour.

The Tower of London, from the water. You can see the famous Gherkin (the pointy bullet shaped building) They call it a Gherkin because it's lit up at night with green lights, and looks like a pickle.

This is the London Bridge. After years of singing the song "London Bridge is Falling Down" I had imagined it to be a lot prettier then it really was.

London City Hall (The family who wouldn't move out of the way for anyone's picture)

Cleopatra's Needle (We also saw the duplicate in Paris, France)

Famous London Eye

After our boat cruise we walked down to Piccadilly Circus, before heading home.

Now that we have been to London, and feel a lot more confident with the Tube, we are excited to actually go in and see things with visitors. Save your money and come on over!