Henly-on-Thames Royal Regatta - At Last!

Hello Dear Readers,

You may (or  may not, as some of you I fear have yet to discover the joys of the RSS feed)  have  missed me last weekend.  The truth is it was so beautiful I didn't have the heart to sit inside and blog.  Chris and I walked all the way to Barnes on Sunday, which is quite close to our new flat and had a lovely day out pretending we had already moved there.  We visited all the cute little shops and admired the French and Italian cafe's with their outdoor seating.  We chatted with local sales clerks about how lovely it is to be in Barnes.  Sadly, we are not much closer this week to being in our new flat, but the Bank's solicitors have assured us that they only received the paperwork on the 4th of July (they received it June 30 according to the tracking number, but whatever).  Congrats and shoutouts to my friends Adam and Melch who have managed to move in to the condo they bought in CA, well done!

This past week I indulged in two days of Holiday for the 4th of July and went to NOT see Patrick race at Henley-on-Thames royal regatta. Something I meant to do every year I was here and just now got around to.  Above is a photo of Thames boat 'A' who made it to Friday's race...

 Sadly Patrick's boat (Thames 'B') did not, but then they drew the boat favored to win so it was no surprise they lost on Wednesday.  Thames 'B's loss was our gain though, as it meant Patrick got to hang with use at the Remenham club.  Pronounced not remen-ham as it's spelled, but more mumbled as a one syllable word like remenom, though I can't do it properly since I'm not English.

 For the first time ever I went to a public event with a dress code, much like Ascot's horse-race, ladies are advised to wear hats, and they MUST wear a dress to the knee.  Men wear jackets, ties and slacks.  The men were allowed to take their jackets off this year because it was actually warm, but not the ties.  Chris didn't have a jacket so we went shopping on Thursday and got him this lovely tweed number from TopShop, where Matt Smith (current Dr. Who) I think does a lot of his shopping.  This coat, with a red bow tie would be very Doctor-y, and frankly that's just a bit sexy to me.

 I'm wearing my favorite new dress with starts on it, pearl necklace and earrings, and my hat, also from TopShop.  Very conservative, very English.  Some women went all out in the hat department
as you can see here.  I think this is a wig, but I'm sure these are two tiny oars she had sticking out of it...

 And this woman I Kinneared on the train on the way to Henley.  It isn't so clear in this shot, but there is a full on bird sitting atop her fascinator, and how fascinating it is.  Turns out she's the friend of a rower on Patrick's team, small world!  Well, I suppose as big as the world of English rowing anyway.......

 Chris and I really enjoyed our day out, and everyone was in high spirits.  Mosley's team even went for the traditional pyramid shot, this was attempt two, and I managed to get the photo just before they all tumbled down again.

I've been enjoying the nice weather here, it's gotten up to the 80's just about (27 C yesterday) and I'm loving it.  I've invented a new soft serve vegan ice cream, which I call call Go Banana's!.  It's frozen banana, pureed with a tiny bit of milk (almond, coconut, soy, anything really) sprinkled with some chocolate chips and swirled with some Reese's' Peanut Butter that I snagged at TKMaxx (that's not a typo, that's what it's called here). The warm weather is also bringing out all the neighbors which is lovely.  We have two kids that moved in next door and they are so inquisitive and friendly, a refreshing change from most English who feel it is polite to pretend like they can't see you.  When I said my dad had been in the army, he said in all earnestness, "Does he carry a spear?!"  when i told him, no of course not, he corrected, remembering that I said my Dad HAD been in the Army, he said, "Oh, well did he USED to carry a spear?"..  I hated to disappoint him.  Maybe he thinks my dad was a Roman centurion?

Hope everyone had a lovely 4th of July holiday, and to my English friends, how about this weather?  I'm watching Battlestar Galactica at the moment, otherwise I'd be outside every waking moment.  Happy birthday shout out to my friend Nina, who had a lovely picnic in Regent's Park for her birthday yesterday (I made her cashmere socks, just realized I forgot to photograph them, meh.)
Cheerio!

The way I'd like to remember weekends

Hello Dear Readers,

This weekend was pretty great. I did all the laundry between Friday and Saturday, including all the sheets and even Patrick's extra duvet cover, which was looking a little bit like a place mat since Patrick often eats on his bed in front of the TV.  Naughty! Not gonna happen when we get a proper table in the new place, whenever that is, still no news on moving grrr! At least I love using the clothesline in the garden to wash sheets etc.

But anyway, laundry done, Saturday was a bit overcast so I didn't feel guilty staying in and finishing up my latest sweater (voila!)  Ooops, boob shot, the next one was better, forgot to set the timer on the top one.

It's the minimalist cardigan from Interweave 2007 magazine, sent to me by Jennifer Imamura, thanks Jennifer!  That's the 3rd thing I've knit from it.....
The sweater is also special because the wool came from the mother of a co-worker who is moving her out of her home into care.  She had a huge wool stash and my friend kindly brought it in to share around the Herbarium.  I got this lovely brown and lots of nice grey wool.  I'd like to do another cardigan, but I'm afraid I'm getting too many handknit sweaters, anyone want a handknit sweater?  Or this cardigan?  Anyone? Bueller?

Also took advantage of the grey Saturday to finish watching Lincoln with Patrick and Chris.  I had kind of already spoiled it for Chris by telling him Lincoln gets shot, oops!

Baby foxes have gotten braver and come right up to our back door now, looking for a handout.  He seemed to be inspecting my mint collection - rosemary, lavender, mint and thyme - all repotted and ready for their move.  You know, whenever that is.

I optimistically brought home some boxes from work to start packing, but my heart isn't in it yet.

To cheer ourselves up, Chris and I went out for a coffee, then treated ourselves to a movie - the new Star Trek!  It was pretty good, lots of insider stuff for the hard core nerds like us (Nurse Chapel! Ha!)  When we got back, Chris found the LockerGnome Chris Pirillo blog where he finally acknowledges my scarf, hooray!

He likes it! He really likes it!  I'm just happy to make something that people enjoy, I think my family is getting a bit fed up with my knitting......

I made a great dinner of lentil walnut burgers out of the Oh She Glows website, along with some handmade spelt rolls, packed two for lunch tomorrow, got my lunch ready, wrote my blog.  Great weekend with all the ends tidied up, rested and ready for the next week, what could be better.

Oh, a rainbow of course! The natural result of our rainy days here, and the looooooong days, it was light at 10:30 on the solstice!

Hope you all had a lovely weekend too.  Cheers!

Still here, no moving date yet...

Hello Dear Readers,

I'm still here, I just haven't felt much like blogging lately.  Nothing bad or anything, but sometimes you just need to take a break from things to get a fresh perspective on things to get energized about it again.  I also have been recovering from my surgery, and am just now feeling comfortable enough sitting down to work at the computer at home.

We don't have a moving date for the new apartment yet, still waiting!!! It's very frustrating because I'm not really motivated to do stuff (like clean, or blog, or anything) since I keep thinking ahh, we'll be moving soon anyway.  The holdup is with the solicitors (lawyers) who are moving the paperwork around for the place, apparently delivering it by carrier pidgeon.  One of the offices claims to not have email, what? That is not possible.  We still expect it to be soon, real soon, so stay tuned. Though I will miss the super cute baby foxes in our backyard, awwww!

In other news this weekend Chris and I got to meet a celebrity, YouTuber Chris Pirillo.  Chris watches his vlog everyday (and I watch it with him occasionally) so when we found out he was coming to London we were very excited to meet him.  About a week before I said to Chris, too bad we couldn't think of something to do for him when we meet him, like knit him something.  He really loves bacon, and Chris suggested something bacon related.  I came home Tuesday night to find him on Ravelry looking at a double knit 5 foot long bacon scarf from the now sadly defunct The Anticraft WebZine.  He said, can you make this for Saturday?  Uh, yeah, only because I'm Super Yogi Knitter!!  4 days of frantic knitting later, I had it, Phew!

He seemed to genuinely appreciate the scarf, though he didn't wear it in the humid basement we were in since it was so stuffy.  I said if he just wore it in one of his videos it would make me very happy, hopefully he will!  Hey, he'll probably need it in London anyway, summers here are very cold and wet. 

He was very kind to pose with Chris and I for photos.  In fact he was kind enough to pose with EVERYONE for photos, fame has not spoiled him.  His demographic seemed to be largely young boys (15-18) and older men (30-40).  I felt a bit like Penny at the Comic Book Shop, especially when it transpired that of the other 6 or 7 women there most of them were one of the kids mom's, it was so sweet when they were asking Chris to pose for just one more photo with their kid.

As a thank you Chris (my Chris, not the celebrity Chris) took me to a vegan restaurant for dinner called Saf in Whole Foods in South Kensington.  Well, I told him he was taking me, but still, it was nice.  Good times.  I had the raw tostata but envied his Buddha Bowl, everything on their menu looks amazing!

Anyway, off to finish cleaning the house, though I know it's pointless since the people who just bought the place off our landlord will probably gut it.  Sigh.  On to bigger and better things, I am comparing garbage can designs and trying to source a bowed-out curtain rod....

Cheerio!

Working Flat Out.... on my Belly

Hello Dear Readers,

This week I did something I probably should have done a long time ago, and was on my list of stuff to do during the Year of Me, but somehow didn't get around to. Some of you might know/remember I was born with a large mole on my "natal cleft" (learned that word this week) that made it difficult for me to sit on my tailbone, or do yoga and other stuff.  On the encouragement of my friend Lucy at my birthday party, I called the doctor to have it removed.  And on Tuesday, I did.

My boss very kindly drove me to the hospital (it was raining, and the Hospital is awkward to get to from Kew, which is why I usually cycle, but for obvious reasons that wasn't going to work this trip).  I went in to the doctor and he explained the procedure and risks etc.  After I got my bottom half undressed and was laying butt up on the table, one of the nurses popped her head around and said, oh, you know my husband, he works at kew.  I do know him, he's one of three American's working in the Herbarium.  London is such a small town after all.  Anyway the doc cut and cut and cut, and when I thought he was onto the stitches already, turns out he was still cutting!  When he finally showed me the result, I said, HOLY CRAP!!  Since I'd never actually seen it (no one can properly look at their own "natal cleft" I had no idea how big and ugly it was, thank goodness it wasn't on my FACE!  In all he removed an ellipse about 1 in long and 1/2 in deep from my tailbone and very neatly (so I'm told) sewed the whole thing up with two layers of internal stitches.

So I've been working from home the past week, alternately on my belly and standing at the computer.  The first days were really painful, I could only sleep lying very still on my stomach and my legs ached.  My mother, who worked in dermatology, advised me that if it were her bum, she wouldn't sit or bend for a week to prevent tearing anything and ending up with a keloid scar (like the horrid one on my leg).  Friday I went to dinner with my friends for knitting Lucy's Birthday.... and stood awkwardly at the head of the table.... see above photo. I did venture to work today and sat (on a pillow and a doughnut).  So far so good, but no cycling for two months!! Two months!  I'll probably finally finish reading Anna Karinina on the train I suppose, thank goodness Patrick gave me his smart phone.

In other news, speaking of Patrick, I don't think I posted a photo of his finished Birthday Sweater!!

 Aww,  he's so handsome in it, so long as you can get past his FACE!

 I'm also totally psyched that my friend Molly is coming to London on Wednesday.  She has to do something for work, but we are meeting up afterwards for dinner and a catch up.  I saw this totally cute summer (esp. for England where the summers necessate not only a summer jacket but a summer scarf and sometimes summer gloves....) dress which is part knit part sewn.  I cannibalized a tank top I made that I never wear any more, and cut up a sheet which Molly gave me when we visited in March.

I had some scraps left over from the skirt part, so in the proud tradition my mother had of making matching purses for our dresses, I made this little matching purse for Katelyn.  I try to make things to fit her but she defies traditional sizing.  So even if the dress doesn't fit, she'll have this cute bag anyway.  I put a bee on it because Molly said she's been really into staring at bees, and she also is really into putting things in and out of bags and boxes etc.

I'll keep you updated on my bum situation, but so far so good, at least that's what Chris tells me, I can't see a darn thing!

Cheers.

The long goodbye.....

Hello Dear Readers,

Well I reached the end of a two week vacation.  You know it was good because I forgot my work login this morning when I finally went back and had to get the IT guys to fix it.  One of them suggested I prevent that in the future by not going on vacation.......

 We had a pleasent last few days in Cyprus, visiting the port, meeting up with our friends Stavros and Margarhita (who are getting married in July, poor dears.....) 

Dad, Jeff and Chris also earned the respect of the Mouchtares of Aramou (Chris's family's village) by participating in one of the Easter Games.  We have no idea what it was they were playing (something about a pepper??) but they were really good sports about it, even though he kept whipping them with a knotted towel.

Back in London we did more tourist things, we went to see A Chorus Line (yes, I may have heavily influenced that decision, and yes it was AMAZING live and on stage.  The only way to see it.  The ONE and only way to see it.  Singular. Sensational.)

We did a few things outside the beaten path, including going to one of the best kept secrets of tourist locations in London, Hampton Court Palace (where I went with Hannah 3 years ago and Molly last August). 
Here is me whipping dad at a game of fox and geese in the Royal Eating Hall, or something like that.

I also got mom to go into the center of the worlds oldest hedge maze, despite her claustrophobia. She did her best The King and I impression, keeping up a string of chatter and conversation while power walking through and asking if we were done yet.


Friday Cat and Jeff flew back to Boston, and Mom and Dad stayed on till Monday.  We spent the day quietly, mostly cleaning up the house as the first showing to perspective buyers was on Saturday.

On Saturday morning we took Mom and Dad to our fav local coffee spot, the Daily Grind and walked down to the rowing club and showed Dad all the renovations.  In the afternoon we saw the Roy Lichtenstein retrospective at the Tate Modern.  I enjoyed it immensely, but then I nearly took a minor in Art History so I think it meant a lot more to me than the others, but we still had a nice day walking around the South Bank Area, exploring the cute shops and artistic venues.  We also took Mom and Dad to that classic English resturant, GBK or Gormet Burger Kitchen.  At least that went over well with dad!

Sunday we explored the medieval city of Kingston and their tiny farmer's market (and famous artwork of domino phone booths), but by the evening we were all worn out of traveling, and the boys played scrabble against each other on their devices while Mom and I watched Hey Cinderella!

 Mom and Dad left this morning, all in all I say it was a successful vacation.  From Mom's perspective it afforded her the rare opportunity to photograph all three of her children on the same continent at the same time!

 Look how thin we all look next to Cat!!  Check out my wild PJ's that mom brought me, they are flannel, surprisingly hard to come by in England.

 And here are all the Lindon's and "New Recruit" Lindons!  Still all able to fit on one couch, how much longer will we be able to say that?

Wooahhhh, we were all fine until Jumbo Cat sat down with her enormous pregnant belly!  Wave!! Whale!!!

Hope you are all enjoying May as much as I am, and I have a SECOND bank holiday in May to look forward to!

Cheers

Happy Easter! Again!

Hello dear Readers,

It's been a very busy couple of weeks as my Mother, Father, Sister and her husband, Jeff, flew into London on the 27th of April.  Here we see me after P9X and Insanity, and my sister's big baby bellly!

 We spent the weekend in London and had a mini birthday celebration for us three kids (mine was March 11, Cat's March 30 and Patrick April 30). Saturday we did Kew and Maids of Honour on Sunday and flew to Cyprus for Easter week EARLY on Monday morning.  Kew was brilliant for color with the cherry trees out and lots of flowers, but it was really cold!  Patrick is even wearing the heavy wool cabled sweater I made him for his birthday.

 The Maids of Honour was really crowded, but we found space for most of us inside for a cup of tea and split an afternoon tea tray.  Pat and Dad sat outside drinking their manly coffees.

 In Cyprus we did a lot of the usual tourist things.  After flying in on Monday early we hit Coral Bay beach after lunch and enjoyed the clear warm(ish) water.  The next day we did the ancient site and mosaics.  It was great seeing this stuff again because I haven't really played tourist in Cyprus pretty  much since my first trip here, it's usually chores chores chores.  Here were are at what I think is the house of Dionyses.

 Of course after a hard hot morning looking at ruins you need to get your Frappe on!  A good solid hour cooling off at the port and people watching.

 We spent a lot of time at the beach this trip, more than I can remember doing in a long time, which is great.  To me summer is the beach, so I feel like I haven't had a proper summer in a looooooong time (we're talking 2006!).

 We went up to the city of Lachi in Polis for a morning, and explored Geroskipu's beach in the afternoon.  Saturday we went to St. Neofytos monastery which is about 15 min away and did more tourist stuff, and then Coral Bay beach again in the evening!

 This is Easter week for the Orthodox faith, so we went to midnight mass last night.  Not really my thing, stayihng up late, church, candles and lots of kids doing little bombs to commemorate the evening, pretty much all the things I hate.  Oh and Chris mad sheep head for him and Jeff for dinner.  It was buy one get one free and, well, two heads ARE better than one.......

Today is a quiet day with the family, Chris and Jeff are next door now stoking the fires to make Souvla and mom and Niki are in the kitchen making stuffed grape leaves.  Tomorrow we plan to make the long drive into the occupied part which my dad is interested to see, then back home to London on Tuesday afternoon.

I thought it would be weird my family meeting Chris's for the first time, but it's actually not bad at all, and I realize I speak a lot more Greek than I thought I did.  It's also a hell of a lot nicer being here when there are people I can talk to and who aren't trying to feed me all the time!!!

Cheers

I love visitors!

Hello Dear Readers,

This weekend Chris's cousin Christiana graduated with a master's in Economics at Surrey University, officially.  She's been living with her parents in Cyprus and just recently got a job as a receptionist at a hotel, which she is understandably ecstatic about in this economy, and in Cyprus especially.  Of course she doesn't earn enough to move out of her parents place yet, but it's a start.  She and her sister flew into London this weekend for the ceremony.  She's the second from the left in the above photo.

 Chris went to the ceremony in Guildford, which is a really sweet little town.  Speaking of sweet, they apparently have an "American Candy" shop there, which sells all sorts of delicious things from the US which are impossible to come by here.  Of course it's nothing I would ever be caught with in my shopping cart normally, but somehow being here I can't get enough of it.  My knitting group asked me last night what foods I would miss from the UK if I moved, and I confess I couldn't think of anything (Except McVities chocolate digestives, but you can find those in the US so it's not really a loss).  I think the truth is you don't miss anything until it's gone and you can't have it, so I'd have to actually leave the UK to realize all the stuff I love and would miss here.

 Of course there is no shortage of M&M's here, as we took the girls out for Chinese in Soho and swung by the M&M shop on Friday night.  You would never believe how many people want to shop for M&M related products close to midnight on Friday!!

 Saturday was a rainy day and we spent the whole day at Westfields mall where the girls shopped until Chris and I dropped..... and then kept shopping.  Fortunately we had dinner at one of my favourite spots, YoSushi! where the food comes by on a little track round and round.  I was very good and had a seaweed salad and some tofu before giving into the red bean past mochi that I eyed over and over as it came round and round and round... they even had a chocolate one!  Yum!  The girl weren't so sold on Japanese food, and Valando had to use the kids "easy" chopsticks that were more like wooden tweezers  but I have to give them credit for trying new things outside of their comfort zone.  Even if those new things all looked suspiciously like fried chicken with just different dressing....

Sunday the girls did the Madam Tussards and London Eye thing while Chris and I enjoyed Putney and sunshine!  We walked along the river path, and discovered a yard full of gnomes and frogs and whatnot to rival even my mother's collection. (Though only barely so).  What you can't see in this photo is that behind the tree on the left there are EVEN MORE GNOMES!

In the evening I helped Patrick get in his US taxes just under the wire, while Chris and the girls went to Ed's Diner in Picadilly to enjoy American style food, burgers, shakes and fries.

I'm almost done with Patrick's amazing birthday sweater, just in time for the weather to get warm and sunny. Of course I have every confidence that it will get cold and rainy again soon....photos to follow next week when Patrick is back from the US, with exciting news about his new job in London.


Cheers