Livin' in America (for now)

Well we are back in the states. Wow is it nice here for this time of year. I heard my house in CO is getting another few feet of snow this week. To bad i am missing that!

Plane day

Flying back home. Nothing to exciting.

Amsterdam for the Day

So the day before we flew out of the Netherlands we decided to go up to Amsterdam for the day. We did tons of walking around-but forgot the camera. LOL. We had been there before so we just revisited some places but AGAIN we miss the Ann Frank house being open. Looks like we will have to come back!

Christmas in Paris

We decided to take a long weekend trip to Paris for our first married Christmas. Since we drove down we got there in the afternoon evening. Troy did not go with me to the Moulin Rouge Show last time I was in Paris so we decided to catch the evening show. There are two shows a night. The first one is dinner and the show. The second one is the show but this one is topless (think showgirls in Las Vegas). No pictures are allowed IN the moulin Rouge.The next day (Christmas Eve) we decided to walk around town. There was not any snow on the ground but it sure was cold. We decided not to walk through the Louve again but we did go see the famous pyramid at the Louve.Then we walked over to the Eiffel tower. We have seen in once before in 2001 when we were friends and backpacking. This time in honor of the holidays they had a lights in the shape of a Christmas tree hanging up side down in side the tower. Also this time it was open and we were able to go up it! (Last time it was a national holiday and it was closed). So we WALKED up the Eiffel tower, and back down...that is one heck of a climb. 674 steps to the second level!!!
I know everyone says this thing is suppose to be beautiful, but we disagree! It looks like a big oversized power tower during the day. At night however it is beautifull when the lights are on. Hows this for our Christmas Light show!?

Here is a video of what the lights do--sorry its sideways LOL...



So here is what we didn't plan for. Christmas day EVERYTHING is closed. HAHAHA This include resturants. So we manage to find a couple gas stations with snacks and a liquor store open and had a little junkfood and champagne party in our hotel room...it was actually wonderful!

Roadtrip

Troy got off of work early today so we took a road-trip down to Paris! On the way down we got to talking...
As most of you know this is our first Christmas together as husband/wife. So we were discussing some of the things we loved/hated about how our families do Christmas. So i would like a little discussion. What is your favorite holiday tradition and what is the one that drives you crazy? Have you been an adult for many years but "Santa" still comes? Does that crazy aunt still feel like she needs to squeeze your checks even at your age? Or any stories of a Christmas you remember the best. I would love to hear everything you got!

Spijkenisse Again

Troy and I got back into the Netherlands last night. So we are back to driving on the right side of the road, which is a big switch for us after Thailand/England were its left. They speak Dutch here however about 90% of the people also speak English so its easy to communicate here. We are staying at the same hotel as last time the Carlton Oasis but we did get a suite this time. Its like a little apartment. We are tenativly here until Dec. 26th so we will not be at anyone's Christmas celebrations this year. Sorry. Once he find out when he is officially done we will decided if we will go back to the states or do some traveling around here. Maybe some New Years Eve in Paris. I will keep you posted. Otherwise nothing interesting happening here. Spijkenisse is a small town so not alot of activity. We are hoping to get some time up in Amsterdam before we leave, i guess we will see.

London Town

Troy and I headed to London this weekend. We had been there before so it was much more calm that the last trip. We got into town on Friday after troy got off work. Friday night we went walking around the Piccadilly area, the Parliament building, and the London Eye. Which is one of the most ugly things I have seen. There is the beautiful architecture around it then WHAM here is a HUGE Bicycle wheel with lights on it. It should be called eye sore not London Eye. The there is Big Ben for all of you who think that's the name of the clock your wrong. It's actually the Bell's name in the clock. We found a carousel so of course had to ride on that! Plus we found the phone booth we toke our tourist pictures at the first time there so we got updated one! Saturday daytime we redid the Westminster Abby. But this time we took our time and did a tour. Since seeing the movie The Davinci Code I wanted to revisit Sir Isaac Newton's tomb it's in the Nave if you follow the Westminster Abby interactive map. You are not allowed to take photos of the inside so I could only do the outside. Then we went to the London Tower, which we got there to late so we didn't go inside but toured the outside instead. We also had to do our tourist pictures of the Tower Bridge (people know it as the London Bridge but its not-there is a London bridge next to it). Funny thing is the people we asked to take our picture happen to be from Minneapolis, MN (USA) small world huh? And we bought tickets for The Lion King play that night. London is supposed to be the second best place to see plays. New York being number one! That was Saturday night and was fun. The costumes were amazing and it had a couple good singers. After the play we went to a restaurant that was like a TGIFs but with fine dinning and the decorations were all old plays stuff. Troy drank a whole bottle of red wine on his own-and I did a fine job of getting us home without a map. We found out the hard way the train stations stop at midnight so we had to walk. Sunday we were going to go tour the Tower of London but troy wasn't feeling so good (shocker huh!). So we slept in then flew home to the Netherlands. So next England trip we agreed to start at the London Tower, we haven't seen it yet from the inside! It holds the royal family jewels.

UK Killer

For all of those you watch the news, that's is the international news or whom check the news of the area we are at...Yes I am aware there is a serial killer (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16171063/) on the loose in my area murdering women 19-29 yrs old, so far I think 5 girls this week were found. The police don't want woman on the street alone. So I promise I am not acting tough and that I am indeed always with someone I know when I am out and about. Thanks for keeping close tabs on me! And as of now they think they are all prostitutes so since I am only a working girl by marriage so I think I am fine. But I will be careful anyway. I promise. And for those who emailed me about this. I am very honored that you are really following us that close-I think your great!

Leeds, UK

Today Troy and I drove up to Leeds to visit our friend Ceri and her boyfriend Eric. Now in that picture you think what a cute couple. However what you can't tell is how tall they are. Ceri is 6ft and Eric is 6'8'' tall so here is one of Eric and me. Eric is a Rugby player for the Earth Titans. So Troy and I went to our first Rugby game. Its not quit what I was expecting. I thought it was much more brutal then it really was. The game has very strict rules for the players/coaches on and off the field. An example of that would be...since the Titans coach said a referee was stupid on a website he was kicked out of two games! Anyway the Titans won the game so everyone was happy. Afterwards we went downtown and hit the bars. Those rugby boys sure can drink. And I am proud to say I can keep up! Troy well that's a different story...he isn't so good at keeping up. It was funny though he was the runt of the packed the next shorted guy was 4 inches taller. We drank and danced and slept well once we got back to Ceri's. The next day we hung out with them again and ate and watched Eric's brother's Rugby game which was on TV! It was funny hanging out with two people who could tell you stories of every one of the professional rugby guys, because they knew them all. It made watching it much more enjoyable. Then we had to drive home because Troy had to work on Monday morning at the Guildford Office (this is one of UOP's many Hub offices around the world).
But on a bad note-the US Dollar hit an ALL TIME LOW for our trip, which made it very expensive. $2 (US) equaled 1 Pound (UK).
And random info fact-did you know that the UK is the only country in the world that actually has enough gold stored to cover every piece of money in the country! Pretty impressive.
And in England tradition I must spread gossip so...did you hear that Prince William had his 5yr long term girlfriend Katie hanging out with the Royal Family during his officer's parade. I wonder if that means wedding bells soon! (This was the only topic on TV!)

Spijkenisse, Netherlands

We are in Rotterdam, Netherlands now. We are staying at the Carlton Oasis. right now but it may change. We are a lot closer to Amsterdam than we thought. So we may move to there and then troy would commute 45min to Rotterdam. I will keep you all updated of course. It rained all day yesterday so we didn't see much. The weather here seems to be about 50-60 degrees. And its cloudy and raining but after my snow storm in Chicago this is wonderful!

Plane Day

Flying out of Chicago to Amsterdam, Netherlands today.