Weekend

This weekend I moved to Lee's house.  Saturday Lee came to pick me up at my flat at about noon and we came back here and relaxed for a bit.  We then watched THe Voice UK!  It is a great show here, I ahve not been watching the American one but I have been seeing this one.  After the voice Lee, Lucy, Sami and I went out to all you can eat sushi.  It was an amazing meal, great sushi and we loved it!
 Sunday, Lee took me to Birminigham University, his college.  His sister was moving some stuff back in after a break so we took another car so she could bring more stuff.  Lee walked me around the campus and showed me where he lived and his classroom buildings.  We then had a nice meal right outside of the campus then headed back.  Was a nice day and it was cool to see a British university.  Sunday evening we went out for a few drinks with Lee's good friend which I had yet to meet and his girlfriend.  It was nice meeting him.
Today, Monday, is my catch up day.  I am at Lee's house and I slept in late and am relaxing now.  It is nice just to relax because I have been very busy this semester.  I am planning on doing things this week but today I wanted to relax.
Looking forward to coming home but I am enjoying it so much here!

Exam Week

So this week has been exam week, I finished everything Tuesday ( even though it was due Wednesday).  Wednesday I woke up and everyone was going to the Harry Potter tour so I looked to see if there were tickets and there were, so spur of the moment, I went.  It was amazing!  We then had a meeting for our last money we got then I watched a massive soccer match.   Barcelona vs Chelsea.  Huge game!
Thursday, today, we had nothing to do so we went to Stratford mall where the Olympic stadium is.  I saw the stadium from one of the shops that overlooks it and there was the official Olympic shop!  It was awesome to see it all!
Tonight I am meeting Adam Isaacs ( from camp) and Lee for dinner and a drink.  I have not seen him since the beginning.
Tomorrow is packing day :( I dont want to!  I will go to Lee's on Saturday.  He is picking me up around noon from here and then be there for the next week.

Friday Night, Saturday, Sunday

Friday night after Kew Gardens Lee and I went to the Comedy Store.  It was 4 stand up comedians doing a show.  It was hilarious.  Saturday I went to Camden Market with some of the guys to help them pick out gifts for their sisters and moms!  It was nice!  FOr lunch we went to the Brunswick market and got a lot of great food.  Burrito, Smoothie, Brownie! MMM
Saturday night I went out with Lee and his friends to a place near my flat which was nice.  I met a lot of his friends that he went to school with so that was really good to meet them.
Sunday we went to Brent Cross which is a shopping mall, then we went on the London Eye!  It was during the day so it was nice.
This is exam week so I do not go to my internship but I have finals and papers.  I have my first one in a few hours, theater!  I hope it goes well!

Kew Gardens

I figured I would write about Kew Gardens.  It is a botanical garden.  They were amazing!  We stayed for a long time and I took a ton of pictures.  There was everything there from the oldest tree in the world, to curry trees, to fish tanks to flowers.  It was so great!

Spotted a Peacock!

Sitting on a Cactus, ouch!

Waterlilies!

Last Week of Classes

This week is our last week of classes, then next week is exam week.  It is starting to be a lot of work but I am handling it well and doing it in advance!
For theater this week we saw Duchess of Malfi.  Best play so far, it was incredible.  Since we did not have another class after this play ( our class was before the play) our teacher came to our house and everyone in the class meet after the play and we had pizza soda and discussed it.  It was really nice to discuss this becuase we loved it!
Tuesday we had an outing or Media and Society where we went to the Soho area and walked around and he pointed out the recording studios and he also told us about the history of religions in this area.  It was very interesting and we went into some different religious places.  For culture by design we had a guest speaker, he was amazing.  He is a film writer and he had us write our own first episode of a show in groups.  It is really interesting and he talked to us alot and it was amazing!
Thursday, today is my last day at my internship.
Tomorrow morning we are going to Kew Gardens.  It is about an hour away but supposedly amazing so that should be great!  Lee and I are going to a comedy club Friday night to hear them do comedy!  I am looking forward to that too!

Passover and Passover Weekend

I am going to do my best to remember everything we did, because my parents have the camera so I cannot look through the pictures to remind myself what we did!

Ok so my parents got in on Friday afternoon from Paris.  I met them at their hotel and we went to borough market for lunch.  We then went to the graffiti tunnel to see that and walked around the banks there.  This took most of the afternoon so after that we went back to our places and changed for seder.  We went to Lee's house for seder and it was really nice.  We took the tube into his area and he picked us up from the station.  After a pretty well done seder ( by Lee) we had soup and all the standards.  The matzoh ball soup was really good!  Lee led the seder very well and with some comedy to it.  Just like our seder's, theirs was a little crazy.  After a lovely seder and the meal we all just hung out.  It was Lee's family ( mom, dad and 2 sisters), his moms sister ( Lisa, John and their daughter Charlotte) and Lee's dads brother and mom (nana).  It was really nice just talking to all of them.  I had met all of them many times before.  They were really interested in American politics.  Lee and his dad drove us back to the city that night and on the way made a pit stop to Abbey Road.  We got our pictures and then his dad pointed out Paul McCartney London house and a few other famous people who lived around that area.  It was cool to see the Abbey Road Studios.
The next morning we woke up and started our day.  We went to Kensington Palace and went around there.  This is where WIlliam and Kate will be living, in Princess Margartes Hall.  The wing that people go in is full of history both old a new.  There is a Princess Diana's dress exhibit going on there which is what I was really interested in.  It had sketches of her dresses, pictures of her in her dresses and then the real dresses.  It was very cool to see!  From there we went to watch the Oxford, Cambridge boat race.  It is something that most people do not get to do so we were lucky with the timing. I had looked up where festivals were and where the race started and finished.  We went to the festival area and there was food, drinks and a big screen to watch the race.  We were right at the water at a park.  We saw the warm up racers go by but we watched the real thing on the big screen because we could not get a good spot on the water.  This race was a unique race.  Right after they had passed where we were ( we were all watching the screen) the boats stopped.  It is a race that they prepare for for a year, and they stopped.  They zoomed in closer and there was someone in the water.  A protestor ( protesting the elites) was there to ruin the race.  He was arrested and they had to figure out a way to restart the race.  They set them up in positions like they were before the protester stopped the race.  Close to the end of the race an Oxford oar broke, ruining their chances of winning.  Shortly after that one of the Oxford rowers passed out and the final ceremony did not happen because they had to take him to the hospital. I did not know before taking my parents it would be so eventful but it was great.
After that we went back and got ready to see the Lion King.   Lee meet up with us and came to dinner with us before the show!  The show was amazing!  It was incredible.  Everything about it was amazing.  After that my dad had to have his last beer in England so we went to a very traditional English pub after that.
In the morning Lee picked them up and we drove to the airport for their flight!
A great weekend with my parents!

This Past Weekend, with my parents!

This past weekend!!!!!

On Friday I woke up early to go get my parents from the airport!  Their plane landed a little late but it went well and then we took the tube back to my flat to drop stuff off.  They brought me so much food and so many goodies!  It was just like JMU they brought me banana bread, challah and some other things.  They even brought Lee his favorite salad dressing!  After that we dropped their stuff off at their hotel, about 5 minutes from me, then we went out!  We took the tube to London bridge.  We went to Borough market, which is the food market that is really good!  We sampled a lot of things and bought some snacks and just ate!  They had their cheesy potatoes and many other goodies!   We walked around there for a while and then we took a boat bus to Westminster area.  It was about a 30-minute ride but it was really nice because the tour guide on the bus told us what some buildings were and some history.  It was really funny and a nice day so it was great.  From there we walked around Westminster Abbey, Parliament and went down to Downing Street.   We just walked around it all and hung out.  From there we went to Trafalgar square, it is all walking distance which is nice.  We walked around there then headed to a pub for dinner! 

Saturday we woke up and went to Sir John Soane (a famous architects) house, which has become a museum.  My parents were looking into things that I had not done yet so that was really good!  We went on an alternative London tour after that was in east London.  It was a tour of the street art in this area and our tour guide gave us some history about the area but explained a lot of the street art and different artists.  We were talking about Pezz, a street artist, and ten we saw him!  It was very cool!  Great tour. From there we went to Notting Hill, which has the Portobello market.  We walked around that for a while.  It has antiques, food and jewelry!  It is massive!  After that we went back to the hotel to freshen up for dinner.  We took the tube close to Lees house and we went out to dinner with his family.  It was really nice! Good food.  We stayed at dinner very late and then Lee drove us back into the city, which was really nice.

Sunday we went to Brighton!  I had wanted to go for a while so it was nice.  Lee drove us to Brighton, which was nice so we did not have to take the tube or busses.  We got there and it was a really nice day!  There is not to much to do there just walk around and enjoy the pebble beach!  We walked around the Lanes some and had fish and chips.  They used to go to Brighton a lot and had it there a lot, so we figured we had to get it from the best fish and chips place, as Lee calls it.  It was very good!  We had a really nice day walking around and taking pictures!  From there we came back, about a 2-hour drive, and then I had some work to do. 

Monday, for theater class I saw the play the Recruiting Officer and it was amazing!!   Was a great play, they were in Bath and Stratford for the day so they were doing their own thing.  They are now in Paris, until Friday!

Pictures and then this week

I got the pictures off of Lakens camera and she had some good ones of me and some good ones with more people infront of Stonehenge and such, they are at the bottom of the post.

This week: I had an amazing week!  We went on some pretty cool outings...
Monday, we saw Bingo for theater!  It was about Shakespeare's life by Bond.  It was depressing but pretty good.
Tuesday we watched Notting Hill for Media and Society to talk about class and we just went to Notting Hill so he wanted to show it to us.  For Culture by Design we did a tour of St. Pauls!  What an amazing church!  We had a great tour guide!  Yesterday was the best, we went to the David Hockney exhibit for art history.  If you dont know him look him up!  He now does work on his Ipad on the brush app and it was amazing but his paintings are great too!  Our tour guide took us through that and taught us so much about him.
I have 4 papers due at the start of next week so I have been working hard to get them done.  I am on 3 i think!  My parents come tomorrow so I will be heading to the airport in the morning to get them!  I am so excited to see them!
Pictures from last weekend are below..

Stratford upon Avon, Bath, Stonehenge and Windsor Castle!

Stratford upon avon.
We got to Stratford at about 4 30. It was this quiet pretty town that seemed so relaxed. We were going to see 12th at 7 15 so we had some time to wander around and eat dinner. After finding out that Stratford is an adorable city and walking past all the shops and buildings we ate then headed to the theater. We went ro the royal Shakespeare company and they did an amaing job! The play was long but really great! They had a pool in te corner of the stage because there are some parts involving water. After that we went back to the hotel and had a discussion with the actor who played sebastian. He was really cute and also really interesting to talk to. The theter class did that and we were askin alot of questions. At that point it was really late so we went to sleep.

Friday morning we had a tour of Stratford by this actor/writer/comedian guy and he was amaing! He was so smart! He took us to anne hathaways cottage, the church, and Shakespeare's Birth place, stopping along the way for information. From there we had lunch and a milk shake and then headed to bath!
We got here at about 5 and just walked around looking for food but also saw the city. We wandered for about an hour and eventually found a place that we wanted ro eat at and we had an adorable sit down 3 course dinner with some wine and then some complementary drinks at the end for 15 pounds? Was great! From there we went to this place called the mole which was a bar/music venue and there was live music which was cool!!

Saturday we woke up and did a walking your of bath. Our guide focused on alot about houses and the history of houses there which was really interesting. It was an amazing day, so warm! We went to the abbey and then we had a tour of the roman bath. The roman baths were cool because there was a museaum inside which was all the ruins. After that we went shopping and walking around some. Bath has amazing boutique shops! Bath is also known for ita thermae spa. This is a bath with natural water in spa form. We got the 2 hour spa treatment which included a steam room, 2 baths and a roof top bath. I have never been to the spa so I did not know what to expect but it was really relaxing! The steam room had 4 different rooms in it that all had different scented steams in it! It was difficult to sit in for a while. We went back and forth between the things. The roof top bath was amazing because you could see the entire city while in the bath! It was around 6 so we saw the sun setting while we were in it! It was an amazing experience! I felt so pampered. From there we went to dinner, it was our last dinner with our weekend trips. We went to an Italian place and it was really nice!

Sunday, we woke up and drove to Stonehenge! After a guided tour and a ton of pictures we went to Windsor Castle. It was amazing and huge. The queen was in the castle because the flag was up! We saw the doll house of queen Mary. It was a huge doll house and it has runnin water in it! Was te most amazing doll house ever.
From Windsor castle we headed back to London, got back at 6 30.
This was an amazing weekend! Every part was amazing! Bath was my favorite place we went to, such a cute city!

Stratford 

us in stratford!

anne hathaways gardens

in bath, attached houses

the abbey, in bath

the roman baths

our friend singing karaoke on the bus!

stonehenge! i have a ton of pictures of me with stonehenge on my friends camera, i will get them off of her 

windsor castle

This week

Just a quick post about this week before i head to Stratford, bath and Stonehenge! 
This week we had great outings! Monday for theater we did not see a show because we are seeing 12th night in Stratford so that should be great! We have a discussion after with one of the actors which should be fun! 
Tuesday we had our first outing to the design museaum where we looked at the exhibition going on which is a contest for the best design of the year. There was everything from houses to furniture, clothes, cars, vacuums, ambulance designs and so much more. After that for Media and society we went to notting hill and got a guided tour around the neighborhood of notting hill focusing on films that were produced there. This neighborhood has countless productions in it because it is near the big film stations and it is also just a diverse area of housing so it is easy to make it a set. That night they got us tickets for charlton football club to go to their game. They are in league one which is a league below west Ham (lees team). The guys in our group were hillarious and painted their

a few boys from our group all painted. the one with the white shirt on did full body paint, he had not taken of his shirt yet!

body's red and got really into it, even though in England they don't do body paint or stuff like that to snow their support, they are just dedicated to the game. That being said, we got some weird looks but it was fun!! They won 3 to 0 so it was a great atmosphere! Yesterday for art history we went to the national gallery and looked at impressionist work! It was amazing! The national gallery has such an amazing collection of it all, from monet, manet, van gough and degas! It was amazing to see it all! My internship has been great! I have been designing a dining table and drawing it on th computer and today I have a meeting with the builder who is going to build it and make it so I have to go over my designs and finishes with him! At 2 today we leave for Stratford! Friday and Saturday we will be in bath! Then Sunday we are doing Stonehenge, then Windsor castle! Going to be a great weekend! 
It is warming up nicely here too so that is always nice! No more pea coat! 
My parents come next weekend so I  looking forward to that!! 

Paris Weekend

So I typed this all and it got deleted...round 2!

So we got to Paris after taking the Eurostar at about 10 pm. From there we checked into our hotel after figuring out the complicated Paris metro system.  Our hotel was really nice!  We then went out wandering for a few hours.  We walked 2 minutes outside our hotel and saw the massive eiffel tower!  We were so close to it!  We then walked down the champs ellise!  It was great that Lee had been there before because he kindof knew where some things were.  He was great with directions!

First night in Paris.  Down the Champs Elisse looking at the Arc de Triumph  

Arc De Triumph in Paris!

 The next day, Friday, we woke up early and had our nice hotel breakfast and then went to the Louve.  We walked around the nice artwork and I found where the parts of the museums I wanted to see. We then went to the Egyptian art part because Lee likes all that stuff.  He was such a trooper with me and my art museums.  He asked me questions about the art and was really interested in it.  He wanted me to explain stuff to him which was really nice.  After that we had to take the classic pictures of the pyramid and touching the top of it.  It took a while to get it right but here are the results below!  Friday was a summer day, people were wearing shorts and it was so pretty!  We had such great weather Friday we were so lucky!

Lady painting in the Louve

Lee outside the Louve

Me outside the Louve

 We were on our way to climb the eiffel tower and go up to the top but there was a long line.  After watiging about an hour to take the lift up we were at the front of the line.  Lee, who is very scared of heights, was starting to get scared, and I didnt tell him then but i was freaking out too.  He had us go all the way to the top ( there are 3 platforms) and then we were going to work our way down so it was less anticipation to the tip top of the tower.  We got to the top of the eiffel tower and he was pretty scared but did so well and even went to the edge of the top to take a picture with me!  We walked around that level then started working our way down to the next level.  We took alot of nice pictures of the setting and then kept working our way down.  Once we got to the bottom he was so relieved, and I was too!  It was nice to be back on the ground!

eiffel tower in the background

at the top of the eiffel tower

halfway back down the eiffel tower

looking up at the top of the tower

 After that, we did not have too much time left because I booked a boat cruise for 6 30 so we had to go back and change and check in by 5 45.  We had just enough time to go to Notre Dame.  We walked around the left bank some, which is known for some art and then went in the Notre Dame.  It was so nice inside and was great to see the inside of it!

in front of notre dame 

inside notre dame 

 From there we went to the boat cruise!  The inside of it was so nice and we had a 3 course dinner with a bottle of wine!  It was so nice to see the Siene and be on it and then see the sites from there!  We enjoyed a nice dinner and some wine and there was great music on the boat.

our boat cruise

lee enjoying his wine on the cruise

on the cruise, near the eiffel tower

statue of liberty and eiffel tower, great view!

us after dinner

 After that it was about 8 pm so we figured we would do what the locals do and perch on a platform near the eiffel tower and relax and enjoy the view.  It was such a nice night so it was perfect to relax after a long day!  We were exhausted by this point, we did a ton Friday!  It was an amazing day!

a massive building that lights up...and sparkles

 Saturday!  We woke up and had another wonderful hotel breakfast.  Obviously I was still craving another chocolate croissant ( they only gave us 2 at breakfast, one for me and one for him) so I got one off the street!  It was amazing!  We went to the Musse de l'Orangerie.  It was really cool to see all the Monet work and there was a Debussey exhibit going on then.  I played some of his work and had no idea he was an artist so that was cool to see!  We spent some time in that museaum and then went on to the next thing.

the best chocolate croissant ever!

 Our next stop was the stairs of the Arc de Triumph.  We went up the stairs and got to the top after our legs were really tired!  The view was really cool because you could see the Eiffel tower too.  At the top there is a panoramic site view so it points out where everything is! we really liked looking at that and finding everything

climbing up the stairs of the arc de triumph 

view from the top of the arc de triumph 

WW1 memorial at the bottom of the arch de triumph 

 After that we went to the Sacre-Core ( part of the Montemarte village).  This is another famous church.  There were so many stairs to get to the church but from all the food I had been eating I needed the exercise!

me in front of sacre-core ( montemarte village) 

 The area around that is pretty artistic so there was a square of all artists doing and selling their work.  We had a nice look at all of it but none of it was the art I wanted to buy.  I wanted a paris-y scene but done nicely, these were all fine artists.

montemarte village, so many artists 

After having a delicious lunch in this area we figured we should walk to the MOulin Rouge.  Luckily it was only about a 10 minute walk because it was not impressive.  Just a windmill, pretty boring!    

moulin rouge

St Patricks Day

After wandering around shops around there and stuff we headed back to the left bank to look at the street artists and also to go to the Latin Quarter.  I found a beautiful painting and then we stumbled across this bridge.  I had heard about them in Paris and Italy but had no idea where there were.  It is a bridge where you "lock in your love" to the bridge with a padlock.  This bridge was so full of the locks.  Lee and I felt obliged to do it!  So we bought a lock from the street vendors and wrote on it and then locked it onto the bridge!  It was really cool!

The lock bridge, where people "lock their love onto it"

we made one!

its in paris locked there

 Saturday, was not as nice day, so we decided to warm up and have a nice hot chocolate.  It was a nice way to take a break for a few minutes!  Everyone in Paris seemed to just relax with a nice drink about half way through the day.

afternoon hot chocolate!

 From there we walked around the Latin Quarter and wandered around the Left Bank some more.  It is such a cool area we loved it!

 When it got to dinner time ( also St Patricks day) we found this nice restaurant but we had just had a crepe right before so we were not too hungry.  We got duck meat fondue and split it. This was the first time Lee had had fondue so it was really fun!  It was so delicious!

Lee's first fondue, dinner our last night in Paris

 From there we found an Irish pub, it was only apporpriate seeing as it was St Patty day, and hung out there for a bit!  It got to be late and we were exausted form our day so we headed back to our hotel!

St Paricks day evening!

Sunday morning we had our hotel breakfast and then checked out of the hotel.  Our train was at 10 15 so we didnt have time in the morning but we had gotten pretty much everything done so we were happy about that!   We got back to London with enough time to go grocery shopping and do my work!  

My weekend was amazing!!  Paris was awesome! 

Onto Stratford, Bath and Stonehenge on Thursday!