Look, kids - Big Ben!

On Boxing Day, our family left for a 10 day trip - courtesy of my parents - to England! We were celebrating 40 years of their wedded bliss and visiting my sister Rebekah and her husband Tom (who's from there). Brother Reid flew in from Texas a few days before we did with his wife Brenda.

Here's the happy couple who brought us all together! Aren't they cute?


So this trip was definitely the gift that kept on giving for 10 whole days. There are so many - God is good - that reminiscent of my summer memories I give you ... drum roll ... our England holiday gifts:


Safe travels (cause, gosh - if that ain't a gift?)    A 6am flight (up at 3)     running through the Toronto airport hearing your flight's last call and still making it on time and hitting duty free right next to our gate     our lovely 2 bedroom flat complete with kitchen right on the English channel    Falling asleep to the crashing of waves 


   Hugs from family seldom seen (unless you count Skype)    double decker buses (Zanna always had to sit on the top, front seat)   hour long train rides to London

  Many, many meals - the Ploughman, Bangers and Mash, Fish and Chips, Fish Pie, curry, pints of beer    wandering up and down the aisles of Marks and Spencer (grocery store)    the towel rack warmer in our flat   Family togetherness

  
   Taking 3 weeks off of school but learning more than you ever could sitting in a desk    London Bridge

Touring London Tower    our Beefeater guide    the detailed description of beheading    watching history come to life    imagining kings and queens   rainy, inside days    hours of hand and foot and beating the guys    Wallace and Grommit    Zanna being "backed up" and miserable and oh, the sweet relief and happy dance    Buckingham palace

Remembering the wedding, the waves, the kisses

One last wistful look

Lunch with Tom's parents    one last family meal    Spongebob cards and playing with Uncle Reid    purchasing little mementos to remember this trip    the London Eye

Lovely - taken by Rebekah

standing in line in the rain     getting under the shelter just as it really comes down    the subway   mind the gap    the Brighton pavilion tour    Crummy soup at the Crypt and Will promising to cherish my soup more in the future     Insults for being an American and then revealing we're Canadian and suddenly we're their best friends ....

realizing that my mother and I bought the same dress in the same colour from the same place to wear for Christmas on 2 different continents     Reading the Help   watching the movie on the plane    the Churchill war museum    reliving what it must have been like

Will's Churchill t-shirt (I should get a picture of that one)    Touring Westminster Abbey   remembering wedding, funerals, coronations        seeing the tombs of kings and queens from history    putting it all together    living  His-story and being amazed 

 watching A Christmas Carol in London   a one man show    New Years with family and watching the fireworks display in London on TV where we had just been the night before    Will getting to sleep over with Auntie and Uncle and play the Wii    tea parties with Opa and Zanna (more like hot chocolate) 

 the countryside   hiking a bit and then a visit to the pub    encouraging a fellow Christ follower on a bus and being encouraged     A family worship (like the Springfield days)  with our own personal pastor    communion with God, communion among each other    laundry all over the place    Bekah and Tom's curry     Hot date night at the Plough    Lamb burger with stilton cheese and burping up that gift all night (sorry - TMI?)     Bisto gravy   M and S soup   a real British tea with the ladies   Mom and me both finding fabulous new coats - half off!    Getting everything back into the suitcases    Tic tack toe, tick tock tack    Our personal chauffeur Tom    The memories we'll always have

A New Year