New Year's Eve London!

This by far is the most exciting New Year I have ever been a part of; we were on Westminster Bridge a 100 yards from Big Ben right in front of the London Eye!  Words and pictures can’t do justice the shear energy and excitement that this event held – the girls fell asleep for a little while, but as the hour drew near even they were shaken with the excitement!  It was enough to keep them up for another 2 hours to get back to the hotel (that’s 4am Ukraine time) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1yLRK2M8YQ

Happy Birthday Ellie

We had a small travel day to get from Farham to London, but we were able to get into our hotel, go out for a fun lunch and coffee at a street corner bakery and then watch an interesting puppet show, a stop at Hamely’s (remember it’s a 200yr old toy store that’s 6 levels!) and a birthday dinner at a burger shop with cake and milk shakes!  We ended the night with opening presents in the hotel room at 11:30 – it’s going to be pretty hard to top this birthday!

Southern Britain

Ellie at Portchester castle

Spinnaker Tower

Stone Henge, New Forrest, Portsmouth harbor, Spinnaker tower, Portchester Castle just the highlights!  There is so much history in this area and we only had two days to explore and we couldn’t even scratch the surface.  Our guides would tell us something was “new” and it turned out to be 1800 years old….. or some house we passed by and it would be 200+ years old?!

The girls playing in moat!

We had wonderful personal guides (who are friends from Slavutich) and the privilege to spend our days and nights staying with them.  My favorite part of these adventures is when we can hangout with the locals learning how other people and cultures live.  It’s always surprising how similar we all are.  

Old English Cottage in New Forest

Christmas Time Again

We had a wonderful relaxing Christmas season a time for reflecting on the reason for the season.  Remembering family and friends and spending time together as a family making memories and traditions.  The girls were spoiled again, I don’t remember bring so many gifts back for them (grandparents, family and friends included), but Nichole kept bringing gift after gift out and Christmas morning the girls opened (very politely) their gifts for almost three hours.  It was fun to skype with grandparents when the girls opened their gifts, that way there was some extra excitement for everyone.  Of course just like last year, there was a huge hole not getting to spend time with you giving you hugs and sharing in laughter and smiles.  Merry Christmas, we love you!

Christmas Concert

The girls had their 2^nd annual Christmas concert where they demonstrated the hours of work they put into learning to play the piano.  I know, I’m biased, but they sounded wonderful, they’re pieces were very complicated and full but short (2-3 minutes).  Anyway there were seven students (American, French and Ukrainian) playing piano, violin and singing and after an hour we had a full concert of classical pieces and Christmas music.  Marina the piano teacher to most of the students demonstrated her ability to instruct her students to near perfection to each of their abilities and it was hard to believe that my girls were playing music that seemed far above what I thought it would sound like…..I’m so proud of them!

A Simple Return

A simple “Target” return in Slavutich was anything but.  I bought a large barrel curling iron the other day at Technopolis (electronic, home appliance store), they even have a red dot on their bags, so you almost think you have gone to Target (no, not really).  Shopping there always starts with putting any large bags or backpacks in a locker before entering the shopping area (it’s assumed that everyone is going to steal from every store so you have to “lock” any large personal items up).  Anyway, the curling iron I chose was inspected and tested to be sure it heats up, all was well.  My friend and I found what we wanted and headed to the check out in less than 5 minutes.  She purchased the items with her discount card.  This takes several minutes, entering item numbers and more stuff and more stuff, than the guy who stands at the end of the checkout counter watching the entire time must check the item number on the box with the item number on the receipt.  During his checking my curling iron numbers did not match the receipt so another guy left with my curling iron and 2-3 minutes later came back with the same box (or so I thought).  We left the store after nearly 20 minutes , remembering how much this store is not like Target (or any American shopping experience, except maybe Best Buy).                                                                                                                                     

A couple days later I opened the box to test out the curling iron and try a style in Ellie’s hair for her Halloween costume…. The item in the box was a smaller barrel iron (which I already own one of those).  Now I was going to have to do the dreaded task of returning the item (actually just exchanging).  Simple, right?  They’re the ones that switched my item anyway.  Sigh, I have the receipt, the unopened iron (they didn’t even break the plastic to test it, very big mistake on their part), and my Ukrainian friend to make the exchange easier.  They look at the item, listen to Marina explain the problem, hum and haw, and finally agree to make the trade but that they would need my I.D. (passport), what on earth for?!  Uugh, I hum and hawed, but I don’t want to own a 280 UAH ($30 iron that I already have), so I relent and hand over my passport which they proceed to walk away with it and tell me it will be about 20 minutes and we should shop around.  Yikes, I hated handing over my passport (how ridiculous)!  Grrr!

Marina and I snooped around, looking at things she wants to get eventually.  Finally a clerk came out and informed us that my item is actually 30 UAH ($2.5) less than the one they charged me for.  Great I thought for a very brief moment as I was informed that I needed to find another item to make up the difference (I could not get the UAH back).  Yet another ridiculous problem.  The other problem is that there is almost nothing in this store for 30 UAH especially anything that I would want.  I told my friend to pick a movie for herself; turns out they had two prices for movies 10 UAH or 80 UAH.  Neither of us felt a movie was worth the 80UAH so she eventually found one for 10.  I still had a lousy 20UAH to spend; I saw rechargeable batteries and after consulting Tony we decided that would be fine.  Turns out the price on the 2 pack of batteries was the price for just one battery, that’s right they take just one battery out of the package and sell it individually (weird and dumb, who needs just one rechargeable), grrr.  Honestly, I don’t even know what I ended up getting, but we finally left the store an hour after we arrived with the correct curling iron, a movie, my passport and something else that I did not actually want to buy.  As we walked through the parking lot and I saw my bag swinging with a red dot on it I informed my friend that it was nothing, absolutely nothing like shopping at Target! 

Ry's 1st lost tooth

This tooth nearly came out in the spring when she ate the pavement one day bicycling.  It did not end up coming out at that time.  In August the tooth started to wiggle, just...a little.  Surely it would be out in a few weeks.  Nope, O.K., a couple months, still no.  Finally the tooth really started to come loose, Ry worked it daily with Ellie cheering her on, "pull it today Ry, it has to come out today!"  Easy for her to say, it wasn't her tooth, she was just eager for the Tooth Fairy to come visit the Fairy house they made and maybe teach them to fly.  At long last, after a few nights of trying and the whole "James Team" cheering her on, Rylie pulled her own tooth out (all smiles of course, aka Smiley Rylie)!

Halloween

A recipe for cuteness; mix two little girls, a touch of creativity and a small holiday! Of course there isn’t a traditional Halloween trick-or-treating event in Ukraine, but this year, my work graciously opened its doors to the kids (foreign and local) to participate in an office door-to-door trick or treating event; a way to breakdown some barriers and share in the traditions of our American holiday.   We also had a costume party at one of the American families home, followed by a five house trick-or-treating finale….I don’t know how it happened, but the girls managed to collect enough booty to fill three baskets!?