Family Florida Vacation - October 2018

 Here is our family selfie in front of the iconic Universal Studios Globe...I guess when there are 6 of you it is hard to see the globe. Or when you are a selfie challenged mom...

 The first Harry Potter thing we saw was the Night Bus - it was all so fun and well done! You could go up to the window and interact with the talking head - we just wanted a picture.

Also outside of Kings Cross Station - phone booth to the Ministry of Magic



Diagon Alley - all of the shops were there, tons of things to see. The dragon on top of Gringots breathes fire every few minutes. We all decided Butterbeer was ok - way too sweet to have more then once, and I am glad we decided to share!

 Honeydukes Candy Shop - we wanted to buy the whole store!

The Gringot Vault ride - sooooo fun! A mix of roller coaster and 3D movie. 

 The next day we took the Hogswart Express to Hogsmead and Hogswart. Again - super fun and better then we thought it would be.

and old mom had back issues....luckily we could rent a wheel chair. I got pushed around all day and it wasn't a total bummer. 

Hogwarts!

 Hogsmeade was done in the winter, at Christmas

I can't remember which ride this was, but we were having fun

 Grace and I were the only ones that wanted to do the Mummy ride. It wasn't as scary as it appears by our reaction :) The Halloween celebration was Stranger Things themed. Inside the main store they had actual video games from the 80's that they play in the show. Jason spent some time teaching the kids how to do low tech video games. It was fun!

Happy Halloween 2018!

Sophie is a palindrome, taco cat. Our sweet friend Nicky Dodson, Grace and Noah don’t need explaining and Luke is 3 hole punch Jim from the office. Halloween is so fun! Our wards Trunk or Treat was tonight. May be the girls last one. We will be in Florida on The 31st so no trick or treating, but we will be  Harry Potter land!

Grace & Sophie's Homecoming

Nicky , Grace, Erin, Abby, Sophie, Campbell & Olivia

 It is still surprising to me sometimes how quickly the girls are growing up. They went to their first high school dance with a group of girlfriends. I picked Grace up a bit early - she said she liked everything but the actual dance ;) It was loud and crowded. The girls got ready together and had dinner at the Waters. They were supposed to go to a restaurant but it did not have power from the hurricane. It was good the Waters did - I think besides Nicky none of the other girls families had power back on yet either, including us.

Girls Trip - DC & Taylor Swift

This girl loves TSwift and has for years and years. She, Grace & Abby got concert tickets for Christmas - only catch, the closest concert was in DC. So we had a fun girls trip! We crammed in a few museums and the zoo along with the concert. Good times!

 

 The girls dressed up as Bonnie, Clyde and a police woman - a lyric from one of the songs.

I'm sad this picture is blurry - but it was so sweet! TSwift was singing a slow ballad about love but the lyrics could apply to friendship too. I love these girls!

4th of July!

 

Em and boys came to celebrate 4th of July. We drove up to Mt. Airy for an old fashioned parade. We have gone a few years now, I love it! This year for the first time there was a speaker system and the entire crowd sang the Star Spangled Banner. It was amazing.

 

Before & after the pie eating contest! Baden was in an earlier heat with younger kids. The boys were surprised how hard it was to eat those pies quickly.

Luke continued his tradition of making a 4th dessert. This year he also cooked the whole dinner. Delicious chicken and all the fixings. We finished the night at the baseball game with fireworks. It was fun to have the Pikes here - they make everything more fun. Although the trampoline bit the dust.The boys were all jumping and a leg fell off, they just kept on jumping and the frame totally bent. Lots of good memories on that tramp!

Northern England

 Our first stop in Northern England was Liverpool. I was sick with a really bad cold for the rest of the trip and did not take a lot of pictures. I still enjoyed as much as possible. This is from a German U Boat museum. It was full of things we had never seen before. This sign in the station waiting for the ferry back across the river made me laugh! And you know I was sick because I did not go get some cake!

This is the only picture I have of the docks in Liverpool. Cool jellyfish, but not historically important. I am so sad I did not take a picture of where my Great Grandfather Scottern Poole immigrated from! He left Liverpool for Canada, and then came to the US. He was from Nottingham. We drove through on the way back to London and it was neat to be there.

We next went to Manchester. They have a large and well done museum about the Industrial Revolution. 

 We drove to Ecclesfield on our way back to London. Jason has an ancestor who is from here and we thought he may be buried in this churchyard. We could not find any graves as old as his would have been that were still legible. Parts of the church are over 400 years old!  Going to the rest room across the street at a local pub was an experience. I don't think I have ever been stared at in exactly the same way.

This is the UK candy feast when we got back. There are so many yummy treats there!!!!

Wales

 Northwestern Wales was so much more wild then I imagined it could be. It felt like wilderness in certain parts - high mountain passes in driving rain, forests of huge ancient hardwoods. It really was all I hoped it would be. Driving was an adventure.  Jason did his best driving a manual transmission with the wrong hand on the wrong side of the road through tiny, NARROW village lanes. We only had one little run in with a curb. I said lots of prayers and Jason tried really hard to only swear in his head. Driving got a bit easier as the days went by but I'm glad Jason was driving. I really don't think I would have been able to. Our funnest adventure was trying to find out hotel the first afternoon. We ended up an hour and half north of where we needed to be up in a sheep field! Our rental had Apple maps which was useless in rural Wales, but we didn't know that at the time! Our hotel was an old manor house.



My favorite tree on the grounds of our hotel. It is a copper birch - the underside of the leaves are green, top is red! This old tree was amazing!

Dolwyddelan Castle

The first Welsh castle we visited was pretty much in ruins. Dolwyddelan was built by Llywelyn the Great in the early 13th century.  I have read so much about Llywelyn and his castles, it was soooo fun to go here. Plus it is a self tour, kind of just out in a sheep field. You can wander and explore and climb. It was amazing!

Criccieth Castle was our next stop. It was much more intact and we wandered for a long time. It was amazing.  The drive there was crazy.

 This was the Great Room. It looks out over the ocean. So fun to climb up to the battlements - I have always wanted to!

 

 We were in Snowdonia National Park most of the time in Wales. On this hike we saw 1 other person. It was amazing! It was fun to see wild foxglove everywhere.

 

 Caernarfon castle

Huge, well maintained, some parts restored. Medieval wall and village still surround the castle which was really cool.