a happy easter...

Having frozen various body parts off recently, I was completely bonkas to plan any outdoor activities this easter. But with a must-do list and an ever decreasing number of weekends, I couldn't let it go to waste.

Anna and Mike had hired a car, so on friday we all piled in and went on an outing - to Ikea! It's a day out in itself... And it was so liberating being in a car - we even resisted swedish meatballs so we could go through the McDonald's drive thru!

On saturday I went into the city, kind of across the road from Downing St - to one of the Royal Palaces, Banqueting House. It was where King Charles I was hung in the 1600's. It wasn't terribly exciting, just 2 long rooms (for banquets!) with very little in them. Although the ceiling paintings by Rubens were pretty amazing. From there I took the tube to London Bridge where I hoped to look inside City Hall (awesome spiral staircase and excellent views of London apparently), but it was closed. It was there that I took this pic of Tower Bridge, and it snowed for 52 seconds, 20 minutes later...

On sunday I went to Kew Gardens, hoping it would snow alot more, but it didn't it was just cold and windy (it only got to 3 that day). Many of the spring flowers were out and I tried to enjoy them but I spent most of the time in the 3 atriums just to keep warm. I got homesick in the Australasian section looking at wattle (my favourit-est plant), and I saw an amazing plant that was bright purple in the centre which graded out to green, and a small white magnolia tree. Kew Palace is also in the Gardens, so I went inside for a look. It was quite amazing - they'd left some of the walls exposed so you could see how it was built, (also) in the1600's.

On monday we met some friends at our local pub, The Swan, and had a great afternoon eating sausages and mash, drinking wine and chatting.

Oh, and the easter bunny had noticed I'd moved, cos he found me...

humungous snow flakes...

Spring has definately sprung - backwards! I was sure I couldn't possibly feel any colder, but this last week has been hideous. There is only one possible up-side...

During the week the BBC predicted heavy snow over easter. Yeah yeah, I've heard that before and nothing's happened. Still, I was very excited by this prospect - I've been willing it to snow for months!

My 'willing' finally paid off! I saw my first snow fall - for all of 52 seconds - while I was in the city on saturday. Snow flakes floating over the Thames. I was so excited!

It tried to snow a bit more that day, but I woke on sunday to real snow. Big flat floaty snow flakes - at least the size of a 10c piece. I pulled on tracky pants and a jacket over my PJ's and my trusty ugg boots, grabbed my camera and ran outside.

It was absolutely magical....

The photo's don't do it justice - but the pic to the left is our street view from the front door, and the other is out the bathroom window.

It snowed for about an hour but it all melted when it hit the ground, so no pictures of everything covered in white.

I'm just so happy I got to see it...

football hooligans...

Somehow we managed to get hard-to-come-by tickets to the football (soccer) - Fulham v Everton. Sunday was a completely miserable day, but we put on our cold weather gear, did some warm up exercises, and headed out.

I was completely psyched - and had humorous visions of me ripping out seats, starting fights, and yelling abuse at the ref (nah, I can't imagine it either...)

It was at Fulham, so not too far from where we live, and arrived in time to have - of all things - a South Australian Vilies pie! And a few sips of beer...

We had good seats, sheltered from the drizzly rain, and sat amongst a lively bunch of Englishmen. One guy 2 rows in front constantly yelled stuff out - "caaaarm'on ref!" "c'mon lads!" "Lescott, you're rubbish!". So I spent 90 mins being amused by him, and generally enjoying the game. Fulham won, 1-0. I gather it was very important for them to win (something about them being relegated if they didn't).

By the end of the game I was so cold my legs were about to snap clean off, so we legged it half way home to warm up, and to avoid packed public transport. That, and a coffee from Starbucks, did the trick.

Football - must-do list - tick!!

"a respirator job"...

When I hired a DVD a few years ago, the guy behind the counter approved of the choice, and said I'd find the movie so funny it was a 'respirator job'.
My saturday night had a similar effect! We were invited out to a friends place in Surrey (we had to catch an overland train!) - and they were a couple called Kylie and Benno (Aussies, of course, going by their names!). They cooked us dinner and there were numerous bottles of good wine - it helps that Scott works for Fosters! Kylie and Benno were absolutely hilarious, and by the end of the night my sides and my cheeks were hurting from laughing so much, and I was begging them to stop. I haven't felt like that for ages....
The laughter was resurrected on monday morning - although this time in disbelief - a guy on my tube had obviously fallen deeply asleep, and was snoring the loudest snore I've ever heard - all the way into the city (about 40 mins!). Everytime someone got on you could see them look puzzled, then start to look around, then they'd look incredulous not knowing whether to laugh or be disgusted. This guy also had a tight beanie on, with his mobile stuffed inside it, poking out the bottom next to his ear.
This country cracks me up....!

spring has sprung, sort of...

Well it had for the first 2 days, the weather was warm and the sun was out - but now it's gone chilly and wintry again. In fact the BBC says we should expect sleet today. Highly unlikely, there's no precipitation in sight...

Everything is in bloom - our mange tout (snow peas to us!) is flowering - and daffodils, apple blossom and another tree I don't know the name of are flowering everywhere. It's really beautiful!
I've been taking pictures out our 2nd storey bathroom window, since I moved here, to record the changes in the different seasons - and I took these two yesterday. Oh, and the tree I don't know the name of is the big flowering one in the middle. You can just make out our patch of daffodils behind the red flowering tree.

Anyhoo, I had a quiet weekend - went to yum cha on saturday (ate some decidedly weird stuff), and Anna and I went shopping on Oxford St on sunday. It was all heaps of fun until public transport and traffic angered us. Luckily we had a dozen 'specially chosen Krispy Kreme donuts to keep us company!

I realised this weekend that I have exactly 16 weekends left in the UK - so I'm hastily drawing up a must-do list!

Time goes so fast when you're having heaps of fun...!!