Sam & Ella

We found these Shetland ponies on a run one weekend & had to go back a second time to see them and feed them a few carrots :-) For no reason at all other than we think one is a boy and one's a girl, we decided to name them Sam and Ella. They are SO sweet! They run (sometime a full sprint!) right up to the fence where we are, to be pet and to smell us. They are so small and so precious! :-) It's love!

Brighton

During the Holidays I remember looking at a "Kent" calendar in the bookstore and seeing the Royal Pavilion in Brighton. So since adding that to our list of places to see, we made the one and a half hour drive down to go see it! The weather was typical--grey skies and since it was right on the water, really windy. The drive down was a fun one, as they usually are :-) We listened to the Tron soundtrack that Peter loves so much and I took in the sites. We parked at a Park & Ride which turned out to be free(!) then hopped on the bus that took us in to town. The houses out there are stunning, we sat on the second floor of a double decker bus so had a really good view of the homes. 

We first walked down to the Pier to get the cold bit out of the way first :-) You could immediately tell that this would be a gorgeous place to visit during summertime. We walked along the Pier while taking pictures & taking in the beauty and on our way back, stopped for a bag of biltong. Then we continued our walk up to the Royal Pavilion. I was hesitant about going inside because it honestly didn't look as big as I thought it would outside (don't judge a book by it's cover?). But after paying the student discounted rate and seeing the inside, I was thrilled. We had an audio guide as we walked through the pavilion, which was nice as it helped me to understand and really appreciate what it is I was seeing. I knew nothing about King George IV before coming here, and by the time I'd left, I feel like I knew the guy! The decor of the place is absolutely i n c r e d i b l e.  Literally, I got chills when we walked into the banquet room. Unfortunately you aren't allowed pictures since all of the wallpaper is the original-but here is what it looks like in there: Banquet Room & Lotus. He basically built this place as a weekend/holiday getaway, decorated to impress his guests. Hanging above us all over were these massively gorgeous chandeliers that literally (according to our audio guide) weighed a ton. A few of them hung by Dragon's mouths, while others for example in the dancing room, were held by Lotus flowers. An amazing fact about this place is that it's decorated entirely inspired by Asian culture, although King George had never actually been to Asia. It was simply based on pictures he had seen. You would never know this after being inside and seeing the detail of everything from the wall paper,  the paintings on the walls, the furniture, everything. We stayed in here for a few hours, taking in the beauty of the place and learning about the past. After, we had a sweet little picnic on a bench outside, although we were bothered by the massive amount of birds (which Brighton is known for having) and then continued on our adventure. We walked around to find the "Lanes," a famous little shopping area with lots of antiques, jewelry and quirky restaurants and pubs. It was again, smaller than I imagined it would be, but lots of fun nonetheless! 

Sushi!

We finally found sushi!!!

We all knew I would miss my Osaka. But here I had Peter telling me "there are loads of sushi places all over!" He would say that! (without actually knowing ;-)) We thought we'd found a place not long after I first got here. It was just up the road, so we went to check it out, only to find it had already been closed down. So I attempted to make sushi myself--which turned out to be a failure. When I steamed the rice and had it on the stove top's "lowest" setting to have it at a simmer, it wasn't low enough and would still boil. (I figured this out during my second attempt to make it, when I had to pretty much babysit the rice). So, I did a little more searching and found two other places, but were a bit of a drive. Finally Peter agreed to take us :-) So, we enjoyed this amazing, three course sushi dinner at 1thirtysix at a very reasonable cost, too! Hooray! Then, he came home one evening with this gorgeous bouquet of flowers, just because :-) What a lucky lady I am!

Bittersweet.

It's the first time in eight years that I haven't had a job.

I've already gone through a multitude of emotions about this-up and down, back and forth.

However, thanks to Peter for getting me a gym pass for my birthday, my days are feeling more productive and I am much happier! Endorphins make you happy, right?!

PARIS!

As an engagement present for Peter and I, and a graduation present for Cat, Peter's parents booked a weekend trip to Paris for the five of us. Friday morning we woke up around 5am and were on our way to the euro tunnel which goes straight into France. You literally drive your car into the train and it takes about a half hour to get to the other side. The drive then is about 2-2.5 hours into Paris, most of which the three of us in the back were asleep :-) We stopped once for a croissant and tea, and soon we were at Disneyland!! The weather was grey and rainy, but only really rained right when we got there. The first ride: Big Thunder Mountain. This ride was very similar to ours, only it had a few extra turns--including one that goes under a little lake, which we don't have. I was very happy to find so many similarities to ours, as I think it should be! One thing that I really liked: when I think of Disneyland, I automatically think of ours in Anaheim. Yes, it is the original, but it's also where I grew up going. To think that some people think of Disneyland Paris as "Disneyland," felt weird to me. Some people, like Peter, grew up going to this place and thinking of it as Disneyland, because it's simply the closest Disneyland park to him. Another yummy food for thought: when I am at Disneyland (Anaheim), I tend to notice how many tourists there are. How far people travel to go to Disneyland. And here I was, in Paris, all the way from San Diego! Finally, I was an actual tourist at Disneyland. What a crazy idea! After Thunder Mountain, we went to Pirates. When Peter came to our Disneyland, he told me that he really liked the entrance better in Paris compared to ours. I do like when the line/queue tells a story before you get on the ride, and I did like this in Paris. But, our ride was better. (And that's all that matters! ;-)) This one was still very similar, but it lacked character monologue and music. I love the skull in ours and how he speaks just before the drop, and the music all around, including the "Yo-Ho" that everyone obviously sings along to ;-) Next was Indiana Jones. Peter had never been on this and had a false concept of what the ride did, which made it exciting. No story while waiting in line like ours, and no story during the ride, either. It was plain and simply a small little roller coaster with one loop-de-loop. It was fun, but absolutely 100% NOT like our Indiana Jones ride :-) After this, we went into Fantasyland to ride Peter Pan. Peter's mom loves this ride, and honestly, who doesn't? Of all the rides in Fantasyland, this one always guarantees a long line (unfortunately) for one simple reason: it's so good! This one was literally exactly like ours. Next, Small world: very similar to ours. Lots of intricate detail that makes the ride so interesting. Then we were on our way to Space Mountain. Space seems to be a favorite to many people at Disneyland. It's dark, it's fast, the music is right in your ears, and it's fun! This one was a little more intense compared to ours because it's more of a roller coaster with loop-de-loops and cork screws. Still dark and fast, lots of fun. One thing I do like about ours in Ca is that even children can ride it and enjoy it. I don't think Disney's original intention was to make big scary roller coasters that some children could potentially be afraid of. Nonetheless, it was great! Our last ride of the day at Disneyland was the Haunted Mansion. I love this ride at Disneyland because it's a good relaxing ride after a long full day of walking. One of the negatives about this ride--it was entirely in French, so while you're in the elevator, I had no idea what he was saying (although I can assume it's the same as ours). Aside from the obvious language barrier, it was great fun and so similar to ours. Maybe even better--dare I say! Towards the end, where ours has weird mechanical ghosts that you can HEAR moving, this one had sorta-scary, cool looking skeletons which seemed to be a major theme. All in all, if it hadn't been so similar, I might not have liked it as much as I thought I was going to. I can say, that even though everything LOOKS very similar, it doesn't exactly feel that way. The layout of the park is much bigger, so everything is more spread out. I didn't hear a lot of music around the park, and I didn't see very much staff as you would at ours. We went over to the other park called "Walt Disney Studio" which is basically like a very small California Adventure. It has the Hollywood Sign, the statue of Walt and Mickey, lots of shopping, and the Tower of Terror. It also has a roller coaster inspired by Aerosmith which is crazy fun! So we rode that twice, then Tower of Terror, then headed to the hotel.

Our hotel was just minutes away from the Eiffel Tower. When we walked outside, we could see it just a few blocks down :-) We all stayed on the top floor (31st!), so we had an amazing view of the city center. We came in, showered and got ready for dinner. We had booked a reservation for one of the Japanese restaurants in the hotel, one that would have a chef cooking our food in front of us (like Benihana or Shogun). But after opening the menu and seeing how much the prices were, we had to apologize and find a new place. The prices were outrageous. So we found a nice place a few floors below with a nice view and delicious menu :-) After dinner, Peter and I went for our walk to the Eiffel Tower where we were meeting my friend Jessica Williams. She was on a little vacation with someone she'd met not long before who lives in France. So we met them and had a few drinks, it was really nice to catch up with her, especially because it feels like forever since I've seen any of my friends!! After, Peter and I enjoyed our gorgeous, slow walk back to the hotel and off to bed for our 8am wake up!

After leaving the hotel at 9am, we went to our first car park in Paris and stopped for breakfast at a place called Les Deux Magots. It's seemed like now it's become more of a tourist attraction, as several famous people such as Oscar Wilde, Earnest Hemmingway and Pablo Piccasso were known to frequent here often. After our delicious french breakfast of croissants, tea and coffee, we were off to the next car park and walked to The famous Arc de Triomphe. To our delightful surprise, European members from age 18-25 were free to go to the top! After an endless climb up the spiral staircase, we took in the gorgeous birds eye view of Paris.

Next was our venture to the British Embassy. We were all really excited for this, as Peter's friend Tom works here, so we would have our own personal tour around the place known to only very important people! Colin Firth had just been there for "The King's Speech" premier party. Everything from the utensils and the kitchenware to the furniture and chandeliers was absolutely breathtaking. And so much history was involved in each piece, too! I think Peter's parents were especially pleased with our intimate tour as they were already so knowledgeable about the history that accompanied it. 

Last but not least was our journey to Montmartre. I had been here before, but during sunset, so it was nice to see it during the day (even though it seemed like it was sunnier last time). Still, a great view  of Paris!

I got through immigration with no hassle at all. I had been nervous about this ever since getting through immigration at the airport--and it was a piece of cake! It was the perfect ending to such a fantastic weekend! Au revoir!