It was so nice to be back in England again and especially to see the children. We had a wonderful time. It wasn't hard at all to readjust to driving on the other side of the road and to use British phrases. You'll have to forgive me for slipping back and forth between American and British usages. (My "best" combination of the two was a month after we moved back to the States. I left the LYS by saying: "'Twas nice meeting y'all." -- We lived in NC many, many years ago.)
We had a busy time. On the Saturday we arrived there, we went to a soccer game in High Wycombe with the whole family (even our DD). It was a fun game, which Wycombe won. We didn't recognize any of the players. However, one of the assistant coaches was a very popular player while we lived near there. On the way back to London, we drove past two of the houses we rented. They looked pretty much the same, but the towns they are in had changed a bit. (The third house we rented in the 4 1/2 years we were in England is east rather than west of London. We moved once because they were going to up the rent on the house we were in while rents in general were falling. That house was also a Feng Shui disaster. We moved house a second time because the company my DH worked for was bought by another company who decided to close the office in High Wycombe.)
We didn't do much except miscellaneous sightseeing until Wednesday, when one of our DSs had his graduation ceremony. It was a grand ceremony with over 1800 people graduating. The picture is of our three children on the way to the graduation ceremony.
The next day my DD and I met at the British Museum. We had lunch with a friend of mine there. Then we went about looking at the sights. (My DH joined us there, as well, even though he had been there a year ago.) There are rooms and rooms of antiquities that the Ottoman Empire sold to people who then donated them to the museum. When we were in Turkey, we saw one of the palaces and several of the mosques that were made possible through this influx of cash.
The British Museum is perfect for anyone who loves ancient history. The museum has several giant (and I mean giant) winged horses from the Assyrian Empire. It has friezes from the Parthenon. It even has statues from one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, the Masoleum at Halikarnassos, and a couple of pieces from another, the Temple of Artemis (aka Diana) at Ephesus. It also contains the Rosetta Stone plus several rooms of mummies. Here is a picture of part of the family resting on the steps of the British Museum after a lot of walking.
The next day my oldest got us tickets to "Spamalot". He had to go to four different ticket agents before finding one that had tickets. It was a very enjoyable play. My two DSs especially liked it since they are Monty Python fans. When we were in Scotland once, we saw some of the sights from their movies. Though, the clerks in one store were taken aback when I asked them for directions to the Bridge of Doom. They weren't able to direct us there but did direct us to one of the castles in one of the movies.
On our final full day in England, we drove up to Leeds to watch a game at Elland Road. On the way, we stopped at Sherwood Forest. For a change, Leeds won the game. It was the first time my DH and other DS had seen Leeds win. It was the second time I'd seen them win -- though the first time probably shouldn't count since it was a testimonial game against Cambridge United who were a couple or more divisions lower than Leeds at the time.
Our trip back was uneventful except for immigration at Newark. The immigration officers wouldn't let people in our line go to another one since the one in that line wanted to go on break as soon as possible. (He went on break while there were about 10 people in our line.) Then the one for our line decided to go on break after we passed immigration and while the two people behind us in line were trying to help someone who spoke only Spanish complete the forms.
Just a short update: I've finished the Elfine socks in KP autumn stripes. I'm currently working on some test knitting for Chrissy aka Knittin' Mom and also a pair of socks in KP bubblegum parade. I'd started the latter socks with the Wyvern pattern, but that didn't work for such bold colors. However, the Anastasia pattern is perfect. I got to the ankle, however, before realizing that I had the wrong length of pattern repeat. With this yarn and size 2 circs, I had a sole and instep of 26 sts each. So, what I should have done initially and have done now is to make the repeat 13 sts (half of 26) -- ie, k9, k2tog, yo, k2tog, yo, for the sock I'm making now. It'll be the opposite, but still 13 sts, for the other foot.
