Yesterday the weather was beautiful for the Marylebone Summer Fayre, which takes place on Marylebone High Street (and surrounding side streets) in central London. Because the weather was so nice, we decided to hop on the bus to Camden and then walk through Regents Park. It was my first time to go on the bus with Evie, at which point I found out that she and Jim are old pros. She seemed pretty nonplussed by the whole bus experience.
There were lots of people out sunbathing and enjoying the weather in the park.
When we got to the festival, this is the first thing that we saw: I think the sexy (creepy) bunny was promoting lingerie...
Anyway, it wasn't all of the creepy bunny theme. There were lots of people and lots of food stalls and samples and music on the streets and dancing and just plain old good fun. A lot of the proceeds made from the fayre went toward supporting the Teenage Cancer Fund. So it was a pretty feel good day.
Jim and Evie, both hungry at this point, managed to muster up some smiles for me.
After wandering around a little bit with some friends, we finally settled down in a park, where Evie proceeded to have the time of her life. First she rolled around:
Then she did some tummy time:
Then some yoga:
A little standing:
Some hanging around:
And finally, some flying (see previous blog for laughing, drooling video footage):
Before getting some Daddy hugs:
And an awesome balloon:
There were flamenco dancers with sangria samples:
And people salsa dancing in the streets: (but no Morris dancers!!?? Gasp! Where's the national pride!? Spain was definitely represented...)
On the way back through the park, we saw some people playing the ukulele, the banjo and the washboard. they also had the words to the song written out on a piece of white cloth, so that everyone could sing along:
The row boats and paddle boats were out in full force on the boat pond:
People were lolling on Primose Hill:
It was a happy day! Summer in London makes you forget how long it takes to actually get to summer in London...
Friday was our five year anniversary and we celebrated by going to the ballet. We saw Balanchine's Jewels, which we thoroughly enjoyed. As usual, The Royal Opera House was impressive.
We had dinner and drinks before the ballet and during the intervals at the Balcony Bar. Extravagant!
Looking down below:
Inside the theater (not us, obviously). I wish we could have taken pictures of the ballet. The first performance was "Emeralds" so they were all dressed in Emerald dresses, the second and our favorite was "Rubies" and finally "Diamonds." It was great!:
Coming downstairs:
We are so happy to have each other and, most importantly, to have Evie who makes all of these years together really extra special.
The library has a free rhyme time every Monday, so Evie and her friend Eden decided to check it out. Here is what they had to say about it:
Evie: Hmm..there's not a lot of room to roll over on this rug. Eden: Yeah, I think I'll just lie here on my back. Evie: I think I'll lie on my face. Eden: The ceiling is great from this angle. Evie: Dude, I wish that toddler would back off...totally in personal space. Hey, man! I was playing with that toy! Why do they always have to TAKE everything... Librarian: Ok, let's sing some songs! Evie: Hopefully we'll get to sing something new today. Librarian: We're going to sing 'Row, Row, Row your boat!" Evie and Eden: Groan!
Now that summer is upon us and the weather is mostly nice, the street festivals and fayres (yes, that's how they spell it) are upon us in London. This weekend we're going to the Marylebone Festival and last weekend we went to the Charlotte Street Festival (as you can see by our clothing, the weather was NOT very nice, but we still went anyway). Charlotte Street is a street full of restaurants in Central London and the festival consisted, basically, of the restaurants coming out onto the street. We had just eaten lunch, so we weren't really hungry, but still had fun goofing around at various stalls.
This stall had a 'decorate your own cupcake' section, so we did. The cupcakes were pretty disgusting tasting, but it was fun decorating them and some guy with a big fancy camera took a picture of my extra special smiley cupcake:
Starbucks can always be counted on for a bathroom during street festivals (taken from inside starbucks): Charlotte Street is very close to where Evie was born (much to her enthusiasm):
Some Flamenco Dancers outside of a Spanish restaurant (No Morris dancers at this festival, but I think we might get some at the Marylebone Fayre):
Jim and I were very excited about a Jazz and Blues Club that had just opened up and had a great band playing. But we needed to practice self control and think of Evie, so we went home. This is the look of a tired baby, who is trying to rally. You may remember this look from the time we dragged her to the giant, weird looking church in Barcelona:
Stay tuned for pictures from today's festivities! It's sunny and hopefully will be nice!
Evie here. My mom is always talking about me like I'm not here, so today I'm going to tell the story of my oh so exciting weekend myself.
So, my parents inherited this thing called a jumparoo from our next door neighbors. It's basically a giant hanging thing with flashing lights and music and other silly things and when my parents put me in it, I sink down really far and my arms stick up and my feet dangle because I'm TOO SMALL. They don't seem to get that, though, so they keep putting me in it and then talking in high pitched voices, which they think will make it all better. Unfortunately, because I am so little, I can't do anything about this except make this noise, which I think gets my point across:
My parents also got this rocking chair. I like it, but they say it is uncomfortable. Since I like it, though, it stays. That's the way things work around here.
Since we got the rocking chair, it was necessary to do some rearranging. I wish I could say that I helped with this arrangement, but my parents seem to think that I'm not capable of making interior design decisions, so they put me in the stupid jumparoo again while they moved furniture around. Finchley likes the new set up, obviously.
I also wasn't consulted about dinner, as I went to bed way before they got around to making it. Personally, I would have eaten sweet potatoes, but my Dad had a different idea. He made tuna steaks and asparagus and mashed potatoes. He's very proud of his grilling:
Finchley thought that he was going to go outside and have an all night party like he sometimes does, but he couldn't figure out how to get his morbidly obese body through that small crack.
So he settled for staying inside.
Jack never gets to go outside and that makes him really mad. He tried to lazer my parents in an attempt to make a break for it, but it didn't work out for him. He took his frustration out on the kitty litter.
The next day my mom dressed me up like a farmer and we went to visit our friends Apollo, Alex and Ruth. We forgot to take pictures, but they really do exist. And fortunately my mom got some fashion sense and put me in a different onesie before we left in the house (so I looked like a farmer girl instead of a farmer boy).
We had a picnic in a park and I showed off by eating lots of apple sauce.
After our picnic, we had to take the tube back home. It was hot and boring and I decided that the only way I was going to get through it was by sticking my hand in my mom's mouth. For some reason, I think this is really funny. Usually my mom won't do it, but yesterday she humored me.
We also danced. As you can see, I was strapped to my mom, so I really had no control over this situation at all. When I'm older, I'll be embarrassed by this kind of behavior, but since I don't really understand that concept yet, I'm willing to tolerate it.
After all that action, I had to take a nap. Napping while dangling from a baby carrier in a hot and smelly tube is not ideal...especially when your diaper is leaking. But you've got to do what you've got to do when your parents are schlepping you around London during your nap time.
Family picture:
When we got home, I took another nap and then it was party time! First I partied in my high chair. I have to say, I was a little underwhelmed by my high chair and kept throwing my toys onto the floor to show that I would prefer to be rolling around. My parents didn't get it, though.
The real party was in the bathtub with Dad. He makes me laugh and I didn't even mind when he accidentally dunked me (if Mom had done that I would have screamed bloody murder). Mom took some PG pictures of Dad and me in the bathtub, but says we have to save them for when we need to blackmail Dad. I'm learning young about the power of photography!
