Notre Dame Cathedral

Even though we spent the most nights in Paris, we really just had the one day for sightseeing.  But we made sure it was a good day!

We started with a tour of Notre Dame Cathedral. It was about 10x more amazing than these photos captured.

We skipped the audio tour again.  Just wandered and looked and tried not to cry.  It's hard to believe humans can create something so beautiful.

I lit a candle for lost loved ones, sat as a quiet observer during service, and thought about God.  I'm not a religious person, but it's hard not to feel the presence of something larger than you in these amazing cathedrals.

This was the last cathedral we visited, out of 3, and I couldn't say which one I liked the best.  They were just all so different.

After the indoor visit, Mark and the girls went outside to climb the steps to the top of the cathedral, and look out over the city along with the gargoyles.  I did not make the climb.  I tried to climb the stairs at St. Paul's Cathedral in London, and had a panic attack 1/3 of the way up.  It was a narrow, spiral staircase and whenI looked up, that was the end of it for me. I had to push past people to go back down the stairs, so I didn't even try at Notre Dame.

I was a bit sad, but the cheese sandwich and sparkling water at the cafe across the street helped.

Up next, the Musee d'Orsay and the Louvre...

London (London Eye)

Westminster Abbey

 

 

Heading to Paddington Station.

Where, after wandering for a long time, along the streets of London, past the Parliament building, past Trafalgar square, we made it to our destination.

Westminster Abbey. We went on the audio tour, and it was pretty amazing inside, but no photos were allowed.

Then we headed back to the Underground station to grab lunch at one of the numerous places we passed as we left the same station.  But first, I felt the need to take around 50 more photos of Big Ben.

One with the London Eye + One cheesy touristy one + One with Winston Churchill + One from the other side of the bridge.

Instead of finding food, we just kept wandering, and wandering and wandering.

And saw some cool buildings. But no sit down restaurants.  And my bad leg was killing me. And me good hip hurt from the fall out of the shower that morning. And my shoulder was hurting from the fall out of the shower that morning. And we were all very hungry. And frustrated. And tired. And lost. And then we looked up and saw Big Ben again. And I may have cried angry tears.

We had walked in a giant circle.  So I lost my mind, and said let's just go to that McDonald's by the Eye.  So we did. After refueling, we found our Underground station and went back to the hotel and called it a day, right after we hit up that Tesco for comfort snacking.

Cadbury egg pudding for me, odd tasting Kit Kats for Emma.

In summary, day 3 was a rough one for us.  Between the shower falling escapade, learning that following a map is much harder in a city that does not follow a grid system or always have obvious street signs, and seeing much less of the city than we hoped for, it was not a great day.

But we learned to ask questions when lost, eat when near food rather than when a perfect spot was found, grasp the concept that Underground stations were huge and harder to navigate than expected, and develop a healthy fear of odd European showers.  This trip was all about learning lessons!

Sedona Photo Walk

photos taken Oct. 2016
Slide Rock, Sedona

More Bowling Photos

I ended up with lots of bowling photos.

And you're probably dying to see them.

Just admit it.  You are.

-Mark doing the "turkey dance" after bowling several strikes in a row

-I pulled the camera out and she just started with all these poses...

-everyone beat me. including tater. she liked to say "she beat me up". I agree.

-Chelsey finally letting her freak flag fly

-so many memories created in just 2 hours.

photos taken Sept. 2016

Alec opted to go camping instead of bowling.

Project Life...July 2016

I finally got around to printing photos and making my project life pages for this past July.

page 1:

page 2:

page 3:

page 4:

Still using supplies I have on hand.

Love how simple this came together, and how visually uncluttered it looks.

And my favorite part this month?  The white "here we go" foam letters on the white card.

Yum!

Want to know more about Project Life?  Click here.

Day in the Life (July 30th, 2016)

At the last minute, I decided to participate in Ali Edward's Day in the Life project.  You simply document the little details of your day.  I set an alarm hourly to remind me to take a photo, but as the day went on, I didn't even need the reminder. Plus, documenting a day is so easy, compared to an entire week.

Simple was the theme of this project.  I just added a few words to each photo, printed them in a grid, added a title sheet, slipped them in page protectors, and popped them into the July pages in my Project Life binder.

Easy. Peasy.

In case your interested, I'll include my photos in this post.

Text was added with PicMonkey.