Stopover in Boston

We had planned to return to Boston after two years of being abroad.  It's funny how life changes as you go along.  We have to make plans, to have a direction to head but simultaneously learn not to be too set in our path.  We stayed another year in London, in the meantime we felt more urges toward being closer to family (and away from a New England winter--I'll be honest, the feelings were about as strong between family bonds and moderate climate!).  When it came time to decide finally where we would go there was a place in San Francisco that was interested in what Collin could offer.  So we decided to return to the states to a new place.

All our things were in Boston--two small storage units full.  We'd pared down quite a bit, leaving just the sentimental and special in Boston and going to England with only suitcases.  I'm sure there were several ways we could have acquired the stuff but what we decided to do was return ourselves.  Sort out the things into pods that could be shipped across the country, say hello and goodbye (again) to dear friends, and enjoy the best of Boston.  Seeing my friends in Belmont was harder than I'd anticipated.  Those friends are family to us, after seven years and babies and a fire and all the other day to day interactions.  I'm not sure I weighted them properly in the equation of pros and cons of leaving Boston for good.  I mean, I'm still pretty sure we made a good decision for us now.  I miss my Belmont friends a great deal.

And cannoli.  I miss cannoli.

Our blitz through Boston was great!  It was hot--especially after England and then Iceland!--but just what we needed.  We ate our way through with a passion.  Pizza, gelato, cannoli, more ice cream, Dunkin Donuts.

Swan boats are a classic.  The last time we had ridden them Eliza was a couple days old.  I know for all of this I was more excited than the kids, but they were kind to humor me.

Forever trying to get a keeper shot of the ducks.  Gotta go on a rainy early morning if you want them to yourself!  But we don't mind sharing, really.  That's the magic of the ducks.  They are for everyone.

Pizza and Mike's. Brave the queue and be rewarded!  We were stuffed to the point of being sick but really, you can always squeeze in one more bite of cannoli.

Then it was time to actually do the work we were in Boston to do.  We got the stuff out of storage, arranged it into the travel pods and sent them on their way.  The kids enjoyed the freight elevator and dolly system to move the boxes.

The view over the Charles from the red line always gets me.

The books the school kids at Abacus made were treasured from the moment they were received.  The boys enjoyed quiet moments reading the notes their friends wrote.

Wild turkeys in the Belmont hills.  I forgot how funny it is to be driving around the neighborhoods and see a turkey saunter across the road.

AMERICAN FOOD!!  The ice cream aisle at the grocery store was like a mirage in the desert.  So beautiful.

We stayed at our friends' home (while they were visiting London, ironically!) and it was so pleasant to have an Airbnb-esque place, complete with trampoline, to start and end each busy day.

Now I'm in a random order of pictures and too lazy to fix it.  Anyway, more favorite food.  Mainly treats.

One of the places with the best memories is the Old North Bridge.  Our family enjoyed it, but more than that we went with many friends and visitors.  I was able to practice taking portraits here several times in different seasons.  We saw the reenactment soldiers march along the path a couple times to send off the shot that was heard round the world.

We attended church in our home ward before we left for the airport and our next leg of the journey.  It was the strangest feeling, feeling home but passing through.  The Belmont ward is the most family outside of family I've ever experienced.  Part of that was us making an effort to be involved and active in the social life of the ward, but mostly it was the amazing people who wouldn't have let us fade into the background even if we'd tried.  I love those people.

Last of London (for now)

I keep postponing working on/publishing this post because for some reason I think if I do then London will really be over and just a fading memory.  And that's just silly because a) it is already over and just a memory and b) it will never be truly over because I'm simply too clingy!

I wonder if I'd written this a few months ago and the moments were more fresh how different it'd be.  Now that I've had so much time to actually go through the change of leaving and moving and to process thoughts in my head it's bound to be different.  As I write this I'm not even sure if I'm going to be sentimental and sweet or depressed and moody.  I keep flip-flopping through the emotions.  And I don't even know where to start or end.

In the middle?

Some of the British sayings and ways of doing things Collin and I appreciated:

* "I'll tell you for why"

* The use of the word "whilst"

* The yellow light as transition between both changes of traffic light

* The words painted on the street reminding you which way to look for cars

* Being asked, "Alright there, love?"

* Could do

In the fall I missed the conkers from the horse chestnut trees the kids would collect and come home with pockets full.  Now I miss the Oxford and Regent's Streets Christmas decorations and the tree at Trafalgar Square.  What will I miss in the winter?  The free museums to escape the cold.  Summer?  Every bit of the short, sweet, temperamental, blossoming season.

I miss walking everywhere and it rarely ever feeling like exercise.  I miss hopping on and off public transit instead of worrying about driving and parking (I already got in my first accident--totally my fault, grr).  I miss that horrible flat because the location was incredible and because it made us be out and about every chance we could.  I miss afternoon tea with clotted cream and lemon curd.

It was a marvelous opportunity to live in a different country and be able to visit many other countries.  That the city we got to live in was London . . . it still feels a dream.  We are so lucky.

Did you know that wild parakeets live in Kensington Gardens?  Well, naturally, if the fairies do of course magical birds do too.  On our way home from the stake center our last Sunday afternoon we discovered a flock of them coming down from the trees for a snack.  We had an apple core and they would come to perch and nibble, then fly back.  You had to be brave to let them land on you!

Touching a Ming Dynasty vase in the V&A museum and the best hot chocolate in the city (in our humble opinion, having tried most of it!).  I loved having so many visitors at the end of our time because they all wanted to go and treat us to hot chocolate.  Yes please and thank you!

Making a quick run to Tesco Express to grab a few groceries took just fifteen minutes round trip.  I loved having a grocery around the corner.

Davy would get his football updates from the papers in the tube station.

Our friend Eitan lived next door and the boys loved playing in the garden with him this past spring.

Davy, the little British school boy.  I miss those uniforms!

Eliza's adopted grandma, Marguerite, from Poland.  She didn't speak much English but she spoilt Eliza rotten at the school pick up.

Spitalfield market treasures.  That market was our go-to Thursday morning activity.  Sometimes we bought nothing (honestly!  Collin won't believe it but sometimes we just looked!) but we often found things I never knew existed.  I loved talking to the stall sellers.  Quirky people, the lot of them!

I feel a deep pain of loss when I look at these.  I know that seems dramatic.  But we worked hard to make London our home.  Anything you put that much effort and energy and intent into is bound to leave roots.

I got to see the hydrangeas bloom at the courtyard of the V&A one last time.

We did a lot of exploring the last few weeks, re-doing favorites and finding some new spots to someday return.

Of course, saying farewell to friends was the absolute hardest.  It really was.  One of my friends (Anna) told me in true British form, to keep a stiff upper lip.  I did, for the most part, but watching the kids say good bye (for now) to Clara, Oliver, Philipp, football friends, neighbourhood friends, school friends, church friends . . . that was tough.  I truly didn't realize how many friendships we had grown.

The last Saturday before we left we dressed up (a little) to go down and try a final time for a good picture with Big Ben.  I think it was our fourth or fifth try?).  We got a good enough pictures, but mostly we got London.  Snog frozen yogurt from a pink double decker, street performers, the toll of the bell, chasing pigeons, rain--the works.

After school runs to the zoo and the Lego store--cramming it all in.  If we lived life this intentionally everyday we'd all be so much more accomplished and exhausted.

My hardest goodbye was to the lions of Trafalgar Square.  I love those guys.

Tears after the last day of school.  We pulled the kids early (the school year runs much later in England) and left for the airport directly after school.  It was so hard to leave teachers and friends and a familiar routine.  Their friends made books for the boys with a picture and note of each of the classmates.  Such special keepsakes.

So here's the thing.  It is time to say au revoir to our London of 2014-2017.  It really is.  We can't go back.  And cheesy as it is to say, we will always have London with us.  We changed there.  We grew individually and as a family and we wouldn't have changed and grown in just the ways we did if we hadn't been experiencing life in London and abroad.  We became more ourselves there.  It got under our skin and we can never/want to never remove it from ourselves.  We move forward and change and grow again with a foundation of all the places we've been before and (more importantly) all the people we've come to know and love.  At the risk of being that much more cheesy and dramatic--blame it on the Sherlock wall!--the Lambourne London will rise again!  London will never die!  

When we visit again someday it will be as if we are going home.