happy second halloween!

Since the weather was nice and we don't know what next year's weather will be, we decided to do the traditional door to door trick-or-treating in my brother's neighbourhood. It was fun watching Clayton and Matthew climb the stairs, knock on the door, and collect their treats. Once the treat drops, they would check to ensure their goodies were safely in their bags. So cute!

Happy first birthday!

Happy first birthday, baby boy! We thank you for the best year ever so far! Can't wait to see what you have in store for us :)

What a difference a year makes...or two!

This new blog definitely confirms exactly my first sentence from my first blog entry; I'm not a blogger! But a special someone has enticed me to blog and these memories will be all for him :) We love you lots, Matt Matt!

Since our wonderful Europe trip - part 2 December 2009 - we now have expanded our family. Our beautiful boy was conceived in Europe (we think it might have been from our stop in London but who knows?!?!). Matthew was born on September 6, 2010. He was adamant on his early arrival (9 days early). My water broke at 11:30pm on September 5. As James had just hit the sack, I woke him up with all the commotion (plus I needed help to get on the toilet!) Then we sanitized (of course!), repacked our overnight hospital bag, planned where we were going to have our last breakfast before the little guy came, took a shower...By 3:00am we were at the hospital! After reading many books, talking to other expert parents, and from our birth trainer, we were expecting about a good 16 hours before we got to meet Matthew. But boy, was he determined to meet us as soon as possible! By the time we were admitted to Emergency, I was 4 centimetres dialated. By the time I got wheel chaired up to our brand new, private Cedar room (equipped with its own toilet and bathtub!) at Women's, I was 9 cms! I was already pushing naturally when I demanded to be given the drugs! I wasn't planning on being a hero! The doctors were quite hesitant to drug me up but they finally gave in. Matthew was born by 6:30am. He would have came earlier, but sorry Matthew, mama needed the drugs!!!

We stayed at the hospital for one night and was quite determined to "get back to reality" so we asked to be checked out. Luckily James was able to get a month off so to spend Matthew's first 30 days together. And luckily for James, he actually slept way more during that first month than ever! Arghhh!!!

day 24 - before we bid farewell

It's our last day in Ol' Paris. We woke up to snow! It was so beautiful and romantic. We had a "free" day as we've done most of what we wanted to do. We decided to give Notre Dame a second shot so we went back to the St. Michel area. We had cheese fondue...yum! Then we walked around Notre Dame. After that I decided to take James to a supermarket that I remembered last time I was here. I was telling him how big and great it was. Once we were there, I realized it was just another Monoprix. It was disappointing but we still went in. We then walked across the street to Printemps, another great shopping mall packed with people. Just like the Galleries Lafayette, there was a women's, men's, and home store. We went to the women's side first and then the men's and found something for both James and I. We were told that we could claim the tax so that's what we did. We quickly learned that we needed our passports so we had to go back to the hotel to get it and then back to the store to fill out the forms.
After all this running around, we finally were able to rest and have a nice dinner. We even picked up some nice desserts which we are about to enjoy before bed time.
Paris has been great to us and i'm happy to report that James will return to Europe and has enjoyed his time here... I'm sad to leave this adventure but super excited to sleep in my own bed soon!

day 22 and 23 - exploration of the city

We started the day at Chateau de Versailles. Wow, what an incredible place. It was a very sunny day and the metro didn't take too long to get there (just under an hour). This place is huge! We walked around the museum and then to the different rooms of this Chateau. Many pictures were taken (pretty sure that there was a no camera policy but everyone else was snapping away so i followed...) We did the audio tour so we learned lots. Then we proceeded to the gardens. This place is just so huge! The walk down to the end was about 2km. I cannot imagine the upkeep for this place. This portion of of the day took almost 6 hours.

We walked by Les Galleries Lafayette but didn't shop inside. Instead we looked at the kiosks outside the store. There were scarfs, earmuffs, towel wraps, a piece of cloth that you can wear 10 different ways...I bought a scarf and a Russian type hat. We then went back to the Ramen Street (St. Anne) to have Ramen again. Our "favourite" place just closed as we got there so we had to settle for a less tastier Ramen restaurant. We then went to Monoprix to pick up some wine to enjoy in our room.

The next morning I finally got to eat a Nutella waffle. Mmmm...it was good. It was so good that i accidentally left some on my jacket! I have so much stuff to dry clean when i get back! We then went to the Avenue de Champs-Elysees. We started out at the Arc de Triomphe. Then shopped our way down. We had the most fun at LV which we went there twice! James was on a mission to find a nice wallet and I was on a mission to spend some dough. On our second visit to the LV store, we were stopped by a Chinese man who only spoke Mandarin. He was asking if we could go inside to pick up something for him and he would give us cash to pay for it and we could even keep the receipt to claim the taxes. I quickly searched for one of Professor Chan's (my one and only daddy) lectures and remembered that he warned me about this. He once told me that people come up to you to ask you to buy something for them as they have been banned by the store because they buy the products and then return to their homeland to make fake duplicates. James thought it was a good idea until I dragged him away and enlightened him in a short "Coles notes" version of the lecture. In the end we did not buy that wallet.
We then went back to Les Galleries Lafayette to have some fun shopping. Again, no luck in spending my money. I guess in a good way, it's better this way. We then took the metro to Nortre Dame. As we got there, it was just closing! So we walked along the Ile St. Louise walk and attempted to find Le Petit Prine de Paris, suggested by Momo. No luck so we just ate at a nearby restaurant near home. I got to eat my Moule frittes! We went back to our hotel and had wine again and called it a night.

day 20 and 21 - bonjour, ol' Paris!

We landed safely and early in the morning into lovely Paris. It was sunny but super cold - just a tad warmer than Munich. We courageously decided to take the subway to find our hotel. James was awesome again. He carried both our suitcases - mine being super duper heavy - onto the subway, off the subway and up four flights of stairs! Oh thank god for James! Mind you, if James hadn't been there I would most likely have hailed a cab for a more enjoyable ride to the hotel... We got to the hotel and they weren't ready for us so we dropped off our luggage and found some grub. James ordered a yummy lasagna and I ordered raw ground beef. It looked nasty but pretty yummy. That night we walked to the Louvre, and then went up the Eiffel Tower. It was super windy and cold. We had dinner (again expensive) and then called it a night.



Today we went to Sacre Coeur, Cimetiere Montmartre, Moulin Rouge, where I stayed last time (area 17th), the Opera, Galleries Lafayette, a very yummy ramen place on St. Anne street (it was so difficult to find and no one knew what street we were looking for except a nice lady at the information desk at the Galleries Lafayette), the Kooki outlet, a luggage store to buy a new suitcase cause the suitcase that I'm borrowing is falling apart! Whew! what a day! We've been walking lots and my body is aching!



If you were to ask James what the highlight of today is, he would have to say our super cheap breakfast - 4 euros! He couldn't get over the fact that last night he had spent 5.60 euros on a 500mL coke when this morning we had two pastries and a coke for only 4 euros. He was quite impressed with our Ramen place too as we spent 19 euros on two ramen bowls, 5 gyozas, a bowl of rice and a bowl of sauteed veggies.

day 16, 17, 18, 19 - guten tag, Munich! I LOVE German beer!

We arrived early to Munich and settled quickly into our hotel. Luckily the central train station is right across the street from our hotel, however we still took the scenic route as we didn't know it was that close. It was sunny but quite cold and they were expecting snow before the end of the week.


We dropped our bags and walked along Bayerstrasse (our Fleming's hotel's street) toward Karlsplatz/Marienplatz. It's a pedestrian only area with open shopping and at the end of this street there was a Christmas market. We were quite tired the first day as we had to wake up early so we walked half way down (before the Christmas market) and then head back to the hotel for a snooze. When we woke, we just went to grab a bite to eat at this tasty and cheap(!!!) restaurant and went back to the Christmas Market as it was closing.


The next day we went to the Neuschwanstein castle. It was an all day tour. We caught the grayhound bus close by to our hotel. The cost of this day was 49 euro/per person plus entrance fee per person which was about 13 euros each, I think. They took us to another castle that was built by Ludwig, a small town called "O-baw-haw-ga" and then we went to the main castle. It was HUGE! We ate lunch first and then proceeded to the horse drawn carriage ride. The princess that I am, wanted to ride in the front seat so James patiently waited for me to choose which carriage I wanted. Unfortunately, the carriage I wanted only had us as customers and decided that it wasn't worth his time nor his two horses so James and I had to take the bus. It had just started to rain when we went for lunch and didn't stop the entire time we were there. The bus only took us, what seemed half way, up to the castle. After (not) carefully reading the signs, James directed us the wrong way. After hiking about 5 minutes, we were faced with a bridge that stretched for a mile long. After being with James for 12 years, this was the first time he ever knew about my fear of bridges and heights. My legs gave way under me and was cemented to the ground as we approached this bridge. It did not allow me to cross. James promised that this was the only way to this beautiful castle that I've been dreaming about exploring. Reluctantly, very reluctantly, i grabbed onto James, closed my eyes, and he dragged me across this bridge. With tears almost coming through, we made it safely across. After a few seconds, we realized that we went the wrong way which meant we had to cross the stupid bridge again! I was pissed! This day was supposed to be super romantic and something that I've wanted to do for a long time. About 20 minutes later (we had to cross the bridge and hike up a hill) we finally made it to the entrance of this castle drenched. We were not happy campers but I was the only one who voiced it, of course. The tour was amazing. It was worth it, so worth it!


We were quite tired the next day so we took it easy. We went to the Olympic park and the BMW centre and called it a day, knowing that we would be heading out again to meet up with Denise, Tino and Lily for dinner. We made it to their flat in no time (about a 5 minute train ride and then 10 minutes to find their place). They took us to this very traditional Barvarian restaurant where we consumed so much meat. I could eat that meat everyday! It was super delicious. I also drank beer! It's called Radler and it's a mix of beer with lemonade. Yum! We also learned that each restaurant is sponsored by a different beer company and that's all they had but it seems like every type of German beer is delicious. After dinner, Tino took us to a nearby grocery market to buy some German treats for our loved ones back home and we went back to their place for some more beer and yep, I was drinking it!



Our last full day before we went to Paris, we knew we had to make two more important stops: firstly, the concentration camp called Dachau and then to the most famous beer hall called Hofbrauhaus . The concentration camp was unbelievable, in a really bad way. James and I got the audio tour and OMG! the things that the two interviewed prisoners and several other workers had to say was just incredibly sad and just plain unbelievable. The torture that these men had to endure was inhumane and completely insane. It was no way to end our glorious German trip so we HAD to find something more fun to end this part of our tour. Next stop was the beer hall. It was close to 4pm when we decided to head there and we were thinking we would just stop in for a beer and then meet up with Denise, Tino and Lily. A couple hours later, we had met a couple from Ireland who just got engaged that same day in the English garden, met two older guys from Japan, had a German wiener with some sauerkraut, two litres of beer for James and a litre for me (each of this glasses of beer was a litre each!) Tino came to meet us as we were still there. When he came, we ordered another round for James, one for Tino and it was time for me to try their traditional hot red wine - it was only okay, I enjoyed the Radler much more. Near the end of James third drink, we had decided to go upstairs to enjoy some traditional German dancing. By the time we went up there, James was not doing very well. He went to the washroom to get the beer out. With little success, he came back to the table and slept while Tino and I chatted away. Tino and I decided that when he finishes his beer, that we would start heading home as it was getting kind of late and we still had to pack for an early flight in the morning. Tino had about a few more sips when James finally awoke. He looked super pale and super sick. Tino, I guess the expert that he is, immediately gave James his nearly finished beer to puke some more. As he was barfing into the glass, Tino and I were laughing our heads off while I was capturing this moment in time with our little camera. Say cheese!!!

Tino helped us get to the train station and then we parted ways. James passed out right away when we got back to the hotel - natch! - and lucky me got to pack up everything!