The Devaney invasion

My mom and sister came to visit us for two weeks...My mom just left this past Sunday and Frankie is here until May studying at Regent's College. The campus is in Regent's Park, which is only a 10 min walk from our flat. There's a pic below - gorgeous!


The night they got in, we went to a pub called "The Volunteer" for dinner. Mom had fish and chips, served with mushy peas! gross. And Frankie very much enjoyed her first public cider (since she'll be 21 in April). Her and Bobby are cheers-ing below. She's already planning her 21st bday celebration abroad...


While Bobby and I were at school/work during the day, mom settled Frankie into school, shopped and explored the city. Frankie moved into her place on Thursday and quickly made a great group of girl friends. I think they have been going out at least 4 nights a week- ahh, the life of a student abroad! (btw - she's arriving in Dublin for the weekend as I type) Each night we'd all meet up for late dinners and plan out the next day. I made mom a list of London activities to do while she was here, and I swear she must have crossed off every one.

On Saturday, we went shopping on Portobello Road which is about a 2 mile long street that has shops and market stalls all along it selling everything - antiques, clothes, art. Mom bought some gifts and a beautiful necklace for herself as a London treat. I got some jazz cd's and a huge loaf of freshly baked sourdough bread for Bobby (which he loved). Then we walked around Buckingham Palace, Big Ben and along the Thames River to my office.

Saturday night all the girls went to see the Sound of Music. When the lights went up at intermission, the three of us turned to eachother with tears in our eyes - it was so good. We were singing our favorite songs all weekend! We even waited at the stage door so Frankie could get her picture with Maria, who come to find out, won a UK reality TV show to get the role! Here's us on our way to the theater waiting for the tube...


The next day we went to a Sunday roast at the Prince Bonaparte pub in Notting Hill. It was a leisurely meal, complete with bloody mary's, rib eye roasts, parsnips, roasted potatoes, and yorkshire pudding. Then, shopping again, at Primark - my new favourite store, pretty much because it's the only place I can afford!

Monday started a really long, hectic week for me. I stayed over near the client site in Reading, England (ha!) on Tuesday night, and got back between 9 and 10pm the rest of the week. Frankie started classes and Judes did much more exploring. Tower of London (where they keep the crown jewels), Spitafields market, changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace, National Portriat Gallery, Tate Modern museum, Windsor Castle, and St. Paul's Cathedral...just to name a few. From what I heard, there were some very nice Londoners who helped her find her way around the city (thank god). But most of the time she'd just wander and see where she'd end up.

Friday night after work we went to an amazing Moroccan restaurant called Momo in Picadilly Circus (Kim D & KT - on the same street as Strawberry Moons...memories). The atmosphere made you feel like you were at a souk. At one point during the night, the waitstaff started clapping and dancing to music and served a shot (we think) to one of the guests! And believe it or not, we tried the wild pigeon for an appetizer. It actually tasted like hamburger. As my dad pointed out, we could have gone outside and had it for free.

Saturday was mom's last day in London. We went to Borough Market for lunch (another daring meal - I had and ostrich sausage and mom had wild boar sausage with warm pepper sauce) and then we went up to St. John's wood. We went to go watch Bobby's cricket practice at Lord's cricket ground, which is very famous here. Unfortunately, his practice was cancelled so we couldn't heckle him, but we did buy him some "whites" at the gift shop - what they call the uniform.

Sidenote - Bobby not only has joined the cricket team, but also the foosball team. He had practice at the pub after school last week. In April, he's going to Paris to compete in the MBAT (MBA tournament) in both sports. I will be there with my camera.... :)

Saturday night we all went to dinner at a gastropub in Islington. Mom tried dover sole, which you can only get in England I guess. It was an early night because her flight was at 9am the next day. We did manage to stop at King's Cross station and take a few pictures of all of us pretending to jump through the wall at Platform 9 3/4. I guess it's a big Harry Potter thing - where they leave London to travel to Hogwarts?? The pics came out great though - I'll post them soon.

We had a lot of laughs and I'm so impressed with all the sightseeing that mom did! Now back to reality....Although Frankie already came over for dinner last night - we love having her here!

Our tour of Italia

It's taken me forever to blog about our vacation to Italy - it seems like ages ago now! What a perfect vacation ("holiday"), though. Lots of culture, food and wine...

So about 14 hours after we arrived back in London from the US, we hoped on a flight to Venice (Venezia). When we got there, it was exactly like the movies - so gorgeous! There were no streets, only very narrow canals and walkways. We spent the first night in St. Mark's square for the New Year's Eve celebration, which was a big show called "Love 2008." The show had special guests, musicans, etc. and confetti and champagne raining down at midnight! The next day we walked all around the island through the narrow canals, took a boatride on the grand canal and ate lots of pizza and pasta.

Next up - Florence (Firenze). We were only there for one day, but we managed to do a lot. We saw the Duomo and even climbed up 460 narrow and windy stairs to the very top to overlook the city. We saw Michaelangelo's statue of David, walked across the Ponte Vecchio (the oldest bridge in Florence) and, again, ate and drank all night.

Last stop - Rome (Roma), my favorite! We walked through Ancient Rome, toured the Collessium, climbed the famous Spanish Steps, saw the Trevi fountain, and visited Vatican City (including getting to see ceiling of the Sistine chapel). The best part was Lucio's uncle, Elpedio, who lives in Rome, met up with us one night and spent over 3 hours showing us around and telling us the history of the city. And on our last night we found an amazing restaurant that served a menu of small tasting pasta dishes. No one in the restaurant spoke english, so we literally had to pat our belly's to tell them we were finished!

For more pictures (and a mini-history lesson), our pics are posted at: http://www2.snapfish.co.uk/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=213938178/a=24380114_24380114/t_=24380114

Christmas in Boston

We travelled back to Boston for Christmas and had so much fun that it was hard to come back. The week flew by as we spent time with family and friends, did some more wedding planning, and stocked up on our American products!

We spent Christmas Eve on the farm in CT with the Svenning clan in the house where Bobby's grandmother grew up with her 8 sisters. We played with Uncle Dave's new train set, caught up with Uncle Cliffie and even got a gift directly from Santa himself!

Christmas I woke up early to drive back and open up gifts with the family. You would think that they would wait for me since I flew across the ocean to come home, but I had to threaten Robby to wait until I got back, which they did (but only by force)! After we opened presents, we all helped get ready for the day preparing the dinner and setting up the house.

Christmas day was so much fun! The new house looked beautiful and feels like home. After a delicious meal and catching up with family, we played an intense game of trivial pursuit (team young vs. team old).

Bobby had a great day with his family in Boylston (poor Keri worked a very busy 24 hour shift on xmas eve day and had to work again on the 26th!) and then they came to Reading to hang out with my family and the girls stopped by too! And we finally got to meet the newest addition to the family - Leah and Paul's new dog Butters Dashway. She's adorable!

The rest of the week was very busy. Lots of wedding updates - getting the save the dates ready, finding my wedding dress (YAY!) and finally seeing the venue for the reception in person (we both LOVE it). Laura, Robbie and Olano came over to my parent's house one night and we played Rock Band (little Robby's new Christmas toy - we totally took over) until 2 am.

On Friday night, Keri and Lucio threw us an engagement party in their new house - it was amazing! Keri and Ellen put tons of thought and work into the party decorations - we had a red carpet going up to the door and there were pictures of Bobby and I everywhere (some in twinkiling star frames)! Bob cooked all our favorite foods and Keri and Lucio made delicious pomegranate champagne punch and setup a chocolate fountain for dessert. My dad also gave a very heartfelt speech. We had the best night!

Engagements!!!

Congrats to our newly engaged friends. We're SO happy we got to celebrate with you when we were home!!!!

Laura & Robbie

Elena & Mike

Happy Christmas!

Before we left to go back to the states for the holidays, we had a few Christmas celebrations in the UK. Just a note - every party here is "fancy dress" and Bobby's school party's theme was "bling"! Everyone had a few jaeger bombs and celebrated that finals were over. Here are a few pics of Bobby and his friends (I put in where they are from too - its a wordly crew)...

Takeshi (sporting his Japenese mafia hairdo), Rav (India) & Bobby


Marcello (Brazil), Paul (UK), Bobby, Shefali (UK), Shipra (India) & Hemwatie (USA)


The Americans - Caroline, Bobby & Kathryn


Yanal (Lebanon), Bobby, Marcelo (Brazil) & Nina (Columbia)


My work party was at a club called The Loop near Oxford Circus...the theme was "hats and masks". We ate, drank, sang (the new hires prepared a song for the group - I guess it's tradition) and danced from 6pm until 2:30am! oops - I was having so much fun, I forgot to take pictures. :)