Mind.Of.Melanie: Back to the Britsh

Well, helllllllo, dah-ling!

I'm back across the pond for this post, in the motherland, aka, Great Britain, England, land of proper people and red buses. Oh, and Big Ben. Which brings me to day two:

Day 2, Sunday, February 9th: Big Ben, Parliament, Changing of the Guard @Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace, V&A Museum
Daily Fitbit Stats: {coming soon!}
*This will be a recurring metric -- each day Gwen wore her fitbit to track the miles walked and number of stairs we did.
Daily Commonality: We both have little brothers. One of them happens to be British and resembles Harry Potter... and we both LOVE Harry Potter.
*This will be a recurring stat -- each day we found out more and more we had in common.

Day two. Wakin' up, feelin' fine. And even better, once my favorite barista introduced me to my new best friend. Nespresso Pixie and milk frother. Yes, you need one of these. Once you get used to the instant espresso and milk frothed to perfection, you will run out and get one and life will never be the same. {Just as I did once back state-side.}

Gwen in her adult-sized onsie (a gift from her mum).

http://www.nespresso-us.com/machines/pixie/pixie-titanium-bundle/

Ok, now we're all caffeineated and ready to hit the ground running (literally, you'll see). Per usual, we hopped on the tube (Gwen even let me try and direct us... she's very much a take-charge kind of girl, so this was a big step), and popped out of the underground right in front of Big Ben. Amazing sight! We proceeded to take several hundred pictures of our surroundings ---- Big Ben, River Thames, Parliament, London Eye... and, red double decker buses! W-O-W. I kind of felt like Joey from Friends, when he was in London and had a 3-D pop-up map that he would set on the ground and step on to get his direction and all the sights...so much to see in one spot, it was like eye candy all around me :)

"Look, kids. It's Big Ben!"

Eye spy two pretty ladies...get it? Eye spy...

See what I mean?! So much in one spot to see!

After viewing the sights on our first stop, we started walking towards Buckingham Palace, strolling through St. James Park. There was a group of rollerbladers meeting up for their morning "blade," dogs walking, people frolicking, and everyone just generally having a nice day. We looked at our watches and quickly realized that we had to book it in time to make the Changing of the Guard. So, we literally ran through the park, all the way to the Queen's diggs. BUT, we made it, and the Queen was in the house (her flag was flying), sadly, she didn't come out to say 'hi' to us. We perched on top of a nice marble staircase for a good view... and then waited...and waited...and waited. And realized that we actually saw two guards changing position, rather un-impressively, and that was actually the whole show. I think we were envisioning something much grander like the Trooping the Colour http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trooping_the_Colour. But, either way, been there, check, done.

We tootled along from the Queen's Palace and through Picadilly Circus and Chinatown, over to Kensington Palace to visit Kate, as I call her (we're BFF, duh).

Past the Ritz on our way... trey fancy!

At Picadilly Circus. There was a little old cute British guy taking
our photo here. He took about five of them and kept saying "cool, ok, cool".
But he had an accent so it was even cuter.

Through Chinatown.

The gates of Kensington Palace.

We went to Kensington for a few reasons: 1) it's a palace, 2) Kate lives here, and 3) they had a special "Fashion Rules" exhibit going on. Check it outt: http://www.hrp.org.uk/KensingtonPalace/WhatsOn/FashionRules?gclid=CL2-n_m09bwCFUOSfgodLA0ARQ

We enjoyed looking at the beautiful dresses of the queens and princesses through the ages. I will say, while Princess Diana was lovely, she was still a product of the 80's, if you get my drift {think shoulder pads, pouffy sleeves, neons etc}

This is wallpaper! Isn't it fabulous!

Ok, not such a great photo, but a great memory!
The cutest old British lady docents were trying to take our
photo with G's iPhone and it was hilarious. They told us to move
over to the left about 15 times and proceeded to take 100+
photos... all blurry! ahahahaha

Us, mirror images of Princess Di.
{a docent's brilliant idea}

And Gwen, holding her baby brochure, just like Kate.

It's here, that we first learned of my ability to take
masterful photos of ceilings. The beginning of an era...

We got to try on some of the clothes, too.

Next on my second day visit (yep, same day still!) we headed to the Victoria and Albert Museum http://www.vam.ac.uk/ Here we rounded out our day of museums, checked out some dresses and fashion through the ages on the first floor, and then visited some different periods of paintings and artifacts on the upper floors. The museum cleared out and we were in a gallery when we heard through the intercom: "doors closing" and we thought we were getting locked in! It would be like the movie Night at the Museum, for us but instead of pre-historic animals coming alive with Ben Stiller, it would be old fashion things like sliver tea service trays and girdles chasing us around the room!