Happy New Year!

Warm greetings from the 3.5 of us in London! How did you spend your New Year's Eve?

We've (I've?) been going a bit stir-crazy with so many unscheduled days spent at home. I think everyone around here appreciates having a busy day followed by a pajama day, so that's what we've been trying to do during Natalia's extended time away from school.

We spent New Year's Eve wandering around central London, first visiting the Natural History Museum at Natalia's request, to see the whales that were off limits (being cleaned) when we were there in June. Then we went to Piccadilly Circus to the Queen's grocery store (Fortnum & Mason) to see their fabulously designed Christmas windows and to buy a belated Christmas gift for our dear property manager, Kari, in Seattle. We fought the crowds on Regent Street for a while, had coffee and cake at a cozy little café tucked down a side street, then headed for home on some seriously crowded trains. We had a supermarket pizza dinner, opened a bottle of bubbly, made some toasts, and performed a few puppet shows for each other. (It's more fun to be Captain Hook than Wendy, by the way.)

Natalia was thrilled to be able to see some New Year fireworks from the French doors in our dining room. Monte wins the award for staying up the latest (I think he made it to 11:55 p.m.).

To everyone who sent us holiday cards and letters -- thank you! It has been a highlight of every day to sort through the stack of mail to see your USA return addresses. All of your pictures are decorating our kitchen wall and delivering a daily dose of "home." xoxoxo!