We're Londoners now! 🙂
Greetings, friends! I haven’t blogged since the beginning of the month and I have a lot to report. I will do it over several entries, so hold on. It’s been quite the adventure!
First though, I wanted to record a little of what our life in London has looked like over the last few months. John has been finishing his second (and last) semester of grad school, I’ve been coaching cheerleading and we’ve been having tons of fun.
Some of the girls and me!
Back in the fall, I was offered the job as cheerleading coach at the American School in London (ASL). I had the pleasure of coaching 12 wonderful high school girls, many of whom had never cheered before. The team was comprised of mostly Americans, some Canadians, and a girl from the UK, with about half of the team being seniors.
After conducting tryouts and preparing chants and cheers for the games, we began work on our big routine. This routine would be performed at halftime of a big game. As the season went on, we kept adding more difficult skills. Unfortunately, we had a few injuries that required us to rework the routine several times. I was so proud of the girls–the routine in the video below was reworked in the half hour of warm up time before the game, due to an injury at the end of practice the day before. The girls pulled together and nailed it. I couldn’t have been prouder as a coach!
Check out my girls performing their final routine–they did an amazing job!!
John and I were also able to spend some time with friends on a trip to Denbies Wine Estate in Surrey, a short train ride from London. We found a Groupon for a wine tasting and decided to take a group trip out of the city. They winery tour was very interesting complete with a Disney-esque People Mover Ride through the wine making process.
Anna, Erik, Kathleen and Jeremy brace for the ride!
This ride followed a 360 degree video experience giving us a detailed background on the region and why it is good for growing grapes. Apparently, the geography and micro-climate of the estate is very similar to that of the Champagne region in France, giving Denbies fabulous sparkling wine. We didn’t get to try the sparkling wine, but we did get to try some food and wine pairings. Delicious. Our tour guide, told us that Denbies wine was great if you wanted to unwind with “two of three” glasses of wine at the end of the day. Considering she was an older lady with a very proper British accent, this was hilarious.
The whole crew
We even managed to find a brewery onsite so the boys were happy. The sun peaked out a little bit and we got to remove our coats for the first time since November. It was lovely!
After lunch at a cute pub in Dorking, where we saw a random stag do (bachelor party), we were on a train back to the city. It was nice day in the English countryside. 🙂
Happy Boys!
Stay tuned…more to come later!!! Thanks for reading. 🙂
John and CB's Most Excellent Adventure 