A British Birthday Bash

WARNING:

You are going to be subjected to some
chronological zig-zags
over the next few posts.

Not an ideal way to go about things, but there's definitely good material.

*******
At this juncture, I'm going to share my first day in Oxford.

Jill - DIL Extraordinaire - put together

a British birthday party
for Grace's 1st and Arian's 33rd.

Take a look at Grace's 200% focus on those candles!

Notice the firm grip on Mr. Kenneth who wants to TAKE ACTION - NOW.

"Okay, kids. You can blow now!"



What could be better than watching a 1 year-old ATTACK a birthday cake?




Kenneth absolutely ADORES Baby Grace!

After all, everything she does is soooooooo cute.

Course #101: Riding Toys

A certain someone figured he could just HIDE,

when it was time for Grace to have a birthday photo alone.

Well, it sorta worked.

The evening wouldn't have been complete
without a stint on the BUCKING BRONCO.

OH THE GIGGLES!

Ephesus, Turkey

I snapped this shot in the ancient city of Ephesus, Turkey.

Six weeks later, the photo below was taken of Arian's family.

Yep. He's following in my footsteps, that kid of mine!

I can't imagine doing Ephesus with one, two, three little munchkins,
but these dear parents have been blessed with the Spirit of Adventure, in healthy doses.

Actually, they didn't follow me ONLY to Ephesus.

Add . . . Istanbul, Venice, Santorini (Greece) and stops in Croatia.


It's fair to assume that they pushed that stroller over some of the very same cobblestones where I ambled, just weeks ahead of them.

But there's one thing they did which I did NOT do:

Hand-washed, fresh-air dried laundry.
My daughter-in-law Jill is an 1st class laundress
. . . even when she's in 2nd world countries like Croatia, as documented above.

ALL THAT BEING SAID,

I'm going to tell about Ephesus from MY humble viewpoint, no kids in tow.


The facade of the Library of Celsus (captured in the first two photos) is absolutely massive.


Here's just one of several statues located behind the huge columns.
It's considered to be the personification of Virtue - something I plan to work on during my next life.

The library contained 12,000 scrolls which were destroyed in a fire, year 262 A.D.

Not one back-up file.

Can you imagine HOW MUCH KNOWLEDGE WAS LOST . . . and HOW MANY TEARS WERE SHED?

This is gorgeous relief is over the entrance of the Temple of Hadrian.

It's memorialized on the 20 MILLION Turkish Lira banknote.

That's a 20,000,000 Liras on 1piece of paper money. Worth $10, U.S.

And we complain about inflation?

These final shots may not seem like much, but they exhilarate me.

It's a tile floor in a terraced home built by the Romans in the 1st Century B.C.

- at least 20 feet long and 7 or 8 feet tall.

Archeologists uncovered six of these terraced houses over the last five years.
All of them have intricately tiled murals on the floors.

I can't help but speculate about the ancient treasures still awaiting discovery.

As a child, I'd dig deep down in the dirt, hoping to find buried treasures. Didn't you?

Another tiled floor with a mural of a lion - uncovered in 2008.

Really, they are down there. Waiting for us.