Beautiful Weather!!!

We have had some gorgeous weather with temps in the 70s, so we took advantage of it and hit the outdoors! (we are really going to have a hard time adjusting to the 90 degree temps back home)



Here we are in an area of Dublin called Merrion Square. This features a beautiful park and brick homes with Georgian style doors.




We visited a stud farm (horse racing is HUGE here) and a beautiful japanese garden. Emma loved watching the horses.

There is a small park close to the apartment, so Emma and I have been going there daily. She loves to be outside and watch the trees.

Her hair is blowing in the breeze...

8 Months Old, July 25th

Emma just gets bigger and bigger. She isn't crawling yet (thank goodness b/c I have no way to baby proof this apt) but she is starting to get up on her hands and knees and then she goes backwards. She started waving "bye-bye" now, which is really cute, and she starting kissing me on the cheek, which I absolutely love.

We are now in the process of trying to wean Emma and it is not going well. She refuses to have a bottle or sippy cup anywhere near her mouth. I know a lot of you have kids, if you have any suggestions, I would love to hear them. Thanks!

Emma Visits her 3rd Country

Well, for our last big trip in Ireland we decided to go to Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom. It is a different world in Northern Ireland than in the Republic of Ireland. They use different currency, different measurements, etc. I can't believe that this was Emma's third country (and she is not even 8 months old, it is a shame she won't remember this).




Below are some pictures of Belfast including City Hall, an overhead view of Belfast from Victoria's Square (which is a brand new mall in Belfast) and Albert's Clock.

We took one of the famous political "black taxi" tours. This is a tour where you learn about the political history between the Protestants and the Catholics. The fighting in Northern Ireland only ended 10 years ago, therefore there is still a lot of division between the people.

There are murals on the sides of houses depicting just what the people went through during the fighting. Below is a mural in the Protestant section. It is creepy because no matter where you stand in relation to this mural there is an optical illusion that the gun is pointing at you.

You know when you are in a Protestant section of the country because they fly the Brisitish flag all over.

This is a mural in the Catholic section. In the Catholic section they will display Ireland's colors which are orange, white and green.



Titanic was built in Belfast. We went to the shipyard to see where it was built.

The picture below shows where the Titanic was painted. The picture after that shows how tall the Titanic was in this little stall and how it towered over the building.

We visited the Giants Causeway, which is incredible to see. The ground is formed into mostly hexagonal shapes from ancient volcanic eruptions. Although it is summer here and the hottest month of the year, we still needed our coats because it got rather cold here. This is at the very north of Northern Ireland.







We visited a huge castle called Carrickfergus Castle. We really lucked out with the weather over the weekend because we had very little rain.



Below are pictures of the walled city, Londonderry. The walls are so big that you can walk on them. It was amazing to see. Below, Emma is sitting on a cannon from the 1600s.

Grandma, Grandpa and Uncle Dave Visit

We went to the Dublin zoo this weekend with Emma's Grandma, Grandpa and Uncle Dave. She really had a good time. Of course, I had to have my picture with her in front of the flamingos.

Emma loved watching the meerkats. She stared at them for a long time.

We were able to see a tiger up close and Emma really enjoyed that.

Dublin has all kinds of festivals on weekends. We attended the "Urban Beach" festival and they had sand and games set up for kids. Emma was a bit scared of the sand at first, but then she started to play with it. As you can see, Daddy buried her legs in the sand.

Here is Emma with Uncle Dave at the Malahide Castle gardens.

And I took Emma to the playground to try out the sand again and this time she was really having a good time. She got really upset when we had to leave.

It got sunny, so Grandpa let Emma borrow his hat. Go Flyers!

4th of July Weekend

Well...no fireworks in Ireland for 4th of July and Gus had to work. But we did celebrate at our apartment with our Danish friend Danny. Emma was sporting her red, white and blue to celebrate the holiday.


We took Emma to the park over the weekend and she rode on the see saw with her Daddy and she loved it!

Christ Church and The Wicklow Mountains

Below are a couple of pictures from Christ Church Cathdral in Dublin.





Here are a couple of pictures from the Wicklow Mountains (where they filmed Braveheart and P.S. I Love You). This is one of the few times we have seen sun and blue sky over the last month. It was very windy so we had Emma bundled up.

We had to drive through the town of Hollywood to get to the mountains. A lot of people actually take their picture next to this sign because of Hollywood, California. (If you blinked, you would miss this town, not quite the same as Hollywood, California)

Emma's War Cry

Here is another funny sound that Emma picked up. Daddy has been doing this to Emma since she was little but now she does it herself!