Author: Nick

Jonah’s sexy and he knows it. This video is the proof. Grandparents, be warned, there’s graphic child cuteness coupled with slightly inappropriate music. If anyone’s seen the music video for LMFAO’s Sexy & I Know It you’ll know exactly why this is so funny.

Nick here posting…
This weekend’s Lloyd family trip was to the city of Verona. Most people have only heard of Verona because it is the setting of Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliette. What a lot of people don’t know is how incredibly beautiful the city is.

We took a train from Vicenza to Verona. There are two kinds of trains here, Eurostar and Regionale. Eurostar trains are direct, fast and expensive. Two one way tickets to Verona would have cost us about $40. On the other hand, Regionale trains are slow, stop at every small station along the way and are very inexpensive. Two one way Regionale tickets cost us only $12. The Eurostar train would have taken a little over a half hour. The Regionale got us there in about an hour and fifteen minutes. It wasn’t that bad though, and frankly we just couldn’t imagine spending $80 for a day trips transportation to a city that’s not even very far away.

Verona, as viewed immediately outside the train station, isn’t much to look at. After a fifteen minute walk into the city centre though, the scene changes dramatically. Beautiful, centuries old houses and buildings line the streets; painted pastel yellows, and reds. As you enter the heart of the city you pass through an archway into Piazza Del Erbe, where street vendors sold everything from lemon trees to pottery. In the Piazza is the Arena di Verona which resembles the coliseum in Rome but is a bit smaller. Later in the day we stopped at a pasticceria vendor, who sold us a cannoli worth dying for.

Next we saw the famous “Juliette’s Balcony.” The entryway into it had the names of thousands of couples graffitied on the walls.

We stopped next to a fountain:

We saw several cool churches:

Then we crossed the river by bridge, yielding the most spectacular view I’ve ever seen. It was incredible.

And here’s a picture of a cool museum:

And lastly here’s a photo from the streets of Verona:

Overall Verona was the most beautiful city I’ve ever seen. I may make this claim again down the road since I haven’t seen all of Italy or Europe yet, but for now Verona is the city to beat. There were a LOT of tourists about, which was a bit of a downer, and the stores were upscale boutiques that obviously catered to rich foreigners, but the beauty of just walking down the streets of the city totally made up for those small shortcomings.

So Jen, Jonah and I went sledding today! There aren’t too many great sledding hills around but we managed to find a couple that were pretty fun! Jonah LOVED it! I put together a little video to remember it, hope you like it!

This Thanksgiving Jen, Jonah and I made the long drive from our home in Maryland to my Aunt Kathleen and Uncle Steve’s house in Cincinnati Ohio. We started out the day before Thanksgiving around 7pm and didn’t make it there until around four in the morning. I was pretty tired by the time we got there but Jen woke up for the last few hours and helped me stay alert. The next morning after all three of us got some good sleep, we headed upstairs to say “Hello” to our gracious hosts. Jonah was at first weary of their Yorkiepoo Sammy, but quickly warmed up to her as soon as Sammy stopped being so excited!
As you can see, Uncle Steve greeted us with a calm disposition.He quickly regained his composure though, and began to slice up the turkey! This year they brined the turkey, which made it about the moistest, most succulent turkey Jen or I had ever tasted!Soon we found ourselves sitting down to a traditional Thanksgiving spread, complete with food, family, new friends, and good conversation.After dinner we all played Catchphrase, adults vs. children. It goes without saying the adults wiped the floor with their kids.In my mind the highlight of the evening came when we played a game in which a paper bag was set on the floor and you had to pick it up with your mouth without touching the ground with any body part other than your feet. Even Jonah played (albeit from mimicking and no real understanding of the rules, but it was cute non-the-less).


The game ended in a three way tie between myself and two much younger cousins. I think I won for my height and weight category!

Anyway, we were SO grateful to our wonderful hosts who took us in over Thanksgiving. It was wonderful being around family, especially since we will soon be leaving for Italy and probably won’t have much chance to see any family for quite a while. Happy Thanksgiving!

So here it is, the long awaited footage of Jonah’s first haircut!

Well, one of the few upsides of being trapped here is Spain is that I got to go out and take some photos. This is going to be a long one…
My friend Mike and I caught a cab yesterday into town. After a few minutes of trying to explain what a beach was the cab driver finally got it. This is the beach in Rota, it’s absolutely gorgeous! There was hardly anyone around because it’s the off season and it was a little chilly. Nonetheless it was a beautiful scene.

After the beach we got some lunch from a little Cantina right near the water. Mike got mixed fried fish (as you can see it looks like they pulled the fish directly from the water into the deep fryer) and I had the Swordfish which was quite good. We ate outside and a cat we affectionately nicknamed Whiskers came begging for scraps. As you can see, Whiskers must have had a little accident. He is trying (unsuccessfully) to scratch his ear with his nonexistent leg while his nonexistent tail doesn’t go back and forth.

Anyway, after lunch we wandered around the city for awhile and I took some photos of the streets. They have these tile artworks all over the city that are really beautiful.

And lastly, I leave you with an image of a Spanish sunset.
Hopefully I’ll be leaving soon, but I have to say that my time here hasn’t been all bad!

Well, as Jen said, I’ve been stuck in Rota Spain for about five days. Rota is a US Naval base on the south west coast of the country, well actually Rota is the city next to the base but it’s just called Rota Naval Base. It’s beautiful here, but I’m anxious to get to where I’m going. I went out on Wednesday night with a few friends and acquaintances and had a blast. We went to a little restaurant in the city and got seafood that was to die for, financially that is. Everything is pretty expensive here and the conversion from US dollars to Euros doesn’t help at all either. Anyway, I’ll post again once I get to Afghanistan. Jen & Jonah, I love you and miss you both!