Taking Steph for a walk.

This is how all of our walks (all three thus far anyway) start. With Nelson taking the leash in his mouth and pulling me. It's actually really cute. He's really laid back and mellow around the house but he gets super excited about going for walks. Yesterday, he took me to the Virginia Water lake.

Since the dogs are allowed to be off of their leashes in this park, I didn't think we were ever going to make it around the lake. It drives me nuts that he has to stop and sniff everything but I'd much rather he do that when he's not on the leash because when he is connected to the other end of it, I'm constantly getting yanked backwards as he stops unexpectedly. This is not my favorite.

I didn't quite get all the history of this part but there are lots of signs that say "Royal Gardens" so I'll have to look into it. This "Cascade and Grotto" was built in the late 1700's if I'm remembering correctly. The original structure was built maybe 50 years earlier than that but was wiped out by a big storm. I really enjoyed walking around the lake. It's four and a half miles around and it took forever with Nelson stopping every fifteen seconds but it was beautiful and there were so many other people out. I think we might make that a regular thing.

(My bedroom is in the top right hand corner of the house)

I'll be real honest, things are pretty easy for me here. As Steven said yesterday, I'm pretty much on vacation. I get up in the morning around 7am, knock on Lauren's door to make sure she's up, then head downstairs to make Lauren some breakfast and a cup of tea for myself. Then I hand Lauren her toast (or whatever) as she dashes out the door at 7:45 and I'm on my own until the evening. I take Nelson for a walk at some point and spend the rest of the day reading, blogging, e-mailing, calling friends, being outside, drinking tea, planning meals, listening to my ipod and/or spending time in the kitchen. Then have dinner ready for Lauren and myself by 6:30 and afterwards she goes up to her room and shuts the door to do homework and that's it!

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The house is huge and SO cold!! I know that anyone who has talked with me in the last 48 hours has already heard me complain about this incessantly but seriously, I'm freezing! The first day, I layered up as much as possible and walked around the house with a blanket over my shoulders. Yesterday, I tried to go without the long underwear and lasted half the day but still had a scarf on at all times. Today, I'm being really brave. Not long underwear and no scarf. My theory is that it's only going to get colder so I'm going to have to learn to tough it out. I'm guessing they'll start turning the heat on at some point in time. I haven't been this cold since our heater broke (both times) last winter. In real life, if I live in a house that's this cold, I'll at least get heated toilet seats. Chilled porcelain is the worst!

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Oh, and their house phone plays a very loud rendition of "Jingle Bells" when it rings. I'm not sure why this is but yesterday I was humming Christmas songs all day long because of it.

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This is my bedroom. It's at least twice the size of the one at the other house and the bed is very comfortable. I really like it. All of my clothes are either hanging or on shelves in the closet and my laptop lives on a little vanity in the corner that you can't see in this picture.

I am missing home loads and loads!! Hope all is well.

love,

Steph

My last day in Lincolnshire.

Saturday morning, I got up bright and early and caught a bus from Spalding into Peterborough. From there, I took a bus that was headed towards Stamford and got off at Burghley House. The house is surrounded by 160 acres of land that is used as a large deer park. They claim that this herd of fallow deer have an ancient pedigree and have been roaming on this land for the past 450 years. The deer greet you as you come onto the grounds.

This house, which was built in the mid 1500's is the largest house of the Elizabethan age and has accommodated many different Earls and Marquesses of Exeter. The house has also been used to film movies such as Pride and Prejudice and The Da Vinci Code.

The ornately decorated house has been well maintained so that the colors and textures of the fabrics and paints used throughout the house hundreds of years ago are still vibrant. The rooms are set up so that you have to walk through each one to get to the other and then come back out right where you started. Somewhere along the line, there was a corridor built along the inside of the house, leading from the courtyard with a door into each room to provide some privacy but all of the beds still have the huge dark curtains which can be pulled around them since it is possibly to have people walking through at any given time.

The inside of the house was incredible! I was having trouble deciding how to best take pictures of it all with the dim light inside but it turns out you aren't actually allowed to take pictures inside the house so, unfortunately, I don't have very many ; ) and the ones I do have aren't of the coolest rooms because there were too many people/video cameras around for me to discreetly take a photo or two.

This photo is of the barrel vaulted Roman stairs and is the only remaining original staircase at Burghley.

Wash room...

A garden was recently built on the grounds called the "Garden of Surprises." It was inspired by drawings and descriptions of the some of the original gardens that were here but I think it was really designed to entertain, especially if there are little kids around. There are water features every where and if you're not careful, you could walk right over, under, or through something that's about to shoot water at you. Take for example this one here. This is the exit. You pretty much just have to stand and wait for it to stop. It wasn't the warmest of days but I had fun watching some little kids play in the different water fountains.

There's also a huge sculpture park. I'm sure that I didn't even see all of it. It really is something that takes time (and a picnic!) but the park is beautiful just to walk around and I probably got more out of the scenery anyway than I would have out of seeing every single sculpture they have there. This is a picture of the lake with some sculptures that were carved right out of some tree stumps growing out of the lake.

After spending a couple of hours at Burghley House, I proceeded to walk to Stamford. I had not idea how long of a walk it would be but it only ended up taking about a half hour and I enjoyed it. The countryside is very pretty and it was a nice quiet walk.

Stamford! Supposedly a very historic town... the architecture is beautiful but at this point I was getting pretty tired so I didn't spend a ton of time there. I walked around and saw all of the buildings and walked through the market area and stopped to buy a couple of clementines but found the bus station shortly there after.

Still feeling rather tired but wanting to make the most of my time and the sunshine that had just come out, I decided to walk around Peterborough a bit. I'm really glad that I went and found the cathedral. It really was magnificent. I got there in time to sit in on the last half hour of the Evensong service. It was relaxing to just sit inside of that fantastic building and listen to people singing.

While walking through the market place I heard some music and decided to go check it out. I found these people jumping around with bells tied to their shins and waving handkerchiefs while a couple of people played the accordion and fiddle off to the side. I had not idea what was going on but it was entertaining and they seemed to be having a really good time. I heard a lady mention that one of them was her husband so I asked her what it was all about. I guess it's called Morris dancing and people do it in the States too, I've just never heard of it. Before I knew it, I was pulled into the craziness. The guys said they needed volunteers for this dance. When the music started I looked around and said, "but I'm the only one who looks different." and he replied, "well, I guess that makes you exceptional!" He passed me a handkerchief and we hopped around to the music. It was ridiculous but it made me laugh so I was okay with it.

I walked down to the river and spent a bit of time in the park before stopping in Starbucks to buy another one of those divine little chocolate-caramel-shortbread things and getting back on the bus. The bus rides are really quite enjoyable just because it's so pretty and there's so much to look at. And when I say so much sometimes I really just mean cows and horses and sheep and grass and clouds but it really is nice. I'm definitely glad that I took some time to see these different places. I would love to go back to all of them and have someone go with me. I miss having someone next to me all of the time to talk to and take pictures with. Sometimes I have to talk to myself for fear I'll forget how my voice sounds! I'm not used to going such long stretches without talking--as you all know from personal experience and as is evidenced by my unbelievably lengthy blog posts. There are about a zillion more pictures that I'll put on facebook if you're interested!

Holy freaking cow.

Well, today was quite the adventure. Quite. Originally, my plan for getting from Spalding to Virginia Water was really easy:

Plan A: Jill, from my tap class, was going to give me a ride.

Easy peasy, right? Well, it was too easy. She called the other day and said she wasn't going to go to Surrey to visit her grandchildren after all because her uncle had an appointment at the hospital that she had to take him to.

Okay, so I went to the train station and purchased a ticket as well as a rail card to help to bring rail ticket prices down a little bit in the future.

Plan B: Jane and Alper could drop me off in Peterborough at the train station on the way to church. Take the train to Kings Cross, take the underground to Vauxhall, and take the train to Virginia Water where Curtis (the dad of the new family) would pick me up at the train station.

Yeah, evidently even that was too easy. Here's how it went down. Alper drove me to the Spalding bus station at about 8:30 am (okay, so this saved me a 15 minute walk from the house... that's helpful) where I waited for the bus to come at 9:05. There was a guy at the bus station who helped me with my suitcase and sat with me on the bus and when we arrived at the bus station in Peterborough at 10:00, he walked with me to the train station and pulled my suitcase for me. Ten minute walk--I definitely appreciated his help. Then I sat at the train station and journaled and drank tea and listened to music until my train came at 11:25. On the train, there wasn't any space in the luggage area of the compartment so I had my duffel bag and my backpack at my feet and my monstrosity of a suitcase on the seat next to me. Observe.

(ipod on at all times and sandwich in hand--I'm ready to go)

I got off the train at Kings Cross at about 12:15pm and walked to the underground station. I patiently waited for the elevator because I didn't want to stress myself out by trying to go down the stairs (stairs were the enemy and I seemed to find theme every where I went). Once I got down into the station, I started noticing that all of the signs for the Victoria Line (the line I needed to take) were covered up. Shoot. Sure enough, it was closed for construction.

Implement Plan C: After asking about 5 people how I was to get to Vauxhall and going down far too many stairs with my all together way too heavy luggage I hopped (okay, fine, stumbled) onto the Northern Line. There were approximately 40 million other people being rerouted along with me and of course, there was no where to sit. By this time my shoulders and back were sort of starting to quiver from aching with the weight of my backpack, duffel bag, purse and pulling my suitcase. Not to mention that it was at least 200 degrees in the underground but I couldn't manage to get my coat off. I rode the underground to Stockwell, crossed the street and caught a bus that was meant to replace the Victoria Line. Got off the bus at Vauxhall, walked to the entrance for my platform and then just stood there, blinking, looking up two flights of stairs.

You know that part in Cinderella when the mice have the key to Cinderelly's bedroom and they want to get up to her so they can set her free and she can see the prince and then they're just standing there looking up at the dizzying staircase? That's how I felt at this moment. Earlier on in my journey I had been actually lifting my 70lb suitcase to get up and down stairs but I couldn't manage that anymore. I pulled it up behind me one stair at a time and stopped on the landing in the middle--panting. I was thinking "If I could see myself right now, I would laugh discreetly and offer to help." Sure enough, this nice girl/lady (about my age) offered to help and we each took a handle and lifted my suitcase up the rest of the stairs.

When I got to the top I threw all of my stuff down on a bench, took off my jacket and ate the three chocolate chip cookies I had in my purse while listening to Michael Buble and waiting for my train that would arrive at 1:45pm. Upon arriving at the Virginia Water train station, I knew that I would have more stairs waiting for me but a very kind man offered to help me up and down them and having completely given up on my "I can do it by myself" motto for a moment, I gladly accepted his help. Curtis met me in the car park and we drove to the house. Six hours after embarking on the journey, I had finally arrived.


I took all of my stuff up to my bedroom and instead of unpacking, I grabbed a book and made a cup of tea and went outside to sit in the sun. It was a beautiful day. Curtis left shortly there after to go play tennis and I stayed home with Nelson.

We sat outside in the warm sunshine for about three hours and it was glorious. My shoulders are still aching a bit and along with my dream about a blue alligator... yeah, don't ask... I also had a dream that someone was rubbing my shoulders. I don't know who, but I didn't really care.

In the words of Ricky Ricardo: ay yi yi yi yi. It was a crazy day but I am so glad to be here. Lots more pictures and posts to come!

Zzzzz....

Um, excuse me, but, why is it that you guys are always sleeping when I want to talk with you? I need to be entertained! I don't have anything to do today so I've just been sitting here with my computer and somehow I just spent nearly the last hour reading old e-mails from Paige and Steven and Mom (Dear Mom: the seagul/popcorn e-mail was my fav for a while... now it's the garage episode). Hope you're all dreaming about wonderful things and that you have a beautiful day! Sweet sleep!!

Sunny Days.

The weather has continued to be quite lovely here, though still not as warm as I hear it is at home. I took some time yesterday to go back to Ayscoughfee Hall and walk around the museum a little bit.

The museum isn't huge but it is significant in this area because it is one of the few medieval structures that is still standing. The original hall was built sometime around the 1450's for some wealthy wool merchants and was built on the River Welland for easy transportation of their wool.

The hall was recently refurbished and though much of what's there is assumed to be part of the original structure, there have certainly been some additions. In the late 1700's a new section of the building was created. It was interesting to see the contrast of the medieval brick spiral staircase compared with the more elegant look of the newer 18th century staircase that has been incorporated into the interior of the house. They have glass panels over the older staircases so people don't try to walk on them. Because of the lighting, I couldn't get good pictures of them but it was interesting to see them.

There are many different information boards throughout the hall that tell all about Spalding and the larger county of Lincolnshire and other bits of history. This area, including Lincolnshire and two other counties, is known as the Fens. It's a large flat piece of land that used to be very close to the coast line, which has since changed. The Fens used to flood every winter and when the land/water would freeze over, people used to just use ice skates all the time to get from place to place. It wasn't until the early 1900's that the people here started to find ways to control the water and keep it from taking over. These days, they pump the water out of the land or divert it somewhere else, intentionally flooding another area to preserve the towns, farmlands, and residential areas.

Like I said, nothing ground breaking or anything but I just like history and I love looking at all of the old pictures and it's just all new and different and intriguing.

I think a big part of the reason why these gardens seem so Alice in Wonderland like is because of the rather curious way they have to shape every tree and bush. We don't do that at home. I think it suits their gardens here because it's all so meticulously manicured but otherwise, I'd rather the trees just look natural.

This path leads to an old ice house. I just thought it looked cool : )

Though the weather has been nice, the temperature changes pretty drastically. Just two days ago I was in jeans and a t-shirt and it was quite warm outside. Yesterday, I wore a light-weight sweater to Ayscoughfee and got cold enough while out on my walk that I decided to buy a jacket. I know, right? I just said I wasn't going to spend any money, but do you know how tiring it is to only have two jacket options when you're used to having a closet full of them anyway?? It's just the worst. I really needed another one. I didn't have anything casual and warm to throw on. There are a bunch of charity shops in Spalding so I walked through about four different ones and finally found this jacket. For a light colored jacket in a charity shop, it looks pretty much new and it only cost 5 pounds. Lena, don't tell Kira that I wore the jacket home -- I know she disapproves of wearing secondhand clothes that haven't first been sterilized. I washed it today. I think it's cute. I would show you the whole thing but it's rather difficult to take a picture of my entire torso without having to take it in a mirror and that seemed far too cheesy. It's bad enough that I take pictures of myself (and my purchases) to show you : )

I've been keeping really busy this week and have spent HOURS in the kitchen. I told the family that before I leave I would stock their freezer with meals for them to heat up when they need them. I've made baked spaghetti, cheese potato soup, Chinese hamburger casserole, pizza, tuna casserole, shepherds pie and a cheesecake. I've been going to the grocery store almost every day because not only have I been buying stuff for all of this, but I also buy things for the meals we're eating and we just keep running out of things like honey or milk or jam or lemons or whatever. Tonight we had pizza and sweet potato fries (strange combo but we have to use up the sweet potatoes). I've already made tomorrow's dinner, lasagne, so that I can just chill out tomorrow. I made chocolate chip cookies today and you know what... I had to crush a chocolate bar to make my own chocolate chips. The nerve. What sort of country is this that they don't sell chocolate chips?!? AND this family doesn't have a rolling pin so for the second day in a row, when rolling out pizza dough, I had to use an empty plastic wrap roll. It actually works really well...

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I've become a total Harry Potter nerd. I've been listening to book 4 almost non-stop this week. I listen while I cook and while I do dishes and while I hang the laundry out on the line... it's ridiculous and far too enjoyable. I don't know what I'll do when I've reached the end of the series. I used to resist listening to audiobooks as I would rather read it for myself but, secretly, I'm loving it. I think the Golden Compass series would be a good one to listen to. Maybe I'll get that next.

Making the most of Spalding.

Yesterday I walked to the outlet mall! Woohoo! Not all that exciting actually. The walk was really nice. I pretty much just followed the river for a half hour and then there it was. It was a very pretty walk. This is St. Paul's Church of Spalding.


The only store that I was tempted to buy anything in was Gap and as far as I'm concerned, things weren't really as inexpensive as they should be in an outlet store so I managed to come out of there without having bought anything! It was good. Very good.

I wasn't the only one who decided it was a good day to go to the mall...


I'm really trying not to spend money on anything but transportation since that is so expensive and I do want to be able to get around and see places. I bought a few Christmas gifts but other than that I just wanted to go for a walk and find something new. Besides, buying people gifts doesn't really count as spending money. The gardens at Springfields, that's the name of the shopping center, are really nice so I walked around there for a bit too.

On the way back I found these plants near the river. I'm not exactly sure what they are but they look like the fake Chinese Lantern plants that Paige and I used to have in our room, so I had to take a picture. Those fake plants really made our room perfect. They have good memories.

I don't think that the kids know I'm leaving this weekend but things have been a little better with them. They've been a bit friendlier to me and I can tell they're trying to be more polite. There are still enough explosions of bad behavior that I know I've made the right decision about leaving. The parents have been very kind to me and I think I would feel welcome in their home if I ever chose to come back to Spalding. Things have been a little crazy here as some relatives were visiting this weekend and a new au pair has moved in. She actually was their au pair last year and they are SO excited to have her here. She doesn't speak much English but is very nice and I've enjoyed having her here because it keeps the kids occupied ; )

Today I want to my tap class and had a wonderful time! I've learned a lot just in the last two weeks and I can pretty much keep up with everything that's going on. It was a good feeling.

A little later on I ventured over to the farmers market in the center of Spalding. It was fun walking around the market and doing a bit of people watching. I bought some produce, some of which I used to make dinner, then did some grocery shopping and headed back to the house.

Dinner tonight was very successful. I made salmon and cous cous. I've never really been interested in cous cous because it's tiny and can seem mushy. Texture issue, you know? But I didn't really know what else I should serve with salmon because we just had rice the other day so I chopped up some red pepper, zucchini and sweet potato really small, cooked them, threw in some salt, pepper, butter, and garlic and mixed it in with the cous cous. It was quite lovely and I was feeling rather proud. I even ate some of it! I'm still not all that into eating dinner. Not sure why. I tend to only want cereal at this time of day. Actually, all times of the day : )

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I don't really have anything super exciting or funny to say so... that's it for now. I'll try to live funnier in the next few days so that the next post is more entertaining!

Peace.

Steph

"I've just had an apostrophe."

(Insert appropriate response quote here. Movie? Tara can tackle this one if no one else wants to.)

Apostrophe/Epiphany: I am so capable. It's true. I can do this by myself and it's amazing! I've never really tried to do anything like this before and I'm just so impressed to find that I can do it without really even feeling anxious or anything. I can research train schedules. I can walk to the train station. I can transfer to 4 different trains in one journey including one leg on the underground. I can navigate the underground system. I can buy my own tickets. I can find the bus station. I can read all of the signs and follow their directions. And I can even ask questions when I really can't figure out what I need to do or where I need to be. Pretty cool, huh? It sounds silly to be so easily excited about my own personal capability and newly found independence but just every now and then when I'm traveling around to new places I think, "Wow. I'm doing this all by myself and I'm surviving." And all of the sudden I have this "I can do anything" feeling. I'm invincible. It's great.

(This is the only picture I took this weekend while waiting for the Tube)

So anyhow, I went to Surrey this weekend -- Virginia Water, to be exact -- to meet the family I'm going to be working for and it was a wonderful experience. The town they live in is lovely. There are green trees everywhere and the shops are cute and when I got off the train it smelled like autumn, which I enjoy. The neighborhood is beautiful. All of the houses have gated driveways and spacious yards ("gardens") with lots of trees and hedges for privacy. The house I'm going to be living in is huge and I have a lovely room with a nice big bed and a window that overlooks the backyard.

The family is very nice. They have two teenage daughters who will be turning 15 and 13 next month, and a very sweet dog named Nelson. We all really enjoyed getting to know each other and last night the girls and I had dinner in Richmond and saw Julie and Julia, which I very much enjoyed.

Before the movie started there was a Jennifer Anniston movie preview and they kept showing Seattle and the Space Needle and I was getting all excited about it and kept saying, "Look! That's my city. There. Yes! There. And.... there it is again! That's the Space Needle!" Of course, the girls didn't really care all that much but it made me pretty happy.

I'm going to be moving in with them next Sunday. That gives me exactly one week to figure out what's left in Spalding that I really want to see, and see it. And take lots of pictures. And blog about it. Just for you :-) I can't wait to go back to Virginia Water so I can take pictures there and show you how pretty it is.

I hope everyone had a lovely weekend!

Love,
Steph

p.s. just in case anyone doesn't get the "apostrophe" thing, in that context apostrophe=epiphany. It's from a line in the movie Hook. Sometimes I talk in movies or in songs.

Confessions of a Confounded Cook.

Confession: I've been living on a diet of cereal, toast, chocolate and tea. Sometimes I throw in a little broccoli or cheese to spice things up but otherwise, that's pretty much it. And you know what the worst part is about all of that? I'm the one doing the cooking! That means I should be eating loads of food because it's my own food. But it's not. It's different. Their ingredients are different and usually I can't even find all of the ingredients so I just have to make strange substitutions all the time.

I'm so bummed about it! All of my comfort food recipes are doing me absolutely no good. Baked spaghetti--all wrong. Beef stroganoff--all wrong. They just don't taste right! The only thing that I actually thought was quite wonderful was the Shepherd's Pie I made the other night but that doesn't even count because it's not one of my favorite recipes that I brought with me, it's just the only thing I could make with the ingredients that were in the house.

I need to figure this out. I need to figure out how to cook and cook well with what they have here. I'm so used to always being surrounded by good food that I just don't know what to do with myself. I've never had unsuccessful meals before! (okay, probably not never) But seriously, I couldn't even make tuna casserole if I wanted to because their mac and cheese is strange. Fortunately, everyone here thinks my cooking is fabulous and it's probably fine, it just doesn't taste the way I want it to. It doesn't taste like home. What's the point of eating if it doesn't taste that good? Of course, maybe it would be better for me to eat something that doesn't taste that good rather than having 4 pieces of toast and 2 bowls of cereal and 8 pieces of chocolate a day...

I have to work on this.

Guess what I've done.

No, actually, I don't think you could possibly guess because no one else would do anything like this. In fact, I can only think of one person who would even consider doing anything like this and that person is Paige. Well, I'll just tell you then. I have this bookshelf right next to my bed. I'm so used to being surrounded by books at home that I took it upon myself to check out enough library books that I could fill up this small shelf! Pretty impressive, yes? And what a marvelous idea! Too bad you have to switch them out every 4 weeks huh? Of course, I'll be taking these all back sooner than that...

Yes, I did strategically place my bear, my duck and my blanket so you could see that they are also well and safe. You can see my cereal boxes down in the corner. I hide them in my room so no one else can eat them. And there's my planner and my journal and my listbook and my recipe book. I'm all set!

I just wanted to share that with you.

Big News

I have decided that I am not going to continue working for and living with this family here in Spalding. I have been having a really difficult time here. The children are very poorly behaved and the parents are very busy and stressed out. I thought for a while that it was okay and that maybe I could help them to sort things out and get their kids on track but I've since changed my mind. I try to keep my blog pretty upbeat so if you want the depressing details, you'll have to e-mail me or find me on skype or something. Basically, I have never been treated like this before and even though I have babysat difficult kids before, it's never been this bad.

I was so happy in London this weekend that it made me realize how unhappy I am here at the house. When I came back on Sunday I was willing to give them another chance and thought I'd stick it out but within 24 I knew things were bad enough here that I would soon be miserable. I'm not a quiter so please believe me when I say this just isn't a healthy place for me to be. On Monday night I told them I had decided not to stay and I explained exactly why. They needed to know. They were understanding and kind about the whole thing.

I'm in the process of choosing another family to go live with. I'm deciding between two families right now and they both sound wonderful. I want to leave as soon as possible but I will probably stay here in Spalding until the end of the month and start with the new family in the first week of October.

I'll keep you posted.

p.s. if you were thinking about mailing me anything please hold off until I give you my new address. Steven sent me a letter over a week ago and I still haven't received it so I'm not sure how long it really takes and I don't want anything to arrive here after I've left. I do want mail though so if you haven't already thought about that, you really should. I'll write back, I promise.

"Es-cap-e!"

"Funny, it's spelled just like the word escape." Escape. That's exactly what I did this weekend. I escaped to London. And I made a big mistake. Huge. I fell in love, with London. Five minutes after walking out of Kings Cross Station, I was already enchanted. I adore the city. I'm a total city girl and I was enthralled. My dad's friend, Ed, met me at the train station and we took a taxi to meet up with his wife Christina where she works at the US Embassy. We arrived just in time for the 9/11 Memorial Service in the park. They had lots of music and different people speaking and it was very enjoyable. Plus, it gave me a chance to just stand in the park and take everything in.

Their flat is tiny but beautifully decorated and so homey. I was very comfortable and happy to be there. Their shower has an on/off button, sort of like my car, and it swivels so you can choose the temperature but they just keep it set at the perfect temperature so you just push the button and hop in. It's brilliant! I forgot to take a picture so I'll send you one later. We went out for fish and chips and while walking, I found at least two cooking schools that I would love to attend! Who wants to fund that endeavor? Any takers?

On Saturday, Ed took me on the Big Bus Tour around the London area. I really appreciated it and it was nice to see everything all at once so that when I go back later I know where I want to spend more of my time.


Our tour guide was pretty entertaining but a little bizarre. The weather was fantastic! I think I've been really lucky with the weather here. Everyone talks about how it rains all the time but I've hardly seen any rain at all. I guess that's how people are about Seattle too though and we all know the truth about Seattle. It's beautiful and green and hardly ever rains except to replenish the greenness.

I have about eight pictures of Big Ben but I thought I'd spare you having to scroll through all of them. They'll show up in the facebook album.

Okay, well, actually here's another one but I had to throw this one in there because this view, the London bridge with Big Ben in the background, is in Hook when Tink is flying with Peter all knocked out and wrapped in a blanket and they fly over that kissing couple and dump pixie dust on them. Just thought I'd put that out there for ya. Figured you'd enjoy it as much as I did.

Westminster Abbey. I'm definitely going to have to go back to this one. There are quite a few places in London that you can visit for free but the ones you have to pay for seem so expensive! Everything in London is expensive (actually, in this entire country), except, however, the mobile phone that Ed insisted I purchase this weekend. It cost just under 7 pounds and then since it's pay-as-you-go I put 20 pounds worth of minutes on it. So, now I have a phone! It just sits in my back pocket and does nothing but that's okay. I have it if I need it.

These little signs on the road with arrows painted next to them saved my life! I love them!! I hardly even have to think about which way to look, I just have to read.

"Feed the birds, tuppence a bag." I know that in some places in London it isn't actually legal to feed the pigeons but I'm guessing it is here because this lady was definitely having a good time feeding them. She must have dumped three bags of bread crumbs out for them. I thought it was cute. I can't imagine caring enough about pigeons to bring them bags of bread crumbs. Maybe someday. They're just not so cute as our little birds at home.

After riding around on the bus for a couple of hours, we went back to the flat for lunch. Later I went back out on my own. I walked through Green Park to Buckingham Palace then around Hyde Park where I hopped back on the tour bus. I saw a many more beautiful buildings that I don't know the names of then hopped back off again and walked through Kensington Gardens. I had to go find Peter Pan. I heard on the bus that when Mr. Barry donated this statue, he had it delivered in the middle of the night so that when school children walked by the next day they would think it had appeared by magic. I like that. A lot.

Did you know that all of the swans in England belong to Her Majesty, the Queen? Probably you did. In fact I think I've even heard that before but I still thought it was sort of funny. Is it all right if all of the bald eagles in the world belong to me?

Ed took me to church with him on Sunday and afterwards we sat at Starbucks and read the newspaper for a couple of hours. I had a caramel macchiato, of course, and this fantastic piece of shortbread that had a layer of caramel and a layer of dark chocolate on top of it. Oh. My. Goodness. It's a good thing we don't have those at our Starbucks stores. It was divine.

I had a marvelous time in London and was not at all excited to come back to Spalding. Ed and Christina offered me a key to the flat and said that I can come back whenever I like. I'm not going to wait too long before going back.

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Hope your weekend was as good as mine!

Cheers!

Steph

Punting in Cambridge

Okay, who knows what punting is? The only thing I could think of when I heard the term was football. (the American kind obviously, not the soccer kind) Turns out, it involves floating down the river in a long boat.



This trip was actually over a week ago. On the second full day that I was here we drove into Cambridge for Friday evening and went punting. I kept putting off posting it because I really can't decide what pictures to put up, so if you want to see all of them, I think I'll put them on facebook.

Cambridge is definitely a college town. It's beautiful but without the college buildings and the college students to run things, I'm not sure what all would really be there.

I had a few minutes to walk around before we hopped into the boats and I found this lovely little church. I think it was actually called the "round church." Original, no?

I don't know what these buildings are but I like the patterns and the contrast and the different shapes the buildings make.

On the river... this bridge has something to do with being a replica of some bridge in Venice... or was it Vienna? I don't know. I was still really tired and I was just relaxing and enjoying the scenery, not listening a whole lot.

I'm rather fond of this picture. Again, no idea about the building. Most of the buildings here are all part of the college. They're either dormitories or buildings where classrooms are held. I love SPU and I think it's a very lovely campus but this, well, this takes the University experience to a whole new level.

It was really a fun and unique experience. I think it's probably a great way to see a lot of the city pretty quickly. Everyone was friendly and I enjoyed seeing all of the little pubs and restaurants that were right on the river. Our boat even pulled over so that one of the guys in it could hop out at one of the pubs and buy a glass (or rather, plastic cup) of beer.

I would definitely like to spend some more time in Cambridge if I get the chance. I need to get some better daylight pictures of all of that fantastic architecture.