Picture day

So I am going to warn you right up front, Emily and I took exactly 311 pictures today. (Her camera died so we shared) So I am going to try and keep the picture posting limited, of course, but there will probably be a lot for today's blog post.

Have you ever heard of a place called Glastonbury? If not, look it up. And then plan a trip to go there someday. It is AMAZING! I went overboard on the pictures there, but it is just so beautiful I couldn't help it.

First we went to the Abbey ruins.

Next we hiked up the Tor! It was amazing, beautiful, breathtaking, and wonderful! (pretty much every good word you can think of)

Yes indeed we frolicked like little girls the whole way up and the whole way down.

We hiked back down the Tor and headed to our next destination.

STOURHEAD!

So for all of you Pride and Prejudice fans out there, these gardens are where they filmed the proposal scene. (The new P&P) Us girls got a big kick out of this! We ran around taking pictures and reenacting the scene for about 30 minutes.

Famous people touched this. I am now famous too. ha

Introducing EMILY one of my favorite people in the world

hahaha

*B*A*T*H*

This is such a neat place! If you are ever traveling to England and want to know where to go, go to bath. The roman baths are so intersting, the cathedral beautiful, and the town is adorable. There are also lots of other fun things to do here like see the Assembly rooms, eat in the pump room, visit the Jane Austen Centre and much more. We had a delightful time doing all of the things listed above. :)

Roman Baths

We ended the day with a trip to Frogs a little frozen yogurt place about a block or so from our house.

Once again we had a fabulous day trip to many magical places. Life is treating me well.

Museums, Museums, Museums.

Monday: Spent all day in the British Museum. I am sorry to say but Fred Astaire lied. A foggy day in London does not make the British Museum loose its charm. Not in the least. Maybe I shouldn't blame Fred. He didn't write the song. He just recorded it first. I'll just do some talking to George Gershwin. Anyways I went to the British museum to wander while also choosing something to write a paper on. It's amazing how much time you can spend in a museum!

Had to add this since its what everyone wants to see. :)

These are the 3 sculptures I choose to write on.

I found a ring the last time I was here (about 2 years ago) and I know its incredibly cheesy, but I think the inscription is so cute. (number 32)

Tuesday: Wait, didn't I spend the whole day yesterday in a museum? haha Oh well. Today I went to the National Gallery first thing after class. We have to observe some Landscape paintings here and compare them with some other landscape paintings and apply them to the Picturesque Landscape idea in a paper. I was there for a long time. I got carried away looking at the other paintings for an hour or so. After we headed over to the Transportation Museum. We had to go to this museum and write a paper on transportation in the early 19 century. This museum was interesting but it didn't give us any information for our paper. haha Oh well. We told the teacher that there was nothing on transportation before 1830 there when we got home, so she decided to change the prompt for the paper to something else. haha. Oh well, it was still interesting to learn how the Underground was made and I had fun looking at the carriages and buses.

Count your many blessings

What a wonderful day today was! We got assigned a ward last Monday so today we were able to attend that ward for the first time. Our ward is about 45 minutes away in a town called Wandsworth Commons. It is a small ward with a very diverse congregation. Our Bishop was originally from Ghana and has 2 young boys. He was so sweet and welcoming to all of us. (Us as in: Me, Jacqui Bird, Laura Clayton, Hillary Laga, Lindsey Markham, and Megan Mathis)

I got my calling today too! Guess who's teaching and playing piano for Primary? Yep! Me! I am so unbelievably happy! This is going to be such an amazing couple of weeks here in the Wandsworth Commons ward. I have already learned so much from the people here. The 5 other girls and I were asked to bare our testimonies in sacrament meeting. I am so grateful for the opportunity I was given to express my love and gratitude for my Savior.

It is always such a pleasure to attend a ward in a different country. It is a very humbling experience. The people are so kind and have such a wonderful testimony. Their faith is strong and their devotion is inspiring.

I am so thankful for the next couple of weeks I will be able to spend with these remarkable brothers and sisters. I hope I can do my best and serve to the best of my ability. The Primary kids and I will have a blast, I can assure you! :)

Ps. Happy 4th of July! We didn't do much here so the Holiday kind of slipped my mind. Oops.

Oh I almost forgot! I took my stitches out today! Hurray! No more stitches for me! Hopefully ever! But lets be realistic here, this is me we're talking about. I am bound to get hurt again sooner or later.

Lindsey Brown was a life saver and took them out for me. Thank you Lindsey! You're the best! And thank you Hannah Cole and Jessica Glover for watching and supporting! haha

*Saturday Surprises*

This Morning we got up and ran to Leicester Square to get tickets for Les Mis! Oh and guess what! Surprise! It’s gay pride day here in London. We were confused at first while walking around the streets of London, but we soon got the idea after the many rainbow flags, parades, and people with no gender went by. All I can say is that I saw some VERY interesting looking and dressed people today. More on that later though.

What next? Portobello road? Yes indeed! We got on the tube and headed towards the market! Oh what fun we had there! It is huge! So many stores, and stands, and antiques, and dishes, and the list goes on!! Quite frankly, I was in heaven! haha. It was a little too busy though. It was hard to stay together with the other girls but we managed. I got some great vintage scarves and some presents for people back home. I think I am done with shopping for a while. It tired me out! But I saw some great antique jewelry. I found this ring that has a Cameo on it and I wanted it so badly, but unfortunately I am not willing to pay 65 pounds for an antique ring. That’s about $98. Shoot. Maybe I'll get lucky and find a cheaper one. I found many treasures and if trying to get it home wasn't a problem I probably would have spent much more $$ today. They had amazing silverware, (because I need silverware right? haha) and old boxes, and old bags! Have I said enough? Probably. You get the point. We were there for a couple hours and then went home for lunch. Thank you, Portobello Market. You did not disappoint me.

P.S. funny coincident for today: my ipod is my alarm and last night I set the alert on my Disney playlist. For no particular reason, I just thought it might be fun to wake up to Disney. Guess what song it played? Well you will never guess because who even has this song on their ipod? It was Portobello Road from the movie Bedknobs and Broomsticks.

Yes, I woke up smiling because of this.

Portobello road, Portobello road


Street where the riches of ages are stowed.


Anything and everything a chap can unload


Is sold off the barrow in Portebello road.


You’ll find what you want in the Portebello road.

(Which I did. ☺)

L to R Courtney, Whitney, Emily, me

So around 4:30 we headed out to catch dinner and then head to our show. Ok so I found a treasure! We stopped for dinner at a little sandwich shop in Leicester Square. I got the best sandwich in the world. It had chicken, bacon, lettuce, cucumbers, and cheese. To top it off, it was toasted on amazing bread. All I can say is, I WILL be going back there. When I find out the name I will come and write it on this post, but for now lets just call it the "outstanding Sandwich Restaurant." Emily got a cucumber and cream cheese toasted on a bagel and she said it was quite delicious as well.

So this is when we had more excitement with the whole gay pride day. It was a mess in London. So many people. Not to mention some very sketchy people. Everyone was drunk. Some were funny, some were ridiculous, and some were throwing up. We got through the crowd and still had time to spare so we got ice cream. We sat outside and just people watched. I have to admit, I saw some really entertaining/scary people.

Les Miserables was just amazing as always! And for all of you Jonas Brothers fans, Nick Jonas played Marius. I will tell you I know all about 2 songs by them, but it was still fun to see him on Broadway. And props to him, he did pretty well for a pop star!

After we wanted to see if we could see the performers walk out, so we went around back.

OH NO.

Bad mistake.

CRAZY!

I got beer pored all over my feet and there was trash everywhere. This Gay Pride day just trashed London. Garbage everywhere. Glass everywhere. Half naked people everywhere. Drunk people everywhere. People singing, laughing, screaming. It was pretty chaotic. Don't worry Dad, it wasn't too unsafe. At least I didn’t feel unsafe. I was with 3 other girls and we got out of there pretty fast! :) Just fyi.

BUT, to illustrate how crazy it was, I have one last story to tell.

As we were walking to the tube station we stopped at a cross walk. I looked down and saw a man laying unconscious with blood all over the ground coming out of the back of his head. Dead or alive? I didn’t know. Two British women got on their phones and called the police. I don't know what happened because we crossed the road right after that. I thought about him a lot tonight though. I hope he is ok. I guess I'll never know.

Well I had my fair share of adventures today. It was a fun day though.

Even the chaos brought some good times.

All in all...

That's London for you.

Surprising and entertaining.

~Canterbury & Cambridge~

Day Trip #2

“It's that you each, to shorten the long journey,

Shall tell two tales en route to Canterbury,

And, coming homeward, another two,

Stories of things that happened long ago.

Whoever best acquits himself, and tells

The most amusing and instructive tale,

Shall have a dinner, paid by us all,

Here in this roof, and under this roof-tree,

When we come back again from Canterbury."

If you haven't already figured this out, our first stop was to

*Canterbury*

The bus ride was wonderful! You know why? Because I got to sleep the whole way. That hour and a half nap was MUCH needed. I don't sleep much here. I'm out playing all day and I save my homework for late at night. Which at first I thought that was dumb but then I realized, I'm only in London these 2 months so I am going to take advantage of it.

We first stopped at St. Augustine’s Abbey where we walked around some beautiful, beautiful ruins. Not too many words for this so I will just tell you this story with pictures.

From L to R: Jessica, Whitney, Emily, me, Sally, Megan, Lauren, Amanda, Courtney

L to R Sally, Nicole, me, Whitney

We spent a while wandering for a while, admiring everything in sight. Then we headed over to theCanterbury Cathedral. We had a guided tour through this cathedral and our tour guide was very strict but also very informative. I think I might just be an expert on it now. Thanks Frank! We learned all about Ethelbert and Bertha, but mostly Thomas Becket. These stories fascinate me. I wonder how it would be to live the life of a monk or a priest. At times when I'm walking through these cathedrals and abbeys and I see them walk by I often fall behind the group because my mind starts to imagine what it would be like. But I quickly jump back to reality and catch up. One thing I dislike more than rushing is being left behind.

Our tour lasted about an hour and then we walked around the cute town.

Next Stop: *Cambridge*

We got there at 3:30pm and the professors told us that the colleges closed at 4:30 so we were all in a rush to get there. Surprise! The colleges closed at 3:30. Oops! We were all really bummed until we learned that the boy’s choir was singing in Kings College Cathedral at 5:30 and we could go into the college and then cathedral to listen. :) I was extremely happy about this. Seeing as we had some time to kill, we walked around for a bit and then we went Punting! Ok, best idea ever! It was so much fun! Our punting guy was named Ollie and he was hilarious! He was a chatterbox and had some funny stories for the 10 of us girls to enjoy while floating along. We had a grand old time and we got to see all of the colleges since the river goes through and around them.

The Boys choir was amazing! Along with the older boys, there were little, tiny, barely 6 year old boys with the most clear and high voices. It was peaceful and spiritual to listen to them.

As I walked around King's college I imagined what it would be like to go to school there. It felt somewhat like a fairy-tale.

We headed home on our bus and made it in at about 9:00pm. We went to dinner and then ice cream. Going out for ice cream here is an almost every night occasion. :)

Side note: (This just made me laugh so I had to add it) Our conversations tonight consisted of the normal subjects girls usually discuss when getting to know each other. Need I say more? After the what's your major, where are you from, and what school do you go to questions, everyone had to go around and say whether they were dating someone, just broke up with someone, how their last relationship was, and who has a relationships blooming. haha A lot of the girls here have missionaries out. So they bonded over that a little I'm sure. As for the rest of us we went around telling past and current stories. We all got some good laughs for the happy stories and some gloomy sighs for the sad tales.

And that my friends, is the end of my most extraordinary day.

V&A

Queen Victoria: “I am young, but I am willing to learn, and I mean to devote my life to the service of my country and my people. I look for your help in this. I know I shall not be disappointed. Thank you. “

I watched the movie Young Victoria last night and I must say I absolutely loved it! Funny coincident of the week: I had to go to the Victoria and Albert Museum for my Jane Austen class the next morning (today). We had to go observe paintings and write 2 papers. Although the museum has nothing really to do with Victoria and Albert personally, I was still excited to go because I fell in love with their love story the night before. I am a hopeless romantic sometimes. But I don’t consider that a bad thing, do you?

Can I just say that I LOVE the V&A? I could live there! I spent 3 hours there today and I didn’t even get through the whole thing. Granted I spent a long time in the Jewelry room. I also spent a good amount of time “designing my own ring.” They have this awesome little touch screen in the Jewel room where you can design different rings. Color, shape, size, design, jewels, it even has inscriptions you can put on it! It was so entertaining and kept us busy for a while! Emily, Jessica, Lauren, and I each made a ring. I of course couldn’t help but to make the most ugly ring possible, just so I could laugh. My ring had a thick purple band with a skull that had red jewels in its eyes and yellow gems on the side. Many more ugly details were included but you get the idea. It was hideous! I got a good laugh out of it. We, of course, also made dream wedding rings. What typical girls we are.

I got great amusement from wandering through the rooms that have the reproductions of famous sculptures and paintings! They have a copy of (and they are all life size) The David and Moses by Michelangelo and also Donatello’s David and St. George. They have Florence’s famous Baptistery doors and also The School of Athens by Raphael. Needless to say, I was overjoyed even though they were just remakes of the real things.

I plan on going back as soon as I can to explore the rest of the museum. I can’t wait.