More Updatage - at LAST!

Hello dear ones over the ocean! Oy vay - we have been staying in SO many places w/o wireless internet. Argh! But at LAST we're somewhere where I can actually connect with the rest of my known universe.

And so, now that I'm connected, I'd like to say: I am officially loving this trip. Since my last update I was blown away by Wordsworth's home and the fact that I was there, endeared to the Bronte's home, intrigued by the medieval reenactments and the history at Warwick castle, awed by Shakespeare's birthplace and the many literary giants who've visited there to pay their respects (many of them etched their names in the glass of the actual room - Keats, Scott, Tennyson, Dickens, Emerson, Longfellow, and Twain, at least), delighted by the beauty and quaintness of the villages of the Cotswolds, satisfied by Oxford (it lived up to my expectations!), inspired by Tintern Abbey, charmed by Bath, envigorated by Tintagel (where King Arthur was supposed to have been born - a fitting castle waaay up on a cliff above the sea), fascinated by the geographic marvel of Land's End - the little tip of England jutting into the Atlantic, grateful to the Pilgrims in Plymouth (they grow palm trees in Plymouth - what a shock New England must have been...), thrilled by wild horses (they were ponies, actually, but wild horses sounds so much better!) in Dartmoor, delighted by Gold Hill, reverent-ed by Winchester Cathedral (not to be confused with Winchestertonfieldville Cathedral), historied-out by Portsmouth (esp. the HMS Victory where Nelson defeated the French but lost his life), and moved by a day trip (via overnight ferry) to the beaches of Normandy in FRANCE. Whew! What amazing days these have been!

And we're also having a GOOD time in prayer, over and over again. Praise the Lord - I'm believing for a difference here because of FAITH in GOD!

And now, I'll repeat some of the highlights via photographs! Wheeee!

This is a "Royal Tournament" we watched at Warwick Castle. The guy getting bashed about is the bad knight. The guy doing the bashing is the good knight! Yay!

I just want to add this picture because I love it! It is me, crying, after bashing my head on the post at which I am pointing. That commie post. It was right over my bed, and it hurt so bad. Grrr. Anyway, I told KJ to take a picture while I was crying, and the result was great gales of laughter. "Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion!"

This is Broadway Castle - a little one-man castle, as it were, built for fun by some Duke or other. It commanded an amazing view of the Cotswold region. Daddy was quite taken by it, so I think I'll have one built for him when my teaching career starts pulling in the big bucks...

Here is some of that famous Cotwold stone, golden in the evening light. Ahhh, what a place. So many totally charming little villages like this one!

Here's KJ and me at Tintagel. We're in the arch-way after having just entered, and behind us (faaaaar below) are the cliffs of the Cornwall Coast looking their wildest. WHEW! Breathtaking.

The wild "horses" of which I spoke! These two don't look especially wild, but the boy horses (um, stallions?) were a pretty lively bunch, thundering around the turf. It was pretty exhilarating to behold.

THIS is Tintern Abbey, one of my all-time favorite locals. Its grandeur was amazing. I've never been so moved to worship by architecture.

This is "Gold Hill" in Shaftsbury. Do you love it?! Can't get much more "charming English village" than that! You should have seen how smitten Mama was - I think that was half the charm right there!

Speaking of things that are quintessentially English - we "happened" upon this CRICKET GAME! Isn't it beautiful? And one of the players actually spent 15 min or so explaining what was going on! I felt like I'd had an epiphany:) And in return, I got to explain to him what an RBI was - something that had been puzzling him for awhile. What a great event!

And this is Omaha beach, one of the two American beaches in D-Day. Stunning beauty to commemorate stunning heroism and valor.

So there you have it! Another glimpse into our merry travels.

Now I'm in England!

Hello again! Well, we've finally hit another B&B with wireless Internet... They seem to be few and far between. But that's okay - it gives me a chance to get some choice gems photographically:) I have over 2000 pictures on my computer right now. Oy vay! And I've deleted much more than I've kept.

(NATE - THANK YOU FOR FINDING ME MY CAMERA!!!)

We've finished our stay in Scotland, and have now crossed over into England. I love this place, too! Oh my word. Tonight we are in the Lakes District, where WORDSWORTH wrote! Wheee! I'm getting into the Literary places big time. Two days ago was Sir Walter Scott's place (and wow, it's awesome - everyone needs to go to his house, Abbotsford), yesterday Wordsworth's birthplace, today his grown up home, tomorrow the Bronte sisters, then it's on to Dickens and Shakespeare... WHEEEEE! What wealth.

Okay, now for some pics from the last four days:

This is beautiful Melrose Abbey, established by Scottish King David I, and closed down by Henry VIII. We saw several Abbeys, and I think this was my favorite. Okay, maybe just one of my favorites:)
This is another favorite abbey, the one connected to Holyrood Palace!
And THIS is Sir Walter Scott's home, which he designed and decorated. I LOVED it. I'm so inspired about reading his work now:)
Here we are at Hadrian's wall. We got there just in time to see this Pict sneaking up on the diligent Roman.
This is Blair Castle, the seat of Clan Murray. Whooo! (Liane & Gretchen, I'm thinking of you and how you were there. Awesome, eh?)

Beautiful Edinburgh! This is taken from Calton Hill where we got some great shots of the city.Here we are, officially crossing from Scotland to England. A momentous occasion...
And now we're in Wordsworth country! We even saw a rainbow, and I was delighted. I mean, how appropriate is that?! Especially considering this Wordsworth poem:
My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky.
Etc.

I'll leave you to look up the rest on your own:)

I'm so thankful for this incredible opportunity!

I am in Beautiful Scotland!

Hello from Scotland, everyone! We Murrays are having an amazing time. I am so in love with this place! I have a new regard for that line from the song Scotland the Brave: "Land of my heart, forever." Oh ya!

Here are some pictures, to give you a small glimpse into what we're experiencing.

Kilchurn Castle, which KJ and I had great fun at - we climbed around in a nearby copse of trees to get this picture (and many, many other pictures, too!).
Eilean Donan - definitely one of the most beautiful sights I've seen thus far. What an incredible castle! We got to go inside and explore it today - my favorite part was the banquet hall. Well, favorite on the inside. Obviously this view is my favorite part of it!
This is Flora MacDonald's grave. I've been thinking of the Bonnie Prince Charlie story a lot this trip, obviously, and was inspired by Flora's loyalty and giving of herself to a cause. It inspired me to be that way in my walk with God.
This is a view from the Isle of Skye (one of my new all-time favorite places on Earth!). We hiked across moors to this northern point to pray. See the tiiiiny white spot between the crags? That's a seagull. We were way up there!
And this is Duntlum Castle, also on Skye. We were supposed to have rain this day, and God, in answer to prayer, gave us sun. What a blessing! Skye was one of my top destinations, and I was so thankful to be able to see it in all it's glory!
This is Inverness - the "Capital of the Highlands." We didn't spend too long here, but enough for me to enjoy the charm and beauty of the city.
And here we all are, in the Highlands (near BEAUTIFUL Loch Lomond - which you can just see in the background), totally smitten with the beauty of Scotland, and having a wonderful time. Praise the Lord!

I'm Going to BRITAIN!

I've been getting more and more excited about our trip! You know, the one we're leaving for in 15 hours!! I'm so in the groove now. I just finished formatting the poetry I want to print off to take, and collecting song lyrics to sing ("Scotland the Brave," "Will Ye No Come Back Again," etc.). And I'm listening to "Loch Lomond" as I type. AHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

And the closer I get, the more I realize that this is a dream come true. Ever since I was old enough to think about a desire to travel I've wanted to go to Britain. It seems like I've been in love with Scotland all my life, and the more I learn about Literature, the more I fall in love with England. And now I'm going there! I'm going to where my ancestors came from - I'm going to see my homeland. It's amazing!

And now, to climax this beautiful moment with a quote from The Emperor's New Groove, "See you [or write to you, anyway]... on the other side."

One of those This and That Posts

*I'm was planning to be all packed for Britain at this point in the day. HA! (Sigh)

*I was going to get some Internet stuff out of the way while my clothes dried in the dryer, and ended up spending FOREVER trying to update my expired virus protection program. Grrrr. The happy news is that I finally worked things out before actually buying the thing all over again. Yay for me, saving money!

*I can't believe I'm going to ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND AND IRELAND AND WALES AND FRANCE! OY VAY!

*My family and I have been getting into the groove. Saturday night they waited up for me to get back from Lindsay's so that we could look at Dad's past England slides. It was awesome! I kept howling "are we going there?!" Wheee! Then, on Sunday, we watched "The Longest Day" (we're going to Normandy one day) and also went over the Kings and Queens of England (I learned this awesome poem during Brit Lit: "Willie, Willie, Harry, Steve / Harry, Dick, John, Harry Three / Edward One, Two, Three, Dick Two / Harry Four, Five, Six, Then who? / etc.) and the roles of the heroes of Scotland (William Wallace, Robert the Bruce, Bonnie Prince Charlie). I'm SO ready for this trip!

*And to get even more ready, I've been working on getting a collection of poetry to read at opportune moments along the way. You know, Tennyson, Wordsworth, Shakespeare, etc. Then, when we're at some poet's birthplace or something, I can whip out a poem! Kimberly's wicked excited about this... I just read one to her and said "Isn't that beautiful?" and she responded "did you think I was listening to you?"

*KATIE ADAMS IS COMING TO FAIRWOOD TONIGHT AND I'M SO HAPPY ABOUT THAT!!!

*I've dreamed about the youth convention every night since it ended. Oh my word. My subconscious is still wicked processing. Peace out, subconscious!

*I'm hoping to be able to post now and then while oversees! Apparently some of our bed & breakfast places have high speed. Yay! No promises, but high hopes:)

*OH MY WORD! KATIE'S HERE! WHEEEEEEEE!!!

The Past Two Weeks!

Hello again, dear readers! Long time no write, eh? PHEW have I been busy. But also having a blast. As you probably know, since my last post I have been to California, led 15-17 girls in Girls' Week, and seen four of my students through their first ever youth convention. Praise God all of the events were wonderful, and I couldn't get over how my two worlds - school and home - meshed so smoothly. My kids had a WONDERFUL time. Oh, and CA was an AMAZING trip. So rather than go into detail on it all, I will post my past two weeks in pictures! If you scroll down, you will find one post of CA pics, another of GW pics, and the last of convention pics. Enjoy:)

Youth Convention Pics!

Here is Melissa rallying the troops - what a great leader!
Craig masterminded an incredible amount of really fun activities,

including this game of tossing rubber bands into a bowl,

his own variation on field day, including this team long-jump competition (go Ben!), and a hilarious skit activity!
I enjoyed the kids, without having any big responsibilities. Yay!

Here are the kids awaiting the next great adventure.

Oh ya, and we had meetings, too. :) Actually it was a really good, spiritually rich time, I thought. Notice how we're standing on our chairs here - we're singing the song "Higher Ground." (I am in awe of Uncle Neil and his good ideas!)

And of course, things wrapped up with the annual last-day picnic. Hurrah for God's blessing on the youth convention!

Girls' Week Pics!

Here is my LOVELY girls' week group. We had such a good time together!
This year the girls asked to sleep outside one night - daring girls...

We had a wagon ride...
Followed by strawberry picking.
We made amazing strawberry shortcake!
They had fun doing daring exploits (you should have seen them getting out there!),

and playing lots of games together (this is Moose). We had a great time! Thank God for a really good, blessed week!

CALIFORNIA!

Here we are in the middle of the night (more or less) waiting for the shuttle to take us to the airport. We look pretty happy for having between 0 and 3 hours of sleep (depending on who you asked...)!
We hustled right to the beach that first night and had an smashing time!
The lighting got more and more amazing. Hurrah for sunsets at the beach!

The next day we saw our dear Matt-ay again! It was so good to see him!

The last day we were there was the wedding - and I'm happy to report 2 things: the wedding was very God-centered, and I really liked the bride. Hurrah! A wonderful time was had by all.