Condensed

Here is a little of what I've been up to the past few days. (pics are from my phone)

 Made some ornaments

 made cookies for the neighbours

Made cake bites (instead of cake pops I was just working with what I had on hand) and how is possible that no one told me how delicious these are? Like bowl licking delicious!

I didn't make the snow but I still like it ;) I did however make a few snowballs.

I make silly faces

I guess I've been in a making mood. 

It is snowing...like a ton. I love it :) 

We are doing well, enjoying Christmas time. It seems like it was just Christmas. How does it always sneak up on me? 

Why I Love the Internet...

...I get to see this face

forgiven

Random London Shots

I just literally looked through my latest picture folder and picked some ones that popped out. The first one might have popped out because of the cute guy :) We spent Monday in London just exploring. We found some cool spots. I loved the old wharfs. Alan likes finding place that have been movies.

Oh and then Alan made me put a picture of myself up :/

The Good Stuff

That's right people! We finally went to chipotle in London, and let me tell you it was good :) Tasted just like chipotle in America. It was also good to see it really busy because hopefully that means they will stick around over here. We seriously debated going back there for dinner, but London's a big place and we weren't anywhere near it . It makes me want to go to London all the time though. Not that I ever turn down an offer to go there.

The inside was only slightly different still has the same metallic tables but not the same kind of art or exposed feel to the rest of it. Also the font was different, but whatever it tasted so delicious. I would have eaten chipotle out of a shady ice cream truck if it tasted the same!

PS the rest of London was awesome too....hopefully pictures of that will come soon.

Mr McAvoy

 So "they" (whoever they are)  have been filming in Oxford all week. On Wednesday while we were waiting for my photography class to start (woowhoo) we ran into some filming while walking around town. Things are often shot in Oxford, but usually it's just a few scenes here and there. but they have been all over the place shooting loads and loads. 

We were having fun just poking around walking in the middle of their sets etc...hey they weren't stopping us. I am convinced it's because I looked like a legit photographer. What? Ok, humour me :)

James McAvoy (I knew him from The Last King of Scotland) just standing there waiting for them to make up their minds whether to shoot the scene again or not. It's funny what they use in filming. For this scene they have transformed this door that just leads in building for student accommodations into the entrance for a pub.
We were watching a different movie earlier in the summer during which there is a chase scene (that they shot in Oxford), Alan and I couldn't help but laugh because they are running down a dead end street. Ahh the magic of movies, nothing is ever as it seems. 

 

Mr. McAvoy again, (with an actress actress also in the movie)

Lately I have taken a lot of pictures with intent on blogging but have been super busy, and hence super tired. Hopefully as my class gets into full swing I will post more pictures, or just get around to the ones I've skipped. Can you believe it's practically October! 

Wembley Stadium

We got to go to our first football game (soccer). It was really fun, I always like being at live sporting events much better than watching them on TV.  In the picture above is our friend from church Ken. He got us amazing tickets through his work. We were only five rows away from the field. It was awesome.  

England vs. Bulgaria

Dedication

Truth 4 Youth

Here are just a few pictures from the summer youth camp we took our kids too. It was an amazing weekend filled with great teaching and spiritual growth.

Well we are back from summer camp, and so tired. We had a wonderful trip, everything went really smoothly and the teaching was amazing! I have to say this might be my favourite camp ever.  I was shocked at how sound the teaching was, it really was very edifying for our youth (and me too). The kids loved Carl Kirby from AiG, they were talking about his talks all week! Paul Wilkinson, whom I'd never heard speak before, was amazing. I think it was the clearest talk I have ever heard on Revelation. Another thing that impressed me was the amount of time we spent in the word, most of the time was spent in group or mini-group sessions, which was hard for a couple of the younger kids but worth it. I seriously could go on and on about the teaching. Well I think you get the picture....we had a really good time. 

It's not that I am slacking :)

Ready for a super random post? Like I said in the post title, I'm not slacking on posting it's just that I haven't been taking pictures. And  Alan was ill for a little while, and now I am have caught this wonderful cold as well; and really who wants a picture taken when you feel like your head is going to blow up or deflate? 

Alan spoke in church this past weekend, and did great! (Oh I love him so) He spoke on evangelism and when is that topic not convicting? He is also going to teach at our church's Christmas service as well! We're excited. Next weekend we are headed to our youth retreat, and I am really excited. I've already told parents I would post some pictures from it, so I will have to follow through,  so you may not have to wait as long in-between posts. Not that you wait in high suspense for my little posts. :)

Earlier this week (pre cold) I went for lunch with a friend (which ended up consisting of ice cream :).  We spotted a very cute little store called POD. It had some seriously cute random things in it. It is one of those small little boutique stores that are fun to poke around in. I found this little drawing of the store on-line, so it might disappear. But it's on the high street here, it has lots of great little things for gifts. I've already plotted how to drag Alan in there :)

I also want to say an extra Happy Birthday to my mama! I hope you had a really good day out with Tim. Love you lots and lots. Ummm can you come visit? I miss you. 

I love summer

I love youth trips :) It was so fun to have one again! Last summer we were still pretty new to the whole living in England thing so we weren't able to do any proper summer youth activities. Since we are now pro's at this living in a foreign land thing (not so much, but we make it work :) we were able to whip up some stuff for this summer. Here is Calvary Chapel Oxford's first summer youth trip ever! We went to Thorpe Park (kinda like a six flags) and had lots of fun. I included a couple of pictures of some youth who I know parents won't mind me putting on my blog.

Ryno (pronounced Ray-nu) and Jake getting off a ride

Leana and I in line for a ride. No we aren't burnt, we took Alan's little camera with us and the colouring is off. It was a great trip for us all to hang out and have fun. We only had one hick up the whole day. One of the other girls was carsick on the way to the park. I will spare you the details...but I am surprised it hasn't happened to us before with all the trips we've taken.

 In just a couple of weeks we are going to camp :) I am really excited. This camp looks really good. It's a small camp but they have some great speakers from Answers in Genesis and New Tribes Mission. 

 In just 3 sundays Alan will be speaking in Big Church :) Please pray for him if you think about it. I am so weird, I get more nervous for him than he does. I think I know how nervous I would be if I had to speak in front of that many people and for some reason I get that nervous for him as well. I know he'll do great though, he is pretty amazing. 

This morning I enrolled in a photography class! I am really excited. It's a twelve week class and I will definitely let you know how it goes and hopefully post some of my assignments on here.

testing...

Just wanted to see what an xlarge  picture would look like :) Sorry, none of this stuff is new.

changes

Hi, as you can see I am changing up my blog, I got a notice that the background I was using before was not going to be available much longer. So this change is out of necessity rather than want. I will be changing it up until I find one I like and then playing around with a new header in photoshop. Then maybe I'll start posting again...maybe

Our Whirlwind Life

We just got back from a rather whirlwind 4 week stay in CA. For people who didn't hear we found out on the 28th of April that we needed to get a new visa in a hurry because of a law change and we flew back on the 3rd of May. It was a little crazy but the Lord totally provided everything we needed and people to cover the ministries we were involved in.

Oh man it was so good to see everyone. So so good. I had missed my close friends and family a lot. We weren't planning on going to visit in May but maybe we should have been. We were home for Mother's Day, 3 birthdays, My sister shared her testimony in School (she did SO amazing by the way), one of the bestest families ever had a baby boy while we were back, and the LOST finale :)

It was the first time we had been back since we moved to Oxford, there are things I would do differently but all in all a good trip. Here are just a couple of pictures :)

That great family I was talking about, here they are. Alan is holding Luke in the above picture and I am with the girls below. We LOVE the Jacksons. It was so good to spend time with them.

We got to meet our nephew (below) and celebrate his first birthday with him. He is adorable! All of our nephews and nieces grew so much in that one year, it was a blessing to see them and spend a little time with them.

We spent a day in Solvang with Alan's Parents and here is a not so good picture to prove it. We really enjoyed being able to go there and spend time with them.

Alan's Birthday

Alan turned 25 on Tuesday!!! Somehow he talked me into letting him open his presents the night before...well it didn't take much. I love giving people presents, so it was a treat for me to let him. Just so ya know that isn't a super flat cake, it's a birthday brownie, and yes I did put 25 dots on it ;)

On his birthday we headed off to Warwick Castle it was pretty sweet. On a side note we have heard rumors that the grocery store Morrisons carry Kraft Mac N Cheese, but it is only a select few that have in stock. It just so happens that there isn't a Morrisons in all of Oxfordshire, but knowing Alan's love of mac n cheese I did find out that there was one en route to the castle. Unfortunately it wasn't one of the privileged branches that had it, so we kicked the dust from our metaphorical sandals and are still on the hunt.

Alan always gets picked to do fun things. When we were just arriving to the castle he was approached by an employee that explained that they use volunteers to power their massive Trebuchet and of course he was asked to be said volunteer. Then as an after thought while Alan was filling out the disclaimer he said "oh you could do it too". Hmmm get in a giant mouse wheel and run to power your Trebuchet in front of lots if people? Normally that would be a big no, but I knew that Alan would really like to do it together. It's a good thing I love him so much. You will however not be seeing pictures of me in that thing. :)

But here he is in the wheel. It really wasn't hard at all and now it's fun to say we have done it.

I might get put in the stocks for putting his picture up though ;)

If your ever in England...firstly come visit, but secondly I would totally recommend this Castle. We had a lot of fun and it was a great day.

My birthday and Easter!

My birthday was a couple of weeks ago. See that cake...Alan baked it :) He is such an amazing husband, always figuring out ways to bless me. We had a fun day despite the fact he was on crutches (poor hubby) and I got to do a little shopping :) While Alan sat in the furniture section of department stores.

Our first English easter...well they don't dye eggs :( but we were determined to. That is a brown (because that's the only colour of chicken eggs they have here) egg, which is why it's so dark. Our fun neighbours spotted some white duck eggs and got them for us. Which we dyed and tasted just like a chicken egg (thanks again, we loved them). This is one of Alan's eggs. I think it is really cute just, it is of the easter bunny leaving eggs around.

Can you believe that in less than three weeks we will have been in England a YEAR!!! I know, I know....weird but totally cool.

Blenheim Palace...because the sun came out.

Went to Blenheim palace on Saturday to be out in the sun. Our first English winter really hasn't been too hard, we are just ready for the sun now. Alan is almost as white as me so that should tell you something. It may be sunny but it was still cold! We did have a great time walking around and enjoying our free pass to Blenheim. We walked around the gardens, rode the train, went through the maze, through the butterfly house, and finally sat down for a nice cup of tea (We are officially English ;)

Here are some pictures from the Butterfly house. The cool thing about caterpillars/butterflies is that when they are in the cocoon everything but there heart turns into goo then they are reconstructed into butterflies. Hmmm...sounds like intelligent design to me.

The maze was fun, it is supposedly the second biggest hedge maze in the world but we did it in like 15 min. So either we were just extremely good at mazes or they just don't make hedge mazes like they used to ;)

I hope that this sunshine sticks around!