My husband got knocked on the head with John Knox's breeches!

Today was Josh's graduation. Congratulations, Sweetie!

This is after graduation in front of McEwan Hall. I am very proud of my husband. He did very well in his studies and graduated with distinction.

Now, the thing about the breeches. There is this bonnet, or graduation cap that the Vice-Chancellor taps the heads of the graduates with when they are called up. It is popular belief that the bonnet was made from the material of John Knox's trousers. Quite interesting indeed.

Again, take a look at flickr for more photos. Sorry about the blur. My zoom lens has not been in my good favour.

How Beauty is Made

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6yRiLPgmEc

Highway robbery!

I went to post a parcel to America today. It weighed 2.6 kilos (roughly 5 lbs.). It was going to cost me £44 to send. The nice gentleman told me that if it was under 2k it would only be £19 to send. I took it back home to repackage it. :)

Happy Thanksgiving.

Sorry I am a bit late about posting our Thanksgiving wishes. It has been a busy week. But now I can post about our dinner as well!

Steph sent us some Stove Top stuffing for our dinner, as well as some other goodies to enjoy later. :) Thanks, Steph! Everyone really enjoyed it.

We had a total of 10 people (including Josh and I) and our group was very diverse. We had 5 Americans from various parts of the US and one being a missionary in Nigeria. Then the others were from Scotland, England, Australia, China, and Spain. I learned that candy in Australia is called 'lollies' (or was that the popsicle? It's getting all jumbled up) and a traditional Christmas in Spain would include a lamb for the dinner. Oh, yes. And I learned that a word I had been throwing around is a very bad swear word here. :P Thanks for clearing that up!

Our meal included:

Turkey (of course)

ham (gammon) with brown sugar and clove

scalloped potatoes with chipotle

smashed potatoes

gravy

stuffing

sweet potato casserole

roasted veg (thanks Andy!)

cranberry orange sauce

biscuits (American), plain and with jalapeno and cheddar

And for dessert we had:

chocoalate mousse and strawberry mousse (thanks Sam!)

pumpkin cheesecake

brownies

fudge (thanks mom!)

Oh, yes. Russell brought some cloudy pressed apple juice, so I simmered that in some mulling spices and we were able to have about as close to mulled cider as you can get here. :)

I tried to push the leftovers on to the students, but even after they took some there was still a bunch left and I couldn't get anyone else to take some. I am glad that we had this opportunity to share our home and food with our friends. I have never been able to host a meal for this many people and it was a blessing. Sam really came through and helped out so much. Thanks Sam!

All in all, it was a very enjoyable day. Now I am off to tackle the dishes. I think it would be safe to say we used nearly every dish, fork, pot, and pan in our flat!

Take a look at flickr for more pictures.

Also, look to the right. We have a new tagboard for you to leave messages on! (hint, hint)

Thank you

Thank you for your prayers and support. The last few weeks have been so stressful with my work and Josh's non-work. Last week, just one day before our deadline, Josh recieved a call offering him a position. He accepted and has started work today (it is quite lonely around here now!). He is working for a Christian organisation called Bethany in one of their residential facilities for people recovering from an addiction. One of the downsides is that he will be on a rota, but if it works out I am going to try to conform my rota as closely to his as possible.

Thanks for your support.

Remembrance

Today is Remembrance Day. We wear a red poppy to rememeber fallen soldiers. I felted this one for 9/11, but I wore just the poppy today. Today, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month we observed a two minute silence. It was powerful to know that probably the whole city was a little quieter at this time.

Take a look at the videos. The first is a touching tribute to some who have fallen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtl5kmWrFLg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVN3hnZxHdQ&mode=related&search=

In Flanders Fields By:

Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918) Canadian Army

IN FLANDERS FIELDS the poppies blow

Between the crosses row on row,

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high.

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

Significance of the red poppy: http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/remembrance/history/poppy.shtml

The big 30!

Happy Birthday to my wife of thirty years....thirty years old that is! Many thanks to our friends: Peter, Sam, and Emma, for treating us to dinner and a movie to celebrate Deliverance's birthday. Deliverance truly is a special and generous friend to everyone who knows her. Happy Birthday, Sweetie!

For Thanksgiving...

Would anybody be willing to send a box or two of StoveTop Stuffing?

on holiday...what to do

To answer Steph's question about if I will be knitting during my holiday...I did feel a sense of relief at just the thought of knitting. :) I was saying to Sam today that it is not one of those "AH" feeling sort of holidays. I still have a lot to do. And as I mentioned, I will be in the store Wednesday to get "signed off" to become a shift supervisor qualified rather than just a piddly shift supervisor in training. Silly how I have been running shifts and doing all of the duties of a proper supervisor, but I have to wait 3 months to get my raise. But I wont go there. I am planning to make a flourless chocolate cake with raspberry sauce for our coffee tasting.

I will also be in the store again for a supervisor/manager meeting on Friday. This is a long needed meeting and hopefully we will be able to address some of the issues that have been causing me and my collegues so much stress over the past few months. I have also raised the radar of our district manager, so he will be getting minutes from the meeting and will be checking with my manager to see how he will be dealing with these issues. So during this week I will be rehashing a lot of what I had been though and bringing up a lot of those feelings.

But Tuesday will be a nice time with friends as Sam and Peter will be hosting us along with Emma for my birthday. Yay! Wednesday night is Bible study, Thursday night is Open Fellowship at church. I would also like to get some things on ebay. I have some Buttermilk Barn( www.buttermilkbarn.com) parties coming up that I need to prepare for. If it doesn't help us pay January's rent at least it will help pay for our tickets home.

So, it will still be a busy week. The good thing is, I will be back to work one week, then I will have another week's holiday. Woo-hoo!

On Holiday!

I have not had a holiday since we went home in April. Twice my holiday was denied. I have been overworked and underappreciated (or not-at-all-appreciated, by my boss at least). Now I am finally on holiday! Though I do not have the AHHH! feeling of going on holiday because I will still be in for a couple of hours on Wednesday and Friday. But I will not actually be working. Then I come back for a week and have another weeks holiday. Yippee! It is still a little bit of a bummer, though, because even though I have been working close to 40 hours, when I am on holiday I only get paid for my contracted hours (20) so it will actually be a cut in pay. But I guess it will be worth it to get a little of my sanity back. :)