Yellow Fields

As I was driving with my parents last week, we kept seeing these fields that were completely yellow. My mom said she could even see these fields when her plane was landing. We had a few guesses as to what it was, but didn't really know (knowing how many dandelions I have in my own yard, that was the first thing that came to my mind). Well, we Googled it when we got home and found out that they were fields of rapeseed flowers. According to Wikipedia, rapeseed is grown for the production of animal feed, vegetable oil (including canola oil), and biodiesel.I couldn't help but look out as I was driving, and be reminded of the yellow brick road from the Wizard of Oz (I guess the fact that I'm reading "Wicked" right now may have something to do with that.)

South Shields

As I mentioned in my previous blog, my grandmother (my mother's mom) was born in a coastal town about an hour and 45 minutes away from here called South Shields. My grandmother was born there in 1905, and moved to America with her family when she was two. My mother had always wanted to visit South Shields, so she brought the actual address where my grandmother was born, as well as a few other names and addresses from my grandmother's hand-written address book.

I typed in my grandmother's birth address (yes, she was born in her family's house) into my GPS. The GPS couldn't find Regent Street, but it did find a Regent Court. We thought we'd give it a try. The GPS led us beautifully from my driveway, all the way to Regent Court, South Shields. From the look of the buildings on the street, it looked like we were in newer development. There was no 55 Regent Court, but we found number 54, and took a picture of my mom in front of it. On the way out, we noticed that where #55 would have been, there was now a horse stable. So, the on-going story will forever be that my grandmother was born in a stable!

We then put another address into the GPS from Granny's address book that my mom believed were friends or relatives of hers (the Holts). When we reached the address, we found a woman gardening out front. My mom struck up a conversation with her asking if she knew the Holts, and the woman said that she did know them, but the last that she had heard, they were living in a nursing home. We were still quite satisfied that we found a person, who knew some people, who knew my mom's mom!

We spent some more time in South Shields in the town center. We found the South Shields museum, and learned more about the city. We then walked along a pedestrian walkway with shops and even a flea-market. You can imagine my delight when I found this shop:That's right... Pound World... the British equivalent of the Dollar Store!!! I went in with Maddie and let her pick out any one thing she wanted. It's nice to know that it exists over here.

We really had a lovely day. We didn't quite know what to expect, but we suspect that Granny Ethel would have been proud of us for taking the time to explore around her home town.

They're Here!

My parents are here! Yipee!!

They arrived early this morning. Their flight landed at 6:17am (1:17am their time) in Manchester. Unfortunately, we had some traffic on the way home from the airport (rush hour and then a few tractors), but now they are in Tim's bed sleeping peacefully!

It's wonderful to have them here. They will get to see Tim play in a t-ball game, and Maddie has a ballet recital this weekend, too! We also hope to visit a town on the eastern coast called South Shields while they're here. That's where my mom's mother was born (my mom has the actual address of the house she was born in!). I was unable to find any relatives still in the area, but it should still be an interesting day trip.

I'll be sure to blog about our time together soon.

Happy Mother's Day!

Hello, and Happy Mother's Day to all of you "mums" out there! Actually, the British celebrated "Mothering Day" about a month or so ago. We decided to wait for the American calendar, and I'm so glad we did.

I had the most amazing Mother's Day! First of all, the weather around here has been gorgeous for the past week. We've been spending as much time as we can outside, and have even been wearing short-sleeves!!! Yesterday's weather was perhaps the nicest day of all that we've had in England so far (a high of 22 degrees Celsius!).

My day started out with the kids climbing into bed to cuddle (which happens every morning). But the real treat was that they actually slept! The four of us "slept in" until 7:45! Just glorious. I was then able to relax and have a leisurely shower as I awaited a nice pancake breakfast. I got to read my wonderful Mother's Day cards, and received a box of truffles from my hubby (he knows me so well). Tim's card for me was so cute! It had a picture of the two of us playing Connect Four. The best part was that he told me, "...and I let you win!" In his picture, you could see that I indeed had 4 checkers in a row. What a kid!

After a nice morning at church, we came home for lunch (leftover bbq chicken pizza, yum!), and even got a nice nap in.

Then in the afternoon, we decided to go to a local village called Knaresborough. It's less than a 15 minute drive away, and I had heard that it was fun to walk along the river there. Well, it was just beautiful. When we arrived, we were first greeted by Knaresborough Castle (or what was left of it).
As we continued walking, we looked out over an amazing view of the village alongside the River Nidd. The view was breathtaking!
We decided to head down to the river and rent a boat. Ethan was kind enough to row us around for about 45 minutes or so, while I steered (we only crashed a few times!).
We topped off our time there with an ice-cream, and then headed into Harrogate for a nice meal. It really was an incredible Mother's Day.

Jacket Potatoes

On Sunday, our church had a fellowship lunch they entitled, "Spuds and Puds!" Spuds stands for jacket potatoes (which we Americans know as baked potatoes), and puds is short for pudding, which is used synonymously with dessert around here (as in, "Would you like some pudding?" "Sure, I'd love some cake.").

Anyway, back to the spuds. The British love their jacket potatoes. It's on just about every menu we've seen around here. They also like to pile them high with toppings... toppings such as baked beans, coronation chicken, prawns (like shrimp), tuna & sweetcorn, chili, or bolognese sauce.












I didn't really feel that adventurous on Sunday with my spud. I went for the standard sour cream, cheddar cheese, and bacon. I know... I'm not following the rule of "When in Rome..."

Well, how about you? Do any of these topping sound good to you?

Maddie's Parade and Tim's First Game

We had two exciting events happen this week.

On Wednesday, Maddie's preschool had a parade! Maddie made a flag of streamers, and a hat decorated with feathers. Then, she and her classmates walked around a part of the base, following a fire truck, and shaking their streamers and musical instruments. It was pretty cute. The second picture shows Maddie walking with her teacher, Miss Hannah.

Yesterday was opening day for baseball for Timothy! The base sponsors different sports throughout the year, including baseball. We really enjoyed having Tim in t-ball back in Joppatowne, so we were so glad to hear that they played baseball here on base. (The British don't play baseball really... only a game called "round-about", a precursor to baseball, and cricket, of course.)

Ethan volunteered to help out with the season, and found out just a week ago that he was the coach of Tim's team. We found this out the day before the team's first practice. Yikes! So far, he's doing an incredible job.

Here are a few shots of Tim's first game.

Thornton Hall Farm Country Park

Tim had the day off from school yesterday, so I thought we could find something fun to do. A friend of mine recommended a place called Thornton Hall Farm Country Park that was about a 40 minute drive away. She had gone there with her sons on a class trip, and said that they had a great time. What really sold me on it, is that she said there was a lot to do indoors. The way the weather has been lately (sunny, rainy, sunny, rainy,...), that was a necessity.

Anyway, we did have a lot of fun. The main barn had a huge slide that the kids both loved. There were so many animals, and they were all so cute! We saw baby goats (the picture makes it look a lot bigger than it really was),

bunnies, goats, llamas,and of course, baby lambs.
Some other highlights included seeing a new baby calf standing with his mama.
(Pardon the big pile of poo!)
And, I'm not sure why, but the farm had wallabies. It was so exciting spotting the joey in his mama's pouch!
However, the highlight of our day was when Tim got to feed a baby goat and a few baby lambs! It was a great day at the farm!