What a Day!

It's seven and I'm so glad to be home for the evening!  What a day!  It's been great day but my legs are tired!  Today had lots of little funny moments in it, so I will do my best to entertain you.

My day started with my usual struggle to get out of bed.  Valerie and I were scheduled to do a tour of the British Museum starting at 11.  We haven't seen each other for a bit, so we scheduled to meet for a Starbucks at 10:30 outside of the museum.  Working backwards, that meant I needed to be on the train at 9:45, leaving the house at 9:30.  I left a little bit late, but it all worked out ok.

As I left the house to walk to the tube station, I saw my neighbor Pam at the bus stop.  I stopped to say hello.  She grinned at me.  I haven't run into her since the locking myself out of the house incident, so I'm certain she was remembering that too!

There is some construction work going on at St. Catherine's, which I pass on the way to the station.  A construction man was pushing a wheelbarrow full of bricks, and he stopped to let me go by on the pavement.  To be polite, I said, "Thank you."  His response?  "Thank you."  I'll never understand the British.  Was he thanking me for thanking him?

I got to the station and hopped on the tube.  It's the time of year for Wimbledon, which means tennis fans are everywhere.  There were a few English people on the tube from outside of London.  How can I tell?  They were talking loudly to one another on the tube.  If you are from London, you don't talk on the tube unless absolutely necessary.  Oh, tourists!

After half an hour, I was at Tottenham Court Road and began to walk towards the museum.  As I rounded one corner, I almost walked into two East Asian girls consulting a map.  The one stopped me and asked, "Can you show us where to go for the British Museum?"  I laughed and told them I was going that way, so we could just walk together.  It turns out they are from Korea.  The girl who asked for directions said, "Oh the British are so nice.  Thank you for helping us and walking with us."  Bless.  I didn't have the heart to tell her I'm American :)

Our tour was a group of 11 South Africans, 1 American, and 2 Brits.  What a fun bunch.  Valerie and I had fun with them.  Since it was a smaller group than expected, we alternated artifacts.  It makes it a bit easier on the voice to have the tour broken up like that.  Additionally, today was apparently field trip day for several school groups.  There were elementary age students from at least three different schools throughout the museum.  Imagine marble floors, high ceilings, and hundreds of children.  It's very difficult to speak over all of that!

I started to joke with the group, trying to perk them up.  I told them I went on this tour when I was 18 and loved it so much that now I'm leading it.  The one South African woman said to me, "Oh, you came on the tour when you were 18 and now you are leading it a year later?"  We had a good laugh at that.

The tour always makes a long day.  We start at 11 but finish around 2, with a quick break for lunch, then we walk as a group to the British Library and carry on there until 4 or 4:30.  Given that most of the British Museum has marble floor, it's a hard surface to stand on for that long.  There are places to sit at times, but no such luxury for the guides!

It is worth the sore feet though.  I love seeing the faces of people who are excited and encouraged by what they have learned.  I wasn't exaggerating when I told the tour that I still remember my first visit to the British Museum nine years ago (almost to the day).  I hope that today has at least a bit of the same effect on their lives.

Happy Anniversary!

June 27, 2011 marked 59 years of marriage for my grandparents!  When I called my grandmother, she commented that she doesn't know where the years went!  But consider...

Two children:

Who each got married:

Each had two daughters, adding four granddaughters to the family:

Two of the four are now married:

Bringing a great-grandson and great-granddaughter:

Perhaps the best picture to describe us is this:

We really are a handful of nuts :)  But we are a very happy family indeed.

Happy Anniversary, Nan and Pap!  We all love you very much!

Hot, Hot, Hot!

We have had a gorgeous day today.  Blue skies and no clouds, and the weather is so hot!  Our high today, according to the BBC, was 29C (85F) and tomorrow the high should be 32C (90F)!  My windows are open, which of course, causes the door to slam and every twenty minutes, I get to hear the roar of the W15 bus as it winds its way around the corner.  But I shouldn't complain, because it has been a truly beautiful day.

This Saturday was a day off.  I'm rubbish at taking a day off.  I get it from my Dad.  I've been reminded (by how tired I've felt) that I need to do better at taking a day off, and I'm the only one who can control that.  So, on Saturday, I decided I would take a true day of rest.  If it related to work, I wouldn't do it.

Do you know how difficult that is?  

I'm the type of person who does things when she thinks of them.  I would check my email and see something work related.  Oh I should forward that on to the team...No.  It can wait a day.  I thought of my finances...I need to get reimbursements ready to submit....No, I have until the 30th of June.  It can wait.  The tour...Oh I needed to research this and change that and call this person...And so it went.  

But I stuck with my decision.  It made for a very good day actually.  I truly felt like I took a day off from work.  Maybe in the future I won't need to be so legalistic about the details of my day, but for now, I think it's helpful.

In the end, I still did a lot.  I made pancakes and coffee for my housemates and I for brunch, did a lot of dishes, laundry, pulled more of our endless selection of weeds from the garden, cut the grass, sprinkled on lawn fertilizer, swept and mopped the floor in the lounge and dining room, straightened Jo's hair for a party that night (she has super curly, thick hair!), went grocery shopping, made dinner for Laura and I, and then settled down for a film in the evening.  

Nothing new is really planted yet in the garden, but here are few snaps from my phone to show you the progress in weeds removed!  I actually moved a little table and chairs out to the patio portion and Laura and I ate dinner enjoying the evening light.  It was quite peaceful.  

We asked a few of Jo's friends for advice on our garden.  The most common response was, "Pour weed-kill all over it and start over."  Haha!  We tried that just for the thistles in the grass.  I think we are growing especially resilient weeds.  Thank goodness I enjoy the physical exercise from digging and pulling because I don't think weed-kill will help us!

While grocery shopping, I was wandering the World Foods section at Tesco and had a little giggle.  

Almost $5.00 for Kool-Aid, imported from the US of A.  It's not what I expect to see in the international section, next to the coconut milk and ghee.  

"They can only kill us."

I'm taking a course on the book of Revelation.  The following is a section from the Believer's Church Bible Commentary: Revelation, discussing persecution:

The principle of not clinging to life in the face of tribulation is demonstrated in the activity of certain young blacks in the days of apartheid South Africa.  Allen Boesak reports that in response to black youths' nonviolent resistance, government troops killed children and forced young people to be aware that they needed to be willing to give their lives for the cause of the birth of the new South Africa.  The youths responded with the words: "They can only kill us."  Boesak elaborates: "Their only power is the power to destroy.  They can never last.  If the church as a whole in South Africa does not learn that now, soon it will have nothing to teach." (1987:83-84).  


This does not mean that the faithful renounce life or seek martyrdom.  Boesak continues:  "We get even angrier at those who, while hiding behind the guns of the oppressor, accuse us of seeking to become martyrs.  There  is no way to explain this to those who will never undersand what it means to know that life may be all one has, but it is not all there is.  We love life because it is a gift of God, we protect it from the destroyers of the earth because it is sacred, and yet we are willing to give it up for the sake of others because giving it thus is a gift of God too."  (1987:89-90).  


Such powerful words.

If you are interested, the book quoted is Comfort and Protest: The Apocalypse from a South African Perspective by Allan A. Boesak.

A Very Old Church

Yesterday, I took the kids to their church.  Paul often jokes about being an Anabaptist and yet sending his kids to Catholic schools and attending an Anglican church.  Such is life in London :)

Their church is beautiful.  I didn't take any pictures, but I'll have to go back sometime to do so.  The church was built in 12th century and is still an active church!  The pews we sat in were installed in the 1920s as a memorial to World War I.  Part of the church was destroyed by bombs in World War II and rebuilt after the war. We took communion during the service and it just amazed me to think about how many people have taken communion on this very spot.

And then we walked outside after the service and the boys were pretend sword fighting in the cemetery, climbing around on the tombstones.  Nine year old boys have no appreciation for history!

Slow Sunday morning with the kiddos

Ezra

After four days, I think I'm beginning to feel as though I'm trapped in a parallel universe where I really am the mother of four.  I still look like me (maybe a few extra grey hairs now) but it's 7:41 on a Sunday, church starts at 10:30, and I'm awake, showered, breakfasted, and ready to share with you from my morning devotions.  I have even adopted that blissful pause, appreciating the silence after the kids have gone to bed, while I do the last of the tidying up from the day before I fall into bed.

I wonder if my parents arranged this so I would appreciate them even more on Father's Day?  Hmmm...sneaky....(Happy Father's Day, Daddy!)  

Years ago, my pastor challenged us to read through the Bible in a year, regardless of what age we were.  I don't remember how old I was, I just know I was in high school, but I loved to read and I took him up on it.  I'm not sure how many times I've read through the Bible by now.  It has not been every year, but I think at least seven or eight years.  If you haven't done this, please do.  You don't have to do it in a year, but read the entire Bible.  It's beautiful.  Yes, some parts are confusing and make no sense in our culture today, but do some research to find out what it might mean.  The best thing is to pray and ask God to help you understand and even to have the passion to keep at it.  

I've been reading the book of Ezra.  It's after the Exile, and the Israelites are confessing their sins to God.  Ezra's prayer in chapter 9 is incredible.  Even if you don't want to read the entire book of Ezra this week (but if you want encouragement, it's only 10 chapters long ;) So why not?)  Here are the verses I've kept rereading:

What has happened to us is a result of our evil deeds and our great guilt, and yet, our God, you have punished us less than our sins have deserved and have given us a remnant like this...O LORD, the God of Israel, you are righteous!  We are left this day as a remnant.  Here we are before you in our guilt, thought because of it, none of us can stand in your presence. (Ezra 9:13, 15)

The grief Ezra felt is described both before and after these verses.  His perspective is incredible to me.  He sees the wrong his people have done, and he is heartbroken by it.  He's felt the impact of the Exile, even though he wasn't one who did wrong.  And yet, there is not a sense of injustice or anger.  Instead, Ezra recognises the collective wrongdoing and goes to God in prayer and mourning.  

So often we seem to feel that the bad situations are unfair of God to allow.  But reread the verses.  Ezra says, "You've punished us less than our sins have deserved."  He doesn't try to point out that he's a good person and he's been faithful to God and deserves  to be spared from suffering.  Ezra even finds the bright side: "[You] have given us a remnant like this..." And he persists in praising God, recognising that "You are righteous!"Isn't that amazing?  

The second point that stood out to me was verse 15.  "Here we are before you in our guilt."  It's our tendency to hide, isn't it?  We feel embarrassed or ashamed, and so we try to keep a secret of our wrongdoing from God and everyone else.  Yet truth brings freedom.  Confession is good for the soul. (That's actually a Scottish proverb!)  There is nothing quite like the feeling of awe and lightness that comes from telling someone you've wronged and seeing them smile and forgive you.  

It reminds me of a situation a few weeks ago.  I borrowed clothes from a friend here in London, who is very fashionable.  She knows I care about how I dress as well, and I was going to Spain for a conference.  She amazed me when I arrived at her flat by letting me borrow anything from her summer wardrobe, which was quite large!  I initially thought I would borrow two or three tops, and instead, borrowed an entire carrier bag of clothes.  

It was a wonderful treat.  When I got home, I wanted to bless her in return.  I did laundry, careful to separate things and to use the delicate setting.  But something went wrong on the last load of clothes, which included two white pairs of trousers, a white tank top, and a faint cream coloured shirt.  The last load finished before I would go to bed and I wanted to hang them to dry by the radiator.  I opened the washing machine and pulled out sunshine yellow clothing.  

I honestly don't know what happened.  The one white top had little tiny yellow flowers, but I can't imagine that would have caused EVERYTHING to turn.  I spent the next three hours (until 2 AM) trying every remedy I could find on the internet for reversing this problem.  Nothing helped.  The dye had spread evenly and completely.  They were still wearable, but very much NOT white.  I even tried looking online to see if I could find the items to replace them for L.  Nothing.

Two days later, I was to meet with L in central London to return her clothes.  When she arrived with her husband, she announced, "Oh I've had an awful day, I'm so sorry we're late."  Uh oh...not going to get any better...  I handed her husband the bag and looked at her and said, "I have to tell you something."  I started crying and blubbered through my explanation, barely able to look at her.  She had been so gracious and just wanted to spoil me for a week, and this is what happened?  

The first thing I heard was L's laughter.  She touched my chin to make me look at her and said, "Hope my sister, you matter more to me than clothes.  They are just clothes."  She hugged me.  After she looked at the clothes she said, "At least they are yellow.  I love yellow.  Thank you for not dyeing them black!"  

That's how I think we often come before God.  We're afraid to look.  We've finally gotten up the courage to at least come before him, but like Ezra and the Israelites, we know we haven't even gotten our due for what we've done, and still, we can't stand in his presence.  But the best moment is when God touches our chin to make us look up and we hear the reminder that through Jesus, we are forgiven.  It's like breaking through the water and finally being able to breathe again.

Kisses for four days :)

Paul and Claire are away for four days for their 17th anniversary, and Angelina and I are "minding the children" while they are away.  I'm not certain that is an accurate description however.  Carrie [14] and Joanna [12] can basically take care of everything on their own. Daniel [9] is the only one who really needs any guidance.  

My duties started with collecting Daniel from school at 3:05 yesterday.  I was very prompt, after Paul's comment: "The school doesn't like it when parents are late to get the kids.  To be honest, the kid isn't too happy about it either!"  Once everyone was home, we watched their daily treat of Scooby Doo.  Everyone was appropriately horrified that this was my first ever viewing of Scooby Doo.  

The evening was filled with homework, a trip to the pet store for birdseed and sand for the bird cage (the girls have 2 birds), dinner, dishes, an episode of 7th Heaven online, and endless Legos, with sporadic bouts of sword-fighting [Daniel...toy swords, don't worry].  Ironically, Angelina enjoyed the Legos the most.  Joanna did make a cute Lego cow. 

Angelina graciously took on the task of getting Daniel ready for bed.  The girls wandered off on their own, and Angelina and I sat down for a chat.  One thing led to another, and in the end, I turned out my light to go sleep at midnight.

I woke up at 5 a.m.  

The birds.  

Oh, the birds.  

I'm never having pet birds.  The idea of waking to the melodic chirping of birds isn't quite as nice in practice.  Those little bits of yellow fluff are noisy!  [And my family can verify, it takes a lot to wake me up.]  Angelina and I are sleeping in the girls' beds, which are in the loft of the house, complete with skylights.  Skylights without curtains.  The sunrise was at 4:43 this morning.  Remember, London is quite north, and we are approaching the solstice.  Between the birds and the morning light, I gave up on sleep at 5:30 and made my way downstairs for breakfast.  Carrie and Jo were already at the table eating cereal.  Morning people .  They smiled but were raised well enough not to laugh at their elders, especially before said elder has found the coffee.  

At 7, I woke Daniel up to start getting ready.  He's not a morning person either, but apparently Legos are his caffeine.  Joanne packed lunches, I did the dishes, and by 8:30, everyone has been walked to their respective schools, hopefully with the necessary books.  I'm now on to my first cup of tea of the day, ready to settle in to my own studies of the book of Revelation.  Angelina is still sleeping soundly.  I guess I finally discovered someone who sleeps more deeply than myself.

[And the postman just pushed the mail through the slot in the door.  Oh my days.  It sounded like someone was trying to break in.  I think I get jumpy when I'm tired.  Hence, the need to switch from coffee to tea.] 

Funny story from last week with these same kids.  Joanna and Daniel were playing a game on the Wii where they could each be pilots of an aircraft.

Daniel: Joanna, do you want to dogfight?

Joanna: Ok.  [Daniel clicks the buttons and starts their game]...Wait...Why are we in planes? I thought we going to dogfight?

Bless.  Paul explained the expression to her.  Her genuinely confused expression was so cute!

Proverbs

Monday night I went to a class on proverbs.  I really enjoyed it.  I've been reading a book written by a Somali man, and he often mentions proverbs his mother taught him when he was a child.  It was very good.  The instructor of the class pointed out that Western culture often relies on only words.  The point of proverb is to create a picture.

With that, she gave us an exercise.  We were to draw "mercy" or "compassion," particularly as attributes of God.

What would you have drawn?

It was interesting to see everyone's drawing.  We had very different ideas.  The class was comprised of 8 students, from 4 different countries: Sudan, Eritrea, USA, and British.  Some drew rain falling on the plants of the earth.  One drew a mother holding a child.  Some drew provision of home and possessions.  I drew Noah's Ark and the rainbow.

Here are some of my favorites of the proverbs I've been reading or we discussed in the class.

What comes from the lips reaches the ear.
What comes from the heart reaches the heart.

The one I see you with I will take you to resemble.

A single hand cannot clap.  

If you are hosted by people with only one eye, then become a one-eyed person.

And my favorite...

He who goes round with the spice merchant smells of his aroma.  

Frederick Martin Lehman: The Love of God is Greater Far

The love of God is greater far
  Than tongue or pen can ever tell.
It goes beyond the highest star
  And reaches to the lowest hell.
The guilty pair, bowed down with care,
  God gave His Son to win;
His erring child He reconciled
  And pardoned from his sin.

O love of God, how rich and pure!
  How measureless and strong!
It shall forevermore endure
    The saints' and angels' song.

When hoary time shall pass away,
  And earthly thrones and kingdoms fall;
When men who here refuse to pray,
  On rocks and hills and mountains call;
God's love, so sure, shall still endure,
  All measureless and strong;
Redeeming grace to Adam's race—
  The saints' and angels' song.

Could we with ink the ocean fill,
  And were the skies of parchment made;
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
  And every man a scribe by trade;
To write the love of God above
  Would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
  Though stretched from sky to sky.

Source: http://www.hymnal.net/hymn.php/h/28#ixzz1PF7WjYTA

Greenwich Meridian

I was walking home from church (in the rain) and noticed something on the sidewalk that I had previously missed.

I cross the Greenwich Meridian going from my house to church!  It's a matter of 5 streets, but none the less, I live in the Eastern Hemisphere and go to church in the Western Hemisphere!  Angelina had pointed out to me that she lives in the Western Hemisphere, as do Paul and Claire, but I live in the East.  Now we know very clearly where the division is!  

English Gardens

We have a nice little enclosed garden behind our house.  It's not very big, probably not more than 15 feet deep and wide (deep and wide, deep and wide, there's a fountain flowing deep and wide...).  However, no one who has lived here in the past five years has been interested in gardening.  Joanne and I were talking today about tackling it.  With pretty summer days, it's a nice private, sunny place to take a book and try to tune out the endless sirens and rude chatter of the street.  As it is right now, you need to fight for space among the thistles.

Here are some "Before" shots of the Jungle behind Number 8:

In a fit of energy, I started on pulling some things out tonight.  I really don't know what I'm doing, but I'm assuming pretty much everything is a weed.  The only thing I'm certain is not a weed is a plant that I planted on Monday!  After one hour, I have a few observations.  

1) I need Uncle Doug and Haven and Mom's combined landscaping advice to save our garden!  2) Gardening in England is not for the faint hearted.  3) Gardening in England is not for those afraid of snails.  We have snails EVERYWHERE in the garden.  They gross me out.  Literally, I jumped when I picked up my little trowel and a snail had crawled onto it.  I'm afraid my garden may revolt and I will be carried off in my sleep by hundreds of snails who are angry at me for disturbing their homes.  I hesitated to pull off my Wellies because I kept picturing icky snails trying to clime up my feet and legs to beg me to stop.  But I soldiered on despite my fears and made some progress.  It's not worthy of a picture yet, but there will be more to come after another few hours next week.  

Peanut Butter Cookies ;)

Thanks so much for those of you who have emailed to comfort me :) I love it! Have no fear though, this really wasn't a *sob* kind of homesick, but just a "life in the USA really does seem nicer today" kind of homesick!  It has since dissipated and I'm back to my usual happy self.  I went to my Bhangra Aerobics class today and Munza was in rare form!  She had injured her heel for a while and, let me tell you, she's recovered.  Munza does NOT believe in low impact.  It was a great workout.

And now I'm setting in for a sweet peanut butter cookie and a cup of tea.  I know it sounds like a lot, but I really probably drink about five cups of tea a day.  Sometimes it's herbal tea, like green tea, loganberry, raspberry, etc, or rooibos (a South African herbal tea).  I also have a cup of coffee almost every day as well.  In the USA, when you visit someone, you get offered a drink.  In the UK, you are offered tea (after all, "What else is worth drinking?"). 

The recipe I used said it made 18 cookies.

It lied.

I now have 40 peanut butter cookies in the kitchen...Soon to be 38 :)

Homesick Day

It's one of those days when "home" sounds really good.  It's ok, it's nothing dramatic, just a "missing home" kind of day.  It started at Tesco yesterday, when I had to pay £2.99 for 350 grams of cherries, imported from Spain.  They looked so good and it's been ages since I've had cherries, and believe it or not, £2.99 was the 50% offer!  (£2.99=$4.90, 350 grams=0.7 lb)  I was also really hungry for sweet corn, but for two small ears of sweet corn, of course already silked and packaged, I would have paid £2.00 more.  Sigh.  So that started my list of what I'm missing today:

1. Sweet Corn: Freshly picked from the field and cooked by my Nan.  Umm Umm Good!

2.  Cherries: Protected from the crows by Pap, handpicked by us girls!

(our very own cherries! Memorial Day, 2010)

3.  Sunday Dinners with the family

(This picture is from years ago!)

4.  Baking with my Nanny!  I made Chocolate Chip Cookies last week, and now I think I'm about to make Peanut Butter Cookies.  We've done so much baking as a family, and now, when I bake on my own, it brings back those special memories.

5.  She may only be a dog, but I miss my little Mischief!  She's a goof but then all creatures born at Mtshabezi are :)

I enjoy my life in London, and I'm feeling very settled and established here.  Even though that is the case, some days, especially days when it has rained five times, I miss Pennsylvania.  If you have the opportunity, go enjoy some cherries and sweetcorn for me!  I'll go make my peanut butter cookies ;)

Classic Hope Moment

This morning I was doing some baking and noticed that our little green bin in the kitchen, for biodegradable rubbish, was getting full.  So I decided to take it out to the big brown bin, which is where we empty it for collection.  As I did that, Joanne was taking out the rubbish from her room.  

Let me explain a detail that is significant to this story.  If you came to see us, from the street, you would step through a little picket gate.  (You can see some of this through the glass in the first picture.)  We have a few square feet of private property surrounded by a hedge/fence that separates our front door from the street.  This is where our big garbage bins sit to the side of the house.

To enter the house, you first go through what we have started calling the "model door".  It's very skinny.  This picture might help. The door is on that opens from the centre, and we typically just open the one side, leaving the other one bolted at the top and bottom.  However, it sometimes gets a bit tricky when you have grocery bags or a suitcase, in which case, we would open both sides.  (Side story: We had a plumber stop by to check our boiler.  He had a good belly, and he squeezed through the door and looked at me, saying, "Do you never have fat people visit you?")

After going through the model door, we have a little entryway about two feet deep.  This is where we keep our recycling boxes and that is also where our postbox is.  Then you go through the second door, which is below.  

Both of our doors automatically lock when closed and require a key to open them from the outside.  You can set the locking mechanism to not work by flipping a button, but I always forget about that.  It's not the best idea, because it would be very easy to burgle the door then.  We are pretty careful to keep doors and windows locked in our neighborhood, because, well....it's London.  

So Joanne takes her rubbish out and I'm at the entryway between the two doors and I remembered that sometimes the wind catches the outside door and slams it shut.  So, I did the smart thing and waited there so I could hold the door open until Joanne was back inside.  Good thinking, right?  Except that I had opened the kitchen door that leads into the garden, forgetting that it produces a lovely cross breeze through our house.  Yes.  You guessed it.  The inside door slammed closed before I could get to it.  

Joanne and I just looked at each other in shock.  

Laura had just left for the afternoon, so there was no one in the house.  We are always really good about locking all the doors and windows.  Our phones were in the house.  Our keys were in the house.  We had no idea if our landlords would be home, because they both work and their kids are in school.  Both Joanne and I do not have anyone's number memorized, just saved in our mobiles.  I had banana bread in the oven and guests coming over in an hour.

Suddenly, we remembered our saving grace.  The whole reason this had happened was because I had opened the kitchen door, which led into our enclosed garden!  If we could only get into the garden, we could get back into the house!  There was a side gate, but it only bolted from the inside, so somehow, we knew we would need to open this.  

I did what any girl who grew up rock climbing in the African bush would do.  I climbed up on top of our garbage bins to see if I could reach over the top to unbolt the gate.

The bolt is on the other side of the gate behind the bins.  Now, you can't see it, but there are two inch metal spikes on top of that gate to stop people from doing the very thing I'm attempting to do.  Even standing on the bins, the top of that gate was about at my waist.  Also, I live on a pretty busy street.  Lots of crazy things happen in Leytonstone, and this morning, I became one of those crazy things.  Have a good laugh as you picture me on top of those bins.  I had been cleaning and baking, and hadn't showered yet.  I was wearing black running pants with a pink waistband, and a yellow and white tank top, and bright blue flip flops.  I still had my glasses on and my hair pulled up in a crazy ponytail.  And I was balancing on two rubbish bins, trying to break into my own back garden, while Joanne spotted me from the ground.  

The first couple who walked by tried not to stare.  They really tried, bless their hearts.  But it must have been a sight to see.  The second woman pushing a buggy couldn't help herself.  I don't think anyone else felt self conscious about looking.  Fortunately, most people either 1) have seen us around enough to recognize us and know they don't need to call the police or 2) really can't be bothered .  I don't even know what the people in cars driving by were thinking.  

Well, it quickly became apparent that I could not get to the bolt to undo it from my position.  I hopped down from the bins, and we went around to the side of the house, to see if I could hop the fence back there.  Joanne was wearing a skirt, so there was no way she could do any of this.  Besides, she's probably more sane than I am and wouldn't even consider otherwise.  Same problem of the spikes, and the fact that it would be a good 8 foot drop from the top of the fence into our garden.  I didn't want a broken ankle, and Joanne didn't want that either, so that plan was nixed.  The garage was locked, so we couldn't go in that way.  

Then, inspiration struck and I realized that though our garden fence is quite high, it is only high on one side, the street side.  The second side is just our house, the third side is the garage wall, and the fourth side we share with our neighbors.  We could easily hop that if we could get to our neighbor's garden.  However, neither Joanne or I had met our neighbors.

Keith and Pam are very nice.  We ran their bell, introduced ourselves and explained our dilemma.  They didn't even laugh too much.  They let us into the garden, I hopped the fence, trying not to smash Pam's flowers or our...well, weeds, and then I dashed into the kitchen and through the house to let Joanne in.  

Then we just laughed for a bit.  The banana bread was still needing more time in the oven, and I dashed around vacuuming and trying to get things ready for when Paul and Claire came over for tea.  And life returned to normal.  Now, the next thing I need to do is make copies of my keys so we have them to hide outside!  In retrospect, I've realized that at least we know it takes a lot of commitment, skill, and effort to break into our house :)

Housemates

My lovely housemates! We went together to see XMen First Class last night. I really enjoyed it. Thanks to a discount offer Laura gets, we all got to see it for free :). We got a little snack before headng to the cinema and as it turns out, our waiter Tom tried out for part in XMen and didn't get it :(

The three of us girls get along very well and it's such an answer to prayer. Joanne has only been living in the house since may 15, but it already feels like we've all been friends for months.

Tuesday was a very long day for me, but both Laura and Joanne are teachers and are on half term holidays. I walked in the door at 9pm after having left for my day at 9 am and they had a plate of dinner in the oven, ready for me to warm up as soon as I walked it. It was so nice! They had also done grocery shopping and gotten mine for me as well! Now I'm getting spoiled!

yummies :)

One thing London does not lack is great food. This is from a little coffee shop on my high street called Horizons. I had the chocolate cake and the icing...I don't know what a cloud tastes like, but I think it tasted like a chocolate cloud!