Wild weather and other excitement

Things are really starting to move here at Dalkeith house. I can’t believe how quickly the time flies. The weather here in Scotland has certainly been keeping us on our toes. I remember telling Drew that it rarely snows in Scotland and, when it does, it doesn’t actually stay on the ground long before melting. Apparently, I was wrong. This winter has been the snowiest UK winter in the last 23 years. I was watching the news and they were reporting on the snowstorms…the UK is definitely not used to this much snow and it’s evident in the fact that there have been over 50,000 calls into law enforcement agencies to report people throwing snowballs! Also, the UK has run out of salt for the roadways so it has been forced to dip into the salt supply at the table salt company, British Salt. The snow has cleared up now, except for on the hilltops, and the temperature has actually started to rise. We’ll see how long it lasts but we’re enjoying it for now!

This past Friday we had our first house trip with the students. We spent the day in St. Andrews which is one of my favorite places in the whole world. St. Andrews is notoriously windy but, amazingly enough, we were blessed with a sunny, calm and warm day. On a personal level it was a great day…Drew and I had fun climbing the 158 spiral steps to the top of Rules Tower at St. Andrews Cathedral and climbing through the abandoned mines of St. Andrews Castle. We also spent some time at the Old Course but mainly we spent our day on the shores of the North Sea, either rock climbing or just relaxing. On a professional level the day was also a success. It was my first official trip with the students and they all enjoyed themselves a great deal. It was so rewarding to hear how much fun they had and I was happy that they enjoyed St. Andrews as much as I do.

On Saturday Drew and I got out of the house and enjoyed the day together. It was a nice, relaxed evening in Edinburgh and we went to see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button which just came out here. As we waited for the last bus back to Dalkeith from Edinburgh we were greeted by a large group of lively students from the program who were out celebrating Saturday night in their own way. Needless to say our bus ride back was full of entertainment! What a romantic Valentine’s Day…

Drew and I got our first extended weekend (at the end of February) booked and we are pretty excited about it. We’re going to Sweden (where our hostel is a boat!) and Denmark but you’ll hear all about that when we get back.

Drew and I are taking cooking classes here at the house. Last week we made shortbread and bannocks, last night we made pastry and sponge cake and next week we’ll move on to casseroles and stews. We definitely get a lot of food out of the deal (we made four pies last night) so I imagine we’ll become pretty popular around the house because we’ve been giving most of it away. It has been fun so far but Drew is definitely threatened by my presence in the kitchen. My pies turned out much nicer than Drew’s which is unfortunate for him as he has enjoyed the last few years of endlessly picking on my less than stellar kitchen skills. As for me, I’ll celebrate my kitchen victories when I can and blog about it so the whole world can know!!!

Tonight I’ll be heading in to Edinburgh to see the Vagina Monologues with some students from the program. I’ve heard good reviews of the show so I’m excited to see it. I invited Drew to attend with us and the suggestion alone was too disturbing…he will be doing something manly tonight!

Well, that’s it for now, hope everything is going well back in the states…we miss you all!

Students, travels, and more

Lately Kels and I haven't done too much when it comes to getting out and traveling but we have done a lot of stuff around the house. Kels has been working a lot and getting to know all of the students. I have done my fair share of just walking around the house trying to find stuff to do. I have got a chance to get to know some of the students even though after a week and a half I still could probably only name about 10 of them. Most of them I have enjoyed spending time with and I like taking on the role of being the navigator or travel expert even though I dont know that much about traveling in Europe. Kels and I have started planning some of our extended weekend trips and I am really excited to go on some of the trips we are planning. So far we haven't had any difinitive decisions on where we are going to do but we have talked about going on a Italy, Switzerland, France, and Wales trip. That will be our Spring break probably. Then instead of a Paris/Amsterdam trip at the end we are going to do Amsterdam Germany and Easter Europe trip endin in Greece and flying back to Edinburgh a couple of days before we have to come back home.
I have been out on the town with the students a few times. We went on a pub crawl and I was the supposed tour guide even though we got lost on our way to one of the pubs. It was a lot of fun getting lost and most of the students didn't mind. There were a few that complained about all of the walking but I tried to pull them out of their shell and let them know they will have to do a lot more walking if they are planning on seeing a lot of Europe.
Last Sunday the students had to do a scavenger hunt in Edinburgh. When they got back most of them again complained about all of the walking. I over heard some conversations that it was the stupidest thing they have ever done. I interjected the point that they were not supposed to take it so serious and it was meant to just be a way of getting them out into Edinburgh and figuring out how to get around on their own. Most of them agreeded that it helped a lot with that but they didn't need to make it so in depth. Whatever, I cant wait to see how some of them travel Europe. They are all going to run out of money because they are going to take a cab everywhere rather then just walk.
Enough ranting about the students. It has been fun having more people around the house. It's not so lonely anymore. I know i have kels but in a house that has probably over 50 rooms and huge main areas it gets a little lonley walking around and never running into anyone even if you just say Hi as you walk by them in the hall. Last Saturday all of us went into Edinburgh and got to go into the castle for free. Some of the perks of being with a big group. I forgot how amazing the castle was. On our way into Edinburgh Kels and I figured out our camera broke so now we have to find a place to fix it or buy a new one. We both we really bummed because we didn't get to take any pics at the castle but I'm sure some of the people that are coming to visit want to see the castle so we will have it fixed by then and put up some pictures then.
After the castle Kels Naomi and I went to dinner to pass the time before we went on a haunted graveyard tour. We had a group of about 20 students and us. About 40 other people joined so we had about 60 people in a tomb at the end that wasn't much bigger then a bedroom. The cool thing about the tomb was that there was a proven poltergeist in there. I didn't have any encounters but one of the students said she felt someone squeeze her side and there was no one next to her. The Makenzie Poltergeist is what they call it and the tour we went on has had over 1000 physical encounters, 20 of which a person flat out pass out in front of everyone. I was sort of hoping that I would get some proof that there was something there but I didn't feel a thing. Oh well, I guess I'll have to wait for the Grey Lady, which is a ghost they say haunts the house we are staying in.
This weekend is a trip to St. Andrews with all of the students and it will be nice to get out of the house and go somewhere other then Edinburgh. Anyway, I hope all is well back home and I apologize for not having any pictures or video but wel will get the camera fix and then we will start taking more pictures so we can show you what we are doing.