Another week has past and Saturday morning has rolled around again!
This week was marked by the first of winter weather. On Sunday morning, I had just woken up, roled out of bed, and walked down the hall to the bathroom when I looked at the window and was quickly woken up out of my grogginess! The world was white! Unfortunately I discovered it wasn’t snow, it was frost. But it really was very white and it looked just as beautiful and exciting to a California girl. =)
Sunday and Monday mornings, we had gorgeous, white frost, and then (one of the highlights of my week), it actually SNOWED!!! Sunday morning before church I took an hour long walk in the beautiful fresh frost. It was both refreshing and freezing. I had to go in when my hands were finally going numb. =)
Here's my friend Bethany and me enjoying the snow (in true English fashion it was just into rain so it doesn't look nearly as impressive as it did 2 minutes earlier!) Bethany is a missionary's kid and has grown up in Africa so this was her first time seeing snow fall! We were both extremely excited. There were about a dozen or so students standing out there with us (all from hot climates of course. all the Canadians were laughing and shaking their heads at our excitement) =)
Last Saturday was an event filled day. After brunch, I ran into 2 of the few kids who live here on campus. I just started talking to the girls (ages 5 and 9) and ended up playing with them for several hours! We climbed all 102 of the tower steps (yes, they counted) =) and played with dominoes. Then we even went to their house and played dress-up, danced, and all that fun stuff. It was also an extremely foggy day! We couldn't see the ground from the tower.
Then, Saturday evening, school had a costume night! Each person was assigned a category by their last night (aka, the last names beginning with P dressed up as geeks, ect.)Categories included: 80s, 60s, hippies, hobboes, futuristic, Disney, historical characters, super heroes, geeks, and I'm probably forgetting another one or two.
I was assigned the 80s theme. Here's all our 80s people:
We definitely all had fun dressing up! =)
My roommate Tamara and I. She was a pirate. =)People were very creative with their costumes and I'm planning to upload pictures on facebook so you can see people's costumes. I think the night's dress-up party was unique in that we all had to make costumes out of clothing we brought to school with us (in case you're wondering, I borrowed the neon pink tights I wore). =)
And in what's become a weekly event, I taught another ballroom class on Sunday afternoon after church. This week they learned the cha cha. =) Everyone really enjoys it and I enjoy teaching them and passing on the love of dancing to others. =)
This week we have continued practicing for our Christmas program at school. I am in the choir. We are singing 3 songs including the Hallelujah chorus. We had our first run through of the whole performance on Thursday night. The production is a mix of choir, solo songs, and a drama with 4 acts. The script was written by a girl here at school and the theme of the evening is "Great Expectations" (that was an assigned theme) and each act of the drama looks at what different people in Jesus' time were expecting of the Messiah.
On Wednesday, I went over to Dougie and Lisa's house (which is on campus but the equivalent of walking several blocks)and hung out with their family. I played with Hannah (age 5) and Ethan (age 3), heard stories from Hannah about her day at school, and had a nice talk with Lisa. As on Saturday, it was nice to be in a normal house and around family for a few hours.
On Thursday, our last assignment before Christmas was due. We had a paper on Ezra which was a lot easier after doing a paper on 1st and 2nd Samuel. Ezra only has 10 chapters versus Samuel's maybe 45 added up?
That evening, I watched the 1st half of "White Christmas" with a few girls since we all wanted a Christmas movie!
Speaking of Christmas...
Yesterday for work morning, I got to help decorate the castle for Christmas! Every Friday morning, half the study body sits in a seminar while the other half works cleaning the campus or doing whatever odd chores need to be done (and then we switch the next week, the students who worked sit in seminar and vice versa). We put up Christmas trees in the dining hall, garlands around the castle on the staircases, etc.
Here's us and our Christmas trees! Rosa is from the Netherlands and Joel is a missionary kid who now lives in Oklahoma but grew up in New Zealand. (you meet all kinds of people here at school! it's so neat to hear about people's different experiences. i love it!) =)
And speaking of the the Netherlands and holidays...
Yesterday, December 5th, is a big holiday in the Netherlands! (by the way, the country is called the Netherlands, "Holland" is actually an improper title because it is the name of 2 of the provinces in the country) December 5th is Santa Klaas day. The Dutch give each other gifts in memory of St. Nicolas and traditionally don't give each other gifts on Christmas. Christmas in the Netherlands is much more focused on Jesus' birth, but in recent years it is becoming more commercialized like the rest of the world.
Our room celebrated Santa Klaas day with Angelique, our Dutch roommate. We had the traditional Santa Klaas cookies and Angelique taught us some Dutch songs that they sing to celebrate. Our pronunciations were terrible! They have so many sounds that English doesn't make. Angelique's mom sent Angelique a present of marzipan and sent each of us a chocolate bar in the shape of the first letter of our names! (it's a Dutch tradition to have initial chocolate bars)
Last night for dinner, we had our first taste of good Mexican food here (it may not surprise you, but so far we have not experienced good Mexican food in England). Even though I'm not a Mexican food addict or huge fan, it was nice and reminded a lot of us Americans (mostly Californians and Texans) of home. =)
And then, we watched A Muppet Christmas Carol in the lounge! I had just been thinking that I would miss the tradition of watching that movie with family at home and was excited to hear that the school was going to show it. =)
Well it's almost brunch time here so I need to go. Today, I'm going to a town named Preston with 2 friends after brunch. So you'll get to hear about that trip next week! =)
I have been able thankfully to upload more pictures on facebook while I've been writing this, so if you want to see more pictures from this week you can check them out:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=74590&l=5a71e&id=720019947
Tons and tons of love to everyone!
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