Days 10-1

10 days: Learning new traditions

One of the great things about volunteering abroad is learning the culture and the traditions.  A lot of traditions were simply a slight change in food, such as lamb for Easter instead of ham or turkey for Christmas.  Pancake Day was different because I really didn't have a tradition for Fat Tuesday, and it's definitely a tradition I want to bring home.  Also, stockings are placed at the end of your bed in England instead of in front of the fireplace.

9 days: Prepping for camping

In two days time, we are taking 31 youth to the Soul Survivor Youth Gathering.  It means we'll be camping for five days, so we had to bring out all the camping and cooking equipment to check off our packing list and clean everything after a year of storage.  It's time to get excited to finally experience this event that I've heard about since my first day at Saint James.  Overall, I'm excited, and a tad bit nervous, to be going to a youth gathering as a youth leader for the first time.

8 days: Reading the banns

I've been a part of a lot of different life events here at Saint James.  I've helped with funeral teas, baptisms, and confirmations.  Marriage is one I haven't been a part of, but I have learned that there are two different ways to be married in England.  Either by license, or by reading the banns.  I had read about banns being read in old classic novels, but I never realized it's still a practice.  From my understanding (British friends, feel free to correct me!) is in order to be married by banns, they must be read a certain amount of times during a church service before the wedding takes place, so if there's a reason the wedding shouldn't happen, the reason can be made known before the wedding.  Think of it as the beginning of a wedding "We are gathered here today... If any of you know why these two should not be joined speak now or forever hold your peace", except weeks in advance, instead of minutes.

7 days: Roadside views

Today we left for Soul Survivor in Somerset. It's a two and a half hour drive, but our route took us past Stonehenge, which made our journey longer, because the traffic slows way down as people try to elongate their view of Stonehenge.  I have to admit.  I wasn't something I was planning on seeing, but I'm glad we drove past it.  It was a part of England you hear about your entire life, and your whole life seeing it as the background on computers.  Seeing it gave me a better realization of Stonehenge and the efforts it took to build it.  The most surprising bit was I spent my entire life thinking it was a site in the middle of nowhere, but a fairly major road goes right by it.  There's also a pig farm next to it as well, which definitely wasn't a part of my imagination.

6 days: Living in luxury

Camping at Soul Survivor was been more glamorous than I remember it being.  However, when you have to cook for 37 people and aren't allowed open flames, you need to have camping stoves, and events tents to protect you from the English rain.  Not everything was luxurious as a couple of chairs broke, so your options are either get to meal times quickly, sit on the floor, or stand for meals.  Also, having volunteers come cook for youth events is amazing, since it frees up the youth workers to be fully present with the youth instead of worrying about cooking.

5 days: The scariest difference in food

One of the scariest differences was going to the grocery store and seeing eggs on the shelf, not the refrigerated.  Again, it's a difference of doing things, and, in this case, it's a different approach to sanitizing eggs for salmonella. The American way requires constant refrigeration, and British way means the eggs don't have to be refrigerated.  However I believe refrigeration extends the shelf life. The benefit is while camping, eggs are one thing you don't have to worry about keeping cool, which really helps us this week for breakfast.

4 days: Midday meeting

Part of Soul Survivor was having a meeting twice a day.  These meetings lasted around two hours each, with about 45 minutes to an hour of musical worship, a 30ish minute talk, and an extended time for prayer ministry, using centered around a theme, such as healing.  These meetings were led by the pastors of the church that organizes the event, whom you can see on the big scene.  The interesting bit was this was my first time going to a charismatic service, and it helped dispel some of the images I had from extreme charismatic churches that use snakes bites and very dramatic prayers of healing.  Like many religions, cultures, and denominations, you have the extreme 1% which gets all the attention and tend to represent the entire group, and then you have the other 99% which is a lot more reasonable, understandable, and representative as a whole.  This week gave me a better idea of the 99%.

3 days: A small break from the rain

It has been raining for all of Soul Survivor, which means the ground is now a giant mud pit and I am incredibly thankful for the pair of wellies (rain boots) I'm borrowing.  I'm impressed at the responses from the whole youth group because day after day of rain can really squash your spirits, especially when everything is wet and leaking, including the Big Top where you are for four hours of the day.  Thankfully, we had a small break from the rain today to eat breakfast outside the tents and toss about a Nerf ball.  The lack of rain also meant we were able to enjoy this gorgeous rainbow and take off our waterproofs for a bit.

2 days: One last root beer between friends

Today we came back from Soul Survivor.  It was an amazing week, and it only makes leaving harder.  There were jokes, pranks, and prayers.  I could not have had a better week to end on, but I'm partially glad it's done because I am knackered. Thankfully after a long bus ride, a lot of goodbyes, and putting up four tents to dry, I was ready for a long nap.  Kat, however, surprised me with the perfect way to relax and re-energize: a nice, cold root beer that didn't taste like licorice.

1 day: Final Farewells

How in the world are we already at one day left?  It still feels like we should be in February preparing for the relationship talks.  All I have to say is that I'm glad the farewells were difficult because it means this year has meant a lot, especially the people I worked with and met.  It's been a hard year with lots of new experiences, but the people at my placement have made it amazing.  I'll be coming home with new skills and stories, and I definitely have two homes now.  One in the United States, and one in England.

Days 20-11

20 days: High Street

Every town in the US has its Main Street.  In the UK, it's not much different, except it's called High Street and that's not necessarily its real name.  Gerrards Cross' High Street is actually named Packhorse Road, and it's the road you use to get to the train station, grocery stores, chemists, restaurants, etc.  This was also the street where you had fairs, such as the Christmas fair, Summer fair, and the odd carnival or Circus (on the common just before this photo).

19 days: Don't blink

In order to go to and leave work, I had to pass through the cemetery.  This wasn't as scary or creepy as most people would consider it to be, partially because the whole church was surrounded by a graveyard, like a lot of older churches are.  It helped take away the fear and discomfort a lot of people have about graveyards, since most only enter during funerals, whether it's their own or someone else's. Here I was entering one a dozen times a week. Frankly, the graveyard became super familiar, as you read the names of those who've come before us, and somewhat comforting during the day.  The exception was the four angels I walked past every day and night.  I blame Doctor Who for this, since Weeping Angels are the scariest villains on the show.  Eventually I became used to the angels, but then during one of my final weeks, I found a fifth one whom I had passed on several occasions and never noticed...

18 days: Advice from fellow YAGM

An interesting part of the UK YAGM program is that there are some YAGM who decide to stay on for a second year, for various reasons.  This means new UK YAGM have someone in country who went through, and are going through, the same thing you are, and they are more than willing to give you advice about juggling work, keeping in contact with your loved ones, and learning the English or Scottish culture.  One of the best pieces of advice for me was "Admit this Christmas is going to be difficult.  Those who pretend it's fine are the ones who struggle the most."  It gave me permission to miss home, to mourn yearly traditions, and then embrace the unknown of minced pies, mulled wine, and turkey dinners.

17 days: A friendly reminder

So one of the strange things to get used to was not having potable water coming out of every faucet.  I was really glad for the reminders, since I was used to drinking water from any faucet.  It was odd learning that I should only drink from my kitchen's faucet.  After some investigation we learned that it had to do with how water is stored.  To be honest, it kind of makes sense.  Think about how much drinkable water we throw away when we shower or wash our hands.

16 days: Scones with cream and jam

If you ever come to England, make sure you have a cream tea.  The first time I heard about cream teas, I thought it was simply pouring cream in your tea, which sounded a bit gross.  It's actually tea with scones topped with clotted cream and jam.  It might sound rather simple, but it's amazing. The difficult bit is there are different thoughts on how the scones should be prepared, either cream and jam or jam than cream.  Either way, it's delicious.

15 days: Learning how to serve English tea

This week I helped with the Friendship Teas which spanned two days.  It was an afternoon of prepping scones, cakes, tarts, and sandwiches, and conversing with the older generation of the church.  I learned more about scones than I knew before, and it was a nice change to interact with the older generation since I spend my days working with the younger generation.  I also learned that finger sandwiches truly do taste different from regular sandwiches, although I think it's more psychological and actual.

14 days: Pigeons

You can't escape the pigeons, and they are plain annoying to most people.  I found them interesting.  If you look at most of the pigeons, you'll notice a lot of them have some sort of foot deformity, but it doesn't stop them.  A lot of the pigeons adapt to their disabilities, or in the pigeon on the step, they don't give up.  I think it's their persistence that makes them annoying to everyone, but I found them particularly interesting.  I felt like they needed a shout out.

13 days: By the sea

We went to the sea for the day on my last weekend.  We spent the day walking along the beach, and having a picnic.  To be honest, "By the Sea" from Sweeney Todd kept playing in my head, and after our trip, I feel like I have now had the full English experience.  It also meant going on a mini road trip with friends, and we had one last day to hang out.

12 days: My last Sunday

Today was my last Sunday at Saint James, as I'll be spending next Sunday at Soul Survivor with Resonate.  I ended up going to all the services in order to see everyone one last time, and it's really nice how each service has its own flavor.  A liturgical morning service, a family orientated contemporary midday service, and a adult contemporary evening service.service.  I'm thankful that I was able to go to each service my last Sunday, since I was able to see a variety of friends in service and say my farewells.

11 days:  Testing light bulbs

One of the youth asked me a couple months ago what I do during the week.  I replied that I do a lot of prep work and admin.  A couple of the youth came to talk to us about Soul Survivor and stumbled upon me in the middle of my other task: busy, but necessary, work.  I was testing a giant box of light bulbs to make sure they all work.  Good news they do!  It's definitely not the most glamorous part of youth work, or volunteering, but when you sign up to serve, you receive some unexpected tasks.

Days 30-21

30 days: Cleaning cupboards and taking numbers

Since there are no Bible studies or Sunday services to plan and prep, I have the task of cleaning out the youth cupboards and taking inventory for the next year.  It took the whole day, but, despite the repetitiveness of counting and cleaning, I was grateful for the opportunity to go through games and crafts from the year and reflect on all that has happened.

29 days: Mailings as far as the eye can see

Before the beginning of each term, we send out a mailing with all the events and registration forms for everything.  We spend hours planning, calling, and reserving for the next term before we even start on the letters, registrations, and term cards.  Once all of this is figured out, I get to put on some music on spend the next several hours going through the database and stuffing envelopes for the Resonate, Boat, and Link youth groups.

28 days: The postbox

After all of the envelopes are stuffed and addressed, it's time to put the mailings in the post.  Now, this isn't really exciting, except for the huge sense of relief and accomplishment that comes when the last mailing is placed inside the postbox.  

However, there are fun detail about postboxes.  There's a silver plaque above the slit, which indicates the next post pick up.  The white box gives the times when the post is picked up everyday and where the closest post office is. Now the really interesting detail is at the bottom of the box, right above the black bit.  If you look there's a crown and a couple of letters.  In this case, it's a GR. (Others say EIIR) This stands for King George, presumably King George VI, Elizabeth II's father.  This means this specific postbox was installed during his reign. The initials on each postbox indicate which reign they were installed.

27 days: Bikes in London

I met up with Anastasia today to spend one last day with her in London before she heads back to Iowa.  Imagine our surprise when we get to Trafalgar Square and everything's eerily quiet.  We venture out of Charing Cross Station on our way to visit the Science Museum, and immediately notice that instead of cars and bikes, the streets are filled with thousands of bicycles.  We left the area to go to the museum, and then wandered around Hyde Park before circling back to Buckingham Palace.  Once at the palace, we watched the bicyclists and jammed out to Rhianna outside the queen's residence.  It was definitely a new, unexpected, experience for the two of us.

26 days: Peak District

I was blessed to spend some time exploring Peak District.  It's a region in the north, characterized by hills with large rocky jut-outs.  It's also rather historical, including Eyam, the plague village; Chatsworth house, the residence of the Duke of Devonshire and burial place of Kathleen Kennedy (JFK's sister); and location of Mr. Darcy's home, Pemberly. 

It's an absolutely gorgeous area, a favorite of mine, and it was also the location of our mid year retreats with YAGM.  One reason why I love this photo is because, for once, I am in front of the camera.  I have hundreds of photos from this area from all my visits, and from this year, but almost all of them involve me being behind the camera.  Piers, our friend and leader of our retreats, says he took this photo because he knew I had few with me in it.  Thank you Piers!

25 days: Tim's Man Crush Monday

My supervisor, Tim, will deny it until his face turns blue, but he has a major man crush on Bear Grylls.  In almost every talk Tim has given this year, Bear has been mentioned, and Tim has gone on record to say if he married again, or, more likely renewed his vows, he would want Bear to be his best man for the Stag Night (bachelor's party).  Tim originally bought Bear's book for his son, but, when his son didn't read it, Tim did and fell in man love.  Bear Grylls was mentioned so often that he became the fourth (figurative) youth worker in the office.

One of my most heart breaking moments this year was when Tim didn't get to meet Bear in May.  We were going as a staff to the HTB Leadership Conference at the Royal Albert Hall in London, and they were launching the new Alpha course with Bear Grylls as the figure head.  Tim, and the rest of us, believed that Bear would come to the conference to promote Alpha. The time came for Alpha's presentation, and I looked over at Tim to see his face completely lit up. (I've never seen him so excited.) Instead, the conference showed a trailer with barely a glimpse of Bear at the very end.  I looked over at Tim, and his face had completely fallen.  My hope is eventually Tim will meet his idol, Bear.

24 days:Cliff College

Cliff College is a small Bible college in Peak District, and it is where the UK YAGM spent their midyear retreats attending the Christian Life and Mission.  These were the times when we were able to come together as a group and talk about what was happening in the news at home, how we would tell our stories to loved ones, and relishing our limited time together.  We took the course with three women from Cornwall, London, and Stockholm, respectively, and spent many hours hiking the peaks with them.

23 days: Time for God

A unique aspect of UK YAGM is we don't have a country coordinator, like the other country programs.  Instead we are placed with a secondary program, called Time for God, or TfG, where we met, and worked with, other volunteers from around the country, including my roommate, Lena.  The pairing with TfG was a blessing because it allowed us to talk to others. While we were struggling with transitioning from liturgical tradition to contemporary tradition, many volunteers were struggling with the exact opposite.  It also meant that we were able to learn about different cultures, such as Hungarian folk dancing, and learned about other culture shocks, such as one volunteer being genuinely surprised at the natural color and texture of my hair, 

22 days: Garbage, Trash, Rubbish

One of the biggest differences was simple household resources.  One is that not all of the water is potable.  As I understand, it has to do with the heating systems, and many sinks have separate faucets for hot (non-potable) and cold (potable) water.  Although newer houses, remodels, additions, etc have double faucets for tradition, ascetics, or because people were taught at a young age to never drink from the hot tap.

The other difference is the way rubbish is removed from houses. Just like the US, rubbish collection is managed, and dictated by the local government.  In South Bucks, almost everything here is recycled.  Plastics, glass, paper, and metal are all recycled and are collected fortnightly.  Even food rubbish (including bones, dairy, tea bags, and cooked foods) are collected weekly to be made into compost by the council.  The huge benefit of the food rubbish is your rubbish bin doesn't leak or smell, which is good since it's only collected once every two weeks.  The downside is you have various of different bins that you can mix up.

21 days: Laundry Time

The big news at my parents place is that they have finally replaced their dryer.  This dryer was at least 20 years old, and last time I was there we were holding it together with a 2"x4" plank and a bucket of kitty litter.

While I understand my parents' excitement (this is HUGE news in our family), it made me realize how different my life is here since I haven't used a dryer in a year.  Most people I know here do not own or use a clothes dryer.  Instead I've used the drying racks you see in the photo, and you have to wait a couple days to have clean, dry laundry. (We aren't even allowed clotheslines in my parents' neighborhood.) My mom doesn't like the stiffness of air dried laundry.  The stiffness never bother me and I enjoyed the fact that it used no electricity.  Plus having laundry drying in the back garden just feels right in England.

Days 40-31

40 days: The empty hall

Every week, we transform this hall into a hangout area for the youth.  Within minutes it becomes filled with Wii, Foosball, lights, couches, sweets, four square, and music, and it becomes a space of friendship and competition.  Today was the last youth service, so from now until the end of my service here.  I wish I had taken a picture with everything set up, but I was engaged with the youth and didn't think of a photo until after everything was put away.  This photo will have to serve as a reminder of all the friendships forged with the youth here every Sunday.

39 days: Afternoon Tea at the Church of England school

Today I was a children's worker.  The local Church of England school had an event for the school's families to commemorate the school year ending.  There was a traditional afternoon tea for the adults with cakes, bunting, and, of course, tea.  My co-worker immediately told me I needed a photo, since this was as traditional as it got.  I, however, spent the afternoon with about 100 children playing with frisbees.  The best part was probably teaching 2-3 year old girls how to throw a frisbee for the first time.

38 days: MA meeting

A good portion of my responsibilities here involve setting up for all the events and meetings at church.  Since each week changes, the three MAs and Chris, who manages the events, get together every Tuesday to go over the events, and make sure there are no major time conflicts.  Most of the time, we take over the assistant rector's office while he's in a meeting.  Today we took over Hot Desk since it was empty.

*Fun Fact: Calendars are called diaries here.

37 days: Life group barbecue

We decided to switch things up at Life Group today and had a barbecue.  It's one of those differences in cultures that I've noticed.  At home I'd consider barbecues to have brisket, pulled pork, cole slaw, baked beans, and the whole nine yards.  I've noticed that most of the time that when someone mentions a barbecue it means hamburgers and sausages.  The biggest difference is the food, but the main idea of spending time with friends and family is the same.  The other similarity at this barbecue was having to keep an eye on the dog who wanted his share of the barbecue.

36 days: Summer's To Do list

The weekly youth events have ended with the summer term, but that doesn't mean our work has finished.  It simply means that I no longer work nights and that I can now go to worship services.  This week Kat and I brainstormed all the things we needed to finish before the new year starts in September, preferably before Soul Survivor at the end of August.  It seems like for every item we erase, we add, at least, one more.  We'll finish it, but we have a lot of admin work ahead of us.

35 days: Hot Cross buns

On Good Friday after service, a bunch of friends and I went out for tea and hot cross buns, a traditional Easter food.  I can't tell you all the symbolism behind these buns, but I do know that the white cross on the top is representative of Jesus on the cross.  I can also tell you that it seems like dried fruit are a huge part of big celebrations.  You'll find them in Christmas pudding, Hot Cross buns, mince pies, and wedding cakes.

My friends were excited about eating Hot Cross buns. (I remember one announcing during a meeting that the grocery store was now selling them, much like we would do for Peeps or Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Lattes.)  I, however, was excited because, after 15 years of playing "Hot Cross Buns" on the recorder, I finally knew what the song was all about.

34 days: Root beer

One thing I truly miss from the States, and haven't quite been able to find or make myself, good root beer.  It's just not popular around here on the basis that most people think it tastes medicinal and is disgusting. (Kat and her husband, Sam, enjoy root beer.  It's been something we bonded over.)  This means that finding root beer is somewhat of a rarity, so, when I find a root beer, I've always bought it (and no two were ever the same).  Most of the time I was disappointed, since it seems that the common ingredient in root beer here is licorice.  It's been fun trying the different root beer recipes, but I am looking forward to having Sprecher again in September.

33 days: Office Shenanigans

We have a lot of fun in the office, usually it's started by Kat or I and Tim joins later on.  This includes office chair races, finger rocket fights, tin can phone calls, and water balloon pinatas.  Sometimes it involves food, such as making cake pops.  This particular photo is from after Kirsty had made profiteroles (cream puffs) and chocolate sauce and offered them to Kat and I and Breffni and Perry.  After waiting over an hour for Breff and Perry to show up for their portion, Kirsty said we should eat them or throw them out.  We naturally decided to eat them, and leave a surprise for the boys when they did show up.

32 days: The three musketeers ministry assistants (MAs)

Lena went back to Germany today.   Lena, Perry and I have been the three volunteers at Saint James this year, and we had some fun times while doing centre duties together.  We dealt with broken trolleys, watched stupid videos, shared sweets and laughs, and modeled the awesome sweaters we found in the attic. We started this year as completely strangers, but we ended as friends (in awesome sweaters).

31 days: The cinema with friends

A couple of friends and I went today to go see Ant-Man in the cinema.  This might not seem like a extraordinary event, but it's often in the similar scenarios, such as seeing a movie with friends, that bring out the dissimilarities.  It's also the place where I physically notice how different my culture is from the one I've been in.  Films have a way of pointing out differences in culture, age, education, language, and humor, especially when you see them with people from different cultures and age groups.  Imagine adults and kids watching any children's film.  The adults laugh at some points, the kids laugh at another, and sometimes they laugh together.

For example, in Tomorrowland, a PG film, there are a ton of swear words used, but Americans would never noticed it because all of the swear words, except for maybe one, are all British.  I walked out of the cinema thinking it was a good film.  My British friends walked out of the theater commenting about how it was the most family friendly because of the language.  Our reactions were solely based on our cultures.

Ant-Man made me realize how different British and American humor is.  I grew up with Monty Python and other British comedy groups and films, so I get some of the British humor.  It was while watching Ant-Man that I realized how American humor is different and our reactions to it.  It's a bit difficult to describe, but, besides my friend, Sam, I was the only person laughing in the theater. Perry, my other friend, commented on how it was both awkward and hilarious at the same time. He doesn't understand how funny the movie was.

Days 50-41

50 days: St Pancras International Station

Today the London Underground (Tube) system completely shut down (for the first time in 13 years) for the day during a workers strike.  This serene picture of St Pancras International was flooded with travelers and commuters trying to find alternative ways of getting home, such as a bus or taxi.  It makes you realize how important public transportation is to the population.

49 days: My home

This is a simple explanation. This is where I've lived for the past year with Lena, my roommate.  Here  I learned just how different English houses are from American houses.  The differences include outlets, light switched, door locks, tea kettles, washing machines, refrigerators, showers, toilets, heating, potable water, and there are probably a few I'm missing. Mainly, it was a place where I could go home at the end of the day, make a cup of tea, and catch up with people back home or simply relax.

48 days: A full English breakfast

As much as I love pancakes and waffles, I have come to appreciate the English breakfast.  It consists of toast, English (not American) bacon, sausage, roasted tomatoes, egg, beans, black (blood) pudding, mushrooms, and, of course, a cup of tea.  It took a while to get used to the idea of eating beans for breakfast, but without them, it's just not the same.

47 days: Saying Goodbye Resonate Style

Today was the End of Year party for Resonate.  It's made up of more food, games, and water balloons than any other event we have during the year.  It's the last event of the year, and it's when we say goodbye to the youth leaving for university and the leaders who are stepping down from their position.  Each leaver is asked to share their plans for after Resonate, and, then, the rest of Resonate prays for them.  However, the goodbyes are not complete until all the leavers participate in one last Resonate challenge.  This year it involved eating profiteroles (cream puffs) as fast as you can without your hands while blindfolded.  (The guys had an added secret ingredient of Nandos hot sauce.)  Anyways, this was the result of the challenge, and thankfully this isn't totally goodbye, as I will be spending a week with Resonate at Soul Survivor before I leave.

46 days: Where's Tim?

This was the sight that greeted me when I came into work today, and it's only half of it.  The worst part of big events is the clean up afterwards.  Pool noodles, water jugs, mocktail ingredients, signs, cool boxes, badminton equipment, and so much more were waiting for us Monday morning.  The benefit of it completely filling the office is it gives you motivation to clean it as soon as possible.  The downside is you have to clean it up before you do anything else.

 45 days: Edda's last staff lunch

After 13 years, Edda has decided to step down from her position as Children's pastor, so, during her last staff lunch, we put up bunting, had some cake, and celebrate all the kids, families, and church members Edda worked with over the years. A lot has changed since Edda started. There was no centre. Sunday School was taught in a small building with plants growing through the windows, and there was no AED on site.  Thanks Edda for all your work.

44 days: Cleaning out the attic

One of the fun parts of my placement is that we get to go places that no one else knows exist, and one is the attic.  Whenever we've gone into the attic, someone responds "We have an attic?!"  So today we went up into the attic to put away the Christmas decorations (Yes, I know it's July), and while up there, we noticed that how unorganized everything was and decided to cleaned it up a bit.  During the process we found a whole bunch of random objects, such as boxes of clothes, WWI coats (real or replicas, we have no clue.), and a half finished model boat.  After we finished, the only thing I can say is "Thank God for showers."

43 days: MA breakfast

Even though I don't leave for another month, Lena leaves next week, so the church cooked us an English breakfast and had us wear crowns as a thank you for the year.  The decorations were put up the night before, so when I left work I had to be escorted out with my eyes covered to keep the surprise.    In order to remember my time at Saint James and in England, I was given a Great British Bake Off cookbook autographed by Mary Berry herself. (This is actually a huge deal.)  It might have been the official goodbye, but I'm glad I still have time to make the informal, personal goodbyes.

42 days: Thanksgiving in July

I didn't celebrate Thanksgiving this year.  I made short blog posts about what I was thankful for during the month and made a cranberry cheesecake pie to share with the staff, but that was the extent of my Thanksgiving.  Part of it was because Thanksgiving doesn't exist here, and the other part was because we were too busy during the actual holiday.  On Thanksgiving, we had a youth leaders meeting, followed by a youth weekend away the next day, so Thanksgiving was not really on my radar. (Something I was thankful for since it kept the homesickness that comes with family holidays at bay.)

Anyways, one of my friends expressed her disappointment about not experiencing a Thanksgiving dinner, so we picked a date, invited some friends, and made Thanksgiving dinner.  We had all the classics: turkey, stuffing, gravy, sweet potatoes, and roasted veg (Sadly, no cranberry sauce due to the season.), and paired it with some British puddings.  It was in July, but it didn't matter since Thanksgiving is really about spending time and giving thanks for the people God has placed in our lives.

41 days: Health and Safety

I think I can say the youth office is the most dangerous in the church.  Health and Safety is occasionally mentioned in England. Scratch that it's mentioned all the time, and in our office it's mentioned even more.  It's not because of all the risk assessments we're creating, but because of the situations we create in the office.  It's usually because the telephone line is draped across the desk, increasing the risk of tripping, and, sometimes, as this picture shows, we stand on furniture to increase our height.  Kat isn't the best role model in this case, since she chooses furniture on wheels.  Don't worry Mom! I haven't followed her example...much.