Thanksgiving and Holiday Break

Hi all!

Hope everyone enjoyed Thanksgiving and is ready for Christmas! ( I know I am!!)

Whiskey Sours

Thanksgiving was a lot of fun. I went over to Ashleigh's flat for dinner with a bunch of her coworkers who also live at the school. Ash and I were the only Americans so it was fun to share our tradition and have friends to celebrate the holiday with. We made a chicken ( turkey would have taken wayy too long) Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans and then a Cranberry dish. and obviously it wouldnt be a holiday without Whiskey Sours!! They didnt have the right whiskey over here but I made do with what I could find and made some pretty good drinks if I do say so myself! Although nothing beats the ones at home with the family! After dinner I got to skype with my fam while they were at dinner. It was nice to sort-of be at dinner even though I couldnt be there in person. All in all a really fun day!

snow storm

Last week we had a "snow storm" here in England. Thats right folks we got a whole five inches! and I am not kidding when I say EVERYTHING shut down. I had six days off of work - tough life haha No one is prepared for the snow over here- they dont have road salt and no one plows. So instead of clearing the roads everything turns to sheer ice and the roads become impossible to drive on. I was beginning to go a little stir crazy after snow day number three. Allegheny didnt prepare me very well as we NEVER had a snow day.

Xmas Party

I finally got out of the house on saturday night when I went to an ugly jumper Christmas party held by three of the LDO's in Reading. It was soo much fun and so nice to see everyone. It had been a while. Ash was suppose to be in Scotland for a wedding, but since they actually got hit with a ton of snow she wasnt able to go and I dragged her to the party with me- and she drove which was SO nice since the trains were all screwy that weekend. needless to say  I didnt get home until 6am. top night.

Ignore my face.. Check out the jumper!

Tomorrow is my last day of lacrosse before I get to come home on sunday!!! It is obviously an ugly jumper christmas practice - and I will be sporting my kitty jumper. Complete style. I will take pictures for sure. Best ugly jumper wins a prize!! I am SOOO beyond excited to come home and see everyone! If you are around- make sure I get to see you!!



                       See you all SOON!!! xx

WAR EAGLE!!

What a game!! wish I could have watched more then live stats but a BIG thank you to my dad for giving me play by plays!!! ... sorry doug and dad looks like you are going to be wearing a nice shade of orange for a while :)

A Long Overdue Update

Hello Hello to all,

Sorry I have been bad at updating my blog recently I have just been very busy - as this term is slowly starting to end and there are lots of things to be done before I leave!

London from the Waterloo Bridge

So about two weeks ago Miss Nell came down to London for a night and stayed with me in Oxshott before heading off on her worldly adventures during Half Term. Miss Laura met both Nell and I in Waterloo station and we walked across the waterloo bridge to try and find a close restaurant to eat at and grab a few drinks. Miss Nell had her huge suitcase with her though so we wanted to find a place to put it while we went out. We ended up going to the Savoy and Miss Nell worked her magic- as the man working at the door took her suitcase for safe keeping until our return. The catch was that we had to go into the bar for a least one drink .. well apparently you can not wear UGG like boots in the savoy because I was turned away. (which ended up being the running joke of the evening) .. its ok I didnt want to drink with those people anyway. So we snuck out of the Savoy and headed to this little Italian restaurant where I had fish and chips ( so Italian haha)  and then we went to this pub that was in a cellar under a different restaurant. It was a lot of fun and great to see them both!

The next morning I dropped miss nell off at the train station and lucky she left when she did! A few hours after her train a laury fell off of the bridge over the train station and hit a train, which ended up closing down our station and roads for the evening. It was really annoying because Oxshott is not very big - and to get in there is basically one major road. well the bridge is on this road and traffic was AWEFUL for at least a  week after the accident.

Little Venice

The next weekend was Guy Fawkes day! - Guy Fawkes was the man who tried to burn down parliament so in his honor they burn his effigy over big bonfires and set off fireworks, etc. It is definitely a fun weekend to be in the country. I went to my the school my friend works at for a big firework display and then we headed into london to see a friend from college! She is currently living up in Birmingham but her cousin was recently married so she invited us to a pub for part of the celebration. It was a fun night.

This past weekend I stayed in Little Venice in London with Miss Laura at her flat. We went out for drinks on saturday night and then had a pretty low key night with champagne left over from my birthday and sheldon/ the big bang theory. Then on sunday we explored Little Venice in the morning - complete with a walk along the canal and a photo shoot on the bridge over the canal haha. We then grabbed some food from the local market and had a picnic inside- since the weather was kind of gross. After lunch we headed to the British Museum where Miss Laura works and I had my own personal tour of the museum. SOO cool. If you ever have the chance to go there I highly recommend it!!

This week for Thanksgiving it will be pretty low key- especially since its not celebrated over here. I think I am going to go over to Ashleighs for dinner on Thursday and then on Saturday break out the Whiskey Sours and celebrate.  I have to say its very weird for me not being home for Thanksgiving- its my first major holiday away from home! but Ill be home soon enough so Im not too worried about it.

Not much else is going on. Lacrosse is still going really well. I have the occasional boy that causes me hell when I am coaching but besides that they are a really great group of kids. Im trying to figure out what I am going to do over the summer/ the end of spring .. looking into working a couple of camps over here that pay well. Hoping that I will have lots of Visitors soon :)

Wellll not quite sure how I missed this gem of a story- So about two weeks ago I noticed that all the lights on one side of my car would not turn off. Then the indicator lights wouldnt turn on and my hazards went soon after that. After much dismay and hitting all the buttons on the dash and turning my car on and off about 50 times I realized that we had a problem. So I called up the garage and brought the car in - turns out the motherboard gave up. Which was GREAT for me since I drive just about everywhere. I had to take cabs everywhere and that was a great big pain. At one point I was on the phone with the cab company and he was telling me I was in the wrong place looking for him- we went back and forth for about 10 minutes on where I was to meet him and ended up he was at a different school ... 20 minutes away. SO just as I hung up it began to rain and I had to wait out in the rain for quite a bit of time before I was rescued. It was probably one of the most stressful weeks since I have been here. The garage kept telling us that I would have my car back the next day and they next day .. well a week later - I finally got it back.  


We are suppose to get six inches of snow tomorrow.. oh GOODY. I though that moving to England meant that I was going to escape the snow and just have to deal with the rain. well that thought was completely false. I feel betrayed by the weather of my new country.  All I have to say is it better hold off until December 12th at 10 am or else. 

Miss you all xx

Out in Guilford before Half Term

Ashleigh 

At my Birthday

Just some more pictures from the Term!

Spain and Birthday!

Back from a really good half term - although it has been confirmed that my life is murphys law. all things that could go wrong - did haha. We left for Linares on sunday to stay with Megan for the week - we flew into Madrid and then took a 3 hour train to her town where she picked us up. That night we went out for Tapas and drinks - which is the greatest idea ever invented. You pay 1.30 Euros for a glass of wine and then you pick off of a menu what kind of food you want and it is included free. Brilliant if you ask me. Then tuesday morning we got up before the sun and headed into Jaen (pronounced hi-en) megan had some stuff to do for work so we joined her. The city was pretty cool- except on mondays all the museums and historical sites are closed because apparently people dont work then. So we just walked around and I cant complain- the views were amazinggg. however - the whole city is built on a hill so that made for quite the walk around town.

Then we went to Granada - we got up real early again and caught the bus first to Jaen and then to Granada. When we got there we headed right to the Alhambra to buy tickets but typical to my life they were all sold out at 10 am. So to make up for it we headed to what megan likes to call "arab land" and did some serious shopping.  I bought a  bunch of things for my family and then we went and had lunch in the big plaza. We saw a few cathedrals and just walked around and enjoyed the sun for the day. Then we headed back to Linares for more tapas with megan and some of her flat mates and some friends from her program. - its crazy to me how late they stay out and how smokey everything is. They are allowed to smoke where ever and my clothes REEK ... my bedroom smells like smoke after unpacking my bags. The tapas were SO good though.

Then we stayed in Linares on Wednesday and walked around Megans town. We went up to the bull ring where Manolete fought and died , which was pretty cool. We looked around in a bunch of the different shops and then met megan for lunch at a local restaurant. after that we went back and packed and got ready to head to madrid. Our last night in Linares we went out for tapas and drinks with megan and all of her friends- where we ate bull testicles. We went to this bar that was dedicated to bull fighting and they had bull heads on the walls and some of the outfits that have been worn- it was really cool. Then we went to this "american" bar and there were big Indian statues and what I would imagine they think are american things. It was really funny- but it was fun.

We stayed in Madrid on the last night of spain - we took the train in and then had to take the underground and a cab to find our hotel. once we found our hotel and got checked in we headed into madrid to see the royal palace, cathedral and the plaza del sol. I wish we could have spent more time there but it was good to just go in for a few hours and look around.

We got home on Friday and met Brittany at the airport and came back to the house. we ran out to the store and picked up mexican food for dinner and some cider. we hung out for the night and just played some drinking games and relaxed after a

 long week of traveling.  On saturday I had to coach but had fancy dress practice! It was a lot of fun and then after practice we ran to sainsburys to pick up halloween costumes ( I was an Indian ) and then headed to a lacrosse club for a party. It was alot of fun and nice to hang out with people that I havnt seen in a while

Today I am just resting and trying to catch up on sleep .. which may take a week or two haha. but luckly the clocks change tonight in the UK!!! so I will be getting an extra hour of sleep tonight :) Thats all for now!




all my love xx

Half Term

Hi all-

Headed off to Espana for a much needed break! SOO excited to go explore, shop and catch up with miss megan! I promise when I return there will be a lengthy blog with lots of pictures!

Miss you all! xx

Lovely Weather

Hi All,

Me on the Thames in Richmond

Hope everyone had a good weekend! The weather here has been AMAZING for the last three days, a real Indian summer! This weekend was a good one, I was going to go into london for the day and explore the markets with a friend - but typical to my life the train was pulling away as we bought our tickets. SO we ended up going up to richmond and walking on the Thames / shopping for the day. It was so nice to just relax and hang out for the day!! Other then that I had a nice 3 day weekend because I am no longer going to Godalming College on Mondays so I sat outside for a few hours and read a book. Which I miss doing since I have no read much since camp ended.

Richmond Green

                                                                                    

Excited for the next couple of weeks. The last week in October I am headed to Spain with a friend I met over here and we are staying with Miss Megan. Halloween weekend a couple of people are staying at my house to celebrate my birthday. We are having a Mexican/ Margarita themed evening and then the next night we are headed out for Halloween festivities. I am making practice Halloween weekend Fancy Dress and I will obviously be going all out. Ill take lots of pictures! Then Miss Nell and Miss Meg will be here in the beginning of November! :)


This week is not very exciting - had 2 sessions today. I LOVE the kids I coach from this one school Hurst Park.  So we are not suppose to hug/touch the kids - like nothing because parents are crazy and its just for our safety and all the kids were hugging me today and I was so awkward and didnt know what to do. just stood there like uhhhhh you cant touch me haha. and they thought it was REALLY funny so they all kept coming up and hugging me. oh man.  But they were really cute, we only have one more class period and then it moves to after school club and they were literally down on their hands and knees begging me not to leave after next week. sooo cute.

Thats it for now! miss you all xx

HAPPY 16th BIRTHDAY TO DOUG AND LINDSAY!!!! love you both lots and lots and I am so sad that I cant be there to celebrate with you! We are going to have to celebrate all of our birthdays when I get home in December!!

xoxox

Throwing my brother off and posting ANOTHER blog!

So today I went to coach at a primary school and saw this one kid beating the crap out of another kid after school let out. This 9 year old was beating up this 12 year old and his friend was trying to get the 9 year old off. At first I was watching it wondering where a teacher/ authority figure was and then realized I WAS ONE. ( this was one of those I feel really old/ empowered moments hahah) So I broke up my first fight today! Its sad how mean kids can be. Oh AND I am holding an assembly at that school. haha oh lord all the things I never thought I would do in my life.

welll a little update-

Heading to Spain for October break instead of Scotland/Ireland .. funny how plans change in like 12  hours. SOO excited! I am staying with Miss Megan and plan on eating plenty of tapas, drinking lots of local alcohol and taking tons of pics. One of the girls I met over here is coming with me too- so I will have a traveling buddy!

Also had year 5 kids ask for my autograph today .. which is really funny. of course I signed there notebooks for them hahahah :) taught them all a bunch of stick tricks and I think I officially have them all hooked on lax big time!

Hi all,

I cant believe its already October!! my favorite month of the year :) ( and not just because it is my birthday month .. although that is a plus! ) It is starting to get very chilly over here and I have been informed that I will not see the sun again until later spring- AHHHHH haha. It is starting to get dark earlier and I am getting a little nervous for the point when it is dark at about 430 ...

Sad day on the lacrosse front- I had to stop going to Godalming college because only 4 girls show up every week despite LOTS of persuasion to all of the girls who have previously played. They "dont have time" ... UGH whatever .. there loss not mine. However the club went really well on saturday and we are at full capacity with a 20+ waiting list! very exciting... and I guess they are really enjoying it!

Besides that - not to much going on here. Went out in Leicester square in London on saturday night which was a lot of fun - really cool to be in the center of london at night ... and I only spent 10 pounds the entire night! I was very proud of myself.

Right now I am planning a trip for half term in october ... I think to Scotland ( to see some Onas!) and then on to Ireland! very exciting .. kinda bummed that spain isnt working out but not to worried as I will be here a while.

Thats it for now!

A Month in

Soooo I have been pretty bad about updating this- but I am really going to try and do it more often! Lots of things have gone on since my last update...

Driving: Haha oh lord where to begin.. driving over here may or may not be the scariest experience I have ever encountered. When I finally got my car back- my host brother offered to take me out and teach me how to drive the car and it was like a scene out of a movie. I probably stalled the car every 5 seconds- and THEN he took me up a hill and I couldn't get the car to move and it was starting to roll backwards and it was terrible. not to mention I almost took out about 10 mailboxes and was up on the curb for a majority of the time. SOO they booked me driving lessons and it was 2 - 2 hour sessions with this nice british man with a heavy smokers cough named Ira who probably thought I was on drugs. I was literally having nightmares about having to drive. The signs over here make NO sense .. for example there is a circle with a cross through it that means 2 different speed limits when you are in different places- WHAT?!? why would you make the sign mean 2 different things?! people like ME have no idea what to do- and therefore are always going slower then need be. They also have signs like: kill your speed, not a child.. elderly people with canes at crosswalks and my favorite the frog signs that are everywhere. So after one of my driving lessons my boss had me drive to one of the clubs and he was in the car and I stalled not before, not after but IN THE MIDDLE of a roundabout. how that is even possible people I do not know- but I thought half of the UK was going to shoot me. However not to worry - I am a driving machine now. I still stall sometimes but I am really getting the hang of it . Did I mention my car has my NAME on it and a nice american flag on both sides?! slightly embarrassing when you look extremely special driving ... oh wellll. glad I am representing the country well on the roads.

Lacrosse:  Lacrosse has actually been AMAZING. I love coaching so much and the kids are great. During the week I travel to different schools and either run their PE classes or run a lacrosse after school club. I am also working with a college team (which is equivalent to 11th and 12th grade in the states) and then a women's club team. I am teaching a bunch of different age groups - I have Year 5 and 6 which are the young kids and they learn POP lacrosse. which is totally different then anything we have in the states- its basically the plastic sticks we use to play with in gym class, no goalies and you can only hold on to the ball for 4 seconds. They are  good for the kids to learn with and they all seem to really love the game. so I have  about 90 ish of them and then probably 90 of year 7- upper sixers (which is a senior in high school in the US or their last year of college before university ) It can get totally chambolic at times but there is nothing else I would honestly rather be doing. I am sooo happy that there is so much interest in Lacrosse over here. The Club team I am working with - Putney-  is realllllly good. They have a definite mix of talent but they have a lot of girls that play on the England squad. I am really excited in October I am going to play in a Tournament in Prague with them!!! Then on Saturdays I run both POP and field lacrosse at the club for about 80 girls - and the great thing is we have SOO many more girls that want to come and play with us - we just need to figure out space and find more coaches. It can be stressful at times - however at the end of the day I would so much rather have way to many girls then no one wanting to show up.

Me in one of the Phone Booth's 

Everything else is great- yesterday I went into London and explored. It is such an amazing and beautiful place. I also love how much diversity is everywhere- everywhere I walked there was a different language being spoken. I definitely want to get into London A LOT more.. especially because all of the museums are FREEE!! Not to mention its only about a 30 minute train ride for me from Oxshott to Waterloo. We went to Big Ben, Parliament, Saw the Eye of London ( the really big ferris wheel that gives you views of the entire city and more), Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace but I was a little upset that I could not find Prince Harry... however I will not give up my search. I have a good amount of traveling planned - In October I am going to Prague to play in that tournament and then I am Going to Spain and maybe Italy - but I will get to see Miss Megan from Onaway so I am very excited about that!! and then hopefully I will be making a trip up to Scotland soon to see Miss Meg and Miss Nell.  There are  SO many Onaway people in Europe this year- Including Miss Laura who is moving to LONDON! yayy!

Big Ben!

Buckingham Palace

Well that is pretty much it for right now- I am going to attempt to get back into working out today- hoping my legs are OK to handle it- who would have known I would miss running this much? I was really happy that they didnt hurt at all walking around London all day- so we will see what happens.

Happy Monday Everyone!   xx

ahhh so I have been here for two weeks and I am obsessed with this place. The people are so nice and everywhere I go everything is SOO beautiful. Last week I had my induction course with English Lacrosse and got to meet all of the other americans that are here working in the south of england. It was alot of fun - were played A LOT of pop lacrosse which is the lacrosse that is played with the younger kids and you use the plastic sticks like the ones we have in gym class back home. Thursday night everyone stayed with some of the LDO's that are in Reading and we went out which was a really fun time. FINALLY learned everyones names haha which was seriously difficult at first- so many new people and not enough space in my brian to remember any of their names! after we finished the course on friday we headed to Bath - which is by far the most beautiful place I have been so far in my life. everything is made out of stone from the same quarry and I was just in awe. We went to Bath Abbey and wandered around the streets. But we were  there for a lacrosse tourney which was so awesome - its not like our tournaments back home - they are WILD here .... wayyyyy to much alcohol haha. we got to go out in Bath on friday and saturday night which was a blast - maybe a little too  much fun??? haha needless to say sambuca and I will never cross paths again.

Im back in Oxshott now- just hanging out and getting ready to start a lot of coaching. Lots of lesson plans to do!! I have a couple meetings with teachers and then I am going down to play/help coach a club team in Putney which will be fun as they are my age. STILL NO CAR  hahaha my lifeee... lets hope I learn how to drive before hmm monday when I have to start? haha ill keep you updated!

If you have a skype account- let me know so we can talk and catch up!

Miss and Love you all
xx

oh and for camp people ..I just have a quick story I thought you would all appreciate. The street I am living on has a church at the very end of it and you can hear the bells from my bedroom. well this morning I woke up to bells that sounded like a Waterfront Emergency. Naturally I threw myself out of bed ready to run down to the waterfront until I realized where I was. 

Almost a week update

Hellllo!


So I have been here for almost a week and it is still unreal to me that I am actually living in England.  It has been a pretty good week so far - but I still do not know that many people so it can get a little lonely at times. Thankfully I have my induction course for English Lacrosse next week so I will get to hang out with the americans that are over here doing my same program. So this week has been pretty eventful- I got to go to King Henry the 8th's Palace (Kensington Court) and look around- it was SOO beautiful and the gardens were unreal. It made me want to start watching the Tudors on HBO - I took a couple of photos and will be posting those up soon.  The family I am staying with also has a bunch of parties this and next week so I have been able to go to those. I went to my first Pub last night for a drink! very exciting ... except its not what I would imagine a pub to be like- it was much nicer then I expected. Also they are so behind here on all of our TV shows and Movies .. which is so weird. Movies that are almost out on DVD in the states are just coming into the theater's here. Im going to need to start saying Spoiler Alert before I talk about any movie or show. 

hmm ok funny stories-
so I went to take a shower the other morning and they told me they gave me a towel in my room (which I later found) but all I could find in my room was this little towel about the size of a bath mat .. and I was like hmm this must be european or something. so I showered with this small thing and then later after  was dressed and ready found the normal towel. haha just keeping things interesting


I hadn't met the son until thursday night when he came into my room to tell me that he had crashed my car (which btw I STILL haven't learned how to drive ... and doesn't look like I will until next week!) I guess he was trying to get to the gas station and ran out of gas and on manual car's the car shuts off when you have no more gas and therefore the breaks dont work- needless to say he ended up running into a tree. So they have been having problems getting my insurance to begin with, and this incident definitely does not help the matter. So when I go to that course next week I have to carpool with 2 other LDO's .. but It doesnt look like I will have a phone either. The son has been using my phone since his broke a couple of months ago I guess and he lost the sim card for it so it cant be used right now. Basically nothing is working out right now lol I am going to be the girl with a notepad getting peoples numbers next week haha


I did have a lacrosse practice I guess you could call it on Friday and it went really well. The girls seemed really enthusiastic and their stick skills were not to bad- I am really looking forward to getting into lacrosse full swing. Paul (my boss/host father) also said that he has been getting emails about how much the girls liked it so I am really happy about that.


That's it for  now! Miss you all! xx

well, im going to be a tea addict before halloween ... going on my 4th cup today and its 5..

First Day in England

Hello Hello to everyone,

Well its my first full day in England and I am still feeling a little jet lagged. Yesterday was a bit long but no complaints as all of my luggage, etc. made it here in one piece. My host family is super nice and has made me feel right at home. I am all unpacked and just trying to get odds and ends set up. I am going to try and post like once a week so everyone can know what I am up to . (ie once I get brave enough to get in the car- once its insured - and tackle driving on the other side of the car on the other side of the road) Hopefully I will have some good stories to share.. however its me, so I am sure I will!

 I wish everyone could be here with me!  love to all