Our Days in the UK

Yesterday I took the kids to the Great Western Railway Museum in Swindon, about an hours away from us. The first triumph was finding it, after only two wrong turns and no minor or major accidents :) We all enjoyed it--they did a great job intermingling facts and information with fun and games, so both kids had a good time even though only one of my kids is train-obsessed. Here we are getting ready to make a run for the entrance (it was pouring rain and we only had one umbrella...rookie mistake here in the UK!)  There is the museum off in the distance. It's in the old Great Western Railway Works building complex. Until 1986 they manufactured locomotives, carriages, and lots of other railway things here. Inside, putting together a model wooden railcar. Finished product! I was impressed by the high quality of the building materials they had for this. Walking underneath one of the old steam locomotives to see how it all worked. (I couldn't figure it out, but so...

We're finally settled enough to take pictures of the inside of our house without me tripping over boxes in the attempt. The cottage has been here since the mid-19th century, with a lean-to added on in 1963 when indoor plumbing came to the village. It's semi-detached, meaning we share one wall with neighbors. Fortunately the walls here are really thick, so unlike in our American condo, we can't hear a thing! Anyway, without further ado, here is our house from the inside: Standing at our front door looking in, the first thing you see is our big chest freezer. (Doesn't everyone put their chest freezer right in the middle of the kitchen and dining room?) Our dining table is in what used to be the fireplace but has been plastered over. (If this were our house, I would unplaster it!) Looking to the right from this same position you can see our kitchen area, with oven, laundry machine (which also serves as a condenser dryer), and sink. Some modern houses have utility ...

Last weekend as we walked through the neighboring village of Bourton-on-the-Water, we stopped in at the Model Railway Museum and Store. In addition to lots of cool model railways (we will go back for a longer look later!) they had a small section in front with other toys, including some stuffed poodles on leashes. Rebecca decided she needed a new stuffed animal, but I insisted she has plenty. I turned to my friend and said, "You should see how many stuffed animals Rebecca has at home." Both my friend and the lady behind the counter who overheard me looked a little perplexed. I immediately knew I had stumbled upon another divergence between American and English. "That isn't what you call them, is it?" Both shook their heads. "Well, what would you call stuffed animals, then?" The lady behind the counter replied, "Soft toys. If you say stuffed animals, it makes us think of taxidermy..." No wonder they looked at me strangely when I to...

When we moved here from Boston we knew we wanted a more rural living situation, so instead of looking for houses in Oxford, we looked in areas surrounding the train lines into Oxford. We ended up in the beautiful Cotswolds. Our little village would definitely be considered rural, although now most people aren't in really rural occupations anymore. It's a rather expensive rural area, popular amongst wealthy Londoners looking for a weekend retreat. Nonetheless, there are plenty of working farms around here, and we have lots of sheep and horses dotting the hills around our village. Sometimes, though, we still hit traffic when we're heading out of town: Probably hard to see from the bad smartphone pictures in the passenger seat, but we definitely see as many horses as cars driving around here. It's fun to hear the clip clop of the horses hooves going by so frequently because it makes me feel like I'm in the eighteenth century (or in Amish country)...

Yesterday was Mothering Sunday here in the UK. We didn't realize it until Saturday night, so we didn't do much to prepare, but it turns out we had a lovely day anyway. We went to our church in Cheltenham in the morning, and the youth gave every woman a box of chocolates. Then we went on a family walk later in the day and I got posies. More on how that happened later, but first, the story of how we learned about Mothering Sunday... On Saturday the kids and I went to the neighboring village of Bourton-on-the-Water to go for a walk with some new friends we met at the library. As we toured the village, we passed the village church. Every little village here has an old stone church, most of them at least five or six hundred years old, some of them even older. As we passed by, a woman saw us pause in front and beckoned us inside. We went inside and looked around at the beautiful paintings and altar, and then I saw a sign posted that said something about Mothering Sunday. We h...

As home educators, the library is as important as the grocery store to our family! (Maybe even more important? I guess we have to eat, but the library ranks right up there.) Before we had gotten settled, before our stuff arrived from the States, before we had even written a proper grocery list, I ordered a library card and we checked out the local library. The closest one is in Stow-on-the-Wold. It is in a beautiful old building that also serves as the Tourist Information Center and has various meeting rooms on upper floors. In the entrance there is a display of old armor and weapons from the area. Here is a bad picture from the parking lot (I mean, car park) after the thought when I realized I hadn't taken a photo from the outside. Excuse the roof of our car in the foreground. The building is in the central square of Stow, right across from the post office/news shop and our favorite bakery. Inside the library, they have a nice children's room, which houses quite a f...