In the summer time when the weather is... cold?

I'm going to start this blog with a fun story. This is part of the reason I want to live in Scotland the rest of my life.

So Clay got a bike for his 30th birthday. Lots of our friends and family chipped in to help us buy him a great bike since we walk everywhere and don't have a car here in St Andrews. So we started looking for something for me on the CHEAP. Gumtree had proven unsuccessful, even though I contacted several people about bikes that they said would 'fit a small human.' So when I finally found a great bike for £10 in Leven, just south of us in Fife, I jumped on the opportunity.

After some emails and phone calls, Clay and I caught the X58 bus to Leven and met John, the son of the guy selling us the bike. He chatted with us for a few minutes, telling us we were the first Americans he had EVER met, and then handed over the bike. When he asked how we were getting it back without a car, we told him we would just take it on the bus. He said, "Well, you have my number, so if you can't take it on the bus with you, call me and I'll drive you to St Andrews."

WHAT. I love this country.

Leven

Sunset on the Old Course at 9:30pm!

So it's almost the end of May, and pseudo-summer is on its way. I say 'pseudo' because it never gets over 70 degrees. I think the high over the next 10 days is 63? That's like never-ending springtime. I haven't seen 80+ degrees since August 13, 2013 (that's when I moved here). The sun comes up at 4:33am and goes down at 9:43pm, with the sky still kinda blue at 10:45pm.

March/April/May has been fun. In March, uveitis came back in full force, but lucky for me, the NHS is STILL FREE. For everyone who says it's difficult to get an appointment because of free healthcare: I called them at 3:00pm on Sunday afternoon, and was in and out of the Dr. Vallance's office by 11:00am the next morning, and a sweet Scottish man gave me a free cup of coffee in the waiting room. I have a follow-up in July, but I'm pretty sure this most recent flare up disconnected some of my scar tissue cause now I can see a teensy bit better than before. BOOM.

April was fun. I spent the month raising money for Clay's 30th birthday bike, which was a huge success. I started watching Downton Abbey which was a glorious mistake. I have taken on some new responsibilities at work, one of which involves training and I absolutely hate it. I always feel like a weirdo trying to train people how to do things, and end up giggling a lot and them looking like a deer in headlights. This makes my masters degree in education especially ironic.

Sometimes my work makes me feel like this.

Other times, it makes me feel like this. And yes, a professional took this.

May's been good. We had a weekend away with church, which was basically like extended Home Group time. Blankets, no shoes, and shenanigans. We learned a new card game, Lauren dominated everyone, and then Clay and Gavin had a paper ball fight and a snuggle. It was a really really good time.

snuggle time.

Jasper and Quentin at home.

Jasper and Quentin at the weekend away... exactly the same.

And now May is almost over. It's still cold and rainy some days (one of those days being today) but it makes the sun especially nice. Clay and I went for a nice bike ride to Tentsmuir Forest, rode around on what can only be described as a roller coaster bike path through a forest, and then saw some seals out on the beach.

Also, today is our 5th anniversary! What have we done today? Absolutely nothing. We have plans for dumpster diving (because I've already found a Microsoft Surface Tablet in the trash?) and then some dinner, where we will finally have the 5th Anniversary conversation to decide that we're still not having kids yet.

Lastly, I want to tell you about something cute that they do in Scotland. Whenever something is found on the sidewalk/pavement or in the street, people pick it up and put it somewhere prominent in hopes that the owner will come back by and find it. I can't tell you how many hats and socks and baby gloves I've seen on people's front gates or on fences. This one was particularly exciting.

Carm

A Christmas Holiday in 3 Parts: Act III

Well, here we are. The last week in the States.

We spent the night with my grandparents again in East Point, watching football, and sleeping late. They bought us breakfast Monday at Cracker Barrell. GRITS.

That night, we continued our tradition of Farm Burger with Katie and Gabe Mick in Buckhead. I just love the story of my friendship with Katie. We found each other on this random roommate search engine in early 2005 while preparing to start at the University of Georgia in the Fall. We met randomly in person at the Laser Show at Stone Mountain, decided we would be roommates, and then lived together for exactly 4 months before I quit UGA and moved to Florida. Now, any normal person would expect us not to be friends anymore. But Katie stuck with me, and we visited each other every year, either in Suwanee or Florida or New Orleans, and were in each other's weddings. I am so so lucky to call her friend. And BONUS, Gabe and Clay get along.

Tuesday, we had dinner with Brent and Kate and CORA! The last time we saw them was our last night in Georgia at our last Braves game before we moved to Scotland. It was so great reconnecting with them, and they gave us hope for when we eventually become parents (whenever that may be in the distant future).

Wednesday we had ANOTHER great burger at Five Guys with Mr. Dad, and then went to Bethlehem to see Mels and Manda and get my hair cut. Nothing like some good sister time and a much-needed haircut.

Thursday, we had some lunch and then saw Josh Stewart, who is still alive, and has a job, a dog and a girlfriend. But he's still the same grumpy old man.

Friday, Sam and I drove to McDonough to see Kellie. Now, these two are another of my favorite friend stories. I met Sam at church in 2003 and she introduced me to Kellie. Somehow, we all stayed friends despite me moving to UGA, then to Florida, then to Nola, then to SCOTLAND! But they are a testament to how blessed I am to have friends who communicate better than I do. Sadly, there were no pictures taken. But here's a throwback so you get the idea.

Friday night was like high school all over again. We got besties Jeff and Clay back together, we ate some Krispy Kremes, we went by the Elam's, and spent the night with the Ritchies. Our last full day in the States started with Chick-fil-A breakfast and Mario Kart. We couldn't ask for more perfect friends.

Saturday night, we had the traditional Rowe family dinner (plus a Turner!) and then it was church Sunday, back to East Point to all-too-briefly see my Aunt Joni and Aunt Robin, and then head back to Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta Baby Girl International Airport. Oh, but not before Melody made me cry, as I'm getting in the car, so then I was weeping uncontrollably at the international terminal while hugging my grandparents and saying goodbye. As I thanked them for everything they had done for us for this trip, my Granama held my hands and said, "Carmen. God is taking care of you." How true.

I was taking funny pictures to try to stop crying.
Clay was not impressed.

We got business class again on the way back to Scotland, and I COULD say that nothing eventful happened... except around 10pm EST/3am GBT, CLAY NOTICED TIM HOWARD ON OUR FLIGHT BEHIND ME IN BUSINESS CLASS. I noticed him too, but not because I knew who he was, but because he had a long, homeless looking beard and I was hoping that Clay wouldn't get any ideas. When we landed in Manchester around 8am, Clay grabbed me and whispered, "TIM HOWARD IS WALKING BEHIND YOUUUUUU!" so I sneakily took photos of them walking together like they were best friends. Clay was ecstatic. We had a cuppa before catching the trains back to St A.

Oh, you know. Clay and his new best friend Tim Howard walking together.

Clay looks like he just saw a murder.

Getting off the plane this time around felt completely different. We knew where we were going, how to get there, and we weren't terrified of people finding out we were Americans. All in all, a good three weeks, but we were happy to be back to real life...

TAKE HIS BRAIN!

Carm

A Christmas Holiday in 3 Parts - Act II

We spent the second week in the States in New Orleans. Now, NOLA holds a special place in our hearts. It's where some of our best friends live. It's where we spent the first 3 years of our marriage, where we worked in our first church, where we got our Masters Degrees, and where we developed our love for Mardi Gras.

Atlanta is home, but NOLA is special.

Jackson Square!

We made the long drive from Atlanta to NOLA, and reconnected with John and Lauren. They were the amazing friends that graciously let us live with them for the last almost 4 months that we lived in NOLA, after the seminary kicked us out of married housing and we had nowhere else to go. Since we've been gone, Trindon is almost 4, and a bit more calm than the crazy 2 year old we left in 2013. They have also added a fourth member to their family, Sweet Caroline, and they are all so precious to us.

Caroline!

Pretty sure there were some sappy girl tears
shed during the fireworks just before this!

A few days later, we met up with Matt and Elise, and did all the usuals: Pizza Delicious, Faubourg, Pearl Wine Co., New Years lighting things on fire on the Bayou, grilling and playing Mexican Train. We even legit sat around an entire day and just watched football. It was magical. We made our way into the French Quarter as well, and enjoyed balmy 75F/25C degree weather, wearing shorts and no socks... IN JANUARY.

It's so funny how different this was than what I expected. I thought everything would be different: our friends have moved on and made other close friends, our friends with kids have had MORE KIDS, everyone's growing up. But it was almost like we had never left. Our friendships are just as strong, we still laugh hysterically together about the same stuff, and we still love each other so much. I love this.

I'm always terrified of losing people. I'm awful at keeping in touch because my ADD brain only sees the people here now and what's going on right here. With the way technology is now, I can skype or facetime or facebook, or text, or tweet everyone in my life, and yet, I neglect this. I've always felt like I deserved to lose friendships because I'm so terrible, and yet, they continue to love me, and continue to put forth effort to keep in touch. This is huge and I can't even begin to describe how blessed I feel because of it.

This may look like Scotland, but don't let it fool you.
Those are Kentwood cows!

We spent our last day in Louisiana in Kentwood at The Lord's Church. I cannot tell you the amount of love that we have for this place. We relate so much of our Scotland lives to our Kentwood lives. Country people really are the same no matter where you are. And our TLC family loves us like no other. Over the years, we've heard so many horror stories about ministry work from people we've known through seminary and beyond. Church people are not always the best people to work with. But we were blessed to have an amazing church family, who loved us despite the fact that we were far away and that Clay threw their children into garbage cans and wrestled them to the ground. This place and these people are so special to us!


After church, we trucked it back up to Atlanta in Little Yaris. Only 1 week left to go!

Tom Maloney - a great boss who, despite his happy face in this photo,
was ready to go hunting and said he 'needed to go kill something.'

Carm

A Christmas Holiday in 3 Parts - Act I

Well, y'all, I wrote 3 blogs about our trip back to America, and I just didn't post them for some reason. It's nearly April, so I guess it's time for me to talk about how it was...

IT WAS FANTASTIC!

As you probably know, we went home for the first time in 16 months and made our grand journey all around the South in the States, trying to soak up as much America as we could. It all started with a 26 hour journey/wait for the flight.

I got a great deal on a off-peak train from Leuchars to Manchester. I was pretty proud of myself, keeping an eye on ticket prices, and buying it like 16 weeks in advance saving us around £180. Unfortunately, "off-peak" in this situation meant leaving Leuchars at 7:47pm, arriving at Manchester Airport at 4:00am. No big deal, right? I can sleep anywhere, right?

UGH. I slept on the 1st train to York. I slept on the 2nd train to Manchester. I slept sprawled out in Terminal 2, waiting for the Delta desk to open at 6:00am (while some Christmas Critters got dressed behind me? see photo attached). I slept at the gate waiting for the plane. I remember brushing my teeth in the bathroom at the airport and looking like someone threw olive oil in my hair and then stomped on my face.

BUT. We got Business class! Perks of flying stand-by (and my grandmother being an amazing former employee of Delta Airlines). So began an 8 hour flight. Other than eating a 4-course meal, watching Elf and Tommy Boy and Parks and Recreation, and having a "Warm Cookie Break" halfway through the flight, it was pretty uneventful.

I wasn't kidding about that warm cookie break!!

Got to Atlanta around 3:00pm EST and so it began. My parents picked us up from the airport, and I finally got all the hugs that I wanted. We ate Chick-fil-A at the original Dwarf House in Hapeville, and I could have cried from all of the joy that I felt in my heart.

Mels, Truett, and Moo

 And so began the whirlwind week.
Christmas Eve/Day with the Rowes.
25th - To Melody's in Bethlehem to take a billion pictures in matching sock monkey pajamas.

26th - Breakfast with Grandparents and Aunt Carla. Marietta with the Turners. ALL of the Turners (even the ones in Indonesia!). Like my childhood all over again.

27th - We ate two meals with the Stepps in two of our favorite restaurants: Fox Brother's BBQ and Farm Burger, two amazing meals that are impossible to duplicate in the UK.

28th - Church with my parents and grandparents, then Natalie's birthday party in Walnut Grove.

29th - Breakfast with my parents, and then off to NOLA!

Are you dizzy yet? We were. We. did. not. stop. Usually, these kinds of trips last about a week, and we're used to that. Make sure we see everyone we want to see in a tiny amount of time. But 3 weeks? and with jet lag? It was going to be interesting...

Carm

I am the WORST

So, guess who is making me blog again this time?

Of course it's Peny Turner. I think her exact words were, "So... you've got all this time to blog for your job but you CAN'T EVEN UPDATE YOUR OWN BLOG??"

I imagine Peny is making the same face as this snarky golf club topper.

(If you'd like to see my work blog, check it out here: Ardgowan Hotel Blog)

Lots has happened since I last updated you on my life. It is now December, which means cold, dark days. The sun now comes up at 8:39am and goes down at 3:34pm. I'm not even kidding. The sun barely comes up, is directly in front of the window at Reception pointing INTO MY EYES around noon, and then conveniently ducks back down behind the trees around 2:00pm. Romantic sunset at 2:00pm people. The struggle is real.

Other than that, Clay has finally matriculated (as of LAST WEEK?) and we've got most things settled... in December. What a ridiculous ride this has been! What has even happened the last few months??

The Lade Braes in October!

September and October were absolutely beautiful. I think one day, I actually wore shorts. ONE DAY! And I remember saying to myself, "I better actually wear shorts once this year, just to say that I did. Otherwise, my life is too ridiculous."

I've lived most of my life from March to November in shorts. Oh, Scotland.

In October, Clay got to legit speak words to Bill Murray, I got hit on by a grown up French guy, and we drove around Fife trying to find a cow for me to touch. In November, we drove as far north as we've ever been, to the base of the Highlands in Pitlochry, and drove around looking at lochs and sheep and cows.

Standing in someone's sheep field! RIGHT TO ROAM!

This is how far north we got!

Life has been good. I'm enjoying my job, we're enjoying our friends, and we're exploring more around Scotland. God is definitely using this time to stretch us. We're learning to live on less, and it's been frustrating but much needed - character-building even. I have a job that I love, that pays us to live without me killing myself, and we are living on less than half of our income from the States and we're fine.

I'm not gonna lie, I spent a lot of pity parties over the last year and a half being bitter about how other American St Mary's students can have kids and no jobs, and still seem to have all this money to go buy cars and go to Spain and travel home every 6 months, and yes, I'd love to live that life, but that's not where we are now.

These cows don't care that I don't have any money!

All of that being said, we are skimpy on Christmas presents this year. We've bought ourselves new boots (with no holes!) and decided we're going to get a projector for our living room. After the all-day Harry Potter Marathon last month, we decided life would be more fun with a giant TV screen on one of our massive walls. Especially when we have our Lord of the Rings marathon in January... and so we can watch The Walking Dead on a giant screen!

So, if you'd like anything special from Scotland, please let us know. Otherwise, you're just getting Rowes for Christmas. No seriously. I keep having these moments of panic, thinking about disappointing people who will be expecting us to bring them goodies from Scotland. If you're expecting anything from us when we come home,  please ask for it.

If I could bring you Jasper in a field, I totally would!

Oh yeah, and we're coming home in A WEEK! I still can't believe it. I'm getting 3 weeks off from work (Scotland makes sure everybody gets paid vacation, y'all) and we're bussing to Leuchars, training to Manchester, and flying to Atlanta. It will surely be a great Christmas. I will be sure to document in pictures with Moo.


So, I always leave with a funny story. So here goes: Whenever we walk to get groceries, we pass the Kinnessburn, which is a little river that runs all over St Andrews and empties into the North Sea. It runs alongside this little path called the Lade Braes (which is beautiful ALL THE TIME). There's a little bridge we have to cross (which is pictured up at the top of this post) and I always look out at the Kinnessburn whenever I walk across it and think about Jurassic Park 2 when that one guy gets eaten by all those tiny dinosaurs on that little river while his buddy is listening to Mexican Restaurant music in his headphones.

**Insert pterodactyl sound here**

Wait! Here's a video of my boss sucking a giant Scotland Spider into this fancy contraption called a Bugzooka.

Ok, Now I'm done.

Carm

Bah-dee-ah! Dancin' in September!

This month always makes me sing Earth Wind and Fire.

I'll start with the most important things. For those of you who haven't shared in my constant worry that we were going to be shipped back to America, consider yourselves lucky. I pretty much operate on a worst-case-scenario basis, where the world is going to end for some reason or another, and even if things are good, there is always something that my brain will worry about and try to plan for. Clay turned in his dissertation back in August and then we knew we would have to wait until October before we found out if he met the requirements for his conditional PhD offer. Lucky for us, we received unofficial word that we are going to be here for the long haul.

we were going on an adventure!

So what does that mean now? Well, for starters, we need to get Clay's marks in October, get that pesky confirmation of acceptance number from the University and then (very quickly) apply for loans and visas because... WE'RE COMING HOME FOR CHRISTMAS! (as I'm typing this, I am envisioning myself as Kermit the Frog and how excited he gets and waves his hands around. You should imagine me like that too).

It's been over a year now since we've been home. A year since we've seen our friends and family. A year since I've driven a car and eaten Chick-fil-A. I am so excited I can barely stand it. I can't wait to hug everybody. You have no idea. I am going to cry for 3 solid weeks hugging every single person I've wanted to hug for the last year.

We make the same faces!

SO - Christmas! The Ardgowan Hotel has graciously given me 3 weeks off, and I could not be more grateful for my amazing reception team for allowing me to do this! We'll be leaving (hopefully) a few days before Christmas and then staying through the 1st week in January. Gotta work out all the flight plans with my lovely grandparents and then start making plans to see EVERYBODY! If you want anything from the UK let us know and we will stuff a suitcase FULL of stuff for you!

Times are good people. Really good. Even if the days are now officially less than 12 hours long. The sun is going down at 6:55pm. I can't tell you how sad this makes me. When I get up in the morning now, it's dark! But on the plus side, there's an owl in our yard and I get to hear him at dawn and dusk. He sounds like a teeny tiny little hooty owl. I wonder if he will bring me letters from Hogwarts?

There also may be an opportunity that I may meet some celebrities this week. There's a golf tournament called the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship happening, and it's basically pros versus amateurs, which turns into celebrities. In previous years, Samuel L Jackson, Michael Phelps, Hugh Grant, and Michael Douglas have competed. The person that Clay and I are hoping shows up, however, is Bill Murray. I've heard too many stories of his shenanigans in St Andrews, and we are going to try to find him this week.

Lastly, I'll tell you something hilarious that I do that my parents absolutely love. So, we live in St Andrews, right? The Birthplace of Golf? The home of the Old Course? Well, on the St Andrews Links website, they have a live camera feed of various places around the Old Course, including the Swilcan Bridge, which is the famous bridge where EVERYBODY gets their picture taken. (You saw the picture of Bill Murray and Michael Phelps up there, right?)

Well, I told my parents about this webcam, and then made the mistake of walking down on the bridge while they were looking at it. I guess it became more real when they realized they could not only FaceTime me, but also simultaneously watch me DANCE (at their command) on the Swilcan Bridge in front of God and everybody while they watched from Florida. I guess it's good proof for their friends that yes, I do indeed live in the Birthplace of Golf.

So if anyone wants to watch me dance on the Swilcan Bridge in front of strangers, please let me know and I'll be happy to oblige.

That's all for now!

Carm

Summer in Scotland

You know how sometimes you get so caught up in life that you forget to do things like blog so your mom will be happy?

Many thanks to Peny Turner, AGAIN, for gently encouraging me to update my blog and keep everyone in the loop.

Last you heard, I was leaving Mitchell's and beginning a new journey at the Ardgowan Hotel as their Reservations and Marketing Manager. I can tell you with 100% confidence now that I was crafted by God for the customer service industry. Throughout my time in restaurant management, I was constantly torn between absolutely hating it and loving it so much that I couldn't leave. It's hard to explain, but those who love serving people can probably sympathize with me. 

I thought for the longest time that I wanted a desk job - completely the opposite of managing a restaurant. Nobody to bother me, I could just plug away at my work and be done with it. With this new change of pace though, I've realized that I really just love customer service... and at the Ardgowan, I can have both. I can sit at a desk and I can run around doing things for people. I can serve and help people, but not at the expense of my sanity.

Not only do I absolutely love my job, but I have been able to help all kinds of people from all over the world. I've met the President Emeritus from the University of Georgia, and he "called the dawgs" with me (and hopefully, secured Clay a job after PhD). I've met the owner of Taco Mac in Atlanta. I've been able to help parents from all over the US feel at ease about dropping their 18 year old freshmen off in a foreign country thousands of miles away. I get to pretend that I have connections with restaurants to get groups of golfers reservations on a Friday night. And I feel like, unlike when I worked in a restaurant, people really appreciate when I go above and beyond.

Let's be honest, nobody respects you when you work in a restaurant. I had a Masters Degree, 7 years of experience, and was making more than most teachers when I finished at Chick-fil-A, and still, people looked at me like "that poor girl. she probably couldn't do any better." Like, somehow, I had made a wrong life decision along the way and ended up at a restaurant because it was the only job that would have me. Some people just love to serve, and that's why I stayed for so long. 

But all of that aside, things are good here at Castle Rowe. Clay has a week before he turns in his dissertation, and then we pray and pray and pray that he gets the marks to send him on to PhD. He has been getting lots of positive feedback from his supervisor, and he slowly feels better and better about it. We I go through waves of confidence and terror, and the great thing about it all is that we won't find out if he got the marks until about a month after his PhD starts. Yeah, I know. It doesn't make sense. But then that leaves us with a very short amount of time to find the money to reapply for visas and student loans. Have I mentioned the exchange rate is terrible right now?

I know I know. God is going to take care of us. He's done it over the past year and he'll continue to do it. Did you know a year ago today, we got on a plane and came to Scotland? We didn't have phones, we didn't know where we were going to live, we didn't even have directions from the Manchester airport to St Andrews. We just got on a plane and ended up here. It still blows my mind that we actually live in Scotland. 

Tomorrow, we have reservations at Maisha, the Indian restaurant where we ate our first jet-lagged and hangry meal in St Andrews. I'd say the last year has been crazy and great.

our living room with furniture, finally

July was literally the sunniest and warmest I've ever seen Scotland be, but August has brought rain and shorter days. Hurricane Bertha was nice enough to scoot on by the UK, making it rainy and windy, reminding us that 1) we can never escape hurricanes, and 2) winter is coming. Scotland tricks us with long, sunny summer days, to the point where we aaaaaaaaalmost forget how bad the winter was. It's coming. 

New Park, our little "neighborhood," never ceases to amaze me. When we first moved in, we loved the colors of the trees around the house, then as winter moved on, you could see the hills beyond the trees and watch the haar roll in over them. As the sun came out in the spring, the whole yard was full of daffodils and now, we have blackberries beginning to ripen. We found an old abandoned stairway leading from the back of the property down to the Lade Braes, and I can't help but wonder what this place looked like in it's prime over 80 years ago. 

    

a nice place to put a chair and creep on people walking down the Lade Braes!

Here's hoping the next year in Scotland is just as good as the first!

I'll leave you with a picture of what Clay would look like if he had (my) hair and was a hipster worship leader. I can't believe he sat there and let me take pictures of this. 

 Carm