When the Cat's Away

Our landlord and his wife, whose house is attached to ours, have the most beautiful flowers and vegetable garden. We don't wander into their yard unless invited, but I definitely admire it on each and every walk up our massive driveway. We also have a nice view of their veg patch from the loft upstairs. Here's the front yard...

When I see this, I know I'm almost home.

All of these roses are growing on one stem. Can you believe that?

Anyway, they have been on a Scandinavian cruise for the past 10 days. Before they left, we went to their house for a barbecue, and they showed us and some of their friends around their garden. They told us to come over and pick anything we wanted while they were away. Well, that's all it took!

We had a lot of their amazing veg for dinner last night. Homegrown produce tastes like store bought the stuff... except the intensity is multiplied by 10. I said, "I think this is what fill-in-the-blank (carrots, peas, tomatoes) are supposed to taste like!"

Here's my small basket of yesterday's pickin's. 

Oops! I forgot the parsley. There's broccoli, snap peas, tomatoes, and an onion in there.

And one broad bean. 

I also picked some of one of my favorite flowers - sweet peas. One whiff and I'm back at my Senior prom. I made my own bouquet of sweet peas for the occasion from the sweet peas in the Pearsey's back yard. Gosh, they were amazing. I think I may have mentioned this before...

Roses

Hydrangeas remind me of summers in Atlanta.

Here are some pictures of their garden.

I think this is a plum tree. They're not ripe yet.

This is an apple tree. They're definitely not ripe yet, but they're on their way!

Oooh! A pear tree! A baby pear!

I picked this apple, but I have yet to taste it.

They have four raised beds with so much good stuff in them: onions, leeks, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, broad beans, snap peas, strawberries, lettuces, dill, coriander, parsley, and other things I can't remember.

Here's another view. Isn't it beautiful! They work so hard in it all the time.

Here are their greenhouses. Lovely.

Here's a view of our barn from their garden. That window up top is Nathan's study loft.

The North Barn has been such a wonderful place to live. I'm going to miss it. 

Leave a comment and get entered in the latest contest. A winner will be announced Tuesday, August 2nd!

A Missed Milestone

Two days ago marked two years with the insulin pump. Remember when I first got it? Crazy. To "celebrate," I went to the endocrinologist yesterday thinking I was going to get a continuous glucose monitor (CGM), but of course, the NHS had other plans. Quick tutorial in the form of an analogy:

finger pricker blood tester thingy : CGM :: snapshot : movie

On my way up to the hospital, I was both happy and nervous to get the CGM, even if only on loan for just two weeks. There was the new technology to learn, the fact that there would be yet another machine to be attached to, and probably obsessive looking at the line graph on the pump as my CGM told it how my sugar was doing every five minutes. But I was still excited. It was more information, which was what I wanted after a few weeks of unexplained highs and more than a few unwanted lows, especially after exercise. 


Side note: For the past week or so, I've been running consistently and following my training schedule for a 10K on September 11th. This is an act of God. It will be an absolute miracle if I can keep it up until then. Having an exercise buddy has helped immensely, as well as going bananas with a fitness inspiration board on Pinterest. End side note.


I arrived at the hospital - which, as I mentioned before, looks like a psych ward from a 60s horror film - and after chatting with the doctor, a nurse, and a dietitian for about 15 minutes (three on one!), I finally asked, "So, am I going to get a CGM today?" No. I was on a waiting list. How long was the waiting list? No one really knew. It was based on priority. People with priority had poor hypoglycemic awareness. Just down from there were people who had really poor control. I didn't (thankfully) have either of those. I don't think I'll ever get one while we live here, to be honest. But if not getting one means that I have good numbers and hypoglycemic awareness, I'm okay with that. I'm just a little bummed.


At least I got a picture of the filing cabinets with post-it notes on them. It's less funny now than it was yesterday, for some reason.

In other missed milestone news, I've quietly moved past 500 posts. There are a few unpublished ones jumbled up in there, and the grand total is 504, so I'm guessing that this is about 500. Yay! Let's make this official and have a contest! I don't know what the prize will be yet, but if you leave a comment on any post between now and August 1st, I'll get you something nice, or at least blow you a kiss from England. Especially if you've never posted a comment before.

Katy, Texas?

Wilmington, North Carolina?

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan?

Baltimore, Maryland?

Oxnard, California?

Whittier, California?

Argentina?

New Zealand?

I see you.

Who are you?

Thanks for reading so faithfully.

Our First English Wedding

This last Saturday we had the privilege of attending our first English wedding. James and Lou, friends from church, were married. It was such a beautiful wedding! The weather could not have been nicer, and we enjoyed scones and tea out on the lawn after the ceremony.

I was a bit stressed beforehand because, just like at Easter, the dress I had picked out for the wedding was totally see through! My sister picked out from Target and sent to me for my birthday, but I was saving it to wear for something special. I just put on tights underneath it, for which I am grateful, because it was pretty cold inside the stone church.

I also wondered about my lack of a hat or a fascinator. It was fine... There were a few there, but not even the bride's mother wore a hat, so I didn't feel out of place.

Waiting for the wedding to start

He's in a suit and tie in July, and he's not sweating!

The bride and her father walking down the aisle

Hilariously, this guy jumped in our picture with the bride and groom.

Congratulations!

We were so honored to be among the guests there. Thanks James and Lou!

Birthday Brunch

Last Friday, I made a birthday brunch for Nathan. As I was chopping some bell peppers to throw into the scrambled eggs, I noticed that this one looked like a familiar horror movie character, or my brother-in-law. Good thing it didn't taste scary.

This is our friend, Kristine. You might recognize her from our walk on the beach. She came to celebrate Nathan's birthday with us over birthday brunch. I made blueberry muffins (an American box mix), eggs, and fruit.

This is us with our food. Yes, I hijacked Nathan's birthday pull-over, his gift from my parents. It's just so comfy and it smells like him.

Winnie Looks Surprised

Maybe she's shocked that June is kissing her instead of putting stickers on her head.

Celebrating at Barnard Castle

For Nathan's birthday, the two of us took a trip to Barnard Castle, which is only about 35 minutes away in the car. We spent the afternoon in the sensory garden quoting Brian Regan's butterfly pavilion bit, exploring the castle grounds, drooling in a theology used book store (okay, that was just Nathan), and counting bunnies on the lawn. Then we finished off the day at Pizzi's, an Italian place in Durham. It was our first dinner out at a restaurant - just the two of us - since December, and it was really nice. The next day we were back on the Dave Ramsey train, and I bought a 10 lb. bag of rice at Tesco. They don't sell dried beans in bulk, but I would have if they did.

We started out at Barnard Castle in the sensory garden. 

I didn't sense much, really.

"I'll be here to answer all of your butterfly questions, today."

Nathan decided to do a handstand, but I snapped the photo a little too late.

And then he started seeing stars.

Success!

Overlooking a big ditch

Castle ruins

We're at the top of the tower!

We ended up having our picnic lunch at the top because my sugar was low, but it led to this fun episode.

The view from the top

Back at the bottom

Isn't the birthday boy so handsome?

He decided this background called for some planking.

And then he decided to push the wall over.

We sat on a park bench and watched rabbits come out of the bushes. We counted 11 at once!

Do you see 11 rabbits? Me neither. But I promise there were...

Here's the happy customer with his used theology books. The shop stayed open an extra hour for him so that he could browse.

An artsy shot

Happy birthday again to my husband! You can check out his sister Hannah's blog for pictures of the birthday boy as a baby, most of which I'd never seen before. I loved them!


You can also count how many times I used the word "decided" in this post. Geez.

He's As Old As Jesus

Happy birthday to my husband and my love, Nathan! Today he turns 33, the same age as Jesus when he left the earth in bodily form. :)

To celebrate on the blog, I thought I would put together a montage of pictures he's taken with his arm outstretched and his mouth wide open. I hope you enjoy this year's "Classic Nathan" gallery.

And a couple more for old times' sake.

Nathan and the leaf blower circa 1993

This is our engagement picture in front of books - commentaries to be specific. Other than the additional 40 el bees between us, not much has changed. 

I love you, Nathan! Happy birthday!