whoops!

I promise I am still alive! I'm just in the middle of nature staying at a youth hostel in the lake district. I forgot to mention this, but we left on monday morning for our five day trip to the north! We have seen some awesome sights already, and I will blog all about them when I get home. I will also tell all about the happenings of last weekend.
tonight should be an interesting night staying in the woods....wish me luck!
I will be back on Friday, just in time for easter/conference weekend.#

love
Jenny

public speaking??

I'm not sure if it's my thing.


"worry is the anticipation that the outcome will be bad. faith is the anticipation that the outcome will be good. faith in christ is the understanding that whatever the outcome, it will be for our eternal good!"

Christina shared this quote with laura and me while studying scriptures a few nights ago.

I'm writing my talk right now for church, and I'm taking a one minute break to post this blog. I'm speaking about sustaining our leaders. I'm so excited for this talk because it's making me more prepared for conference. I love conference!

wish me luck with my talk tomorrow. The last time I spoke was May 2008, so I'm a little rusty. I will need all the help I can get!

oh, and I'm also singing with sarah in sacrament meeting tomorrow. We're singing in two different meetings because our accompanist, the lovely caitlin, is in the other ward. She wanted us to perform in her ward too, so it should be a busy sunday.

I'm going to have faith that my talk will go well and that I will someday figure out my life!

well, back to my talk. goodnight all you lovely people!

a beautiful day in the neighborhood...

of london town!

I can't believe how great today has been. I have loved every second of it.

First, we went as a program out to Hampton Court. Henry the 8th lived there, and he was married to Kathryn there. Did you know that Henry's diet was 75% meat? He also had six wives, and he was a crazy man. We walked around all the different parts of the palace and saw where he used to live.






My favorite part was the gardens outside. There were beautiful fountains and cute triangle trees. We saw a group of young kids running around the crazy playing games. We were inspired by them, and we all held hands and spun around in circles laughing until it hurt.



On our way to the maze, we stumbled upon beautiful fields of daffodils! I love that they grow all over England. It's such a great sight to see after all the weeks of dead plants and rain. We had a little photo shoot in the daffodils after running around the maze, singing and being crazy, and getting lost.







Then we made our way back to the train station, barely missing our train by a few minutes. We walked around down for the next half hour, and I bought a new umbrella for 6 pounds. what a deal!
We got on the next train and made our way to my favorite place to eat, borough market.



I got a kangaroo burger and a big chocolate brownie. I don't think you could find a place with more yummy foods packed into one market. I couldn't find the flapjack man, so that was kind of sad. But! we found our friend, the patte mushroom man, and tried some more samples.





On the way home, rachel and I stopped at Primark. As normal, I was overwhelmed by all the people, cute clothes, and ridiculously low prices. I know some of the stuff will fall apart soon, but how could I pass up such good deals?!

Then I came home, ate dinner, practiced my song for sunday, and then went to the National Portrait gallery. Laura came with me because she wanted to go to the national gallery (they're right by each other), and we had the funniest experience on the tube ride over.
it went kind of like this...
laura pulled this disgusted/surprised face at something she saw behind me.
I looked behind me and saw nothing in particular
I was really confused and was like "laura, whats the deal?"
I did a double take
and then I saw this man with something moving around in his jacket pocket
to my horror, it was....



a ferret! (minus the hat)
The guy started coming towards us, and he sat in the seats right across from us. I politely asked if we could snap a pic of his little friend, and he said no jokingly. We asked a few questions about the ferret and then suddenly he was handing me his furry friend. I took him into my arms (what was I thinking??), and laura snapped a few pictures. To our horror, she tried to kiss both of us with her little mouth. I gave our friend back to her owner, hoped off the tube, got hand sanitizer, and laughed my head off with laura.

At the national portrait gallery, I saw a bunch of cool paintings of past and present famous people in england. While I was looking at pics of the princes, I ran into Kellen. He walked back with me to trafalgar square, where we met laura. We looked at the beautiful fountains and then headed back home. We stopped at Marks and Spencers and tesco, looking for a treat. I found some yummy british cereal that we came back and devoured, and we made our way upstairs for bed. I got distracted by my friends watching new moon in the classroom, so I had to pop in and watch the last half.

Now here I am blogging, smiling at how happy today was. It really was a beautiful day in the neighborhood (we even sang the mr. rogers song today). I love everyone here. I love every second of my time here, even if it's spent cooped up in the classroom or our tiny dorm room. I love people. I love life.

Trials will always come into our lives, but our Savior always is there with open arms, no matter what.

I'm learning that life is all about learning to love like He does.
His love can heal anything and everything.

anyone who may be reading this, have a beautiful day!

blast from the past

I was sorting through some pics last night, and I found these treasures.




They are from when I was in Europe with my family forever ago. Little did I know that I would be back ten years later!


My camera is back in tip top shape now. Don't worry, I won't have to post anymore random old pics in an attempt to spice up my blog.
My camera battery charger was hiding in my closet, and it finally hit me today where it was. I just have silly moments where I temporarily lose my mind. But all is well now.

I had two great field trips for class today. We visited the Albert memorial statue for Civ and then the Tate britain for british literature.

I must be off to read the Iliad now. But before that, here's a great quote that my friend reesa shared at devo a few nights ago.




"The Lord doesn't expect us to work harder than we are able. He doesn't (nor should we) compare our efforts to those of others. Our Heavenly Father asks only that we do the best we can—that we work according to our full capacity, however great or small that may be."

Dieter F. Uchtdorf



sweet dreams!
xoxo

cambridge

today we went to st. albans, the cambridge american cemetery, and cambridge.
The american cemetery was a great sight to see. We joke here about wanting to be european, but I'm so thankful to be american.
I went punting with annie, michelle, jen, and liza. We had a tour of nine different colleges along the river in the sun.
I would post pictures, but my new camera charger seems to be a fluke. Maybe I will work out my issues with the battery one of these days.


I came back and skyped raquel.
you know those people who are so down to earth and real that they simply make you want to be better? they remind you that the world is a wonderful place, and that you don't need worldly possessions to be happy.

well, that is raquel.





the world could use more people like her.
love you raquelly!

I love home

I love london, but I love home just as much.

I love being at home for...




special occasions



baking with mom












old memories and new memories


and...



my room!



with sasha on my bed


I swear london is trying to tell me to go home lately! I just can't seem to stay healthy here. This place just wants to keep me sick or something. I had a little scare with the flu today. Thankfully, I do not have it!
And trying to balance school, sight-seeing, sleeping, exercising, staying healthy, blah blah blah is so hard. It causes much stress. My body is mad at me for not taking better care of it over here.

but what is there to do?! nothing.
all I can do is run around like a crazy woman trying to get everything done. I had a good chat with my dad tonight, and he told me to just relax and try my best with balancing everything.

relax.
that is a new word for me.

work hard, plan everything out, and then relax. that is my new goal!

today I went to the Sir John Soane museum. lots of crazy, random artifacts thrown together in a little flat.
I walked down to queensway with laura to get flapjacks (yummy granola bar-ish snacks). The middle eastern guy at tesco loves us. As well as the one that I bought my camera battery charger from. He asked for our numbers, and we ran away.
haha. we flatter ourselves. I know it's just because we are american!

I have to go to bed right now...I only have 24 more days of london centre. I want to make the most of my last days here.
cheers!

Queen Victoria

Today I went to the Queen's art gallery at Buckingham Palace with rachel. The display consisted of paintings and artifacts of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. The queen had this picture painted for her husband. She's wearing a locket in the painting, and the locket has some of prince albert's hair. Queen Victoria painted, sang, played the piano, and loved going to the theatre and throwing balls. She was an extremely influential monarch, especially with culture and the arts.

Rachel and I walked around Buckingham Palace before the gallery and took some pictures. My camera was having issues, so I will post rachel's later. Before going to the palace, I showed rachel V.V. Rouleux, and she fell in love! just as I expected.
We had a very classical oriented day. As if ribbon, the palace, and the art gallery weren't enough, the program bought all of us tickets to a violin recital this afternoon. It was at Wigmore concert hall, and it was beautiful.

It's so magical being here.

I'm falling asleep while listening to iron and wine right now. I think that's my cue to end this post!
goodnight world!