Welcome to England! (Sept 14&15)

There is no getting around it. If you are going to an international destination, you have to deal with a long flight. Not my favorite part of the trip, but not as terrible as I expected. We flew out of Portland, had an hour layover in Salt Lake City and then went straight through to England. It's somewhere around a 12 hour flight (all total). We left about 2pm and landed at Heathrow at 10:00 am London time, which is 2am our time. Delta did a great job with service, I might add (even the in flight meals were tasty). Thank goodness for in flight movies, a kindle and downloaded shows from Netflix!

I have to say that the view of London from the air made the whole flight seem worthwhile!!

I spotted the Tower Bridge and Tower of London!

I had heard how big Heathrow airport is and was expecting quite a process to get through customs but it was really quite easy. Hardly any line and we zipped right through! After making our way through customs, we picked up our rental car. You definitely have to feel adventuresome to get a rental car in England! We had talked a lot about transportation for our first week and decided that with all sightseeing we wanted to do we really needed to get a car. Easy for me to say as I wasn't going to be the one driving, lol! Trust me, though, being the navigator isn't so easy either.

Everything is opposite!

Driving like a pro

That first trip out of Heathrow was scary! Not only is Eric sitting on the right side of the car, but we are on the left side of the road and we immediately get to a roundabout!! Right then I wondered if we were going to get our rental car back in one piece after a week of driving?? We had a two hour drive to our hotel, on very little sleep, went through roundabout after roundabout but somehow we made it! We even had a pit stop for a bite to eat and a spot of tea along the way. An interesting thing about England is that they have "services" alongside the highway every once in a while. It could be just a gas station/mini mart, or maybe a hotel/restaurant, but often they are like big US shopping mall food courts. The place we stopped for lunch was a food court style. We ate a place called Patisserie Valerie, which is a UK chain bakery/cafe. It was here that I had my first real English tea.

We made it to our hotel dropped our bags and then went into town for a quick grocery run before passing out for the night.

First view of Rutland Water from hotel room

View from bedroom

What an awesome condo!

Planning for Adventure

For as long as I can remember I have had a fascination with England. My sister, Jennifer, and I share this love of England/London. I don't think we were a bit surprised when my sister had her DNA done and we found out our heritage is almost 95% from the UK (mostly English but some Scottish and Irish too).  We love the history, the places, the accent, the culture etc. but we had never actually been to England!  It's been our dream for a long time to go to London and especially to go together.

A couple of years ago my sister told me that she and Chris were planning to go to Europe in 2018. Her plan was to visit Edinburgh, London, Paris (her #1 destination), Belgium and Amsterdam. I am thankful that my husband got on board with us going with them so that my sis and I could see London together. As it turned out, the dates we selected would be very close to our 30th wedding anniversary, so there you go, "Happy Anniversary" to me from Eric.

After much discussion Eric and I decided that we didn't want to go to as many places as Chris and Jen (just sounded too exhausting for us), so we decided to spend our two weeks in England. As it worked out, our first week would be spent in the countryside (in hindsight, best decision ever!) and one week would be in London (where we would meet up with Chris and Jen)

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Let the planning commence! We had over a year to plan for the trip. Did I tell you I'm a planner?? Well, my sister is even more of a planner than I am! We both did a lot of research for our trip. Read articles online, read books, watched travel videos, had lots of conversations, bought travel essentials, made lists of places we wanted to check out, etc.

We even practiced our packing! Before our trip to Vegas, Eric and I decided that we were going to start traveling with carry-on only. Vegas was a trial run for me as me traveling lightly wasn't really a concept I knew very well. We bought travel backpacks and packing cubes.

Osprey FarPoint 40 backpack

Packing for two weeks wasn't actually as hard as I thought it would be. A few changes of clothes, three pairs of shoes (maybe a bit too much but I hate having sore feet when there is a lot of walking to do so I wanted to switch out), raincoat (it's England!!), puffy jacket, personal item tote bag with neck pillow, kindle, snacks for flight, iphone, travel journal and I was pretty much ready to go!

Having never been so far away from home, on such a long flight and for two weeks, I was a mixture of excitement and apprehension. Would the trip overwhelm me? Would I  be exhausted? Would I be homesick? Would England live up to my expectations? I made up my mind that I was going to think of the whole thing as an adventure...no matter what happened, it was all part of the adventure. Relax and enjoy the moment.

With those thoughts in mind, we were off across the wild blue yonder, next stop, England!

The Beginnings of Adventure

I've always been quite the homebody. I like to do little trips here and there, but never stray too far from home, and am content to go to the same places I love over and over again. Maybe it's because I'm super routine oriented, not extremely adventuresome or spontaneous and am such a planner (new places takes a lot of planning).

My husband, Eric, always says, "there are so many places to see, why do you want to keep going back to the same places (like Disneyland, lol)"? I'm not entirely sure, but I do know that over the past couple of years, I've begun to develop a little spark of adventure in my spirit. Maybe it's all the conversations with Eric about our future retirement traveling the USA in a travel trailer?? Maybe it's watching my 22 year old son see more places in two years than I have my entire life?

It started a couple of years ago when we took a week long trip to Vegas. Vegas, you're thinking?? I know, right? I had never had the desire to go to Vegas, but we were looking for somewhere warm that wasn't too expensive to get to. Vegas definitely met that criteria. We also liked the fact that we could drive to the Grand Canyon from Vegas.

We had so much fun! We loved seeing the different scenery. We hiked the Red Rocks, people watched on the Strip, gawked at the hotels and lights, saw Cirque du Soleil, drove on the old Route 66 and saw the Grand Canyon. It was awesome! And it left me with the thought that there is a huge world out there full of different cultures, architecture, landmarks, climates, etc. and I want to see more of it!

So when my sister started talking about fulfilling her lifelong dream of going to London and Paris...well, you'll have to read the next post to see where that led us!

One of my latest creations is a wrap bracelet stamped with the word “PATIENCE”. I also included a cute little turtle charm. My inspiration for this piece comes from something my youngest son said to me many years ago, “Slow and steady wins the race”. It makes me think of the story of the tortoise and the hare J

The word “patient” in the bible is often translated as “forbearance”, which simply means “holding back”. I can honestly say that it’s not in my nature to hold back (as many friends and family would agreeJ). My first response often times is to speak without thinking or be in a hurry to get my point across, which can result in me saying things based on my emotions that I later regret.

Proverbs 15:18 says, “A hot-tempered person stirs up conflict, but the one who is patient calms a quarrel” and James 1:19 says, “My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this; everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to anger”.

As I grow older and continue to walk with the Lord, I desire more and more to be one who calms a quarrel rather than stirs it up. A seed of change in my life is that I am realizing is that it is sometimes better to just say nothing than to stir up strife. If I let the peace of God reign in my heart, then that is what will come out of my mouth. I choose to practice PATIENCE.

If you are interested, you can find my “Patience” bracelet along with my other jewelry creations in my Etsy Shop, https://www.etsy.com/shop/SeedsofChangeJewelry, or check it out on FB-Seeds of Change Jewel

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“Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations; I will be exalted in the earth!” Ps. 46:10

Being still is one of the hardest things for me. I just don’t do very well being idle. I’m always on the go, my mind is always racing, thinking of the next thing on my “to do” list. Even when I am “relaxing” by watching a movie at home, I keep my hands busy by crocheting, beadwork or some other type of craft project. I guess that I am just wired to be like the energizer bunny. However, even the bunny’s batteries wear down after a bit.

You may be the opposite of me and find it really easy to relax. However, even for those of you who can relax more naturally, you may find that it’s hard to do in this busy world that we live in. So many things vying for our time and energy. It can be really hard to re-charge our batteries.

This morning, on my way into the office, I caught a whiff of one of my favorite smells…beach air. Sometimes it is really powerful and other times more subtle. In that moment, I made the choice to stop for a few moments in the parking lot and just take a couple of deep breaths, inhaling that sweet beach air. It’s refreshing and re-energizing to me. In that moment I was reminded of a great God who made the ocean in all its glory. He loves me and He wants me to “be still” so that I can know that He is God.

I have to be intentional each day about slowing down, if even for a few minutes in a parking lot, to be refreshed by His Spirit. I have to be intentional to not let the rat race of this work swallow up my desire to know and be cared for by God. How can you take time today to “be still and know that He is God?

Back from ladies retreat weekend at Drift Camp. What a wonderful weekend with 40 beautiful women of God! This weekend was such a great reminder of why “community” is so important. It is so easy to get caught up in the busyness of our daily lives and not take the time to grow and nurture our relationships with one another.

It seems as though in my younger years, while raising my boys, it was easier to find “girlfriend” time. Play dates at each other’s homes or days at the park were pretty regular. Now that my boys are grown and I am working full-time, it seems much more challenging. Of course, back then, whenever we did get together, the focus was really on the kids, and not on each other, so I guess every season of life does have its challenges!!

Hebrews 10:25 says that we should not forsake the assembling of ourselves together, but exhort one another. This is so important because God made us all different parts of one Body and we are each supposed to use our gifts for the good of the Body. This can only happen when we live in community.

So, maybe now isn’t the time for you to get away for a weekend retreat with the ladies, but I challenge you to think of some way that you can foster being a part of “community” in your own life. Maybe it’s as simple as picking up the phone and inviting a friend out for coffee or a play date. You won’t regret it J

Gardening is on my mind this time of year. I love seeing the signs of life in a tired wintered over garden when the sun starts shining. The peonies are poking up through the ground along with the numerous bulbs that were planted the previous fall. There is new growth on the clematis and hydrangea. Beautiful and exciting! Wait a minute though, what is that I see? Ugh, it’s the first sign of a weed. Not just any old weed, but the nemesis to my coastal garden…the dreaded False Lily of the Valley. At first sign of this nasty weed, I know one thing, it is time for WAR!!

Yes, that’s right, war. This isn’t some simple little weed all by itself. This is a nasty, aggressive weed with a massive root system. If I don’t declare all-out war on it, it will take over my garden and choke out everything in its path. What I have found to be somewhat effective is anytime I see a new leaf poking of the ground, I yank it out, so that it doesn’t have time to grow and multiply. However, it spreads fast and I can’t always keep up with it and then I have to take more drastic measures, like using Round-Up. I have to be so diligent and vigilant.

This reminds me of what the bible says about the root of bitterness. When speaking about pursuing peace with all people, the writer of Hebrews teaches us that a root of bitterness will cause us to fail of the grace of God, to be troubled and to be defiled. (Heb. 12:15). It is so important that we don’t hold onto the things that are done against us by others and cause there to be fertile soil for the root of bitterness to grow wild in our hearts. Just like the False Lily of the Valley in my yard, unchecked forgiveness and resentment will grow like wildfire into a root of bitterness that will choke all the love out of our lives.

The moment that we recognize those wrong attitudes in our heart, we need to yank them out and lay them at the feet of our Lord. It literally is a war against bitterness. With the help of our Lord Jesus, we can have a beautiful garden free of bitterness.   

Gardening is a passion of mine. There is something special and therapeutic about digging in the dirt and being a part of the process of creating a beautiful landscape. When I moved to the Central Oregon Coast almost eight years ago I had to learn a whole new way of gardening. I had moved from the Sacramento Valley, a place that is known for its hot summers. It wasn't unusual for us to have several weeks at a stretch of 100+ days.

Not so on the Central Oregon Coast. If we hit 80, it's highly unusual, maybe happens once a summer. It is considered a major heat wave and the locals can't stand it. The average summer temperature is about 65 degrees. Fine by me.I had no problem at all with the cooler weather. I'd lived in that Sacramento summer heat for 27 years. Enough is enough! I had looked so forward to being able to sit outside without sweat pouring down my back. I dreamed of a nice coastal garden like I had seen in magazines. Boy, did I have a lot to learn.

I was used to planting roses, marigolds, zinnias and the like. All those heat loving plants! Those things would never grow around here. What was I to do? After some trial and error, I figured out the best way to go about it. I just starting looking around my neighborhood. What was growing in other people's yards? Why reinvent the wheel? Find the things that grew well in other people's yards and plant some of the same. That worked pretty well. Then every once in a while I would try something that I hadn't seen locally and guess what, it would usually die. So, the things that did well, like fuchsias, azaleas, peonies, I would plant more of, but the things that didn't I would yank out. Now my garden is looking pretty good.

I realized that this is a lot like my spiritual life. I need to look at the things that are growing well in my life. Those are the things that I need to plant more of.  Sow the seeds of kindness, forgiveness, patience, etc. And those things that are not good, I need to yank them out by the root. Goodbye to envy, unkindness, impatience, stubbornness, unselfishness, etc. . These things have no place in the soil of my life. Any just like in my garden, I want to look around and learn from those who are emulating the behavior of Christ. Christlike behavior is what I want to exhibit in my own life. Then just like a beautiful garden, my life can bring joy to the lives of others.