My mom arrives in the UK! Part 1

On Saturday the 27th I took a very long three hour trip to the airport to pick up my mommy!!! We travelled back to Norwich and she finally got the proper tour of my flat and we relaxed for the night (as she had been awake for 25 hours).  For the first 6 days up until Friday we spent our time together in Norwich.  On Sunday we had an amazing day at the Norwich Halloween Pug meet up.  After mom riding her first double decker bus we headed to Eaton park to snuggle and play with pugs dressed in costumes.  We met many friends.  Lola (a pug with a lovely under bite) and her sister Coco were our favourites.  All they wanted to was sit on your lap and snort.  After the Luna incident, this just made the both of us so happy.

Lola

Coco

Isn't she so freaking cute?!

After the pug adventure we wandered Norwich a bit and went to many stores looking for a square casserole dish.  Since we couldn't find it we gave up and bought a circular one and headed home.  I made my famous mac and cheese that night and we just spend the evening watching wonderful, tack British television. 

The next day we wandered to the Castle museum before joining up with Taylor and wandering around the city a bit before going out for a lovely dinner.  Many of the days of her trip in Norwich are a little blurred since we did SO much! We went out for a lovely dinner at a vegetarian restaurant, visited the Market, got milkshakes, visited my university (but sadly didn't see any bunnies), walked the many old streets of the city.  To top is off mom got to visit the grave of her great-great grandmother (I can't exactly remember how many greats).

Don't we look SO happy.

Mom and I got to participate in our favourite event: afternoon tea.  I took her to Biddy's (the tea place I have mentioned before) and she LOVED it! We got sandwiches, tea, scones and a huge slice of raspberry coconut cake.  Scrumptious.  On her last day here Taylor, mom and myself visited Norwich Cathedral.  Having stepping in it once before but never explored it, I never realized how HUGE it is! We got a guided tour from this sweet older lady who never everything about it! We also went on a ghost walk through Norwich and I found out cute little facts I never knew!

Friday morning we left for London to begin a new adventure.  But I'll write about that in another post.

Luna

I haven't posted in here for a long time.  A couple of weeks ago I phoned my mom up for our regular chat and she informed me that they took my 8 year old Bernese Mountain dog Luna to the vet and they found out her body was riddled with cancer and she did not have much longer.  The dog is my puppy sister so myself and my family were devestated.  I didn't feel like writing, interacting with humans or anything.  I was able to fly home and snuggle with her for her last few days and be there as a comfort for my family. This entry is going to be really long, but I have to write it.


Luna, a.k.a Goo-Goo, and bug was the best dog I could have ever hoped for.  When you entered the front door you got what we call a Luna greeting.  She was just so happy to see everyone, she would bark like crazy, sit on your feet for snuggles, and if you tried to move away from the greeting she would hit you with her paw, or even give you a hug with both paws.  Now this happened no matter how long you were away from the house or who you were.  She gave this greeting to everyone.  She believed when people came over to our house they came over to see her (lets be honest, they probably were).  All Luna wanted was to be with her family.  If any one of us left the house she usually laid by the door waiting for us.  Luna was extremely loved, there was never a day that went by that she didn't receive at least 100 kisses on her freckle nose.  She loved a car ride, in fact I think it was her favourite.  When people began putting on their shoes, that was her cue to go crazy since it meant she got to go on a car ride.  She also loved when my dad went out for a smoke, as it meant she could sit on the porch and look for the raccoons that lived in our neighbours roof.  I always felt bad for Luna when I became a vegetarian.  When I ate meat I didn't really like it so after dinner I would have half of it left over and lucky Luna would always get it.  When I became a vegetarian, she would still look at me after every meal, or watch me while I was eating waiting for the meat.  But, she was stuck only getting a cookie.

Luna was a big suck, and when we first got her I was so excited to have a dog to play fetch with and other fun games.  I soon learned Luna did not do this.  Her idea of playing was grabbing a toy (or a shoe) and running around the yard hoping you would try to steal it and then kinda play tug of war while barking at you. But she wasn't lazy.  She loved a good walk.  Her and my mom would walk for hours, and lucky for her every Saturday she would get to walk with her dog boyfriend.

Going home this Christmas will be really hard.  Usually when I get off the plane all I can think about it getting home and receiving "the greeting".  The house will be really empty without her.  I'm used to her being next to me almost all the time.  I will always miss my Luna, her goofy grin, her freckled nose, her warm heart, her hugs that sometimes ended in pain, and the happiness she brought to me and my family.  Even though she is no longer with us she will always be in my heart.  I am not religious in the slightest but I like to imagine her running around a field and hanging out with my cat Bandit in a place that has no pain, only lots of treats and car rides.

Facts!

I have been in Norwich for a month now and there a few things I have come to understand.

-Getting used to cars driving on the other side of the road is easy.  Getting used to the drivers side being on the opposite side is not.  I still freak out when I see a child or dog on the Canadian drivers side, and think to my self "who is letting their dog/child drive?!" 

-Women of all sizes love to wear very short shorts over tights no matter the weather.

-The British love pre-packed food.  I swear 2/3 of the grocery store is pre-packed meals.

-Cath Kidston is very popular.  Everyone owns her bag (or at least a cheap rip off).  I also want to own one...

-Squirrels are not as prevalent as they are in Canada.

-Eggs are not refrigerated in the grocery stores.
 
-People are very polite to you, but don't expect them to say sorry if they run into you/hit you with their bag/step on your feet.

-ALWAYS keep an umbrella on you.  There are days like today were it was supposed to be sunny all day, but it randomly mizzled (drizzling rain/misting) for 10 minutes).

-Nobody guesses I'm from Canada, they all think I'm American and they apologize profusely when I say where I am from.

Bombay mix!

I mentioned Biddy's Tea Room in my last post.  I'm so addicted to that place that I went the next day with Taylor.  He had a cola chocolate cupcake (a chocolate cupcake made with cola, which you could barely taste) I had a scone with jam and clotted cream and violet flavoured tea.  Oh, how delicious it was! Taylor loves the place to and I cannot wait to go back.

Taylor is the king of the tea room

Ooh! I finally found a winter coat (I didn't bring mine as it is a shabby piece of work).  It's an adorable Hell Bunny coat that is not only warm, but adorable.

Thanks mom for helping me afford this

Friday I had my first Museum Studies class.  The professor is amazing (she is the one who interviewed me for the program and I could have sworn she grew up in England, but she is American and has been here for almost 10 years.  But, she has a strong English accent....) The class is fantastic, it is actually teaching us the skills and information we need to one day work in a museum, no matter what role we want to take on.  She is also a crazy cat lady, I only know this because the examples she used always mentioned her cat.

Saturday night a bunch of the students from my program went for dinner at the Bicycle Cafe.  There was only about 8 of us, which made it quite intimate.  I dragged Taylor along so he could meet everyone.  We stayed for a few hours and then had a peaceful walk home through the Cathedral walls at night. 

Sunday something glorious happen.....PANCAKES!!!! Taylor made me pancakes from scratch (thanks to a Martha Stewart recipe).  They were delicious! I ate far too many and napped for the rest of the day because of them.I did have a Skype date with Ms. Blaze.  I miss that pretty little lady, but we made plans for Xmas (Sadies and the AGO? Sounds like a perfect day)

I also talked to Abi (who is in Japan for her honeymoon at the moment!) and we came to the agreement that everything we need to know about British culture we learnt from Ab Fab.  For example, carpet commercials are horribly weird, fanny bags are called bum bags (fanny is another word for the front of a lady apparently), and Bombay mix is delicious! Bombay mix is mentioned in one of my favourite Ab Fab episodes and is a quote often used by Abi and myself.  So, when I saw it in the market, I KNEW I had to try it.  And good god is it delicious! It's roasted lentils, chickpeas and peanuts with these strange fried noodle bits all put together with lovely Indian spices.  I will be bringing a huge bag home and everyone can try the amazingness of it. 

Bombay mix!

Tea time

Wednesday was the day of group presentations.  Ours went very well although we were second to last.  After classes I made plans with Charlene (she has two kitties!) to head to the downtown area.  We wandered around checking out every vintage store we could find (there are lots and they are damn cheap!) and chit chatting.  We headed to Biddy's tea room which is my new favourite place! It is a tea room made to look like a Victorian house.  In the window there is a taxidermy fox wearing a top hat.  When you get inside there is an upstairs restaurant and a downstairs lounge where they make all their own scones, cake and cupcakes.  We decided to share a maple pecan cupcake-it tastes like pancakes, so freaking amazing.  The lounge is decorated as a Victorian home filled with Victorian chairs, figurines, books and wall paper.  I'm in love.

All the frames on this wall contain pictures of cats

We continued wander and I found a small vegetarian/health food store tucked away in an alley way.  They have everything! I found veggie hot dogs, seitan, tempah, etc. After we went our separate ways.

I always assumed that England wasn't too big on Halloween, which is my favourite holiday.  But, most stores have Halloween decorations in their windows and our local grocery store has an aisle of Halloween decoration.  So Taylor and I decided that since it was our first Halloween living together that we were going to decorate.  We only have a few things at the moment, but as soon as it gets closer to the date we will add more things. 

BREAD!!!!

Last Thursday we accomplished things! Go us! We headed to the Norwich Council to hand in the form that says I'm a student so you cannot charge me council tax.  That just saved us 100 pounds each month.  We wandered around town and stopped in on this candy shop that has some North American sweets.  I picked up a tiny pack of pull-n-peel licorice.  3 pieces cost me 1pound and 30p (I still have not found out how to use the pound sign on my keyboard, oh well).  I am addicted to licorice and eating this was pure heaven! 

I hit up Primark which I had been told by many people is really cheap clothing, but I didn't realize how cheap.  I picked up a pair of pants, 3 pairs of tights and 2 sweaters for 27 pounds.  It's fantastic.  I then stumbled upon an AMAZING baking store that made me feel very poor.  I want to bake here, but it means I have to rebuild my collection of baking accessories which isn't possible on my poor student budget. 

Last weekend Taylor got quite ill with a weird stomach bug/cold thing....so the weekend was spent taking care of him and going a little stir crazy (it didn't help that it also rained for a lot of the weekend).  Monday I had to head to class to work on our group presentation.  Although we worked on the presentation quite a bit, we also just spent a large portion of the time chatting.  No offence to Taylor but it is kinda amazing to have a conversation with other ladies.

Monday also had some exciting news from back home, my mommy booked her flight to come visit me!!!!!! She will be here on the  27th! I'm so freaking excited! I know you read my blog mother so I'm going to show you all over Norwich and London!

Tuesday Taylor was still quite ill so I decided on a whim to go out and grab some ingredients and bake my first ever loaf of bread.  Now, I can bake almost anything (I still have to make my own pie dough-that is my goal this Christmas) but bread has always scared me.  But Sara gave me a great recipe and it was extremely easy.  I was frightened it would come out of the oven tasting awful, but it really is delicious.  I think I'm going to try to make it every other week.

Bread!

 Last post I said I would post some photos of the apartment so here you go:

Our bedroom.  I think we all know which side I sleep on

My Tudor dolls decorating our windowsill

Bathroom

I lucked out on my bathroom being painted purple

Tv nook

I still have a few more to take, but I keep forgetting....Oh well, it gives you guys an idea of the things I see all day.

First day of class

On Wednesday we had our official first day of classes.  It began at 9a.m and it was a giant group of all the students studying their Masters under the World Art and Museology program.  We had to do the informal introductions.  Then we were given a group project (one that counted for nothing grades wise).  They split us into groups of 4 and each group had one person from each program.  I got paired up with three lovely girls: Supriya (from India), Caitlin (pronouced Cathlin)and Martina (from America).  Basically, the idea of the project is to choose an object from the Sainsbury museum and give a presentation on it and shared perspectives.  We had a wonder around the room, and after each choosing an image we decided to go with my favourite: a Roman statue of Isis feeding Horus, something I know a lot about.  I understand probably half you people don't care but I'm still going to explain in detail the project.  We are not to give a history of this piece, but instead discuss what each of us bring to this object with our various backgrounds and the strengths and weakness of different perspectives.  After class we all got lunch and then worked on our project.


The day was not yet done though, we then had another tour of a library, this time of the Sainsbury library.  We then had nothing planned until the evening so I headed home and relaxed.  At 6 I took the bus back to school for the formal welcome party.  I hung out mainly with my group partners, but also got to meet another American who is taking a masters of art degree.  It finished at 7 and I cam home to a delightful treat:  Taylor made dinner.  He made vegetarian lasagne from scratch.  Oh boy it was so gooooooood! It was nice not having to cook dinner for a change, although it did mean I had the lovely chore of washing the dishes.

Tomorrow night I'll post some pictures of the apartment, how exciting!