Family homestay in England weekend

These are the girls from my hall.
Becks, me, and sophie^Paula (my roomie), Emma, Becca, and Debbie^ This was a small town in England where we went w/our host family for the kids swimming lessons.

Me, Ashlee and Lindsay by a river in England.

Me, Ashlee and Lindsay in our room for the weekend.


Our host family, I was walking to try to get in the pic.

Seeing their cows.

Sheep!

Sheep in road!

The house we stayed in.

We had a beautiful day, which is unusual.

Isabel showing us the cows.

There were the 6 of us in my program going to England for the family homestay, plus 2 Glasgow school of arts students. We got split up on the train ride there, and when it came time for us to get off, the only guy in the group couldn't get his train door open and ended up stuck on the train til the next stop, which was 20 mins. away, then 20 mins. back on another train. He wasn't in my group, so Ashlee, Lindsay and I left w/ our host mother. She and her husband had 3 kids, all under the age of 7, Megan, Michael and Isabel.

They took us on a drive around the countryside, which was beautiful! At one point we had to stop b/c there were sheep crossing the road! Then we went w/the mom to take the kids to swim lessons and we got to walk around the small town. (we got to see another castle, it seems there are castles EVERYWHERE here). Then we took a long walk along the road by their farm. The kids took their bikes, then laid them by the side of the road so they could race us. We were all exhausted.

Lindsay, Ashlee and I shared a room and a bathroom. The shower was HORRID. We couldn't figure out the hot water, so all we could take was freezing cold showers. Lindsay didn't take a shower the whole weekend (yuck!), but I figured out to use the kids play bucket and fill it up with hot water in the bathtub to at least wash our hair.

We also went to a chocolate factory and got some brilliant hot chocolate! Then we ate lamb and some kind of vegetables for dinner one night. (actually they call lunch dinner, but i don't know what they call dinner). Then we had custard and apple pie for dessert, which was excellent. The next day for lunch we had bread, salad and cheese, and the cheese was Wensleydale, which is what Wallace and Gromit eat (claymation movie characters). I love cheese and had like 5 pieces. Then we were going to have ice cream and strawberry bread roll (or something like that) and our host father was trying to be funny and gave everyone their bowls and in mine he just put a block of cheese.

In the evenings after the kids went to bed, the parents like to stay up and talk til 11 or 12 at night. We even watched a movie called Housesitter starring Tori Spelling, which was a horrible movie and all we did was make fun of it the whole time, it was a lot of fun! Finally it was time for us to leave. We met up w/the other students and got on the train. We were supposed to switch trains in Carlisle (i don't even know if that is in england or scotland) but somehow we ended up on a bus for an hour and a half back to Glasgow. It was strange.

When I got back Sunday night, Becca and Emma had stayed in our room and i walked in to them w/ their laptops using our internet cables. They had moved Paula's bed, took all her clothes out of the room and put them in Emma's room, and used tape to stick Paula's shoes to the ceiling. They just made themselves at home while we were gone and camped out there for 24hours. I got back, took a shower, then paula got back, and they were still in our room. Then they left their laptops and backpacks in our room while we ate dinner and had a kitchen clean up. Later we all watched a movie in our room and then everyone went to bed and they finally came back for their stuff and brought Paula's clothes back. Then to apologize to us, Becca and emma came into our room at like 11 carrying a bday candle each, turned out our light and sang silent night. Then told us to blow out the candle and make a wish, that was how they were repaying us for letting them stay in our room. Thank goodness I know them and like them or I woulda been a little annoyed...tho it is kinda funny that one of Paulas shoes won't come off the ceiling.