Outdoor Museum of a Village in Wales

We went to this cool "village" of old buildings in Wales. These buildings are the originals, but have been moved to this site. It was like going to Williamsburg/Jamestown or Nauvoo. There was also a reconstructed Celtic village there. There were people in all the buildings explaining things and some even sold things like old fashioned fudge and pottery. Always have to have the wallet ready!

 

Toll Road Office/House

 

Just a house

 

Inside Post Office

 

Outside Post Office and WWII sign

This post Office was used as a main source of info during WWII

 

Cute Mailbox

 

Rooster fighting ring

 

Celtic Village

 

We named him Ferdinand

 

Beautiful Heather

Tintern Abbey in Wales

We left last Thursday at 6:00 AM to go to Wales for an overnight trip. Trying to get a family of 7 ready at 5:00 AM isn't easy. Somehow we managed and I was impressed actually. All the students were ready too! It helps that they serve breakfast and had everything ready for us to pack our lunches. We could never get out on time if they didn't.

Anyway, our first stop was Tintern Abbey. It dates back to the beginning of the middle ages and was added to until the mid 1500's. Even though it was in ruins, I thought it was beautiful. I even liked the fact that it was in ruins. We've seen so many Abbeys, but this one stands out in my mind.

Of course Daniel always makes things interesting for us. As usual he was running around. It had been raining and things were a muddy mess. Does anything else need to be said? Scott just said, "I'll take the camera."  I was surprised because Scott is usually the one to deal with the kid's messes. He's such a great husband and dad! This time Daniel was mine to clean up. He had thick, mushy, mud ALL over his left side. I was wondering why all the students were smiling at Daniel and looking at me. Scott was kind of mad, but I just laughed and took a picture. Then Scott and everyone laughed. The picture doesn't show very much. And wouldn't this be the trip that I only brought one pair of jeans for him to wear. (The pair he was wearing!) The grass was wet and we were able to wipe off his coat and hands. The jeans were toast. He wore his PJ's the rest of the trip. He fell in those too at another place, but not as bad.

Daniel before (With an attitude!)

After and covered in mud!

 

  

 

We live in a fishbowl!

Today Scott and I were asked to go to Rodger's flat for a chat. Rodger is the head director. We felt like we were being sent to the Principle's office. It turns out that there have been complaints about Daniel. He has a crush on Reesa and it bothers her roommates that he follows her around, sometimes into their room. (We don't allow him to go into the rooms or library) He will also pick things out of the salad bowl (which he gets reprimanded for), he sometimes puts his hands on the things they put out at breakfast time, (he gets in trouble for that too) and he runs around a lot. Sounds like any little kid to me. And Daniel is a very active one. I fought back the tears as we were talked to. Rodger could tell I was uncomfortable and went on and on about how we have every right to participate in things and how he doesn't want us to feel like we can't be involved. Why would he say that? Of course we have every right, that's just understood and shouldn't have even been brought up.

I cried and cried once we got back to our flat. It's really hard because some of the students LOVE playing with Daniel and encourage him. They play chase with him and hide and seek. They tease him, "play" chess with him, etc. etc. I had a girl the other day tell me she can't get him to love her. Like it was a competition or something. It's really hard to not take something like this personal. For me anyway. Scott isn't at all. He just thinks the students need to know we're trying. That once people know that, then they won't be so judgmental. He also said they complain about each other just as much if not more. He's right about that. He's going to announce some things about this during tomorrow's devotional. The kids and I won't come down until after.

*Sigh* I do feel like withdrawing from things. That's easier than being confused about what Daniel can or can't do. If I don't know the boundaries, then how can I teach Daniel. Some students like to play with him and some don't like it when he gets so wild. I don't either actually, but I like to see him playing with people. Scott will probably get feedback at the devotional and we'll take it from there. In the mean time I have to walk on egg shells and talk to Daniel before we do anything in the centre. I just want to go home right now!

Oxford Natural History Museum

We had some free time in Oxford and decided to do something more kid friendly than another church or museum. So we went to the Natural History museum. What a fun place. I even liked it better than the one in DC in some ways. It seemed a lot more interactive. I could be wrong. Maybe because it wasn't so big. Anyway, they had another museum attached to it that had all kinds of artifacts including a case of what early humans did to their dead enemies. It had shrunken heads and skulls and things. I think it was one of the highlights for my boys!

 

  

  

  

 

Oxford University

What a beautiful and huge campus! It's all over town, not just one campus like most of ours are in the US. We spent most of our time at Christ College (NOT Christ's college) and saw some amazing things including the Great Hall and stairs from Harry Potter. We also went into their very old library with books dating back to the 10th century. Way cool! Below is a post about Lewis Carroll and Alice in Wonderland here at Oxford.

 

  

the Great Hall is in here. It's where they have special meals for guests and faculty.

 

  

  

  

 

J.R.R. Tolken and C.S. Lewis

Here are some pictures of a pub in Oxford that these two would talk about all their fantasies in and just hang out.

Blenheim Palace

Just a nice house for 11th Duke and Duchess of Marlborough and also the birthplace of Winston Churchill. He never lived there though. The family title was passed on to his cousin. But they were life long friends and Churchill was there often. The most interesting thing to me was the Churchill exhibit and the gift shop devoted to WWII books. I bought two. I'm just not into big palaces for people I know little about. I'm really not into the Royalty here except the Windsors a little. I liked Princess Diana. It's all just so pretentious to me. Scott may feel different. I should say to be fair that Daniel had a lot of trouble here and it was hard for me to listen anyway.  I had to leave the tour early and take him outside to run around. That seems to be a running theme of my experiences here! He's such a cutie though. In this case I was glad to do it. Besides, the grounds were beautiful!

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

 

JABBERWOCKY

Lewis Carroll 

(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
  Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
  And the mome raths outgrabe.

Alice was real. She was the daughter of the dean of Christ College at Oxford University. Lewis Carroll was a student here and was inspired to write Through the Looking Glass and Alice in Wonderland. Alice had a cat and looked through the garden gate key hole to see the garden she wasn't aloud inside of. The tree is I think several hundred years old and is named the Jabberwocky. I didn't catch the whole story, but I think Lewis Carol liked Alice as a girl and used her as inspiration for his books.

 

  

  

Alice's grave

  

Tori posing as Alice.

Stoke Poges

This is just a little village outside of Windsor with an old little church that was the setting for a poem called "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" by Thomas Gray. In some of the pictures you can see Daniel flirting with the female students. He LOVES their attention and they seem to love his. There are also some pictures of the boys in the coach.