Marching Right Along

Another month has come and gone, so it's time for me to bring you up to date on the happenings of our lives here in Scotland over the past 31 days. Here goes!

• The highlight of March came a couple of weeks ago when we, together with our friends the Allens and the Brewers, rented cars and took back-to-back day trips, exploring parts of Scotland none of us had yet seen. We covered a lot of ground in a short time... all in the "lovely" weather of an early Scotland spring (i.e. howling wind and blowing snow/ice-cold rain). I'll give you a quick run-down of our itinerary here, but if you want to see more photos and get a bit more info, you can check out the album I posted on facebook. Or you could check out either the Brewers' posts or the Allens' version of events.
• Day 1 we headed up north-north-east, through Dundee, making stops at Arbroath Abbey and then Dunnottar Castle. Although Arbroath was a neat stop in its own way, Dunnottar was incredible -- its location, on a rock outcropping jutting into the sea, surrounded by sheer cliffs on all sides, is the type of stuff you think only exists in movies. We then headed up to Aberdeen for a couple of hours before driving home.

The whole crew in front of Dunnottar Castle. Beside Liana and I are Garrick and Andrea Allen, and beside them are Chris and Rachel Brewer, with their boys John and Sam.

Arbroath Abbey

• Day 2 we headed west, first stopping at Castle Campbell. This castle was also pretty incredibly situated. It's at the top of a broad, wooded ravine ("Dollar Glen") with a commanding view over the town and countryside below. The colours of the Scottish countryside were beautiful, even in winter. Afterwards we headed to the town of Deanston and visited the Deanston Distillery, where we took a tour to learn how single-malt whisky is made. It was a very informative and fun experience! We made a quick stop at nearby Doune Castle before heading our separate ways (the Brewers headed back to St Andrews; we and the Allens headed to Edinburgh to hit up the Costco -- a little taste of North America!). I really got a full Scottish experience on this day: freezing cold weather, the beauty of the southern highland landscape, a castle, and whisky... oh! And haggis for lunch! The only thing missing was a kilt.

A view of Castle Campbell across the glen and through the mist.

Love in Castle Campbell!

• Liana's work has been going well. If you haven't read her recent blog post about it, go do that now! :-) She starts her final week in the shop tomorrow, which means she has been at the Balgove for 11 weeks already. That's pretty hard to believe. She's very excited to move into the role for which she was hired (marketing and PR), and to find out a bit more about what it will involve. I really think there is some serious potential for her to make a significant contribution to the development of this great business. I'm so thankful that she has been given this opportunity!
• The weather here has been absolutely dreadful up until the past two days. As per my previous post, on the day marking our having been in Scotland for six months (March 11), it snowed pretty heavily. Since then, it has snowed on and off -- some days more, some days less -- practically every single day. Unbelievable. Plus, the wind has been blowing pretty hard, and the temperature has stayed at or just below freezing. All that to say there has been almost no signs of spring ever arriving. Thankfully the sun has been shining on and off since Saturday, so maybe... juuuuust maybe... things are changing.
• A week and a half ago we had Canadian visitors! Bill and Kathy Lumsdon, friends from church back home, were in Scotland (where Bill has roots), and so they stopped in St Andrews for the afternoon/evening. It was great to see them, to "show off" our town, and just to be with some people who are from home. Plus, they took us out to dinner, which was very kind. Thanks for the visit, Bill and Kathy!
• In case people here hadn't clued in yet, I'm pretty sure the secret about how gifted Liana is in the kitchen is now out. Her and a couple of other ladies arranged a baby shower for five women in the St Mary's community who are either imminently expecting or have recently had babies. Surprise, surprise, Liana was in charge of the food, and people were blown away. I think she had a had a lot of fun doing all the cooking/baking, and it was a joy for me to see her turning our tiny kitchen into an awesome-food-producing factory.
• March has been pretty nutso for me in terms of my work. I've been working to get my GRO complete (you can read about what that is in my February recap). The end is now in sight, but there's still much to do. I've managed to get a complete draft of my chapter done, and I've sent it off to my supervisor for review. Hopefully he'll be getting that back to me early this week. My bibliography is complete, but I've still got a lot of work to do on my thesis outline. I think it will be a really great feeling to have this stage of the process done. I'm looking forward to a bit of a break.
• Yesterday morning, we attended an Easter morning sunrise service on the ruins of St Mary's on the Rocks, the site of the oldest church in St Andrews. All that remains are the ruins of the stone foundations, none standing any higher than about two feet off the ground. Located right on the coast, with a beautiful view out over the ocean to the east and south, it made for a wonderful place to join with brothers and sisters in celebrating the resurrection of Jesus. All the churches of St Andrews were involved in planning this service together, so there was quite a large group. We sang, prayed, read scripture, and broke bread together to celebrate God's victory over death. It was a wonderful service to be a part of. What an awesome day Easter is! Jesus is risen!
• That said, Easter was another one of those times where we've been particularly aware of the things and the people we are missing at home. Thankfully, we (and our friends Raymond and Mary Blake) were invited over to the home of our friends Adam, Lindsay, and Christy for the afternoon and evening. We were very grateful to be invited to celebrate with them. It was a great evening of fantastic food and lots of fun.

  

  Easter dinner! Left to right: Christy, Raymond, Adam, and Lindsay. Mary Blake was taking the photo.

Well! That recap ended up longer than I anticipated. Looking back on it, I guess it was a pretty full month. I'm really looking forward to April, as we'll have lots to celebrate and enjoy: Liana's 30th birthday, the completion of my GRO, the births of the babies in the Sportack, Watts, and Fox families, and our trip to Spain! That means there's going to be a serious blogpost for you to read when that's all said and done. :-) May the joy and hope of Easter be with you all!

Liana (a very cold Liana) and I at Doune Castle

PS I hope you enjoyed the "punny" title. Nothing like a good pun!