Latter-Day Home

Have you heard of Latter-Day Home?  It's a fantastic online shop of LDS-themed art and home decor.  It was started by Owen Mortensen, an artist friend of Joe's.  I love this simple seagull tray and this fun beehive pillow.  I also love this Salt Lake Temple doorknob etching made by my sister, Sara Alleman! 

Rice's Church Primer

The Winchester Cathedral shop has some interesting books on church architecture.  One that looked particularly helpful was Rice's Church Primer.  It contains drawings and diagrams of various architectural elements common to churches in Britain.  It looked very helpful and informative.  What a great idea! 

Marks and Spencer Treats

The last time we went to England, we fell in love with Marks and Spencer - especially their Simply Food locations.  So they were one of our first stops when we got to Heathrow.  Some of the fun things we found this time included gum in little resealable pouches.  I liked the lemon mint.  (There was also peppermint, spearmint, and a curiously strong mint - like Altoids.)  And we were intrigued to find a veggie version of their famous Percy Pig gummy candies (without gelatin).  We also ate many sandwiches and good British potato chips from M&S over the course of our trip.  Yum!

The Hambledon

When we were in Winchester, we did a lot of walking around the town.  We passed a place called The Hambledon a number of times but never at the right time to go in.  Their window displays were lovely, however: lots of fun, flowery, summery, picnic things.  Aren't these fan garlands so fun?  And this jadeite pitcher is an elegant option for any summer meal. 

Dutch Treat

I have to interrupt my trip posting to note the incredible game that the Netherlands had in the World Cup yesterday.  Did you see it?  They beat defending champ Spain 5-1, and it was truly amazing. 

Tim Hortons Frozen Hot Chocolate

So the first thing I can tell you about our trip is that we saved $700 by driving up to Toronto and flying nonstop from there to London.  That was fine with us, because on the way we were able to stop at Tim Hortons.  They recently introduced a frozen hot chocolate.  It is every bit as tasty as it looks!

Rule Britannia!

We recently returned from 10 days in England.  We spent time in and around Winchester, Oxford, and London and visited places that were of interest to us.  It was a nice and relaxing trip.  One of my favorite places in London was the Liberty store.  It is incredible.  I'll be posting some of my other favorites here.  If you want the full trip details, they'll be coming up on our family blog.  (Email me if you want to follow along, and I'll send you the URL.)