Corn

Living in northern Illinois, we are not far from DeKalb, home of the famous DeKalb corn seed. Needless to say, we are surrounded by cornfields. In fact, there is one that adjoins our backyard. I love looking out the back window over the cornfield. I will be sad when it becomes time to mow it down! Here is the view on a foggy fall morning.

Wee Bothy

One of my favorite souvenirs from our trip was this "wee bothy." It's a little ceramic bothy made by Diana McFarlane of Glenshee Pottery. A bothy is a stone shelter in the Highlands of Scotland that's left open for people to take shelter in. I bought this little version on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh.



By the way, now that I'm home and not working I'm planning to include more original photos on my blog instead of swiping them from other places!

Clotted Cream Fudge

This may be the last post about food from the UK (but maybe not...). We were very intrigued by something that we saw that was called clotted cream fudge. It turned out to taste just like homemade caramels. Clotted cream, I believe, is what we ate with our delicious meringue pillows, but it also makes a great fudge!

Thursday Text: D&C 88:119

Since we've been in the throes of re-organization at our new home, I've been thinking a lot about simplicity and organization, etc. I started to wonder if spending so much time on these kinds of things was important. And guess what? The Doctrine and Covenants says it is! These are the goals that I want to have for our home:

Organize yourselves; prepare every needful thing; and establish a house, even a house of prayer, a house of fasting, a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God

West Cornwall Pasty Company

Another delicious thing that we discovered in the UK was the pasty (pronounced pass-tee). Many of the Tube stations include locations of the West Cornwall Pasty Company. I think that a pasty is the same thing as what was once called a "hand pie." It's a pastry folded up with meat, vegetables, etc., on the inside. My favorite was the apple and pork version. Delicious.

Samphire Hoe

One of our favorite places in England was Dover, which was a total surprise. Tony just wanted to go see the famous white cliffs. Before we knew it, we had driven through the city and were about to re-enter the carriageway when we saw a sign for Samphire Hoe. It's a protected natural area where you can walk or fish. We walked along the seawall and enjoyed amazing vistas and fresh sea air. It was very enthralling. (And, yes, I took these pictures!)

Pavlova

I have a couple more posts to do about food from our trip to the UK. Tony's favorite food - and one of his favorite parts of our trip - was a big blob of meringue that was served with clotted cream and berries (including currants) at Blenheim Palace. Martha has a recipe for what looks like basically the same thing here. Yum!

Friday Featured Etsy Seller: Zephyr Woods

A couple of weeks ago we were up in Madison, Wisconsin. We visited the famous farmers market around the capitol, and I discovered Zephyr Woods. They were just clearing up, so I was glad to snatch a card and look up the shop on Etsy. These wood pendants are really beautiful, and a portion of the proceeds goes to kiva.org.

Thursday Text: Tennyson Transformed

When we were at the Tate, I saw a book in the gift shop called Tennyson Transformed. It explores the connection between Tennyson's poetry and the visual culture of the Victorian Age, notably the Pre-Raphaelites. The work on the cover is one of the many dramatic depictions of the Lady of Shalott. Fascinating.

BMW 1 Series

There were so many fascinating small cars in the UK. Our rental car was a Peugeot 308, and it was very fun. I was interested to see that BMW makes a 1 series. I didn't know that they made cars that small. (This was confirmed when we were at the BMW golf championship in Chicago on Saturday, but the US versions are all coupes.)