Adventures in Aberdeen: January 2010

Snow and Sea

This is just weird for a California girl to see.

Apparently, it's a great time to surf!?

Snow!

We had a lovely walk home tonight!

Review of 2009

It is only fitting that I write this blog, looking back at 2009, with jetlag...in the middle of the night. 2009 was a major year of travel for us, and, with that, jetlag. We start with last January when Kelli and I took our trip North. We went for a week around Britain's northernmost mainland area, and enjoyed every minute of it (well...except for that minute when I was writhing on the ground after spraining my ankle). Here is one of our many one-track roads up North, and one of the many beautiful Lochs we passed on our way.

February brought a friend from seminary, Chris, who was on his way to Africa for the year. Chris took a quick trip which included the coldest walk along water I've ever taken!

We don't have a March because our camera was broken :( But, through the power of magic, it works again! (By magic I mean anything that happens to fix electronics). Fortunately, after the financial strain of broken electronics, Kelli was hired on as a lecturer at Robert Gordon University! We were very excited, and still are, for such a great opportunity. It is a long way from our first year in Aberdeen wondering how in the world we were going to find her something to do (now only if we could find her less!).
In April, we could adapt the old adage of "April showers bring May flowers" to something like, "A decades worth of rain throughout the year brings flowers in April." In any case, come April, we get a lot of them.

In May we had more friends arrive. Mel and Mark came for a wee visit and we gave them the classic tour around the area, including one of our favorites - Dunnottar Castle!

While this pic provides a peaceful outlook of the month of June, it was anything but. I taught a 3 week long intensive class in California (3 hours a day 5 days a week), we went to one of our favorite spots (San Luis Obispo), hung out with the family and went to Palm Desert. We were back for about 6 weeks in all...crazy.

In July we were back in Aberdeen for our birthdays. After taking a couple of weeks getting over jetlag (I get ruined coming over for about 2 weeks), Kelli and I took advantage of the long days by getting out and seeing the sun. Likewise, come July around campus there are always weddings going on. Here is a pic from one of them.

August was time for us to enjoy getting back into the groove of our life in Aberdeen. I turned my attention away from developing the class I had just taught, which I loved doing, and really focused on why we came to Aberdeen in the first place.

September was time for me to hit the ground running with my dissertation. This was when I started seeing the end in sight (the end I still seem to be seeing!).

October brings our students back to us! Kelli and I lead a group of university students, and so the Summers always seem to leave our place a bit quiet (and leave us with a bit more food!). We always look forward to having them back.

In November we celebrated the engagement of our friends Julie and Derek, and took a day trip to Inverurie. There, I tried something called a yum-yum, pictured here on the lower left. To the untamed eye it is simply a donut, but do not be fooled, it is as dense as a scone, as sweet as a donut and as good for you as a swim in McDonalds' grease.

December brought another round of flights which provided me the current jetlag I now enjoy. Here is a pic from downtown Castle Rock, which is about as random of a pic as we could find!

Well, we look forward to seeing what God has for us in the coming year. I should, Lord willing, finish up in the Spring, and Kelli and I continue to wait in expectation for future plans to substantialize...but it looks like we may be waiting a while! We'll see, it could be that there is another years worth of Aberdeen adventures ahead of us.

Traveling randomness

We saw some snow...and ended up coming back to Scotland which was swamped with snow...but enjoyed having a white Christmas.

We also saw the ocean and some pelicans which was nice. Our bodies were confused by California sunshine (too bad we only experienced it for 48 hours or so).