Friday October 10th. I've been having a nostalgic day today. When I woke up this morning I was thinking about Ohio University and Athens. This weekend is Homecoming , maybe that's why it was on my mind, but as the day has progressed I continue looking back into my past and the last few years. One thing that I have found recently, is since being here the last two months, I have started going back and looking at old pictures from my life, from the last two or so years, and where I was a year ago today. It's really refreshing to go back and look at where you were and how far you have come. It really gives you perspective. The perspective I have been gaining from doing this is becoming more and more emotional. I realize as I am looking at my pictures from a year ago, I was happy...but I really wasn't. I look into the eyes of the person that looks like me standing in pictures and that person is not me anymore. And I am glad of it. I don't mean that I have really changed who I am. I'm not saying who I was or who I am today are a total 180 from each other and my one year younger self was someone I hated. By no means do I mean that.It has just become more and more clear to me that a year ago I was miserable and I knew it.

 It makes me start to cry when I look at those pictures and then think about me sitting here a year later and just how much my life has changed. I think about how much I forced my life to change, how I fought my way out because I knew I was the only one who was going to make it happen. I am proud of myself for that. I made myself get away from the way I was living before, and I knew a small change here or there wasn't going to be enough. So when the opportunity came in April to join the YAGM Program, I dropped it all and ran full speed ahead to follow my dreams and do 1.what would get me moving in a different direction than the one I was heading, 2. what I had wanted to do my whole life which was A. Visit London, B. Live in another country for a year, and C. Finally pick up the phone and answer the call from Jesus Christ that had been ringing in the background of my life for the last two years. Even sitting here now I am crying because I am just so happy at the decision I made to leave a life that wasn't right for me. I mean I had a good job at a prestigious company that paid well and had great benefits. I had a solid group of friends that I spent lots of time with in the evenings and on weekends. I had a boyfriend, and a nice apartment I could afford, and I was volunteering for a good cause in my spare time. I was living a fairly carefree life in the city with endless possibilities but it wasn't right for me.

In a matter of months, I quit my job, left my friends, gave up a life I was familiar with,  left most of my wardrobe, my bed, and other belongings behind, left my family and packed whatever I could fit in a suitcase and a carry-on for a year and jumped on a plane to start over. And that's what I have been doing since I have been here. Starting over. I left an ideal life at home to find a life that was ideal for me and for God. To find the life that was meaningful to me. I can't explain to you the feelings I feel looking at those pictures from a year ago today and the progression of pictures that I see coming after them. I look at the year 2014 and where I started out this year and what has happened to me in the last 10 months. I already feel like a different person and I'm still changing. I am not changing into a new person, I am changing into me. Instead of warping my identity this year as I thought would happen, I am pealing back layers of distraction that have been the cause of my misery the last few years. I am finally remembering, finding, and discovering the original parts of me that God made me to be and his plan for me. Somewhere in the midst of things, life transitions, changes, life decisions, and figuring life out as an adult, I lost sight of that. Like many of us do. I forgot that who I am and how I want to live is the way God created me to be. I started to believe that in order to help people I had to stop being who I was and live differently to conform to the way I thought others wanted me to live so that I could better understand them and therefore help them. I forgot that the way God had helped me to help others all these years was by being who I was. For me that's going out and meeting people in the world and helping them find themselves like God has for me.
"But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain." 1 Corinthians 15:10 

Last week I visited my friend Nora in London. Also, this week England celebrated Harvest Festival. Giving thanks for the Harvest and all the food we have to eat. Below are pictures from the food drive we did in a local school and all the food that was donated to the Food Bank from the school. Give thanks for food, friends, and Fall!

Celebrating Nora's Birthday with some Nutella and waffles

Toffee and Banana tea

Canal In Paddington

Coffee shop on a boat

Paddington Bear

Found me my first Pumpkin Spice Latte of the season

Bangers and Mash

The church where I work

Donations from the school to the local food bank

Decorating the windows in church for Harvest Sunday 

Hello All! Another wonderful few weeks have passed since my last blog. So much is happening each and everyday and time is passing so quickly that before I realized it, another few weeks have passed since my last blog post! Ahh!

So, I have been working at my placement for three weeks now, with one week in the middle for my TFG conference. So in total, I have been here in the UK for a little over a month now. Actually a month and a half. So, to recap some highlights of my first six weeks in London, England....Since landing in London 6 weeks ago, I have seen amazing famous monuments, museums, and churches of London such as Big Ben, Tower Bridge, The London Eye, The British Museum, Westminster Abbey, and Buckingham Palace. I have moved to South London to prepare for my placement, met many wonderful people, and started working at St. James Anglican Church. In my placement, I started working with children and young adults teaching stories from the Bible and settling into my role in each group. I left for a week to attend my Time for God conference in North London where I met other wonderful TFG volunteers and learned some great lessons about what to expect for the road ahead. Upon my return, I moved into my permanent residence for the year and have started getting to know my fabulous host family who have been some of friendliest, kindhearted people I have ever met. I have also started learning about the British culture and some of the different words Brits use. Some of the words I've learned include creche for nursery, serviette for napkin, flapjacks here are an oat bar not a pancake, full stop for period, and the word cheeky, used like we would use ornery to describe an amusing mischievous child. And I have also started regularly using some more well known British words like rubbish, well done, jumper, lift, loo/toilet, lovely and so on. I have tried some new British foods as well,such as Ribena (juice drink), Gooseberry yogurt, the fruit flavor Blackcurrant , Chocolate Digestives (popular cookie), Lancashire cheese, and using a French Press to make coffee. (Food images below).

 In the following weeks since my last post, I have continued work at my placement at St. James and am getting to know the adorable kids I work with each week. I unfortunately will not be able to share with you any pictures of the kids I work with since British law forbids photos of children to be posted on the internet without written consent from their parents, but I will still be allowed to take photos throughout the year so I can keep memories of my time with the kids for when I get home.

So, during each week I work with a variety of age groups helping to lead an activity and Bible story. The kids that come to the groups are from the surrounding community and don't regularly go to church. Some of the children attend one of our four churches in the area that work together, but the rest come strictly to the weekly groups. These groups allow both parents and kids to come to an environment where they are accepted for who they are, without the pressure of having to attend church, and can receive the message of God and the Bible. This helps people in the community to build a relationship with the church without having to decide to regularly attend church on Sundays or adopt the beliefs of a specific denomination in order to receive the word of God. This type of evangelism is one I have come to like very much since it allows for individuals to decide to attend church in their own time, without pressure, and decreases the amount of intimidation some might feel when thinking about going or returning to a church setting.

In the last two weeks we have been teaching the kids the story Joseph and the Technicolor Dream Coat and David and Goliath. It has been a really nice experience for me to teach these Bible stories to the kids because they were the same stories I grew up with and haven't heard for a long time. It has been a very refreshing experience to go back and look at these Bible stories that were my first exposure to God and the Bible and see them through the eyes of an adult and how these stories still bring great understanding of God's love that can be applied to any person at any age.

I have also had the chance to get out and explore London with my new friend Nora from Hungary. This past Saturday, we went to a place in northern London called Camden Town. For all the shopaholics out there this is the place for you! If you like unique, options, bargains, trying new things, and seeing beautiful places look no further than Camden Town and its endless shops and beautiful scenery. I explored this town one Saturday from ten in the morning until ten at night and still couldn't see everything there was to see. A great experience and great place to have lunch, if I do say so myself :). Pictures below and more blog posts to come.

Ribena juice drink. Comes in concentrate so you just pour out a little then dilute with water. A nice way to get more for your money I think.

Blackcurrant. Very popular fruit flavor here

Gooseberry is also very good. Haven't had an actual Gooseberry yet but the yogurt is good.

Lancashire cheese is my new favorite. It's like a more mild mozzarella that is dryer and crumblier. Hmm good.

Chocolate Digestives. Not a specific dietary assistant, just the name of this delicious cookie that apparently American's tend to love. 

This is how I've been making my coffee. This is a rather large French Press. You can get smaller ones for just one cup of coffee but it's a fun and new experience for me and my coffee drinking.

This is the must have appliance in every house hold in the UK. Like a coffee maker but it only boils water. Fast and easy way to get hot water for anything....thinking I may need one when I get home for all the tea I will be drinking. ;)

Welcome to Camden Lock

Don't worry, these aren't all the shops

just a few on the way

Camden Lock (also Starbucks to the left :))

This made me chuckle 

Bobbies 

Camden Lock. My other favorite thing that ends with Lock. (First being Sherlock Holmes the TV show that my host family has so deviously gotten me addicted to)

What a lovely place for some lunch

and coffee

Lion Ladayni

Grrr

So much artwork everywhere!!

This little place lets you get your feet pedicured by little dead skin eating fishees for only 10 pounds. That's one we skipped today but we may be back ;)

So many cool things to look at everywhere

Want

This is just the food area

Market people

Pretty

All the shops are in here

Sadly no real horses though

Not sure of the face I'm making in this pic but we finally got a picture with a palace guard! Yay!

Lovely spot for dinner

Yay dinner at Camden Lock!