Monday's Memories: Scarborough (the place with the fair)

A friend who spent a summer in England told us we simply must visit Scarborough, so we planned our route, drove across the Yorkshire Moors and made a quick stop.  I'm really glad we did.  A northern English beach is a sight to behold.  The most prominent sight here is the ruin of Scarborough Castle.

 On the walkway above the beach

Good thing they have the barrier, right?  I think we were there at high tide because the waves were coming in hard and fast, and there were a lot of surfers.
 

What is this face I'm making?  I don't know.  KJ took the camera, and we now have a lot of shots of me making various facial expressions on the beach of Scarborough.  I'll only make you look at one.  We saw several signs advertising the fair, so we were obliged to walk the beach singing Simon and Garfunkel.
 

I really wanted to walk on top of the cliffs overlooking the water, so KJ dropped me off and tried to find a place to park (always a difficulty).  The wind was blowing so hard and cold up there, but I loved it.
 

The many dots of black in the water are surfers.  I thought they were brave to be in the North Sea in October.

After our walk we got back in the car and drove along the coast for awhile, until we made our way to Hull, birthplace of William Wilberforce.  And perhaps you shall see some pictures of that on Friday.

Fall Family Photos

Is this girl beautiful or what?

This was our runner-up Christmas card picture.  I'm excited about getting the winner in the mail.  My kids were champion smilers.

See?

A Recipe for your Friday

Hello, little group of people that check in on the Pughs.  I never intended to neglect posting this week; it just kind of happened.  I've been blogging in the morning, and I think Tuesday I didn't feel inspired to write anything, and then Wednesday I tried to be really disciplined and prioritize teaching Ella before anything else, which I did, and it was great!  But then I just got busy being disciplined, and I was trying not to piddle at the computer that day so...

Thursday is KJ's day off, so a lot of time is spent with him, and I went to Wal-Mart, and then I was making his special request supper, and made some phone calls...I was also trying to go through a few photo shoots I've done recently.  I still have quite a bit of work to do in that department.  

As a special Friday treat I thought I'd share the recipe for KJ's favorite chicken ever.  I'm going to have to start making this more frequently.

"This was the first dish you ever made that

I fell in love with."

- KJ Pugh -

This recipe came out of a book of appetizer recipes, and I made it the first year we were married.  I'm not really sure why I first decided to try it, but I'm thinking it was in part for the same reason I could make it on the fly last night:  all the ingredients are probably in your pantry.  And it really is super-good.  I didn't feel like dealing with skewers and cutting chicken breasts (SO hard to do.  I recommend cutting them while still slightly frozen.), so I just poured the marinade on top of chicken breasts and let them marinate in the refrigerator, then baked the chicken on 375 for about 40 minutes.  KJ ate two of them, and that's saying a lot for him.  

So, fire away!  It's scrumptious and doesn't really need a dipping sauce.    

Monday's Memories: The World of James Herriot

I gave you an excerpt from one of James Herriot's books when I wrote about our drive through Yorkshire.  Since then, I started re-reading All Creatures Great and Small, and it has been so fun.  It's such enjoyable and charming story-telling, not to mention the laugh-out-loud factor that his stories have.

We got up early Friday morning and drove through the Lake District to the town of Thirsk in Yorkshire, which is Herriot's fictional town of Darrowby.  It's been so fun to read Herriot's descriptions of the house, including the vines growing profusely along the front and be able to picture it exactly.

We parked on the street, somewhat uncertainly trying to figure out if we needed to put money in a meter or not, when a brisk British gentleman walked up and introduced himself, asking us if we were the Americans he was supposed to meet with that morning.  I wrote about meeting James' Herriot's son, Jim, on our trip.  It was definitely a highlight and a fun providence.  He was born during WWII and grew up in this house, on this street.  It's amazing to think of all the changes he has seen there through the years.

I didn't learn until reading Jim Wight's biography of his father that James Herriot was really James Alfred Wight, and Siegfried Farnon was really Donald Sinclair.  Though he changed Sinclair's name, we were told that his portrayal of him in Wight's books was spot-on.

 Mrs. Pumphrey and Tricki-Woo, mentioned in the previous post

  The Dining Room, along with the desk where Mrs. Hall

imperiously set up camp

We paid for audio guides, narrated by Jim Wight, that we listened to as we walked through the house.  It was hard to believe I was in the house where all those stories I'd read took place.

 The living room with the French doors leading to the garden

   Collection of pipes and the famous mug, where Siegfried haphazardly deposited all his funds

The house was huge with a looong hallway of tiled floors with little rooms shooting off from it.  You can well imagine just how cold it would have been without central heat.

 Pill Boxes

 Dispensary with all the old-fashioned remedies

 Operating Room

 

This was the warmest room in the house according to Wight, snug and warm with a roaring fire.  It was used by his mother as a sewing room and where Jim and his sister Rosie would do their schoolwork.
 

 I love a big, old-fashioned kitchen.

 I would not have loved the amount of work laundry was back then.

The old stable and outbuildings were converted into a museum filled with memorabilia from Alf Wight's writing and veterinary days, as well as a model of the set used on the BBC's television show based on his books.

Finding the famous Austin there was definitely the biggest highlight after meeting Wight's son.  This car was Alf Wight's transportation to all the farms on his veterinary visits and is almost its own character.

  Walkway leading to the french doors in the living room

 KJ and I on set

There are a lot of fun activities for children, and the museum is a popular field-trip destination for schools.  Adults can have a good time, too. 

 

Even in its fakeness, this is gross.  Am I right?  But this was the true world of James Herriot, always with his arm stuck up the inside of a cow, untangling the legs of calves, bringing them into the world.  He describes it as long, back-breaking work, because you know, normally cows lie down to give birth.

 Thirsk's church, where the Wights were married

After our tour, we walked down the main street of Darrowby, ducking into a sandwich shop to get some lunch to-go, where I learned that the Brits spread butter on their sandwiches, much as we do mayonnaise.  Interesting, I thought. 

This boxed set of James Herriot's books would make a great gift for someone, I'm sure!

To Grandma's House We Went

We started our week-long adventure this week with a visit to my grandmother's house.  I got an early Christmas present (a new camera lens!), and I was eager to capture the fall colors.  It was a beautiful hour and a half in the car.

 Ella was eager to look at the beauty around her, too.

 

 James was eager to...do whatever he wanted.

Ella practiced her gymnastics.  We used to ride on the seesaw and swing on old wooden swings on this frame.  I didn't realize until Monday that my great-grandfather had made the swing set.

 What's that I see?

{I think he was looking for bad guys to shoot with his fireballs.

I kid you not.}

 

Our latest trick for getting natural smiles out of James is to tell him to tell someone about Mario.  He lights up.  My mom reminded me of Ella's young obsession with The Little Mermaid, so this phase will pass, I suppose.  For now, even with 5 days away from the Wii, he did not forget about Mario and Luigi.

Ever since Alabama History in the 4th grade I've remembered that the camellia was the state flower, but I didn't know they bloomed in the winter.  My grandmother said they normally bloomed in January, but her bush was covered in buds this week.

Leaves, leaves, leaves.  I've spent the past week soaking in their loveliness, "drinking them in," as Anne would say.