bye bye chapel

It is a gorgeous, COLD, clear autumn day in Stanton St John. I just cleared a giant pile of leaves from the Chapel's front steps, in anticipation of the movers coming later this week.

The sparse tree branches out there are a good metaphor for what the Chapel looks like indoors - pretty sparse! Pictures are off the walls, bookshelves are empty, and all we have to show for three years of life in the UK is in four big boxes.

Maybe it's fitting then, that I finally show you all (those of you who haven't already seen these on FB) what the Chapel looked like at the height of summer - voila! a much overdue house tour, here on the front lawn! Downstairs: Living, kitchen, entry and a little loo

Upstairs: one lovely big master suite with bathroom and dressing area (and my "office" of course). I'll miss coming to work here every day!

  

   

chapel preview

I keep promising a tour of our new place, but the kitchen just never stays clean long enough to photograph it! Here's a little preview of a favourite reading nook, and our scandalous open-concept bed/dressing/bath room :)

a spot of croquet

Two wonderful things happened last weekend:

First some lovely friends came to visit, and then the sun came out.

Erin and Jonny spent a couple days in Oxford/Stanton St John during a 2 week tour of England. They are incredibly fun and doubled the Canadian contingent at our chapel warming party on Saturday (which was a smashing success and I was having too much good chat to bother with photos).  

On Sunday, after a dose of tourism and high tea in the city we came back to STJ for a highly competitive match of croquet on the Chapel lawn.

In Oxford this is a sport they take seriously (see above, the boys doing their best to look club-worthy). It's a little known fact that croquet is the worls'd oldest varsity sport - the first match took place between Cambridge and Oxford in 1231. One rumor purports that the sport was so popular with Oxford Dons back in the day that one college, Balliol, was even named for the sport (ball in 'ol)... umm, but I think the Balliol family might take issue with that claim. University Parks, near our former home, has a pitch specifically devoted to croquet and on any given day you might see the club out in their whites and hear them cursing over a missed wicket.

We were four novices at this ancient game so there was more guessing at rules than passing through wickets. Erin, however, forgot to tell us that 'lawnsports' is her middle name and left us all behind in a trail of grass clippings. See photo below of her looking smug during a post-match pint. I, for one, am looking forward to a rematch!

new kids on the pond

The Chapel got a special delivery this weekend. Five new ducklings turned up on Saturday morning and were testing out their new swimming skills all day (with some breaks for naps). We're pretty enamored by these little guys.

Yesterday morning, however, we peeked out the window and sadly discovered they were down by one, and by the afternoon we only had three little ducklings in the yard. We're gunning for the last three to hold strong and didn't even feel angry at momma duck when she started squawking at 5.30 this morning - she was probably trying to scare off the local fox. Dean managed to capture the troups when they still numbered five. pretty friggin cute.

cool off

The sun FINALLY joined us in Oxfordshire on Sunday. We took advantage of it by tootling around in the yard. Well, I tootled - tugging at weeds here and there. Dean's involvement was a bit more hardcore: trimming ivy, mowing the lawn and helping our landlords chop a tree and burn a big pile of brush.

By the end of the day he was sweaty and smelled like cinders and sap. Obviously there was only one proper way to cool off after all that. I mean, beside the soothing sound of rushing water, why ELSE would you have a stream in your yard?