Scotland: Walking, Color, School, Family, and Bums

So Sorry it has taken so long to post again!  Here are some pictures from our first month and a half of settling in and adventuring in St Andrews:

East Sands beach - prime time for our first Sea Glass hunting.  We found some good ones!

You can see the cathedral from the 1400s behind us

One of River's primary modes of transportation these days!

One of the fun surprises of Scotland is a few new playground apparati ;-) that we have gotten to enjoy.  Here is the awesome Huge swing!

For the first month, walking was our only way of getting around.  Notice how the girls invented a way for all three of the kids to ride in the stroller when they were tired!  We definitely put our walking time in - Janelle added it up one day in September - 6 hours of walking!!

Walking Esther to school (her 2nd school).  You can tell what school it is by the uniforms (it took a little convincing that blue was going to be an acceptable color for her)!

It's not exactly warm right now, but it also does not rain every day, so we have been really thankful for the sunshine when it comes!

More walking!

Our neighbor in the apartment is a 6 year-old whom Esther has enjoyed playing with - very fun!

This is the park that is immediately behind our house.  Dancing and singing are standard activities that could occur at any time!

River is getting super-big and strong.  He has been working on the push-up position (plank) and can now hold it for about 5 seconds.  We were trying to convince our girls to do tummy-time, but River hangs out on his tummy all the time; I think we are getting a taste of one difference between boys and girls.

Future favorite sport?  Not that I am pushing for that at all!  ;-)

Esther is taking violin lessons now, which she chose to do and committed to try for a year.  So far she has been enjoying it (except sometimes that part about practicing a few minutes each day)

Watching Esther work on writing and reading has inspired Bella who now loves working on her letters.  She works on them almost every day and can now write her name really well (with a little help on the 'A').

Janelle has done an amazing job making our Flat into a home (on a budget)!!

River's Room - the girls are doing so awesome playing with River.  Bella's favorite words to River, especially in the morning are, "Hi sweety boy! Hi sweety boy!  You are the sweetest boy in the whole world" (repeat about 8 times!)

Canvases that Janelle made for River's room with the virtues.  Pretty awesome!

We call this room the "Great Room"

Nana's painting on the other side of the Great Room.

Canvases that Janelle made for our room.  Janelle and Esther have been learning to sew on Esther's new pink sewing machine, so Janelle made a bunch of pillowcases with colorful fabric that she bought.  We love our color!

Our "new" car!  After a month of walking everywhere, we decided that it was time for a car.  In the UK, you are rewarded for having a smaller car, so we are cooperating with the system in our little Toyota Corolla (which is still bigger than a lot of the cars here).  We are really thankful for our car (and the chance to get good at driving on the left). 

Things are going well here.  We really are having fun as a family.  One of the great gifts has been the community of people that we are already getting to know.  Many of the students in the Divinity School are in a similar place of life to us, and the wives do a really good job of connecting.  We have started to make some new good friends, which we are so thankful for.

We have also found a church, the Free Church of Scotland, that we are excited about.  Our new church experiences have definitely made us appreciate even more what we had in Boulder and Pasadena, but we are thankful for this little community to call home, and although they don't have the programs for children that we are used to, there are loving adults who are there and are starting to get to know Esther and Bella (it may have sped up that process that they decided to dance in the aisles last Sunday, which I gathered is a very new thing for this church!).  I also got to lead music a couple weeks ago at the service, which was really a gift to me.

My school started in mid-September.  I am working on a one year Masters now that I hope will roll over into a PhD when it is done.  My classes are good and pretty intense.  We have tons of reading and almost all primary sources (stuff like Irenaeus and Augustine and Athanasius and Thomas Aquinas), mostly from the first 4 centuries of the church. Here's how I described it to a friend recently:
School has been life-giving still, but in a new way.  Last year felt more like being fed delicious smoothies all day - tastes delicious, not much chewing, but good sustenance.  This year has so far felt like eating steak and potatoes - takes some cutting and chewing; you have to cut off some fat; but a good bite tastes really good and you know it is going to keep you full and strong longer.  Hopefully the analogy makes sense - here we read almost only primary sources so far, and I am being exposed to theological concepts and points of view that I had no idea existed.  For example, my Trinity teacher has a very different (but still committed, evangelical Christian) take on the Trinity than I came in with!  Although that has been challenging, I have found that I am really glad to see other perspectives and question some of the things that I had assumed everyone thought were true. And, there are other teachers here who have a theological approach much more akin to mine, and when I get to learn from them, it is amazing!!  I have recently loved reading Irenaeus and Athanasius and seeing their understanding of the good news  of Jesus and the Incarnation (Jesus becoming man) that was MUCH bigger than just the problem of sin needing to be forgiven but was a grabbing onto a humanity that  was broken on the inside and alienated from God, sanctifying every step of human life (birth, childhood,...death, resurrection) and pulling that life up into a communion with God that is way beyond what Adam and Eve had in the garden but is exactly what God had in mind from the beginning. 

Janelle and the girls and River are doing well.  The girls are on break from school right now, and when break is over, Esther will be starting at her 3rd school.  It is a long story, but the bottom line is that we feel this school is really going to be best for her, and we are really excited she gets to go there for the next 3-4 years. 

We have been compiling our list of "Scottish" words that we have learned so far... here are a couple with context -
"bum" - bottom; at the park a mum said, "Don't sit on the grass or you'll get a wet bum!"
"tidy" - clean; at school the girls have "tidy-time" every day"
"brilliant" - awesome


Love to you from the Buckner family.  May you know the glory and presence of the Father in the Son through the Spirit this day and week.

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