It's not about Marmite, but if it were ...

I've taken a good bit of grief about our move to the UK.  For some reason, my friends and family think the move had to do solely with getting better access to Marmite.  It might have to do with a Facebook record that occasionally shows photos like this,

Or captures these conversations from our home

5yo: Daddy, I think I would like to go to the UK.

Me: Why is that?
5yo: Because they have swimming pools.
8yo: And?
5yo: And we get to go on an airplane.
8yo: And?
5yo: And the airplane has a TV in the seat.
8yo: And?
5yo: What else?
8yo: They have Marmite!

Maybe it's because this was one of the first photos I posted after we landed in the UK.

I've consistently stated that we didn't move to the UK just because of Marmite.  That said, I do wonder sometimes what would have happened if we did.  For example, it might mean that I've come to appreciate that great bastion of British culture, Dr. Who, because of how it can be used to portray the Marmite / Vegemite discussion.

I could write a haiku about Marmite.

Marmite on toasted
English muffin with butter.
The perfect breakfast.

I could adapt a favorite gospel hymn.

Oh the deep, deep love of Marmite,
'Tis so lovely spread on toast.
When it's eaten with my breakfast,
It's the part I love the most.
Oh, how lovely is my Marmite;
Mummy says it looks like tar,
But there's nothing quite so mah'velous
As a fresh, unopened jar!


Finally, I might re-write a bit of Lord of the Rings film dialogue between Merry and Pippin.

What's that?
That, my friend, is a tub.
It comes in tubs?  I'm getting one!

Family Walk (and other rambles): Calke Abbey

I've been wanting to put something up about Calke Abbey for a while now.  The estate is just a couple of miles away from our home in Melbourne.  This proximity, combined with easy access because of our National Trust membership, means that we've been there many times.  We've gradually accumulated enough photos to have something blog-able.

There's a herd of deer living on the grounds of the estate.  Evidently they are very cost-effective lawn mowers.

They also double as excellent topics of attention for squirly girls whose father needs to get out of the house for a while.

The grounds also have a decent number of sheep (as do pretty much any green spaces in Derbyshire). Evidently the lambing season at Calke Abbey has been an attraction for quite a while.  Several of the herds were recently sold to a private farmer, but there were enough for Kristine to take the girls earlier this year.

The proximity of Calke to Melbourne and Derby makes it a good place to meet for play dates.  This was during Easter break when we met up with some friends from St. Giles church in Normanton.

The Oldfields (whom we visited in Swindon at Easter) came to visit us for this past weekend.  We spent a good bit of the afternoon on the grounds with a picnic lunch and ambling walk around part of the estate.  Here's the route from RunKeeper.

Typical of England's schizophrenic weather, the previous week had switched back and forth between sun and rain.  The skies were clear and sunny enough when we left the house that Kristine asked the girls to bring along sun hats.  Elise and Charis took advantage of the chance to model the pouting poses they learned from the Gorgeous Georgians at Warwick Castle.

The normal first photo from any walk is of the three girls running off ahead.  That didn't happen this time.  Clare decided she wanted to start the walk riding on Kristine's back.  Elise and Charis were otherwise occupied chatting with the Oldfields.  The walk started across the field in about the middle of the trees below.

We stopped to get a shot of the girls on a fallen tree.  This is what happens when you tell your children to frown on 3, and one of them takes you seriously.

The girls got some hero poses in on the same tree.

They found a standing tree with a hollow trunk that all of them could fit inside.

A couple younger folks (ahem, Clare ...) started running out of steam shortly before the 1 mile mark into the hike.  John graciously treated us to ice cream.  As it turns out, ice cream is one of the foods that our US-trained taste buds have struggled to adapt to what's available in the UK.  The ice cream we ate here, which came from a local dairy farm, got high marks from all of us.

The ice cream gave Clare enough energy that she spent a reasonable amount of time after our break walking.  After that she was on my shoulders.

Early in the hike we had an unfortunate encounter between Clare and some stinging nettles.  John pointed out the duckweed antidote that usually grows near nettles.  Charis decided to preempt a potential nettles encounter by carrying this particular (large) leaf with her for the last half of the walk.

By the last half of the hike, Carol and Elise were ahead of the rest of us, cheerfully singing (songs that I couldn't hear because I was bringing up the rear with a certain 3 yr old on my shoulders).  I caught up with them here because they went exploring on a path that made them turn around.

We came up to this stone wall near the end of the hike.  I counted nine girls milling around the wall, and one man trying to line them up for a photo.  The girls were all Elise's age or younger.  I watched him with a mixture of admiration for taking that many young children out for a walk alone, and relief that it was him instead of me.  As the girls ran away from the wall and into the forest, I heard him utter the magic words to get them (mostly) under control: "Girls, let's go back to the cars so we can have a snack."  This was followed by shrieks of "Snacks!" and a stampede across the field.  The man's head is visible just above Elise's left foot.  The girls he was corralling are all in front of him along the path.

We got a picture of the girls on the same wall.  Clare's expression brings to mind a recent conversation I had with a neighbor on our street as I walked with the girls to the post office.

Friendly neighbor (to Clare): You're a mischievous one! I can tell in your face.
Looks at me: She's the troublemaker of the three, isn't she?
Me (smiling): That's right.

We made our way out of the woods and back across the field to the cars.

Nothing tops off a hard day's walk (or, in Clare's case, ride on parental backs and shoulders), than a refreshing swig of water out of a Marmite themed cycling bottle.  More on Marmite and its role in our move to the UK is here.

Family Walk: Father's Day at Dove Dale

After going out of town in early May when we travelled to Wales, there's been enough going on near home (various birthday parties for the girls, a band concert for me) that we largely stayed around Melbourne since then.  That, plus the unpredictable weather with a string of rainy weekends didn't really incentivize us to do a ton of outdoor activity.  All of which was starting to leave my feet feeling a bit itchy.  Fortunately, two things happened at the same time that let me scratch the itch.  First, Kristine offered to let me set the family agenda for Father's Day (I asked for an afternoon hike).  Second, the weather mostly cooperated (more on that later).

Here's our driving route.  We've found that activities in north Derbyshire work well on Sundays after church.  The girls get some snacks at church and run around with their friends for a while.  This makes them more amenable to a 30 or 45 minute car ride.  The extra distance somehow isn't as noticeable on the way home as it is on the way out.  The glitch we didn't factor in on this trip was a small voice piping up from the carseat, "I need to use the toilet," just as we came into Ashbourne.  Rather than spend time trying to find a public toilet, we told Clare we were almost there and asked her to wait.  Fortunately the gamble paid off.  It didn't take us long to get through Ashbourne to Dove Dale, and Clare was fine waiting.

I didn't turn RunKeeper on before we lost mobile phone reception, so had to construct the route afterwards.  Here's a reasonable approximation of what we did.  Just under 2 miles.

I mentioned that the weather mostly cooperated.  The drive from St. Giles to Dove Dale involved reasonable levels of mist and the windshield wipers operating.  That meant everybody had raincoats on when we started the hike (unlike our Tissington hike, this excursion included both raincoats and boots all around).

The directions from Derbyshire Walks with Children (DWWC) had us going on the side of the stream that is not paved or level.  This is the closest that my girls have ever come to off-road walking.  It was fun, but it also meant we went pretty slow while Clare and Charis found their way over the uneven terrain.

It didn't take Elise long to decide that if the path was uneven, then maybe walking off the path would be even more fun.  She spent a good bit of this hike on the hillside.

Once she found her footing, Charis was off and running.

Clare, on the other hand, was pretty tough to keep focused on the walk.  She thought it was much more fun to pick up stones and throw them into the water.

Once we were off the "rugged" part of the path, both Elise and Charis spent most of their time running.  During our house-hunting trip last December, Kristine and I wondered if the girls might need some help adjusting to the 3/4 mile walk each way to school.  We thought maybe she could start by driving part way and then walking the rest of the way.  Clare's still growing into these long walks, but I shake my head and laugh at the memory of that discussion as I watch Elise and Charis now.

Clare was ready for a rest by the time we got to these steps at about the 1 mile mark.  That meant Kristine had extra work to do climbing the steps.

This rocky area had a quasi-summit where Kristine and the girls got this hero shot in.  The path led downhill both ways from this area so we decided to turn around and head back.  We were about an hour out from the car, and there were enough people on the trail that Kristine and I were both feeling a bit claustrophobic.

The trail was crowded, but the river that we walked beside was truly beautiful.

I mentioned Elise's commitment on this hike to not walking on the primary path if she could avoid it?  By this point Charis was following her example.

This point in the trail is well off the route charted in DWWC.  That's my excuse for not knowing the story behind the log with coins stuck into its cracks.  I'm guessing it's something like a wishing well.  The girls were fascinated.

And, despite my attempt at stern instructions, managed to pull several of the coins out of their cracks.

If you squint at the photo below, you'll see the crowds of people on the trail.  That was the only downside of this particular hike.  Kristine and I both have strong mental models that hiking involves a decent amount of solitude.  You don't get that at Dove Dale.  That said, we never had to throw elbows to get through.

The only place the crowds presented a logistical challenge was at the stepping stones.  We had to cross these stones because we wanted to walk back to the car on the paved track.  Considering how many people were waiting to cross the stones, folks did a decent job of being polite and taking turns while groups of four or five families crossed each direction.  Neither Elise or Charis fell in, although Charis did need a little help getting across a couple of the larger gaps between stones.

Clare needed quite a bit of help.  She had the time of her life being swung from stone to stone.  The fellow behind Kristine had to cross three times.  He carried his toddler over to his wife (who had crossed in front of us with another child), then went back and returned with a stroller.  I'm thankful for Kristine's willingness to carry Clare on her back.

Elise, realizing we were at the end of her chances to walk off the beaten path, asked if she could take one more climb up the rocks.  Charis was hot on her trail, and Clare insisted on going along.

Here's the hero shot.

That's Dove Dale.  Lovely walk, but way too many people.

Onset of the accent

The girls made a couple of videos this afternoon for their classes in the US.  For me, this is a fun record of how their accents are changing.  All three girls adopt varying degrees of UK accents when talking with peers or adults over here.  These video messages to their American friends show how the accent is becoming increasingly subconscious.  We shall see (or hear) how they converse when we make our trip to the US in late July.

Here's Elise (who steadfastly insists that her UK accent is put on, but shows a decidedly UK cadence here).

Charis (like the video, her accent is consistently a hybrid)

and Clare

Half Term Break: Warwick Castle

One of the primary reasons I took this secondment in the UK was the chance to work on the Trent 1000 -TEN test program.  I've been targeting the test support gap in my skills as part of my "cradle to grave" mantra for a while now.  People who have lived through test programs learn ways of thinking and solving problems that those of us who've spent most of our time in the requirements or preliminary design world struggle to comprehend.  One of the biggest lessons is that reality never goes according to plan.  Case in point is below.

• Plan: The engine will be doing a set of tests that Shawn has been involved with right in the middle of the Derbyshire county half-term break in May.
• Shawn's response: This as an excuse to keep us in town (the real reason is we were worn out after Wales made 4 out-of-town trips in 4 months).
• Shawn's backup plan: The engine will run early in the week, so we could always keep our eyes open for a good deal within 3 hrs of driving.
• The reality: The engine test Shawn was involved with didn't run until late Friday night.  Other than a brief phone call while making coffee cake with the girls on Saturday morning, Shawn's capable colleagues handled the (not entirely) unforeseen SNAFU just fine.
• The lesson learned: We should have gone to Scotland for the week.  Okay, maybe not.  The truth is we all enjoyed the chance for time off that didn't involve a major change of scenery.

We took advantage of being in town to meet up with Sharon, a friend of mine from high school in Kenya now living in Birmingham, and her two boys, at Warwick Castle.  At just about an hour's drive from Melbourne, it worked well for a day trip.  Here's a photo that Kristine took from up on the castle wall.  Doesn't look bad for being 1,100 years old.

Partly because of the fluid engine test situation, and partly because of my not being on top of things, we had to buy tickets when we arrived.  That meant £24.00 each for Kristine and I, and £20.00 for the girls (Clare was free).  I was not impressed at first.  I've gotten used to the prices at the National Trust sites, which are much more economical (free for us now because of our membership, but on the order of £4.00 per person otherwise).  That said, my stinginess thawed over the course of the day.  One reason was the peacocks in the gardens at the front entrance.  This was a first for the girls, who were delighted.

As a child, I frequently saw roaming peacocks at a popular stop on the drive from Nairobi to Mombasa.  One of my powerful memories is of a particularly aggressive male attacking one of my siblings. I was more than a bit apprehensive with these ones.  My apprehensiveness was unfounded.  These peacocks were content to roam the gardens on their own side of the fence, display their colors, and make loud noises.  The only downside was that their loud noises were awfully close to a crying child.  And Clare, being a curious mimic, tried to figure out how to sound like a peacock.  She proceeded to practice her peacock sounds for many days after we visited the castle.

The castle grounds have a pretty extensive set of Horrible Histories exhibits about life at the castle during different time periods.  I had heard of the Horrible Histories (they were the basis for Elise's Year 3 curriculum at school), but had not had any direct exposure.  Each exhibit had a variety of activities with varying levels of educational value.  They also had two or three actors dressed in period garb, and in character for the castle during their time frame.

My favorite was the Gorgeous Georgians.  Not because of the fancy hair activities (which the girls enjoyed greatly).  I enjoyed it because I thought the actors did the best job.  The young woman in the photo below was the daughter of the castle lord.  She had an older woman acting as her chaperone.  The woman had a real name, but the younger woman called her Lady Wobble-bottom in honor of her broad girth and love of eating cake.

At one point, on hearing Kristine say something to the girls, the young woman said (in a very loud, properly aristocratic voice) "Speak again!  Where are you from?"
Kristine: Indianapolis.
Lady Wobble-bottom, they're from the colonies and they've come to visit.
Kristine: Actually, we live in Melbourne.
Oh, how lovely.  They're from the colonies, and they live in other colonies, and they're here for a visit.

Evidently even the Horrible Histories don't know about Melbourne in England.

Each exhibit had cutouts where you could poke your face through for a photo.  All three girls enjoyed this immensely.

Elise and Charis also got a chance to get put in stocks.

I enjoyed the mix of humor and education that the Horrible Histories look for.  The instructions for how to build a longboat are a good example.

If you followed those instructions, maybe you'd get a longboat like this one.

A close second favorite as far as the exhibits was the trebuchet.  They lose points for having the fellow on the other side of the stream use a microphone to make his speech (although that was perfectly understandable) and for the musical soundtrack that blared through the loudspeakers before his speech began.  The fellow did a good job with his speech.  It was rousing, passionate, full of important details about how the trebuchet would strike fear into their enemies' hearts and bring them glorious victory.  Buried in that speech were two important statements.

The first one: It's assembled with no metal pieces.  All the wood fits together.  Like going to IKEA, except that you don't have any leftover bits.

The second one: Sometimes, wars are not won with weapons.  Sometimes they are not won with horses and men.  Sometimes, you just need an engineer.

Was anyone listening (say, young children who are intent on being authors, illustrators, and librarians)?  And if they were listening, did that second statement stick in their brains?  We shall see.

The trebuchet in action.

I'm not sure if it was because of being half-term break, but there were quite a few people at the castle.  As a consequence, doing anything indoors felt extremely crowded.  In general I wasn't very thrilled with the indoor exhibits we saw.  There was a princess tower with an actress who guided the children through an exercise to free an enchanted prince from a photo and reunite him with his love.  Parents weren't very impressed.  I didn't hear the girls come out chattering about how much they liked it.  No doubt my 8 yr old blog editor will disagree when she reads that line (although she can't make me change it since it doesn't have any spelling or grammar errors).

On looking back at the photos, I probably didn't give them enough credit because I was so busy feeling claustrophobic.  These antlers, for example, are impressive (as are the weapons you can barely see hanging on the wall next to them).

Part of the reason for my claustrophobia was that a good portion of the larger rooms was blocked off. This was to protect the items on display, but didn't leave much room for making your way through the hordes of visitors.

There was space for us to pose for a photo with a wax figure of Henry VIII.

Sharon's boys were good sports about having to spend so much time in the stroller.  By the time we grabbed a bench to sit down and eat lunch, they were ready to get out though.  Elise and Josiah took advantage of the down time to run around in the courtyard.  Crowded rooms with under appreciated displays are in the main wing of the castle shown.  The (underwhelming) princess tower is accessed through the stairs to the left of the golden lion flag.

Being there with Sharon meant we were also able to get a rare photo of the whole family.

In addition to the actors at exhibits that run all day, like the Horrible Histories, there are several one-time performances.  We got to see two of them.  The first was a staged series of duels to earn the title Master of Chivalry.  Two honorable young gentlemen in red squared off against a dishonorable gentleman and his young protoge in black.  Each person on each team fought each person on the other team.  It culminated when the dishonorable protoge looked like he would lose his second fight, so his mentor jumped in.  The red fellow on the sidelines jumped in as well, resulting in all four guys fighting at once.  The weapons choreography, which I got photos of, was impressive.  Some of the other choreography (e.g., falling down when the other fellow's leg sweeps a couple feet away from yours) was a little obvious.

You see the crowds of people in the courtyard watching the duels?  Right after the contest was over, the heavens opened and we had pouring down rain for about 15 minutes.  This created stampedes for the few places that provided shelter (remember my previous comments about the interior being cramped).  We wound up putting on raincoats, pulling covers over the stroller, and huddling under the tree behind the yellow flag here because none of the arches or overhangs had space to squeeze a party of six plus stroller.  Fortunately, as seems to be typical of English weather, the rain passed pretty quickly.

We hung around the roped in field for an exhibit with birds of prey.  The exhibit almost didn't happen because the rain would have made the birds' wings too wet for them to fly.  As it was, the skies were clear enough that the birds were okay (although not clear enough that the folks watching took off raincoats or put down umbrellas).  This owl is a baby - about six months old - so he's still in training. That meant he didn't have to fly around and return to the handler's glove to get a piece of meat.  He just had to make a circuit of the posts in the field.

He may have been still in training, but he was remarkably calm about all the people gathered around to watch him.  Since he didn't know how to fly from the field to a different handler, he got to go into the crate with the black walls that was at the top of the field.

There were several other birds in the exhibit, including an Egyptian Harpy Eagle and an American Bald Eagle.  The sequence for them was to land on the handler's glove, get launched into the air, fly in a circle, and then return to his glove for some more meat.  We were standing at the bottom of the field in the middle.  This was great for seeing the birds and hearing the handler talk about them.  It also meant we were right in the middle of their flight path when they returned to his glove.  That wasn't a problem for everybody else.  The girls enjoyed seeing the birds up so close.  The only person it was difficult for was me.  Let's just say that the flight path for a large bird of prey is not a comfortable location when you're 6'5."  I would have gotten some good pictures if I'd had my act together instead of being so busy flinching.

The largest bird was this eagle from Kamchatka.

She was large enough that when the handler launched her off his glove, she had to fly to the top of one of the castle towers to be able to glide back for her meat.  This had something to do with the moisture in the air from the rain, which added weight to her wings.  Kristine and Elise climbed that tower after the exhibit was over.  Here's the view.

And here's the happy (if somewhat bedraggled) Elise enjoying her climb.

And a final farewell shot of the courtyard where the chivalry duels were performed.  It was a day well spent.  Pricier than I would have liked, but I think the sophistication in the different exhibits gave us our money's worth.