More than a dog

We're sad to report that the beloved Terry family pet, Montague (Monty), has passed away. The English Patience blog, as well as Adventures in the Midwest and the BBBBlog, would like to honor him at his passing by sharing a few stories. We hope these stories will be therapeutic for all of us who mourn his passing.

One of my favorite of Montague's many talents was his ability to retrieve food from any seemingly-unreachable place. There are many incidents of his eating whole pans of rolls, plates of pancakes and whatever else he could manage. But my favorite specific occurrence was when he managed to get a massive slab of pure, dense chocolate from the middle of the kitchen table, where it had been placed specifically because it would be unreachable for him. That Monty was able to consume such a large quantity of a substance that should have been lethal to him is one of the things that made him so special.

The above photo is from a family hike at Tent Rocks in New Mexico. What family outing would be complete without Monty? All 7 of us (Mom, Dad, Michael, Bob, Nick, MONTY and me) had a great time hiking that day. Monty did his best to make sure none of the group was separated because he liked us all to be together.

Now it's time for Jacob's memories...

How can anyone choose just one or two Monty moments? Once when I was grilling chicken breasts at the Terry's, Monty was very interested in my every move. His nose was never far from the grilling surface, so when a whole chicken breast slipped through the tongs, he had swallowed it before I even realized what happened. He swallowed it WHOLE and PIPING-HOT from the grill. Garth's lunch for the next day was gone.

We're glad Monty is no longer suffering, and we hope he's enjoying the peanut butter in heaven. :)

Happy Holidays 2008!

If you've been following our blog this year, this post won't really contain anything new. But for those of you we don't regularly correspond with, we hope you're doing great and that you tune in to our blog occasionally to see what we're up to. We'd love to hear from all of you too!

In January we finally got our long-awaited paperwork to move to England! We had been waiting since March of 2007, and we were excited and grateful to finally know we'd be moving in February.

Before we left we made an extra-special

trip to Alaska to visit Rachel's parents and brother. Things were excessively cold--down to negative 45 degrees F! We had a wonderful time doing things you can only do in Alaska in the winter: seeing the aurora borealis, watching the dog sled races, seeing the massive and elaborate ice sculptures, taking a dip in the hot springs and watching our eyelashes turn frosty. And it was great to see family!

We moved to England in February and have absolutely LOVED living in this fabulous country! We've seen so many wonderful and iconic sites: Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Stonehenge, Shakespeare's birthplace, etc. And we've enjoyed the food and culture. So far we've taken trips to Paris, Scotland, Germany, Normandy, Prague, Portugal, etc. We're having the time of our lives!

In May Jacob's brother Joel and his wife Emily visited. We had a really fun time together doing lots of fun England things. We also took a trip to Scotland, which was amazing! Emily and Joel were wonderful guests!

Jacob spent 2 months in Iraq over the summer. He had an interesting time, but the separation was difficult. Rachel had a fabulous time with her brother Nick while Jacob was gone. Rachel and Nick visited Germany, France, Ireland and many awesome places in England: Liverpool and the Beatles sites, the Isle of Wight, Bath, York, Sandringham House, countless castles and stately mansions and more local--but fabulous--places like Cambridge, Ipswich and London.

Jacob spent 3 weeks working on audits in Turkey in October & November. He had a good time visiting Biblically significant sites and other fun Turkish places. He even learned some Turkish dancing techniques while he was there. :)

We spent our Thanksgiving in Portugal, but we still got our turkey dinner with Jacob's amazing coworkers a few days before we left. He enjoys the people he works with in this office, and we love hanging out with them. Rachel is still working remotely for the credit union back in Albuquerque. She still loves her job but misses her coworkers.

The weekend before Christmas we decided to visit the Christmas markets in Germany, which were amazing! For Christmas we plan to have a quiet, relaxing day at home and dinner with friends.

We hope you all have a wonderful holiday season!

Love,

Rachel and Jacob

Frohe Weihnachten!

We drove to Germany to see the Christmas markets this weekend, and it was a truly magical experience! We visited Christmas markets in Köln (Cologne), Aachen, Trier and Bernkastel; our favorite market was Aachen by far! Thanks to Mike (Rachel's brother) for recommending that market! (It's pictured above.)

The markets are characterized by bright, beautiful stalls where they sell many fascinating things: nutcrackers, cookie cutters, candles, nativity sets and accessories, spatulas, pottery, tree ornaments, sculptures, scarves and many other fascinating and random things. We arrived at the Trier market just before it opened, so here's a photo of Jacob exploring the market without the massive crowds.

But the highlight of the markets is the amazing food!! Everywhere we went we smelled something delicious, and we tried to taste as much of it as possible! For example, the cheese-covered pretzel I'm eating in the photo below (at the Köln market) is something we'll be talking about for the rest of our lives; it was that good!

At the Bernkastel market they turned the apothecary building into an advent calendar. You can see from the below photo that they open one of the windows every day of December. It was adorable!

In Aachen we discovered the Lindt factory outlet store--wonderful! We also enjoyed another Aachen specialty: Aachener Printen. It's basically the highest-quality, most delicious gingerbread in the world. It was FANTASTIC! Here's Jacob admiring a display of Aachener Printen in a shop window (yes, his tongue is hanging out of his mouth).

Speaking of food, here's a list of everything we ate while we were there--only 2 days!

• 2 bratwursts on Brötchen with fabulous German mustard
• The legendary, already-mentioned cheese-covered pretzel
• Berliners (remember the famous JFK "Ich bin ein Berliner" comment? We had to try them!)
• Roasted glazed almonds (these are TO DIE FOR!)
• Aachener Printen
• Apfelpfannkucken/Apple pancake (this was one of my favorites--so yummy!)
• Assorted Lindt chocolate
• Local trout
• Deer goulash (Jacob joked he was eating Rudolph)
• Authentic gummy bears
• Heart-shaped gingerbread (Lebkuchen)
• Hot chocolate (exceptionally delicious!)
• Beef Soup
• Wienerschnitzel
• A massive yeast dumpling with Swiss-recipe cheese fondue
• Christmas balls (pastry)
• Soft pretzels
• Cheese bread
• Pudding pretzels
• Streusel pastries (pudding and cherry)

Did we mention we LOVED the food? :)

Happy Christmas!

A holiday baking day

I spent the entire day today baking. I baked peach pies, chocolate chip chocolate cookies, cowpoke cookies (more commonly known as "cowboy cookies") and 2 types of granola. I also made a cabbage soup for dinner.

During the holiday season it seems like I spend more days entirely in the kitchen than I do in any other occupation. Last week I made homemade Twix and biscotti to send to my boss. Within the next 7 days I plan to make several pies, chewy molasses cookies and gingerbread people.

I know that many of you are similarly engaged in creating holiday goodies. Happy baking!!

(If any of you would like instructions for any of the above items, I'll be happy to provide what I have--just email or comment on the blog with your request. I should issue a warning: I'm incapable of following a recipe, so I don't always have one. But generally with baking I have at least a starting point.)