Hometown Love Hodgepodge

After today, there are only 5 more Wednesdays in 2024 and the last Wednesday of the year is Christmas! Thank you, Joyce, for the Hodgepodge Questions again this week!

1. What was your favorite part about growing up in your hometown?

My hometown was a melting pot of people from many cultures that opened up my eyes to the world. Besides friendships with other Russian-Americans like myself, there were many Mexican, Jewish, Japanese, and Armenian Americans in my friendship circles. The photos are from a mini-reunion with some high school friends.

2. Do you prefer ‘material’ gifts or ‘experience’ gifts? If you answered experience, tell us about one you’ve received and truly enjoyed.

At this stage of life I’ll say the experience gifts are the best! The gift of our whole family being together is always so so good. Our 50th Anniversary weekend in Walla Walla with all our kids and grands and our Scotland trip with our oldest and our dear DIL were priceless!

3. Is brown a color featured prominently in your home decor? Your wardrobe? What’s a favorite brown thing you own? Of the brown foods listed here which one is your favorite and/or most often consumed… brown sugar, brown rice, pretzels, coffee, dates, cloves, German chocolate cake, whole wheat bread?

Shades of brown do play a dominant roll in our home especially since all of our wood furniture and chairs and sofas are brown. Our walls are Khaki Shadow. As far as foods go, it’s coffee for me.

4. Which ‘Charlie Brown’ character do you relate to most? If you’re not sure, you can take a fun quick quiz by clicking here-Which Charlie Brown Character Are You? or the one found here-Charlie Brown Quiz. I got the same answer on both.

I got Linus and Marcie and I’m really not an introvert. I don’t need a security blanket, either. 🙂

5. What’s a favorite item you’ve purchased this year?

This ‘Coo’ print we picked up at Hobby Lobby to remind us of our Scotland travels is a favorite. This Highland Coo puts a smile on my face each morning as I walk from our bedroom to our living area for my cuppa black (dark brown) coffee!

6. Insert your own random thought here.

Here’s a real Highland Coo…

This one is a baby.

Thank you to all who visit here and double thanks for leaving a comment.

Scotland Travel Journal ~ Celtic

On the same Saturday as our visit to Glasgow Cathedral and the Necropolis we attended the Celtic v. Hearts game at Celtic Park Stadium. It is our tradition when traveling with Josh and Laura to attend at least one futbol (soccer) match. Josh has a good source to secure tickets for us and they are always tickets that include special seats and hospitality.

Celtic won the game and after the game we decided to wait around to see if Josh could get his Jersey signed by a U.S. Player who is on the Celtic team.

Success! It was fun to greet Cameron Carter-Vickers and congratulate him on his performance in the game.

Our time at the stadium was complete and now we hoped an Uber could pick us up and get us to our dinner reservations on time.

We made it with 5 minutes to spare! The Ox and Finch is a Michelin star restaurant with small plates on offer that were all very interesting and out of the ordinary. We enjoyed our time.

It was the end of a very filled first full day and only full day in Glasgow.

We had breakfast on Sunday at the Ivy again before we packed up and journeyed to Stirling for our next big adventure.

I had some extra shots of our time at the Ivy from Saturday morning.

The rest of these photos are from Sunday morning the 15th of September.

While waiting for our uber to Stirling, Laura was able to search out the music this Piper was playing and get a video and photo of him. It was a bucket list item for Laura. She got a few more of these moments, too.

Goodbye Glasgow. We enjoyed our stay.

Waiting for our Uber ride to Stirling.

At every turn and every new experience we thanked God for His goodness to us.

Scotland Travel Journal ~ The Necropolis

On Saturday the 14th of September after viewing the inside of Glasgow Cathedral we walked outside to improving weather and decided we shouldn’t miss the hike up to the Necropolis to view the John Knox Memorial.

The Necropolis is a Victorian garden cemetery full of wonderful architecture, sculpture and fascinating stories.

Adjacent to Glasgow Cathedral, the Necropolis was modeled on Père-Lachaise in Paris. It is estimated that something in the order of 50,000 burials have taken place here, with around 3,500 tombs.

Built in the Classical Revival architectural fashion, the Necropolis was established by the Merchants’ House of Glasgow in 1831. A monument to John Knox, which was erected in 1825, dominates the hill.

Our walk to the top of the 2nd highest hill in Glasgow where the monument to John Knox was placed was our good introduction to the climbs ahead of us on this trip.

The history of William McGavin can be found here.

The story about how this monument to John Knox came about can be read here.

The inscription which has worn away can also be read in full at the linked site.

The Reformation produced a revolution in the sentiment of mankind the greatest as well as the most beneficial that has happened since the publication of Christianity.

In 1547 and in the city where his Friend George Wishart had suffered, John Knox, surrounded with dangers, first preached the doctrines of the Reformation. In 1557 on the 24th of August, the Parliament of Scotland adopted the Confession of Faith presented by the Reformed Ministers, and declared popery to be no longer the religion of this kingdom.

John Knox became then a Minister of Edinburgh, where he continued to his death, the incorruptible guardian of our best interests.

The weather was moody and cool which made the hike to the monument pleasant and atmosphere appropriate.

On our way down we walked another path to see a smaller memorial to Wallace.

We walked to the hop on hop off pick up spot and waited for the bus for our overview of Glasgow. Here are some random things that caught my eye.

Across from the bus stop while we were waiting.

The Doulton fountain is the largest fountain ever constructed in terracotta. Queen Victoria forms the apex of the elaborate three-tiered structure. Below, four groups of figures represent the peoples of Britain’s colonies in Canada, South Africa, Australia and India. Built to commemorate the 1887 Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria by the Royal Doulton Company.

Our next event on this day will wait for another post.

Scotland Travel Journal ~Glasgow Cathedral

We made it all the way home on Thursday the 26th of September. We fly out of Seatac Airport (Seattle) which is a good five to six hour drive from our home in Colville. Since we were traveling with Josh and Laura we find it easier to drive to their home the day before our flights and drive and park at the airport with them. Our flight home from Scotland arrived Tuesday evening and we would be in no good shape to then drive the 6 hours home so we spend another night at Josh and Laura’s before we attempt our final drive home. There were dust storms predicted on our route home for Wednesday so we put off our travels home for one more day and had a very nice drive with great weather conditions on Thursday. Taking the extra day made it possible for us to see Katie and Andrew, too, which was good.

Looking back I see that I covered our flight and arrival to Scotland well here. I even had the energy to post a few details on our first full day which was Saturday the 14th of September here. From here on out in Scotland the days were full of activity and I had no energy to put words together or match those words up with photos. Our internet connections were slower and slower, too. Some of our days and the events and experiences we had deserve a post all to themselves. I might be done with my Scotland Travel Journal by November!!

Our lodgings in Glasgow were at Native Glasgow. The central location worked well for us.

A photo for any Dr. Who fans out there.

On Saturday September 14th we had breakfast reservations at The Ivy for 8:30 and their webpage said we should dress ‘smart’. We dressed as smart as we could and walked over to the restaurant which was very close to our hotel. It was a wet and drizzly beginning to the day.

After breakfast we walked over to George Square to catch a hop on hop off bus.

George Square is named after King George III. Laid out in 1781, today Glasgow Square is home to the headquarters of Glasgow City Council, and showcases an important collection of statues and monuments, including those dedicated to famous scots such as Robert Burns, James Watt, Sir Robert Peel and Sir Walter Scott. It is also the square where people gather for major events and to let their voices be heard, aka protest.

Our first hop off spot was St. Mungo’s Cathedral (Glasgow Cathedral).

This medieval cathedral is thought to have been built on the site of St Kentigern’s tomb and marks the birthplace of the city of Glasgow.

One of Scotland’s most magnificent medieval buildings, Glasgow Cathedral is the only one on the Scottish mainland to survive the Reformation of 1560 intact.

Glasgow Cathedral is built on the site where St Kentigern, or Mungo, is thought to have been buried in AD 612. St Kentigern was the first bishop within the ancient British kingdom of Strathclyde, and the present cathedral was built during the 13th – 15th centuries.

Admire carved stone bosses on the ceiling of the Blackadder Aisle, and one of the finest post-war collections of stained glass windows in Britain.

My people looking up in awe of this amazing structure.

One of my interests in this trip to Scotland was gleaning information connected to the Reformation and the Covenantors of Scotland like John Knox, George Wishart, Patrick Hamilton, The Two Margarets, Jenny Geddes, and others. We would learn much about the early martyrs of the church throughout our stops in Scotland.

This stone reads…

“Here lies the corps of Robert Bunton, John Hart, Robert Scot, Matthew Patoun, John Richmond, James Johnston, Archibald Stewart, James Winning, John Main, who suffered at the cross of Glasgow, for their testimony to the covenants and work of reformation, because they durst not own the authority of the then tyrants, destroying the same, betwixt 1666 and, and 1688.

Years sixty six, and eighty four,
Did send their souls home into glore,
Whose bodies here interred ly,
Then sacrific’d to tyrrany;
To covenants and reformation,
‘Cause they adheared in their station,
These nine, with others in this yard,
Whose heads and bodies were not spar’d,
Their testimonies, foes to bury,
Caus’d beat the drums then in great fury
They’ll know at resurrection day,
To murder saints was no sweet play.

I love the eagle lecterns in the United Kingdom.

The Unicorn and the Lion (Scotland and England), the Thistle and the Rose.

We looked up a lot but it was also good to look down on the amazing floors.

Stand Sure is the inscription on the Sword.

The Crypt of St. Mungo’s was another layer of amazing architecture.

The weather outside improved and we decided to make the journey up behind the cathedral to view the Necropolis and specifically the monument to John Knox.

This is already way too long of a post and I will save the Necropolis for another day. Thank you so much for journeying along with us on this most amazing experience we enjoyed. Thank you to Laura for sharing all her photos with me. All my posts will be a mix of both her photos and mine.

Thanks be to God for His amazing goodness to us in our travels.

We Made It!

All the way from Seattle, Washington to Glasgow, Scotland on the first leg of our journey!

We got to Sea-Tac and breezed through security with plenty of time to spare for our Aer Lingus flight to Edinburgh with a stop in Dublin, Ireland. Our flight left Seattle at 6:45 PM on Thursday the 12th of September.

Laura got a shot of me enjoying an online puzzle that was offered in the game app on the plane.

We made it to Dublin (because of the time zone difference of 8 hours) at 11:30 AM on Friday the 13th. Our connection in Dublin onto a much smaller plane was touch and go for a while as there were some technical issues but we finally boarded and made it to Edinburgh airport at 3:30 PM on Friday.

Our luggage arrived quickly and we made it to a queue for an airport bus to take us to Glasgow.

That trip is normally 1 hour long but there was a lot of Friday afternoon traffic and we didn’t make it to Glasgow until after 6PM.

It was a short walk from the bus station to our hotel and it felt good to settle in our rooms and then make it out for a nice sit down meal. After trying a couple of Pubs that were packed to the gills we settled in at All-Bar-One where we enjoyed our time.

So thankful for all the travelling mercies we enjoyed on this day.

It’s our first time in Glasgow, an old city with amazing architecture to enjoy. So thankful for Laura’s eye for the details in taking photos and sharing them with me.

Hoping to share more postcards along the way. We have been up for well over 24 hours and hope to sleep well, Goodnight!

The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b.

To honor and encourage

Tag Archives: Glasgow