The Hogmanay Torchlight Parade

This week we're hosting my mom and she's been able to experience the Edinburgh Hogmanay.  Take a look at the website for all the details, they claim it's the worlds biggest New Year's celebration... debate amongst yourselves.

On Monday night we took part in the torchlight procession.  Roughly 30 ancient Scottish warriors led the procession followed by a full bagpipe marching band and 20,000 folks carrying torches.  It was amazing to see the entire downtown area alight with torches and the massive bonfire and fireworks were impressive!  I've posted some of our pictures but they don't do justice to the event, I suggest looking here at the professional pictures.

 

Scottish Warriors bearing weapons and flame

Stacie and Sally joining the crowd

Torch Procession

What's a parade without fireworks?

The bonfire

Tonight we'll be joining crowds over 100,000 strong to welcome the new year with fireworks and Auld Lang Syne.  Have a happy new year and I'll see you in 2009.

-Kyle

Our family Christmas

Here is a bit of a photo montage of my family's visit to Edinburgh for Christmas: 

Whiskey Shop on the Royal Mile

Inside the Great Hall in the Castle

Our traditional Christmas Eve nachos

View from Holyrood Park

Stacie's dad at the top of Arthur's Seat

Dinner at the Witchery

Kyle, Justin & Me in front of the Dome

Stacie's parents at the top of the Castle

Armour inside the Castle

Chapel inside the Edinburgh Castle

Kyle, Justin & Me in front of the Castle

Kyle & Me with a Piper

Justin with all of his Hearts Football Club gear

The family (minus our photographer- Stacie's mom)

As you can see, we had a wonderful and very eventful trip with my family. The plan was for my parents and brother Justin to fly off to Paris on Saturday morning.  However, on Friday morning my mother woke up with her leg swollen to twice it's normal size.  After spending most of the day in the Royal Infirmary, we learned that she had three blood clots in her left leg and was unable to fly.  After much debating, my father and brother decided to continue on to Paris without her and have left her here in our care.  Hopefully she'll be able to go home soon- it just depends on how quickly her blood thins.  

On a more positive note, Kyle's mother Sally arrived safely this afternoon from Spokane. She is spending the week with us here, so we'll keep you updated with some great New Year's photos. 

-Stacie 

St. Andrews

This week we've been blessed to have Stacie's family visit us for Christmas here in Scotland. We've been showing them around the city and even took them to a soccer match.  Today we all jumped on the train and headed to historic St. Andrews.  I was aware of the history associated with golf but we were all pleasantly surprised with the rest of the city.  Here's a few pictures:

Rugged natural features of hole #4

Group shot at hole #6

Old Course Hotel in background

St. Andrews coast on the North Sea

Castle ruins, (for McClure: history)

Cathedral remnants and graveyard

We all had a great day exploring St. Andrews and found it to be a charming Scottish village with amazing views and impressive history.  Stay tuned-in as we'll be uploading pics over the next few days as we play tour guide.

-Kyle

Getting in the Festive Spirit...

Kyle and I have been busy over the last week getting in the Christmas spirit by moving to a new flat and dressing up as Santa...not sure how the two go together? They don't really, but that was our weekend. We have been having issues with our flat in the past month (aside from the obvious issue of space) Mildew...a little while ago I noticed a lovely black and white substance growing on our bedroom wall- nasty! Long story short, we were able to get our landlord to agree to let us out of our lease for health reasons and the Lord has provided (Jehovah Jirah!). We moved in on Saturday to our much nicer and more spacious flat in the Bruntsfield area of Edinburgh. Here are some pictures of our new pad:

Entry Way

Living Room

Master Bedroom

Kitchen

Hallway

Possibly the greatest feature of our new flat is the laundry drying rack. To save space and utilize the high ceilings they have installed a pulley system to hang wet clothes. Check it out!


To celebrate our move, we went out on Saturday night to the Christmas Market. The market has a ferris wheel, swings, slides, ice skating, bumper cars on ice and tons of booths with traditional Scottish and German fare.

Now for the dressing up as Santa part. Every year Edinburgh has a charity walk called the Santa Stroll where you get a Santa costume as part of your entry fee. We went with a group of people from my work. After we all got our Santa gear on, we went for a leisurely stroll around Princes Street Gardens serenaded by bag piping Santas. Even Deacon got to wear a Santa costume and got 'oohed and ahhed' at as we walked around. He was quite the hit in his red cape!





This week is Kyle's last week of final's and then my parents and younger brother arrive on Friday to spend the week with us! We'll post some updates while they're in town.

-Stacie

Who turned the lights out?

"Save Me

Call my name and save me from the dark"

-Evanescence: Wake Me Up

With Scotland being a similar latitude to Alaska, things are starting to get pretty dark over here...I thought I was doing good not having to start work until 9 a.m, but when the sun doesn't rise until 8:30 a.m. it doesn't feel as good as it used to.  With the shortest day of the year being about 2 weeks away, we still have a few weeks left of diminishing sunlight.  The sun has been setting around 3:30 in the afternoon it's only going to bet worse.  On the flip side though, we will be living it up this summer when the sun rises at 4 a.m and sets at 11 p.m! 

-Stacie