Week 14 – Back to Tantallon and Dirleton Castle, Rainy, rainy, Lost but found a great pizza place

Well, this week just flew by.  It was rainy almost every day and you have to understand that when I say rainy I mean it never stops raining.  It is raining when I wake up and it is still raining when I go to bed.  It comes down in so much water per square inch that I don’t even know how to explain it and yet it is so light that you don’t really even hear it beating on the roofs or pavement.  The other thing that amazes me is even with all the rain you don’t find puddles or overflowing gutters.  The water all just goes away.  I’m not sure where.  You never see clogged drains anywhere or anything.  There is one spot near our flat that always fills with water a bit and I did put on my jeans and my raincoat Monday night and walked three blocks to a little corner grocery store to get some bread and my new addiction, Loftus Biscuit Spread.  I eat it with bananas for breakfast.  (Why is everything good fattening!!)  And it was raining the whole way there and back but it was so nice to walk in.  My companion doesn’t like the rain at all and just feels all gloomy in the rain.  I don’t know why it makes me feel happy.  But I do really like the rain, when the wind isn’t blowing anyway.

Wednesday Sister Six and Sister Sam’s gave me a call and asked if I could come teach an investigator with them.  I love it when I get to do that.  This day we met with a young man who is from Scotland.  He is about 17 or 18 I think.  They found him the day before and were able to go into a Costa with him (Costa is a place like Starbucks) and sit and teach lesson 1.  They taught him how to pray and challenged him to be baptised.  So today he was coming for lesson 2.  He came to the church right next to the mission home.  His name is Spencer and we found out he walked about 40 minutes to get here to listen to the next lesson.  And it was still raining.  He is so interested in learning more about the gospel.  He has not been religious although he was baptized when he was younger in some church. He had never given a prayer before the day before this when the missionaries taught him how.  He was excited to report that he had said another prayer that night before going to bed and he had read the Introduction to the Book of Mormon.  It made me wonder if I were in his shoes, would I have walked 40 minutes in the rain to meet with two girls to talk about church and prayer?  I’m so grateful that I don’t have to figure out that answer.  And I’m so amazed at the desires people have to find out more.  It makes me realize once again how mindful our Heavenly Father is of each one of us.  And he is counting on us to help him bring as many of his children back to him as we can. Today in Sunday School we were talking about learning and we talked about the word intelligence and how in the scriptures we learn that intelligence is light and truth. A girl raised her hand and said that when she discovered the church and was baptised she felt like a heavy curtain had been thrown open and she could see now.  She said she realized that there was light now in her life and she could see.  I liked that.

Thursday guess what…still raining.  Sister Six and Sister Sams came in drenched.  I had to take their pictures.  Sister Sams boots finally gave out and let the water in.  Her socks are covered in the dye from her boots.  And you can’t tell but her notebook is soaked.  You can see the water line on Sister Six’s skirt.  Not long after they stopped by Elder Peacock with his exchange companion, Elder Woodfield who is from Texas.  They are also soaked and just came in to grab a few more Book of Mormons and then they were off again.

 

Friday after work we decided to drive to Costco and get a few things and then have pizza there.  I was pretty sure I knew the way and since our internet is still not working in our apartment we left on faith that we would find it.  Well, I was wrong.  I didn’t know the way.  I got to the interchange okay where I’m sure I’m supposed to get on the “freeway” and we got on but the exit put us in the middle of nowhere.  I kept thinking it has to just be over this next little ridge but we were getting farther and farther from anything that seemed familiar.  So I thought, well, it’s a nice evening and it finally is not raining so let’s just see where we end up.  We ended up in a town that we have missionaries in named Dalkeith.  It’s really not that far from Edinburgh but I never realized where it was before.  We drove through their town and found a place that looked busy called Pizzaria and Fish Bar.  Well that title pleases both Sister Gifford and I since she loves fish and I love pizza so we parked up a block and walked over to it.  It is just a place to go in and order and then you take the food out with you but it was a great place.  I literally hate seafood.  I can’t even imagine

taking a bite but even that looked good here.  But I bought a pepperoni and salami pizza and it was delicious.  We ate in the car for lack of any dry place to sit outside and then plugged in our postal code for home and made it home safe and sound.

Saturday the sun was peaking through white fluffy clouds and we could see blue sky so I decided it would be a good day to take Sister Gifford to Tantallon and Dirleton Castles since that is somewhere I had already been and worth seeing.  Tantallon especially is such a pretty place and so much room to roam and play.  I think this is a stop for my kids and grandkids as well.

 Dirleton Castle is about 8 miles away from Tantallon and this time the gardens there were in bloom and it was a pleasant walk with fresh air and no rain.  As we were coming out of Dirleton we saw a group of men all in suits with tails and they began walking down the road with a man playing bagpipes behind them.  They were are fancy looking but we have no idea what was going on.  Maybe the groom being ushered to a wedding??  We have no idea.  But it was nice to see and listen to the bagpipes for a minute.  We then went in search for lunch and ended up in West Berwick which is a great little tourist-looking town on the waters edge.  We had lunch at the West Berwick Grill which was fine but nothing great.  The funny

thing there was we were both so thirsty because it was a bit windy and we had been walking so much so we sat down and ordered a Diet C

 

oke.  She asked what size.  We have never been asked that here.  So we both said Large.  She brought a class with ice (yes, we almost always get ice

in Scotland) and a teeny little bottle of Diet Coke which is what we always get when we order a drink.  So I have no idea what a small Diet Coke would be.  But it tasted great.  Best of all, right next door was an Italian Gelatto place with 30 homemade flavors.  Amazing.  I had two scoops in a waffle cone.  I should have taken a picture but there was really no time.  I had Toffee Fudge and Biscoff Crunch.  Oh man, they were amazing.  Worth going back for sure.  Afterwards we plugged the postal code for Costco into the GPS and we were off to Costco.  The GPS took us a scenic way that I would have never known about otherwise and we drove along the edge of the water for quite a while.  We stopped at one point because we could see some wind surfers out in the water so we stopped to watch.

So today is Sunday.  I have been waiting for two weeks for today.  My friend Sheri Bromley has been in Scotland for two full weeks and finally made it to Edinburgh.  They came to church today and it was so nice to have a piece of home even if it was just for a couple hours.  When we texted before she came I asked her if she would mind putting a shirt in her suitcase for me that I wish I had brought from home.  She asked if there was anything else so I said, if you are going to the store I would love some Fritos Bean Dip.  I was hoping she got me a can.  Well, Sheri pulls out this entire brown suitcase and says everything in here is yours.  I owe her big time now.  14 cans of bean dip and about 8 bags of Fritos.  I am going to be enjoying myself so much!!  I couldn’t believe it.  I am the happiest person right now.  It’s embarrassing that Frito’s Bean Dip can make me this happy!!

Thanks Sheri!!  I’ll figure out how to pay you back at some point.

Well, the rain is going to be off and on all this next week but it’s okay.  I know you guys are all home celebrating the 4th of July.  I will be thinking of you.  Light a few fireworks for me.  I will really miss that.  But at least I have bean dip!!

Love you all.