Garden Parties and Primary Colors

And after all, the weather was ideal . . . --Katherine Mansfield, "The Garden Party"

A few months ago, one of my friends (Rachel) and I decided that it would be great fun to throw a garden party.

And it was great fun. The weather wasn't ideal, but that's okay. We got together, had tea sandwiches, cupcakes, elderflower cordial . . . it was a proper English party. And on the celebration day of the Queen's birthday, no less.

[Bunting. All of the bunting.]

[Garden party food.]

Also, Dani, Mary, and I all ended up matching. So of course we had to take a picture: 

[Oh heyyyyyyyyyy.]

[This is the reality of trying to take a picture we're all happy with.]

Love these people. 

Love this place. 

And I love garden parties. 

A Day in Parliament with Elder Oaks

Two weeks ago, I had a really neat opportunity to listen to Elder Dallin H. Oaks (a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostle of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) address an All-Party Parliamentary Group in the House of Lords. He spoke about the importance of international religious freedom and of the need for religious voices to be part of the public square.

I had this surreal moment in the House of Lords--it was standing room only in the room, but there were two extra seats at the round table (where the speakers were sitting alongside other dignitaries). The chair mentioned that there were two seats available and that someone should take the seat. My friends (who were standing with me) said that I should take it, but I hesitated. Finally, one of my friends said, "If you go, I'll go." So we went to sit at the front.

I just sat there--sitting with world leaders in government, religion, and law--and I thought for a moment: "Is this really reality? This can't be my life." But there you go. For a moment, that was my life. And it was such a surreal moment.

[This is the best picture I have of us with Elder Oaks at Parliament.]

[Some of the Oxford Crew at Parliament.]

[Dani and Meg Go to Parliament.]

 On Thursday, Elder Oaks came to Oxford to participate in a symposium on religious freedom. I was asked to be Sister Oaks's "go-to" woman, so I spent a good part of the day getting to know her. I really like her; she's an incredibly kind, insightful, and accomplished woman.

[With Elder and Sister Oaks.]

Anyway, it was a very busy two days, but also a very full two days. It was my first time ever meeting an LDS apostle, so it was also a special experience for me. I know that they are not perfect, but I really do believe that these men are called of God to represent the Savior and to do His work on the earth today.

Exams = done.

I don't have much time to write (and I still have so much to catch up on), but I did want to post this picture:

Exams = done. 

Time to sleep now. I'll write more soon. 

my oxford. // godstow abbey.

One of my favorite things about Oxford--about England in general, actually--is the proximity to the past. You can just go walking and find an artifact. You can run along streets with Georgian facades and with plaques that tell you a famous author, artist, or philosopher lived there. You can have a picnic in the ruins of an abbey. 

[if you look closely, you can see my hand slowly edging towards the poppies. i love poppies. they are some of my favorite flowers.]

Another thing I love about Oxford are the people I've met here. I don't want to think about leaving yet (so I won't). But I am truly in love with the goodness of the people that I have met here. 

Picnics, people, and poppies. Can't get a Saturday afternoon much better than that. 

Big things and little things.

Big things first: 

I finished and turned in my dissertation!

[Right after I turned it in. Huzzah!]

Ha. I turned it in last week, but my brain has now been dead to the world. I mean, I'm revising (Oxford speech for studying) for exams now, but how's that going for me? Well, it depends. It's hard to concentrate when it's been so beautiful outside. And I've learned not to take a sunny English day for granted. So that means excursions to ruined abbeys and lunches in University Parks. 

[Godstow Abbey. I'll do another post about this because there were just so many pretty pictures from that day.]

Sunshine is good for the soul. You know what else is good for the soul? Wearing shorts. I wore shorts for the first time in months (like, since August or September, probably) on Monday. And it was glorious. Although my legs are sooooo white. I think I blinded a few bikers. Sorry, guys. 

[Shorts!]

Some other random things. I found this sign the other day. I know it was for an event, but it just made me laugh: 

["Common people that way." Ohhh, Elitist Oxford.]

Also, shout out to my college mum who dropped off American Girl books in my pigeonhole so I don't get "brain fever" from thinking too hard during my revisions. She noticed that there was a shocking lack of books on the subject of early nineteenth-century Scandinavian immigrants and the daily lives of prepubescent American girls. I'm looking forward to reading them. :) 

We are all nerds at Oxford and it is the best. 

As we walked in fields of gold.

One of my favorite things about Oxford is that you don't have to go far to find nature. 

One minute you're in the hustle and bustle of Jericho Street, and the next you can find yourself in Port Meadow, communing with the horses and buttercups. 

Port Meadow is one of my favorite places in Oxford. 

It's especially beautiful in the spring/summer, when the fields are just covered in buttercups. 

It's also a great place to go running in the morning. Not only can you run through buttercup fields, but you can also run past thatched cottages, charming handmade signs, and old churches.

England in the spring sunshine is heaven. 

I'd like to thank the Academy . . .

Part of the submission requirements for my dissertation includes an "Acknowledgements" page. Which is great--I'm all for gratitude, and I certainly could not have written this dissertation by myself.

But acknowledgements always end up sounding super cheesy. I mean, I want to thank the obvious--my rockstar supervisor, my parents, mentors who helped me get to Oxford, the librarians, etc. But there are so many more things that also helped me write my dissertation--the practical things like the fact that I don't have to use a typewriter and that so many of my resources are online.

If I could write an appendix to my acknowledgements, I would definitely include:

-The Original Broadway cast of Hamilton.  For pump-up music and for making feel hip, cultured, and intelligent. (And for keeping me awake while I wrote bibliographies and footnotes.) Not throwin' away my shot, ya'll.

-The cold, rainy English weather for forcing me to stay in the library and actually write my dissertation.

-Spell check. And the synonym finder on Word (for those times when you use the word "essential" way too many times).

-Dry shampoo. Obviously.

Couldn't have done it without you guys.