Taylor Swift Concert!!

Today has been such a wonderful day! We first has three hours of school, but then we were off to explore the city. We went on a long expedition and found many cool things. The British Library is way cool! I don't have a picture of it, but it was fun to see!

After we found King's Cross Station, which is where Harry Potter goes on his way to Hogwarts.

My cart is already half way through and I'm on my way!

Platform 9 3/4 was fun to see! It wasn't as exciting as I thought that it would be, but it's something that was on my list of things I wanted to see while here in England.

Tonight we found out that there was a Taylor Swift Concert here in London. We got so excited and decided that we were going. We didn't have tickets, or even know where it was, but we were determined to get in! While some of us were doing kitchen duty, others were looking on Google for tickets. Pretty sure we found some!! Seven of us went to the concert and it was such a blast. My throat still hurts from screaming and singing so loud, and my body is exhausted from dancing so much!! There was a section of people standing in front of the stage, and then there were seats. We were on the forth row behind the people standing!! We had such AMAZING seats and it was so worth our money! Our tickets were only 14 pounds, which is about $21 American dollars.

Taylor Swift

The concert was seriously SO much fun!! It made me miss my roommates and friends though. I have so many funny memories of listening to Taylor Swift with my friends. Some of them include:

1. Breaking wooden spoons while dancing in our backroom (aka. dance party room) and screaming at the top of our lungs to "Our Song"

2. Burning pictures while screaming "Picture to Burn"

3. Listening to Madilyn scream her favorite part of "I'd Lie" because it applies to her life

4. Driving around singing and dancing to "Love Story"

5. Listening to the John Schmidt version of "Love Story" on Sunday mornings

There are so many other fun memories I have with my roommates! I miss them all and I hope they are all having a wonderful Summer. I can't wait until we all go back to Provo and will be together again.

Hairspray

We went and saw the show Hairspray. It was such a fun show and I loved it so much! It made me want to just get up there and join them! It was such a cute show! :)

An early start lead to a wonderful day!

Today has been a really long day, but SO worth it!! We started out by waking up at 5 so we could be down in the kitchen to pack our lunches by 5:30am. Then we loaded on the bus and drove 2 hours to Stonehenge. We had to go so early because we got special approval to go inside the ropes and actually touch the rocks and take pictures up close. It was such a cool experience!

Stonehenge is something that I have heard a lot about, but I never though I would see it in person. I am so grateful that I was able to actually see it in person and have the chance to study it.

Me and Katherine

After Stonehenge, we drove 1 1/2 hours to Wells Cathedral. It was very elegant inside with simple designs.

Next to Wells Cathedral was Bishop's Palace.

The gardens at the Bishop's Palace were incredible!

We jumped back in the bus and drove to Stourhead. It is the most GORGEOUS place I have ever seen! Notice the bridge in the background. It is the bridge filmed in the movie "Pride and Prejudice."

We walked the two miles around the entire pond and tt was so beautiful!!


The Temple of Apollo--this is where the proposal scene in "Pride and Prejudice" was filmed

In front of the Temple of Apollo

For our last destination, we drove a half hour to King Alred's Tower

We climbed the 205 spiral stairs to the top

Today was such a fun day because we were able to spend it with everyone in the group! I have met so many wonderful girls here and I am so grateful for their friendship. It's amazing how close we all have come to one another just in the first week. I am excited to continue to become closer to everyone here! I love it here so much!!

Mitcham Ward

Last Sunday night we met with the Stake President of the London wards. All of us girls from our study abroad have been split up into different ward assignments of where we are supposed to attend church. I have been called to attend the Mitcham Ward, which is about an hour and a half away from my house. To get there, we ride the tube for 20 minutes, board a train for 40 minutes, board a tram for 15 minutes, and then we have a 15 minute walk from the station to the church. Altogether it takes us about an hour and a half to get there if everything goes smoothly and it costs $15 to go to church each week.

Although it's exhausting just to get to and from church, the minute I walked into church I knew that it was going to be the neatest experience in my life. Everyone in that ward is so warm and welcoming! It is by far the most diverse ward I have ever been to. It is about 70% African from Ghana, 20% Asian, and 10% white (which include the two Elders and the one couple missionaries). As white BYU girls, we really stuck out! The chapel is the smallest chapel I have ever been in--with two medium sized benches next to each other and about ten rows of benches.

Sacrament Meeting was so spiritual and it was the best meeting I have ever been to. The spirit was so strong and those people are amazing! I bore my testimony in both Sacrament Meeting and in Young Womens. I actually got called to be a Young Womens teacher so I am really excited about that! There are ten girls in there and they are all way cute! I am so grateful that I have been called to this ward because I know that it will be such a life-changing and learning experience for me!

Markets...and more markets!

Last night we went to a London Singles Ward Stake Dance. It consisted of us crazy American BYU girls all dancing in the middle of the dance floor, and about 25 people that were actually in the stake. It was a lot of fun!

Practicing our dance moves in our room before the dance

This morning we started off at Borough Market and wandered around there for a while. It was similar to a huge farmers market with tons of samples. Our breakfast consisted of samples of all kinds of food. It was fun! After that we went to Portobello Road and spend time there looking around. This is a picture of the road. It was so crowded of people! It was quite the adventure!

Enjoying looking around at Portobello

Tonight we went to Hard Rock Cafe for dinner. It was SO yummy!

After dinner we started at the Tower Bridge and walked along the Thames for a few miles. It felt so relaxing!

The Thames River at night

Westminster Abbey

Today we went to Westminster Abbey and went on an audio tour on the inside. Wow! It was so incredible! It's hard for me to comprehend how old a lot of these buildings are and how much history is in each one of them. London is full of awesome history!

The outside of Westminster Abbey

After, we walked over to the Parliament and went inside to watch the house of commons. It was really neat to go inside because it made the Parliament seem more like a real building than just a tourist site. I loved it!

In order to go in the Parliament, we had to go through security, get our pictures taken, and wear name badges around our neck.

I absolutely LOVE the Thames River and all of the different bridges that go across it

Tonight we went to Trafalgar Square and were in the filming of a T-Moble commercial. There were thousands of people there that were singing karoke and being filmed. One of my friends and I actually got interviewed and asked questions about the big event that was going on. We had to sign a paper saying that we give them permission to put our clip on the news tonight!

These were all the girls that went to the filming of the commercial. Pink was the live guest that was performing. It was so fun because it was a mini concert by Pink! We had a lot of fun belting "So What" into the microphones that they had on us!

The Church is the Same All Around the World

Today was quite the experience! I went with two friends and traveled an hour and a half on the tube, train, and then a taxi to find the London, England Temple. It was beautiful and such a neat experience, that it was worth every minute of traveling we did to get there.

The temple had such beautiful grounds

All of the temple workers were so kind to us and were so grateful that we were there. I don't think they get many people there to do baptisms.

Jenny, me, and Rebecca