Some Happenings At Woodbrooke (or as Madeline calls it 'Spider-Hollow')

Highlights (or lowlights depending on your role in the following events) since returning on Monday night to Woodbrooke, the only Quaker retreat center in all of Europe:

·      Madeline and I are roommates. Hallelujah!

·      Despite the pacifist dogma permeating our surroundings, Madeline has declared war. A war on Spiders. In the midst of a peaceful Tuesday night homework session in the lounge, Madeline left to get a cup of tea. On her return, she discovered a spider DOWN her shirt. Not a small spider. A VERY large one. As you can imagine, there was quite an upheaval.  (pictures of the afore-mentioned spider will come when we have better internet)

·      Wednesday contained no encounters with spiders. Sweet Relief. As Madeline drifted off to sleep, she whispered a prayer that neither of us would find spiders in our beds. While Madeline slept peacefully, I finished the remainder of my reading. Suddenly, I noticed a startlingly large eight-legged creature scurrying along the wall—mere inches away from my bed. Stifling my instinctive scream so as to not wake Madeline, I stealthily killed it. However, that spider’s corpse in turn killed my ability to sleep—every shadow turned into hulking spiders, ready to invade my haven.  Tonight is our last night here at Spider-Hollow—we’ll see how things go.

·      Tonight we had a celebratory bonfire as one of our friends on the trip, Kelsey, turned 21. We made ‘banana’ boats—bananas stuffed with chocolate, wrapped with aluminum foil and cooked in the coals of the bonfire. As you might imagine, the babes definitely capitalized on the extra available chocolate. Side Note: In the past weeks here in England, I have been abstaining from naps in an effort to make the most of every day. (Also we haven’t had any time for naps.) This week, I decided making the most of every day included prioritizing naptime. If there’s one thing I know about myself, it’s that I need my sleep. The length of my naps has increased each consecutive day, culminating in this afternoon’s nap…in the midst of which I decided I would rather continue my nap than wake up for dinner…aka I especially capitalized on the extra chocolate in lieu of my dinner.)

·      Following Madeline’s performance of Taylor Swift around the campfire, Annie led the charge to ‘run’ the labyrinth. Although the labyrinth is in fact only one inch deep (it’s mowed into the grass—the gardener here enjoys his job), it’s quite tricky to navigate when one takes into account the sharp turns, wet grass, and giggling girls full of chocolate.

·      Chocolate has been a theme this week. Yesterday, we visited THE Cadbury factory. It was like entering a bizarre dream. Things you may not expect: a full on jungle featuring life-size Mayans harvesting the ‘cacao’ bean, a Disneyland ‘It’s a Small World’-esque ride that features cocoa beans in every climate and continent, liquid chocolate tasting, a ‘music’ room featuring a larger than life gorilla drumming a Phil Collins song, and moving (‘quaking’) benches as we learned about the Quaker origins of Cadbury Dairy Milk Chocolate.