Update on the Hayes family :)

Things we have done since my last blog:

Put up a Christmas tree! It was quite cheap and not exactly real but we quickly fixed that with strings of popcorn, blue and silver bobbles, flowers, and candy canes. Completed with Christmas presents wrapped underneath it made our flat completely Christmasified! I had cut out paper snowflakes, decorated lamps with blue tinsel, hung our christmas cards, put up window stickers, and sprayed fake snow onto the windows. Such a wonderful festive flat!

We went for a ride on the ferris wheel! There are so many decorations up in George Square and a gigantic ferris wheel so we went for a ride overlooking Glasgow. It was so beautiful! What a fun date :)

We went to a Radiant Church Movie Night!!!!! We watched Elf, had popcorn, soda, and hotdogs! All the staff was dressed up all fancy with a ticket booth, ushers and everything. A good laugh on a very stormy day :D

Last things last, I have been playing in a few concerts with the wind band and orchestra. One concert was quite christmasy complete with tinsel on anything that we could tie it onto (including my bassoon!). The orchestra concert is tonight so we will see how that goes. We're playing all things Scottish: Bruch Scottish Fantasy (w/ soloist), MacCunn: Land of Mountain and Flood, Mendelssohn: Hebrides, Mendelssohn Scottish Symphony. In a very pretty hall called the Barony Hall (see picture below).

It has a brand new organ built as a replica of one from Beethovens time. It sounds so pretty! And goodness gracions is it huge!

So that's pretty much us for now. This weekend we are so so busy meeting up with friends and saying goodbye. Andy has his exam Monday morning then it is off to Dundee for a week before flying to Alaska!!! Cannot wait to be in a place that already has 5 feet of snow on the ground :D

Thanksgiving in the UK?

Turkey, stuffing, pumpkin pie, sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top, mashed potatoes, and much much more! This is what occupied one particular table in Edinburg on Thursday. Our friend Ruth invited Andy and I over to her parents house for a quite-American thanksgiving. Ruths husband, Todd is from California. His mum was over for a few weeks and so she became the official host of an absolutely amazing thanksgiving. I made my very first pumpkin pie to add to the ensemble. For never making a pumpkin pie before, Andy said it was the best he's ever had...of course he had never had pumpkin pie before...that probably had nothing to do with it ;) There were probably about 15 people over at Ruths parents house and we proceeded to play a very active game called King Elephant. Details of the game are quite complicated...basically you make stupid sounds impersonating animals and try to win...which I did! Hoo Rah! :P

We spent the night over at Gran and Grandad Bruce's house and spent the next morning hanging out with them both reading books, chatting, drinking tea, and eating far too much food! Lol, good 'ol Granny Bruce :D

We got a bus back from Edinburg to Glasgow where I met up with the lovely Anna Shields to go see Ludovico Einaudi!!! He played a wonderful concert. I got to see him to years ago in Newcastle and he wowed the audience yet again. We followed it up with a very sophisticated cup of coffee and lovely visit in McDonalds. I love that they basically never close :) I have to say that it was a wonderful end to a fantastic Thanksgiving weekend.

And here stands one of the most amazing piano players I have ever heard in my entire life!

New Plans!!!

We don't have to spend 3 months apart!!! We decided that it was going to be outrageously expensive to change our tickets and ridiculously hard to live apart for 3 months so we have changed our plans yet again. Also, considering the fact that the laws keep changing every few weeks I could very well move back to Alaska, the laws could change, then I would be back in Alaska without a visa and with my dear Andy back in Scotland. So we are going home to Alaska for 10 days over the Christmas holidays then coming back just after the new years. Next summer I'll head over to Alaska a bit before Andy and apply for my visa then probably stay a few weeks after to ensure we allott for enough time to acquire my visa. So that's our latest plan! Alaska, see you at Christmas time!!! Now I"m going to decorate our flat :)

I am going to have to learn how to be married long-distance for a few months :(

So the morning of my 21st birthday I got a phone call from our lawyer who is helping Andy and I acquire a visa for me to be able to live in the same country as my dear husband. The very changing news that we received was that I have to be in Alaska while I apply for my visa. This could take up to 3 months :( So in the next few days I have to buy a very expensive last minute ticket back to Alaska and head back alone to begin the application process. Andy will be able to come over for 10 days during Christmas and new years which is a huge blessing. This also means that we will have to change my return ticket. So not only is it extremely expensive for the tickets, visa, and paying off our lawyer fees but we also will have to spend a few months apart. My poor husband is going to have to live on his own for the first time in his life. So that will probably be quite hard for him to get used to aswel. Not exactly the easiest news to swallow particularly on my 21st birthday :S

The biggest comfort in all of this is that I know that God is looking out for us and He cares more about our marriage than we even do. God will always provide for all of our needs. This includes money, friends, and a place to live. It is not going to be easy to be apart and being married long-distance for a few months will be quite hard to deal with. We dated long-distance for 13 months and we survived that and we know that God will not give us anything more than what we can handle. We are hoping to learn better communication and build more friendships during our time apart. At least I get to go home to Alaska during our time apart. It is an absolutely wonderful place. So um...Alaska here I come?

My Visa application is now in my hands!!!

I just received an application to apply for a spousal visa!!! I am going to start working on the 54 pages of never ending questions all about me and my history and every part of my history that I can write down on paper.

So it should be fun times and something entertaining to occupy my spare time...not terribly entertaining but the prospect of having a visa in my hands in the near future will keep me going :) I cannot wait to get started! Not terribly sure how long it will take to fill out with alllll the thoroughness the UK requires for immigrants. I GET TO STAY!!!!!!

21st birthday week

I am currently living the last few days of my 20th year of life. About to begin "adulthood" in every country! Apart from getting the stomach flu I have to say it has been a pretty fantastic week. My lovely husband has made my birthday week full of fun and lots of presents. Everything from Donkey Kong Country for my Gameboy Color to animal bandaids to pink hand soap to help girlify the bathroom. He also got me lightly decaf coffee which the jury is still out on what he was trying to say with that :P

This morning I got woken up by the postman dropping off a parcel with a crossword loo roll and a Venus Flytrap kit from my recently acquired Mother and Father in law. What a good start to a Wednesday, two days before my 21st birthday. It has been a good week no doubt :)

Don't like visas much

RAINBOWS ARE AWESOME! AND VISAS ARE KRAP! God gave a rainbow to Noah as a promise. I don't think that was where God stops with showing promises in the forms of rainbows. When Andy and I were talking about being engaged and we were asking God to give us clarity to ensure we were not throwing away a lot of potential. I am learning that God does not work with potential but calls people to him and trains them when they are willing. Andy and I were sitting and talking and all of a sudden saw a rainbow. At one point we were trying to decide on a flat to live in and after hundreds of phone calls and figuring that we were never going to have a place to live we walked by a wall mural with...a rainbow painted over it. Another time when we were split up on flights coming over here and worried sick that I wouldn't get through the border we were graced with a rainbow below the airplane. I later got let through the border. Yesterday my visa ran into another glitch. I think we have both jointly just felt like this is getting quite ridiculous. I cannot believe how difficult this is and it feels like we just get shot to the ground every time we attempt to get it again. I do not understand why it is so difficult to get something so simple. We plain just don't know what to do now. Many thoughts and words were thrown around. We just remember that God is watching over us and provides. He will not leave us hanging.

There are cool things happening though! We made some friends!!! We went to a church last week and met a couple that are just awesome! Scott and Monica have totally taken us under their wing and taken us in as friends. They are in their 2nd year of marriage, a loving and wise couple, Scott is an asst. pastor in Re:Hope (the church we went to last week). I have met up with Monica a few times and Andy has met up with Scott a few times. I think we have a few good friends that aren't going anywhere anytime soon. I'm missing my Radiant Community Group girls quite a bit but God provides and we have friends! :)

I have also hung out a big with my lovely roommate from my exchange year. She is the most dear girl and has provided us with an endless supply of Dr.Who, loads of films, gluten free cookies, chocolate, flowers, and many other treats. She is amazing. It is so nice to have a girlfriend that is still open to hanging out all the time.

So tomorrow Andy starts classes again for the first time in 4 months. We'll see how that goes ;)

Back in Glasgow!

So here is a blog worth writing! In the last 2 weeks we have returned from our honeymoon, acquired a flat and completely moved in, got my visa worked out, and have made a plan to find a new church. It has been a very eventful two weeks for sure!

Honeymoon: perfect perfect perfect! We had such a lovely time together and were really able to just relax that week. Slept sooo much and felt terrific by the time we returned to Dundee :)

Flat: We had one viewing and basically gave our sob story/were in very fine form personality wise to convince the flat owner and nerdy kid competing for us to get the flat that we were most deserving. They all felt quite bad for us after hearing what we have gone through in order to get just one viewing. Turns out that God totally had this flat in plan for us and He gave us the perfect place. It has a lot of qwerks (such as not having a shower...we have compensated by going to the gym every day, lol) and being a bit beat up. But it is HUUGGEEE! Look on facebook

for all the pictures :) It is also in a really great location. A bit further out than our last flat which was right in city center. Turns out that probably wouldn't have been a good choice because we would have a steady flow of people stopping in and we would most likely end up out of the house more often than we should. So it is a 20 minute walk to city center or we can take a train! We have set it up with all of our things and it has been dubbed “the epitome of cool without trying too hard”. Needless to say, we have the coolest student flat I have ever seen :) Not exactly what I imagined as my first home but hey, God decided to bless us beyond what we deserve once again. We have also been blessed with the money to be able to have lots of friends over already and feed them many meals. We figure that since God gave us such a large flat in such a good location that we need to use it to His glory and bless our friends. So we have had a few people over for dinner, lunch, and just generally to chill out. We want to make our flat inviting to all sorts of people :)

Visa: I still do not have one...but it's ok! Through a friend of a friend we were put in touch with a solicitor called Thorntons. We got to meet with the head who put us under the guidance of one of his trainees (she is basically the cheapest help we could have...still not eh...what I would call affordable but hey ho, I'm no lawyer) who has already dealt with a case almost identical to us (so we do not have to pay her to research solutions!). So we have already been taking action to fill in a few forms and are acquiring proof of address to start the process. We will be able to put all the information and required documents together and send off our application by my 21st birthday in November! After that I will get an interview either here or London where they will assess our situation and then hopefully grant me with a spousal visa!!!!! WOO HOO!!!! I cannot wait at all :D We are just giving thanks to God for providing us with the financial resources to pay the solicitor and the friends who put us in touch with them, and that we are going to be able to keep me in the country :) We have a lovely lady trainee who is going to hold our hand through the entire process :) :) :)

Church: So we have decided to switch churches to one that is more community based, that is geared towards young people/couples, and that we can both start out in as newbies. That way we can both get to know everybody at our church as a married couple! :) We have two churches picked out that we will start touring. The first is named Re-hope and it is an incredible church, does work with the city folk especially those who are in poverty, has incredible preaching, and also good community...but it's like a 45 minute walk away and in the middle of winter when it's pouring down rain and very windy do we really want to walk for an hour and a half in church clothes? (our train doesn't run on Sundays). Then there is another called Harvest that meets at Strathclyde university. It is much newer and only has about 20-30 people in it so far. We do not know as much about it other than a few of Andys friends attend and they love it. We think it might be hard to be part of a community that I so far away and that Harvest is just much closer for ease and ability to bond with people. Sooo...we have no idea. WE're praying about it and gonna see where we think God wants us. We want to minister and be in community and be pushed in our faith. We just don't know where that will be yet.

So that is the Andy and Hadassah update as of now. We just got our wedding pictures from our Scotland wedding in the post today so look for them on facebook :)