Before you say it, I know, I've been away for a while...well five and a half months. Terribly sorry about that!
Lots of highly exciting things have happened over the past few months so allow me to give you a brief summary of everything that has been going on.
Getting back in the saddle
One thing I really missed whilst at uni was getting to ride so being able to spend time out at the yard with the horses is always amazing and so very relaxing!
Getting Quizical
One of the local bars at home holds a quiz once a week so myself and a couple of friends (and Tal one time) went along. Our team 'Sister Jude and the Supremes' were so on fire that we ended up coming second both times we went, winning two £50 vouchers! We spent the first on Thursday night cocktails on my 21st birthday and then went for a lovely meal to spend our second voucher. It was lovely just being able to have a catch up and a good laugh with friends.My 21st!
I spent my birthday with friends and family (Tal included!), exactly what I wanted to do. I was spoilt rotten of course, getting a new watch from my parents and an antique flute from Tal. He keeps insisting that I play it as that's what it's there for, but I think I'll just wait....I'm a little bit rusty! My parents prepared a lovely family lunch with my grandparents. It was so delicious and they even got me little ice cream cupcakes as my birthday cake,
Leicester
Tal and I went to Leicester to visit a uni friend for her birthday. Tal had bought himself a car a few weeks before this so our road trip to Leicester was the real test drive of little Duncan! The drive up was great fun, even though it was my first time driving on a motorway. Fun fact: the slowest we drove was actually on the motorway! For Abbie's birthday, we went for a lunch in a cute little restaurant, chilled watching movies and playing board games, and the next morning we went for afternoon tea. It was so lovely to be able to relax and spend time with friends from uni who I had missed dearly!
Dorset
I returned to England at the end of July to attend a party in Dorset. It was lovely to see more familiar faces and to be able to spend more time in the peaceful countryside. I got to go for a few hacks in my few days in Dorset. It was a lovely change of pace and scenery and very much needed! We returned to Dorset shortly after the first visit for a few days, just to relax and take it easy before the hectic few weeks we had ahead of us!
We can never seem to take a normal picture!
Annual Camp
After our travels around England, it was time for Tal and I to head off to Longmoor for Kent ACF's annual camp. The two weeks were very testing, exciting and so much fun in the end. I found it difficult to start with as I didn't know very many people, I was thrown in at the deep end too with it being my first camp as an adult instructor with everything being completely new to me! I learnt a lot from the camp and made some wonderful new friends.
Return to Canterbury
After a few days relaxing, it was time to pack up the car and head back to Canterbury, ready for the new term to start. We moved into our new house on the first of September and it didn't take long for all of us to settle in. We've had a few rough patches but we were all ready to start of our second year!
Freshers
Our entire household was involved in the arrivals weekend. We all helped move the freshers into the college we lived in last year, got to meet and have a chat with the new students about uni life and again got to see friends from on campus again.
The end of the week so the most exiting event of the week: freshers fair! Marrow had their stall on the second day and it was wonderful to represent such a great society. There was so much interest from new and current students and we ended up with about 130 names added to our mailing list! Elena and I went on a walk to hand out leaflets and meet little Teddy the pony! Freshers fair was a great success and we were all looking forward to the exciting events planned out for the year!
Teddy!
I didn't think my course could get any better but it really has! During this first term I am taking Investigation of Disease, Skills for Bioscientists 2, Human Physiology and Disease 2 and Metabolism and Metabolic Disease. My modules are all so interesting but with that the work load has increased...surprisingly enough! In lab practicals we have been given the opportunity to begin to plan our own experiments, making us think more about what we're doing and not just following a method step by step.
Marrow AGM
The second weekend in October saw the Kent Marrow Committee travel up to Leeds for the Marrow Annual General Meeting. We got to meet lots of other marrow groups from across the UK, were given lots of great ideas and actually got to meet people who have been affected by stem cell donations, both donors and recipients. On the Saturday evening we all dressed up for the awards evening and dinner. I happened to head to the bathroom with a couple of the committee members and actually ended up running into someone I know, it's such a small world! After the dinner everyone headed out to the clubs but little old me and Elena were coming down with something so headed back to the hotel for an early night. On our final day, we had some final training and talks. I attended one about cord blood donations which was fascinating and something that I didn't realise happened! We headed home and all hit the hay after a long, exciting and rewarding weekend.
Marrow
The work of Kent Marrow didn't end at the AGM! We hit the ground running and had our first bucket collection and recruitment event (which was actually before the AGM) and raised £36 on a cold day in Canterbury town and were able to sign up 29 people, bringing our total to 44 so far!
Since then, we've had another on campus bucket collection and have three more recruitment events planned for the next month so it's all go with the committee!
Surprise Visit Home
My brother and I had planned a trip for me to come home at the end of July so we kept this secret from my parents for three months! I came in the back door and put my arms around both my parents, giving them quite the fright, they definitely were not expecting it....secret well kept! It was lovely to be able to spend time with my family and not have to worry about working or deadlines. We went out for dinner, went on a family shopping and trip and spent Remembrance Sunday with my grandparents watching my brother. My friends arranged for us to head out for a meal on the Saturday night, it's fair to say that they were pretty shocked too!
Alice and Naomi take a lovely, normal picture.....
...and then there's Jenny and I!
Apologies for such a brief post of what I've been up to. If I told you everything that's been happening, not only would it fill a book, but you would have fallen asleep by now!
Until the next time,
Catherine xxx
