Birthday Week!!

So last week was my birthday and it was a fantastic birthday week! Tuesday night Marlo took me to stay in what was basically a castle. Her parents stayed there their last two night here and had a third night free that they could not use since they were heading home, so instead of letting it go to waste Marlo decided she would take me there for my birthday :) The place was called Adare Manor, which we were informed is different then a castle cause castles are meant to keep people out whereas manors invite people in. The place was absolutely beautiful. Marlo's parents arranged for a car to take us to and from school to the manor. Tuesday night we checked in and settled, then we went for a swim in the pool. After our swim we did some homework, yes we did homework on our little get away from school. Then we snuggled in bed with some hot chocolate and Bailey's and watched a movie. And of course Marlo made me take a shot at midnight for my birthday lol. The next day we got a free Irish breakfast and then did a little wandering around the grounds and golf course to take pictures of castle and Abbey ruins.  Can you imagine golfing on a course that was also home to these beautiful ruins? Well that's what the Irish get everyday.  So on my birthday I got to see some gorgeous ruins and then that afternoon I treated myself to a bit of a shopping spree. You see I needed some summer clothes for our trip to Italy, and since it was my birthday I figured it was ok to buy myself some new outfits :) My birthday night the girls all surprised me with a make-shift cake complete with candles and they even had balloons blown up and some party hats for everyone. I love those girls. We had a good night together and they helped me have an excellent birthday even though I wasn't able to celebrate it with those I love back home. I did have a rough morning the next day though ;)
To conclude my birthday week I spent the weekend in Scotland! Me and Marlo had to catch a bus at 1am to get to Dublin for our 6:30am flight to Edinburgh, Scotland. We landed in Scotland around 7:30am and found our way to the hostel. Friday consisted of playing on a playground in Princes St. Garden (yes we were 22 year olds playing on a playground, I think we were a bit overtired at this point, but it was a fun time!), a walking tour around Edinburgh which was really nice we got to see some gorgeous buildings and learned a lot of the history of the city. I loved Edinburgh city, well at least the old town, it was made of all old gothic style architecture, simply gorgeous. After our walking tour we caught a train to Glasgow, we were told by everyone that we had to go to Glasgow. Well after arriving at Glasgow we couldn't really figure out why everyone said we HAD to go there, although it was cold and rainy so it might just have been that we didn't want to spend the time walking outside to see the sights.  Anyways we decided to walk down what seemed to be the main road, Style Mile, and while walking we were seeing a lot of shoe stores. Marlo and me looked at each other and instantly decided that the afternoon was going to simply consist of shoe shopping, a decision we were both very satisfied with. By the end of the day we both had a new pair of shoes :) We then had an absolutely amazing meal at a pizza place in Glasgow. It was probably hands down one of the best meals I've had here, a chicken pizza and then a slice of apple pie of dessert, both were to die for! Once we got back to Glasgow we decided to just chill at the hostel, which was a real cool place. They had free internet, games, and even a really nice movie room. Saturday we did a tour of the Highlands, the tour complete with a guide wearing a kilt :) The highland were beautiful, the day consisted of gorgeous snow covered mountains and lochs. Eventually we made it to the famous Loch Ness, where we took a boat tour to go on a search for Nessie. Sadly we were unable to find the girl, but we did get to see the beautiful surroundings of Loch Ness. It was a very long day so once we got back to Edinburgh we were ready for a warm place to eat some traditional Scotish haggis. Me and Marlo decided to share an appetizer portion of the haggis, we both decided we really enjoyed it and would definitely eat it again. For those of you who don't know what haggis is, it's basically every other part of the lambs insides that doesn't go towards the traditional cuts of meat. I know sounds gross but it was surprisingly good. After diner we were going to do a ghost tour of Edinburgh but it was still raining and we had a long day so we decided to just hang out at the hostel again. We ended up watching two movies with a lot of very cool people and actually met and were roommates with two guys from Milwaukee. Sunday we walked the shops a little bit before catching the bus to the airport. By one o'clock we were on our way back to Ireland. The reminder of the day was spent on the bus from Dublin to Limerick. I swear have our days when we travel are spent on buses, so much so that I'm pretty sure we have been conditioned to fall asleep whenever we are on a bus now. So yeah overall it was a great birthday week here in Ireland! Scotland was magnificent, a bit cold but nonetheless a beautiful country. Now this weekend we are starting our big week long trip starting with our flight out to London early tomorrow morning. We are starting with two days in London, then we'll fly to Venice and spend a day there, then on to Florence for a day, and lastly three days in Rome! We'll be flying home next Friday and have actually decided to spend the night in Belfast. Since that is the one place in Ireland we haven't seen yet, and they are the home of the Titanic, we decided to extend our trip for a day and make our way up there right from Dublin. So my next blog won't be for a while but it will be on a lot!

Adare Manor

This is what they get to golf next to!

Edinburgh Castle

Scot's Memorial in Edinburgh

The Highlands

It's Nessie!!!

Oh and on a side note, I got some very exciting news last night. I was accepted into the Veterinary School at University of Minnesota!!! I'm still hoping to get into Madison, but at least now I know that I definitely have a spot at my second choice school!!

I Guess It's Been A While

Sorry everyone I was informed by mom that's it's been a while since I've blogged, so now I guess I have to play catch-up.
Let's see after St. Patty's Day things have been pretty mellow here. That weekend after St. Patty's I decided to just stay on campus and Marlo and I began planning our big trip for the week before finals. We already had our Scotland weekend booked, so now it was time to book the big week long trip! We knew we were going to start our trip in London so that was the first flight and hostel we booked. After that we had to decide to go from London to Paris or London to Venice. We found it was going to be cheaper to go to Venice first, so that was the next flight booked. Within Italy we plan on going to Venice, Florence, and Rome. We will be spending one day in each Venice and Florence and 3 days in Rome! After getting that far in our planning we decided to hold off on planning Paris until after spring break, we had had enough of looking for the cheapest flights and places to stay! Jumping ahead to this last weekend when we decided to start looking at booking Paris we found flight prices to have doubled. Our initial plan was to fly from Rome to Paris but now with the prices where they are we didn't think it was going to be worth it. So needless to say we will now be flying from Rome back home to Dublin. Neither of us are heartbroken though cause it saves us some money, gives us a few extra days to study for finals, and it leaves one European city on our bucket list for later in life. So now we are officially done planning and I can't wait for the traveling to begin! I am so excited to get out of Ireland and see other countries, and it all starts this weekend with Scotland!
Besides planning our trip me, Marlo, and Brooke decided to go to a movie one night (all the others where down in Killarney for the weekend). We went to go see 21 Jump Street, very funny movie with the very attractive Channing Tatum.  For the most part the movie theater is exactly the same as back home, however the one thing we did notice was different was our senses of humor.  There were plenty of parts in the movie that us Americans found hilarious and were laughing only to realize that no one else in the theater was laughing. I guess the Irish just don't have as good of senses of humor as we do haha.
The last week in March was absolutely gorgeous here. We had temps in the upper 60s, all the Irish said it was like their summer weather, none of us were complaining! Everyday that week was spent doing homework outside. Any free time we had we were out on the lawn in our courtyard soaking up the sun on a blanket. I think I even got a bit of a tan that week! Of course we had to get this gorgeous weather right before mom came for spring break and I knew there was no way it would last long enough for her to enjoy it; it was rare enough that we had it the entire week! I think we were a bit spoiled cause now we are back to our 50 degrees, cold and rainy weather :( I would like the summer weather back please!
Alright so now we are to spring break and mom being here! Mom's flight came in at 7am on Saturday morning and I decided that I wanted to meet her at the airport that way she didn't have to worry about trusting the cab driver to get her to the right village on campus to find me. Since Marlo was also going to the airport to fly out to Germany we were going to take a bus that goes to the airport at 4am. Well we figured if we got to the bus stop 10min early that would be plenty considering the Irish are always 10min late. However, this one morning the Irish decided to be early. As we are walking to the bus stop we see the bus pulling up, so we go from walking to running to try and catch it. We just about made it but as we got there the bus was pulling away. So there went our plan of avoiding a costly cab. We called the cab service and a man was there in 10min to take us to Shannon. It actually worked out just fine cause our cab driver was an extremely nice guy and we talked about horses the entire time and then we didn't even charge us the full fee once arriving at the airport, and now I had an idea of how much a cab was going to cost for us to get back to campus with mom and Gloria. Mom was very brave and booked us on a day trip that same day they flew in. So after making our way back to campus we were off to see the Cliffs of Moher. Now most of the things I did with mom while she was here I had previously done with my group of friends, but each time I had already gone it was kinda crappy weather and it happened to work out that with mom although it was cold it was at least sunny and not raining! We had a cold and windy day at the Cliffs but some sun did peek through for some nice pictures. And we got to stop at Monks for their famous seafood chowder, oh my goodness that stuff is so good! It was a long day for all of us, especially mom and Gloria so they were in bed early that night. Sunday we went to Blarney Castle. It ended up being a gorgeous day, enough that we could even go without jackets. I would have to say the best part of that day was watching mom panic going up the Castle and once she was at the top. I never knew my mother was so afraid of heights! She was freaking out on the steps on the way to the top cause they were kinda tight and winding. Then at the top she would hardly even look out over the edge cause she didn't like being up that high and then she wouldn't even kiss the Blarney stone! Gloria at least had the guts to kiss the stone, but mom wasn't going for it she was too busy freaking out haha. I thought it was funny :) Monday we spent the afternoon on the bus down to Killarney where we stayed fr three days. Monday we simply looked around the town a little. Tuesday was the Ring of Kerry, which again was beautiful, it was cold out but at least we didn't have to deal with rain. I still enjoyed seeing all the scenery again and of course I got to play with the lambs at the one spot again. I'll be honest the entire time we were stopped there I didn't even bother taking any pictures of the landscape again I simply played with the lambs the entire time. :) That night we found a pub near the hotel where mom and Gloria shared a Guinness and I had my Bulmer's Pear, while listening to some live Irish Traditional music. Wednesday we did the Dingle Peninsula. Another gorgeous day of scenery, it was a lot of the coast line kinda like the Ring of Kerry, just absolutely beautiful. We had the same tour guide for both days, Micheal, who was very nice and also whom mom had a little crush on :) As soon as she told me she thought he was cute I knew exactly why, he slightly resembled a young Richard Gere and being the excellent daughter I am I know Richard Gere is mom's #1 man so I knew that's why she thought he was cute. Anyways those two days were filled with breathtaking views. Thursday we were up early to catch the bus back to Limerick. The day was spent with me giving them a tour of campus and walking along the Shannon River. That night I left mom and Gloria to fend for themselves cause I wanted to stay at my place and didn't want to walk to the hotel and back again. I found out the next day that they found themselves the off-license near the hotel where they bought some souvenirs for people along with a Kopperberg (strawberry-lime cider that I had been raving about all week but all the pubs we went to were out) for themselves, that made me happy. Friday, William (Sam Klug's fiance Brittany's cousin, did you get that? lol) took us to Bunratty Castle which is just outside of Limerick. We got to tour the Castle and walk around the folk park which is a little village made up of houses from all different areas and time periods of Ireland. This is also where I fell in love with some little lambs! They were so cute, they looked like baby calves and were just simply adorable! I've decided I need to get some when I get home. After walking the Castle grounds we headed back into Limerick where I showed them around the city a little and then with nothing else to do for the night we caught a movie at the cinema. Then Saturday morning mom and Gloria flew out. It was a great week having them here, I'm so glad mom got to come and experience Ireland with me and I'm very thankful Gloria came with her so she didn't have to travel alone. It was nice having a little bit of home here for a week, although it would have been better if mom would have smuggled my baby, Candy, here in her suitcase or something :)
The day after mom left was Easter and I was able to go to St. Mary's Cathedral, the oldest church in the area, with Marlo and her parents for Easter service. The Church was absolutely beautiful on the inside. Big stone columns and archways, simply gorgeous. The church was protestant and the service was very similar to something I would be use to at home. The choir did a bit more of the responsive singing then the congregation but I was familiar with the hymns we sang so it was easy to sing along. After church all us girls went out to lunch on campus with Marlo's parents and we watched the first half of the rugby match between Limerick's team, Munster, and the northern team, Ulster, which was actually being played at the arena in Limerick. So that was my Easter. I did miss spending it with my family, I got to skype some with Michelle for a little while and she was talking about how they should go to VanAbles and that made me wish I was home so bad!
Well I think that is a long enough post and I think I've got you all caught up now. I'm off to Scotland this weekend so you can expect my next post to be about that!