I worked for the weekend and it's finally here!

Friday at school was pretty chaotic.  I was busy all day and then after lunch, the afternoon consisted of what the school calls Shine Time.  Once a quarter, the students are given an afternoon to choose from several fun activities to participate in for the remainder of the school day.  Yesterday, there were groups of students baking; learning to draw cartoons; making Easter chicks; cleaning out the cages of and playing with the school's guinea pigs; making friendship bracelets; building birdhouses; learning how to care for and train dogs; participating in a contest for an Olympics poster; and making Mother's Day cards.  There were several more activities, but these were all the ones I roamed around the school to see.  It was a good afternoon.  As I walked around to the groups of students, I had several ask me if I was an American.  They wanted to hear me talk "American" and try to "speak" British.  It was highly amusing.

Today, I woke up rather early, because my host and I planned to go to do some shopping.  We left this morning and drove to Plymouth, where we went to some of the outlets so I could buy a few things for school.  Plymouth is a lovely little seaport, and they have a naval base there.  It was quite cloudy and rainy today, so the fog prevented us from seeing much, but from what I saw it looked lovely.  There were sail boats in the harbor and we watched some of the ferries coming in from other ports.  Then we had lunch at The Old Customs House, a traditional pub that was built in the 1700s.  It used to be...a customs house.

After lunch, I had to go to see one of the many things Portsmouth is famous for....the Charles Dickens museum.  Portsmouth is the birthplace of Dickens, and his old home (he only lived there for a few months) is now a museum.  You can explore the house, read about the history of his family, see the some of the original illustrations approved by Dickens himself for his novels, and see some things he owned, as well as the sofa he actually died upon and his death certificate.

After visiting Dickens' former home, we stopped in Chichester on the way back to Bognor for some more shopping.  The shopping is unbelievable, with traditional chains like Top Shop and Jigsaw, as well as a several quirky independent shops.  We walked around and did some shopping, and stopped in one of their many traditional tea rooms for afternoon tea and cake.  I could have spent all day there, and I actually plan to, in the upcoming weeks.  There is a beautiful cathedral in the center of town and a university as well, with a theater and lovely grounds to walk around.  I think the next weekend that isn't raining and is a little warmer I will have to spend in Chichester!

Tomorrow is Mothering Day (Mother's Day), so I believe we'll be spending it with my hosts' family.  If the weather is nice, we plan on going to an open air museum just outside of town.  If its raining, I'm not sure what we'll do.  I actually wouldn't mind just spending some time at home tomorrow, because I feel as though I've been running around nonstop since I arrived one week ago.