In the soup

Two friends from the U.S. are headed over here as I write this post.  I'm very excited for them to be here. 

In anticipation of their trip, I decided to make a chicken soup for their supper tomorrow evening.  I started the day by making my way over to Housewives' Choice Fruiterers.

I found almost all of the vegetables I needed--sweet potato, leek, parsnips, carrots, and onion--but the HC didn't have a turnip or dill, so I knew I would have to do more shopping after work.

I had class preparation I needed to do, so I headed over to the campus for a solid work session.  The river walk is still too muddy to manage, so I continued through the city centre.  Once again, I found British Civil War references.

The actual building was even older.

I haven't explored too many of these side streets, so this little jaunt whetted my appetite for more wanderings.

I needed to get a move on to campus, so I hot-footed it over to the Hive.  I decided to do a bit of a walk around to get a few more steps.  I was surprised to note some features in the landscaping I hadn't seen in my previous visits.

These are strawberry plants! You can see a teeny berry toward the bottom left of the photo.  The landscape also included grasses and other herbs.

The biggest surprise was the creative mowing.

It's amazing the things one notices with a camera that wouldn't ordinarily catch one's attention.

I walk by the Hive very, very regularly, but I usually walk on the other side of the building and I've never seen this work.

I hurried across the Sabrina Bridge to the St. John's campus along the Oldbury Road through the Malvern Gate.  In an earlier post I had added photos of sculptures, but I missed one.

This is actually the first in the series of brick structures, but my eye was drawn to something else.

Yes, it's a tree, but it has a plaque at its base.

As is the case in Duluth, there are memorials on benches and elsewhere.  Surprisingly, there were crocuses in the grass!

Spring in autumn.

I was collecting my sous chef from school this afternoon, so I hied over to the playground at her school to wait for her.  We headed back through the city centre to purchase chicken, meet my young friend's mum (also a friend) who had graciously picked up the missing turnip and dill, bought some bread and then picked up some other snacks for my friends at Marks and Spencer.  My friend took a photo of my groceries while I collected what I needed.

After purchasing a Marks and Spencer "always" bag and loading it full, it was time to head home and start cooking. 

My young friend scraped and I chopped.  After three hours simmering on the stove...voila!

This will be waiting for my friends when they arrive after their long, long trip.