I've decided to started blogging again. Emily and Rachel have inspired me.

A lot has changed in the year-and-bit since I last posted. In August, Anthony asked me if I would be his wife, and I told him that nothing would make me happier. We got married in Virginia last December and and then moved to London to be close to Anthony's job.

Marriage is a Very Good Thing. I highly recommend it. I think the best part is getting to spend lots of time with your best friend. We celebrated our 6-month anniversary this week, and I love Anthony so much more now than I did when I married him.

I've spent the last six months eating my words, after telling people for years that I'd never live in London. I guess I thought of big cities as great places to visit, but not anywhere I'd want to live, because of the dirt, crowds, and horrendous traffic. But it hasn't turned out like that at all. We're in a really fun district called Hampstead in the northwest part of the city. I like to think of it as London's Georgetown. It feels more like a trendy town than part of a major metropolis. It's full of big trees, old houses, quirky shops, restaurants, and sidewalk cafes. Almost everything we need is within a 5-minute walk: church, the Tube, the bank, the post office, 3 grocery stores, the bakery, the doctor, the dry cleaner, and at least half-a-dozen pharmacies. Best of all, we're just around the corner from Hampstead Heath, London's largest park, where I like to go running in the mornings.

We live in a rambling 7-room flat on the top floor of a Victorian mansion. Anyone who walks in can learn two things about us just from our front room:

1) We really like books. There are five bookcases in the front room alone, packed and overflowing. There are more bookcases in our little office, books lining the staircase up to the office, and always a few books in the bedroom and the dining room, which doubles as my study.

2) We also like plants. At the moment, the front room is being taken over by 8 pepper plants, all of which have grown significantly taller than we ever expected. I was thinking maybe 12-15 inches, but the biggest ones already reach past my waist from the ground. There are more pepper plants in the dining room, together with some eggplant, and the kitchen window is taken up with herbs and a 3-foot avocado tree. (We started it from a seed back in January). But all that is just the beginning. There's a huge balcony off the back, where we have a whole garden arranged in clay pots -- a variety of vegetables, fruits, and flowers. I call it my jungle. The strawberries have just finished producing and I'm planning to make a (tiny) black currant tart next week from the proceeds of Rhett Butler. (Yes, we name our plants. We're weird.) There's also room out there for a couple of tables and the grill, which will make for wonderful summer dinners once Anthony's hay fever lets up for the season.

Now that I've broken the silence, I hope to post semi-regularly. Hope to see you again soon!