Early Christmas in Durham

For Christmas this year, I just couldn't wait to give Nathan his gift. I had been thinking about it, scheming, and planning for months. I didn't want to pack it and give it to him in America because it was a bit cumbersome but delicate at the same time. We decided to exchange gifts before leaving for America on Wednesday night. I didn't know exactly how to wrap it, so I just told him to close his eyes while I held it up. Here is a video of him "opening" his gift. 

Our neighbor Keith, who lives at Crook Hall, painted it for us. We love it so much! I love that the cathedral is in the background too. We will hang it above our bed when we get back to Durham, and it's something we will treasure forever!

My turn! Nathan laid the gifts out on the bed and led me in and told me to open my eyes. 

It's a fancy fleece - not from a charity shop! I also got some warm socks and a cookbook. 

As I type, Nathan is playing golf with the boys, and I'm finishing up addressing all of my Christmas cards. It's good to be back with family and friends! We've already eaten lots of tasty food (first stop: In 'N Out) and have been raving non-stop about the comfortable bed in the guest room.

More later! Merry Christmas!

House Tour Numero Dos

This was last Friday in the North Barn. Working as a team, all of our stuff was out of there and the house was completely clean in about four hours. Pretty sweet if you ask me. 

For some reason, Nathan insisted that he look like a total creeper in this picture.

Here we are at Herons Court. This is our little back garden. Pamela and Cullen planted some hydrangeas (oh, Atlanta!) and a slate border around the beds. They found the slate around the corner from a roof that was being torn off. So awesome. There was already a huge rosemary bush and some sage too. Yummy!

In we come through the back door. Here is a table and chairs. That's it for the dining room. Except for my Ivanhoe's cup, which everyone at school thinks is a complete freak of nature because of its large size.

Here's the kitchen. You probably figured that out.

Pamela's futuristic coffee machines are on the counter, and we now have amassed quite the collection of wooden spoons. There's no such thing as too many wooden spoons.

Our former landlords dropped off a housewarming card and the beautiful flowers in the window. Isn't that amazing?

Here's the pantry/laundry room. Pamela made our spice rack (on the top shelf of the wire rack) out of boxes and duct tape. She rocks. Notice the huge Costco sized spices from Uncle Bob and Aunt Deanie at the top of the picture. If anyone in England needs some Pappy's BBQ rub, I'm your girl.

Moving on to the living room, Pamela painted that picture. So beautiful!

Straight ahead we have the Bergstrom's couch and Catherine's aloe plant. To your left we have our new neighbors' leather couch they were giving away and the Blackwell's mirror.

From another angle..

Right-O. Now we're up the stairs to the second floor (first floor if you're British) landing. The McKenneys found this awesome piece of furniture at a charity shop, and it's adorned with another of her paintings and some other mementos.

Here is Cullen and Pamela's room. She made that bed skirt out of burlap she discovered at a fabric shop down some alley in town. Good grief, she's talented.

These pictures are of their lounge/study/guest room. They scored some great finds in their first few weeks here, and they brought a lot of home with them to make this truly an amazing space!

I love this little bay window nook.

They also salvaged some big bricks from a dumpster, covered them with ordinance maps, and made them book ends and door stops. So clever!

And now... OUR FLOOR!!! Are you so excited?!?!?!?! Well, to be honest, I haven't really been home much this week. Nathan's been at a church conference in the Lakes, and I've basically been a boarder at work. I hope to get some more things organized this weekend. I promise to give you another tour when it's presentable. 

So, the bed's made, but we need to get a lampshade for that horrible swinging compact fluorescent light bulb. Those big pink fuzzy things are my yeti socks, which I needed to sleep in every night - along with my hooded sweatshirt and puffy vest - because I was without my built in bed-heater (Nathan) this week.

Stuff everywhere makes my eyes twitch.

The guest room. At least I can close the door on this one.

*choking sound*...Something... must... be... done...

More stuff without a home yet, most of it swimming in Tesco bags

Nathan's office. I have a feeling the door is going to stay permanently closed on this room.

Yeah, but at least the books are in bookshelves... that he's outgrown already. Aaack!

Here's to keepin' it real.

Breakfasting Out of Doors

 This morning the weather was P-E-R-F-E-C-T! I decided that Nathan and I should be breakfasting out of doors, so I moved some living furniture outside on the grass.

Oh, shadows... I look like a football player because I have a kitchen towel on my shoulder. I haven't been working out that crazily. That's my laundry hanging on the line on the right.

Look, it's no big deal. We're just enjoying our morning meal in England... next to the hedges... behind the rose bushes... in front of our 700-year-old stone barn house... in the sunshine... with a gentle breeze. Yes, that's the smallest size container of table salt you can buy.

Hard boiled eggs, buttered toast, Greek yogurt with berries and cashews, and water in a beer pitcher served in jam jars. Eclectic.

What did you have for breakfast this morning, and where did you eat it? A Nutri-Grain bar in the car? Cereal at the counter? A full spread in bed? Do tell...

When the Cat's Away

Our landlord and his wife, whose house is attached to ours, have the most beautiful flowers and vegetable garden. We don't wander into their yard unless invited, but I definitely admire it on each and every walk up our massive driveway. We also have a nice view of their veg patch from the loft upstairs. Here's the front yard...

When I see this, I know I'm almost home.

All of these roses are growing on one stem. Can you believe that?

Anyway, they have been on a Scandinavian cruise for the past 10 days. Before they left, we went to their house for a barbecue, and they showed us and some of their friends around their garden. They told us to come over and pick anything we wanted while they were away. Well, that's all it took!

We had a lot of their amazing veg for dinner last night. Homegrown produce tastes like store bought the stuff... except the intensity is multiplied by 10. I said, "I think this is what fill-in-the-blank (carrots, peas, tomatoes) are supposed to taste like!"

Here's my small basket of yesterday's pickin's. 

Oops! I forgot the parsley. There's broccoli, snap peas, tomatoes, and an onion in there.

And one broad bean. 

I also picked some of one of my favorite flowers - sweet peas. One whiff and I'm back at my Senior prom. I made my own bouquet of sweet peas for the occasion from the sweet peas in the Pearsey's back yard. Gosh, they were amazing. I think I may have mentioned this before...

Roses

Hydrangeas remind me of summers in Atlanta.

Here are some pictures of their garden.

I think this is a plum tree. They're not ripe yet.

This is an apple tree. They're definitely not ripe yet, but they're on their way!

Oooh! A pear tree! A baby pear!

I picked this apple, but I have yet to taste it.

They have four raised beds with so much good stuff in them: onions, leeks, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, broad beans, snap peas, strawberries, lettuces, dill, coriander, parsley, and other things I can't remember.

Here's another view. Isn't it beautiful! They work so hard in it all the time.

Here are their greenhouses. Lovely.

Here's a view of our barn from their garden. That window up top is Nathan's study loft.

The North Barn has been such a wonderful place to live. I'm going to miss it. 

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Moving

Prayers have been answered! Our Atlanta house has been rented. Just a few days after I e-mailed our blog advertisement around, a family from out of state came to Georgia to look at it and wrote a check for a deposit on the spot. They will move in the day after our current tenants move out. This is such a huge, huge blessing. I'm so pleased that they can love on and enjoy our house and the furniture in it. The dad will be the assistant athletic director at Georgia State (Nathan's alma mater), and the son will be in the same class as my first group of students at Whitefield. I hope he feels cool living in Mrs. Parker's house.

Speaking of moving... Sadly, we'll only be calling The North Barn home for a few more weeks. We've absolutely loved living here. With a house full of character, fabulous neighbors, a great landlord, a central location, gorgeous surroundings, and a historic house and gardens next door, it was ideal... except for the price. It wasn't so much the rent (which was "much" in itself) but the cost of utilities that was making our heads spin. The high ceiling with its 13th century beams was nice to look at, but it wasn't insulated well, which made staying warm very difficult. Some nights during the winter Nathan and I could see our breath when we got into bed. Keeping the heat on all the time was very, very expensive, and we knew after the first few bills that we were going to have to look for something else.

We were extremely stressed for a while there. The money we had saved for our three years here was depleting rapidly because of our international student fees and the very high cost of living. The dollar is not as strong as the pound, so seeing our reserves disappear 1.67 times faster than we anticipated was extra painful. In our first 10 months, we blew through two thirds of our savings. We wondered how were were going to be able to stay for two more years, especially with me not having steady work.

Enter God's provision...

I got a job (an amazing story in itself) that starts this fall, and then our friends the Griffiths put us in contact with some of their friends coming over to Durham to study. Any friends of Carter and Liz's were sure to be friends of ours! We "met" Cullen and Pamela McKenney over Skype back in April, and it turns out that we have all kinds of crazy connections. Pamela had questions about looking for teaching jobs, and hopefully I steered her away from making a lot of the same mistakes I did. 

Anyway, I'm not sure how, but we soon were talking about the prospect of sharing a house. Several other couples we know (some in Atlanta and some here in Durham) have done it and it seemed attractive for several reasons: 1) It would save both couples a grip of money, and 2) It would force us to be an intentional Christian community. We decided to pray and see if this was something God had for us.

Very shortly thereafter, I heard about a house that another PhD couple was moving out of at the end of the summer, and it sounded like the perfect set up: a tall, skinny townhouse with three floors. Each couple could have its own bedroom, bathroom, and living space. We'd share the kitchen, dining room, and another living area. It's very near other church family and it's a two minute walk from the big Tesco. It's about a 25 minute walk to town and 15 minutes to church. 

After several more months of conversation via Skype, e-mail, and Facebook, we decided to go for it. With my new job and the money we'll be saving living in the house with Cullen and Pamela, we will be able to recover our losses from this year of waiting. 

But wait! The North Barn came completely furnished, and the new house isn't. Furnishing a three story, five bedroom house ain't no joke. God has provided for us hugely again! I contacted all of the PhD families we know who are moving away from Durham this summer, and many of them either gave us stuff or sold it to us for cheap. We've got beds, couches, wardrobes, a dining room table and chairs, bookshelves, desks, kitchen things, etc. for a fraction of the price it would cost to buy at Ikea or Tesco. Thank you, Lord! 

Last week we put Jake and Eddie to good use and made them work for their dinner by helping us move about six car loads of furniture.Very unlike when we first set up shop, The North Barn is looking more like a charity shop, and it's a bit chaotic. I have to keep reminding myself that it's only temporary.

Nathan's seat is really far forward, don't you think?

Nathan's study is next to the furniture jigsaw puzzle upstairs. I'm afraid it might just topple over at some point.

Bookshelves and a mattress line the stairs.

Upstairs. Yikes.

Those would be mattresses and box springs on top of our wardrobe, The Princess and the Pea style.

Now, I'm sure you'd like to meet Cullen and Pamela, wouldn't you? Let me see if I can find a picture...

Well, here is a nice looking couple. This picture should go in a magazine. Oh, wait! That's THEM!

You'll be seeing lots of the McKenneys on the blog in the future. They arrive on August 11th, and they'll be staying with Sam and Emily, our first English friends, until we move into the house together on September 1st. 

We'll miss The North Barn, but we are so grateful for our time here. We've been able to make great friends, live close to town and especially to church, host lots of people, etc. Thankfully, Cullen and Pamela's lifestyle is similar to ours, so I'm sure the house will be full of people quite a lot. We're looking forward to starting this new chapter with them in just a few weeks!