Our Place, Our Stuff

When I lived in Taiwan at age 23 I wasn't interested in interiors or design of any kind. Because of my lack of interest in those things, I didn't take any photographs of my living areas. I so wish I had. I'd love to have pictures of the kitchen I shared with five other people, where we had to boil our drinking water and where one of my roommates whipped up the most amazing American meals for us once a week; I wish I could see my balcony where we did laundry (or didn't do laundry, depending on whether the machines were working or not); my tiny bedroom then my bigger bedroom and the hard mattress I slept on that had a top layer of grass cloth; the bathroom that had a drain in the floor where I took showers with no shower curtain and had to put used toilet paper in the trash; the hallway area with the full length mirror where I got ready every day; and the hodge podge selection of books on the first floor bookshelves where I first picked up The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, a book that would become one of my all-time favorites. These are the mementos of daily life that I don't want to forget.

Now in Luxembourg we've been ever so slowly piecing together a world that resembles home. I took tons of pictures of our apartment when we first saw it while house hunting, and you can see those on my other blog. 

I'm taking it from there now ...

This is the apartment on the day we arrived. The rental furniture company was in the middle of unpacking everything that was meant to hold us over until our sea shipment would arrive two to three months later.

 The kids' room with the rental beds.

I thought I took a picture of our bedroom, but I didn't. 

 Our first four Saturdays here included trips to Ikea. It's only 15 minutes away, just over the border in Belgium. European homes usually don't come with light fixtures or closets, so these were our two priorities. Here's one stack of pieces that Adam would transform into our closets.

 We needed four light fixtures, and I chose the same for every room. Adam attempted to install them but it wasn't going well, so we hired a guy to do it.

 Behind the kitchen table is the other huge stack of closet pieces. We had the pieces delivered to our apartment but we didn't know how to get the delivery truck across the large courtyard since it was blocked off with metal barriers. Adam and I had to take tons of trips back and forth across the large courtyard, schlepping all these pieces upstairs to our apartment. It was a hot, humid day and we had already spent four hours at Ikea, several of which Adam spent picking each and every piece from the warehouse alone while I kept the kids entertained. It was one of those life events that either makes or breaks you. #totalikeadomination

 Once Adam had our closet in our bedroom set up, our clothing racks were sent to the front room.

And that was basically the gist of our lives: shuffle, build, shuffle, move. Adam wins best Ikea closet builder award. He built three of them, one for the entryway, one for the hallway, and one for our bedroom. After three solid Saturdays of Ikea shopping and building closets, he finished the last one over a period of a week and a half at night after work. Where's the applause emoji when I need it? Seriously. Clappppiiiiinnnnnggggg!

Last Monday our sea shipment came! We waited seven weeks to get it. Not bad, Amazon, not bad. 

It was an exciting day. And then I remembered: this is just moving day all over again. But whatever; it was so nice to have our stuff back. Now we can move on with life. 

While I get this chaos organized, I bring you the rest of our daily life.

This is the laundry room. Our washer and dryer are the stacked ones in the back middle.

I love them so much I could kiss them. I had to translate everything and tape it to the side of the machine. But let's be honest, I use the same settings every time. Just like in America.

 Next to the laundry (buanderie) is the garbage room (poubelles).

 Black is garbage, yellow is glass recyclables, the blue bags in the back hold plastic recyclables and all other recyclables go in the big blue bin on the left. Exciting!!!

The parking garage is enormous. 

 We have two parking spots so we park in the middle. It's the ultimate luxury when dealing with kids getting in and out of car doors all day.

 We live on the first floor, which would be considered the second floor in America. Tripping on these stairs is a death wish.

 4C, that's our building. I'm the annoying tenant who props the giant, extremely heavy front doors open during the day so my kids can run in and out at will.

 The elevator. Endless fun for the kids. Their fingerprints are all over the inside. They looooooove when I let them go on it alone. And the hallways echo like crazy so my kids' going to and from tantrums can be heard building-wide. Awesome.

 This is our front door. There are no markings to distinguish any doors (and management insists we keep it that way), but our "Ware" name was taped in tiny letters to the doorbell for us when we got here. Home sweet apartment!