Making a house a home

We have been turning this new place into our own.  It’s been a lot of fun.  The house was furnished with the bare necessities when we took ownership, so fortunately we could move right in.  But we have been adding lots of comforts, conveniences, doing some repairs, etc. and adding a few decorative touches.

Here is the living room today.  I should do some kind of “hover over the objects to learn more about them,” but I’m not going to.  The print over the mantel is one Jim and Marta, our sister-in-law bought in July in Utrecht. Marta managed to stash it there until last weekend, when we stopped to visit her and picked it up to bring it back here. We bought the Delft vase in an antique shop in Utrecht, possibly the same one where they bought the print in July. The Danish Christmas plate is one Marta brought when she came to visit in October. The lithograph on the left is one given us in Wrocław in September. It is of the old university building, one we’ve been in several times. The 3 watercolors on the right were in the house when we got here. The coffee table books are Asterix and TinTin that Ken and Marta brought over with them, a book about the University of Wrocław, another gift, and a book about beautiful villages in Normandy, a gift from some of Patrick’s friends who stayed with us in Duluth in August.  So you see we are filling the house already with things that have meaning to us.

Here’s where we ate many lunches and several dinners when the weather was warmer.  The table and chairs came with the house, but I bought the tablecloth in Wrocław. This is a typical lunch here.

Marta and I have worked on the garden.  I think it deserves before and after pictures, because though the after is a huge improvement, it might not look that impressive if you don’t see the before.

 

I pulled all the weeds out of the gravel pathway. Marta and I removed the black plastic and stones, a number of weeds and pruned the shrubs. The plants that are left are forget-me-nots, daisies, strawberries and some miscellaneous weeds that we don’t recognize. There is room for more improvement next spring.  We also planted two hydrangeas. The hydrangeas around this area are spectacular, so I wanted one or two of my own.  I think they will do well without attention.

I also put some bulbs in the front corner, but you can’t see those yet.

When Ken and Marta were here we also bought 3 bicycles and went on two medium-long bike rides around here.  That was fun.

We just have a few more days here—well two more.  Then we head back to Duluth for 3 weeks, but will be back here for Thanksgiving.  Our boys will be here then too. Ken and Marta, the boys and Jim’s sister, Alice are all partners in this venture with us. Alice is planning to be here in April. We hope the boys and Alice like the house.  Ken and Marta gave it their two thumbs up when they were here.

I’ll try to post some photos of our bike rides if I get a little encouragement.  It’s hard dong this when I don’t know if anyone is reading it.