Nomads No More...

2011 was the year our family became nomads and while it was fabulous, we are ready to get settled into our new place.

Of this year's 12 months, we were conveniently in a different part of the world every 3 months. The first 3 months we finished our time in DC, the next 3 months went to Shanghai, the third 3 months we spent a month visiting family out west, then on to Oklahoma for a couple of months of Tim's flight training and a couple of weeks with Grandma in Kansas, and finally the last 3 months of the year in England! We spent the first month here in a temporary furnished apartment, and now we FINALLY we have moved into our home in Cambridge.

Searching for a home in England was quite a different experience than back in the States. Instead of working with one realtor who will show you all the houses you would like to view, we had to make individual appointments with each listing agent. And they are in no hurry.... if you called on Friday to view a place, it would likely take until the following Wednesday before they could fit you in. Not good news for some impatient Americans.

We actually viewed the house we choose on Friday at 4:30. We called to tell them immediately after that we were very interested and wanted to see what we could work out. She said that was great and to call her back on Monday as it was now the weekend. It was one long weekend for us... painfully waiting! The house has a few quirks, but we absolutely love the location and the area. I really don't need a car as pretty much everything is a 10 to 15 minute walk, but I will happily keep it for when it is cold and rainy (they say it does get cold and rainy here, but the weather since arriving here five weeks ago has been fabulous!).

This is the new place for those wondering what a cute little place in Cambridge looks like. The outside is very English looking and "quite lovely" as the locals would say. It has enough backyard for running around and digging, but not too much where we get to spend Saturday taking care of it. BONUS!

This is the entry way...why is that whatever house we decide on always seems to have funny "coloured" (Brit spelling) carpet?! At least it is all one colour throughout the house!

The living room... yup, radiator heating, we must be in Europe.

This is supposed to be the dining room, but we have decided to use it as the play area for the kids. Aren't the curtains "lovely?" There are matching ones in the living room as well. Hopefully I'll have replaced them before any of you come visit!

If you look at the picture through the laundry room, there are two small doors that are supposed to be used to pass things back and forth between the kitchen and dining room. The girls have already had a lovely time playing store/restaurant!

This is the actually quite large (relative) kitchen, until you consider that our dining room table will be going in here....we are thinking we will take the door off to make it feel slightly more open.

There is a door to the garage, well a door to the outside and then another door to the garage (note, Brits pronounce garage more like we say "carriage"). Whatever, we are just happy to have a garage, even it it is semi-detached!

Where is the dryer you ask? Well it is not a standard item here in the UK. In fact this house has no hook ups for one. THANKFULLY they have what is called a "condenser dryer" where instead of a vent there is a plastic tank in the dryer that collects the water that must be emptied after each use that we are able to borrow from the Tim's work during our stay here (not in picture). Fortunately it actually works great... as that would have been a deal-breaker for me! The weather here is just not conducive to line drying!!

Bedroom #1.....a little bigger than our last walk-in closet. It will definitely be used as a storage/craft room.... or for visitors we don't want staying too long :-)

The girls' room, just enough room for their bunk beds and trundle. It has a great wardrobe built in for their closet.
This is the guest bedroom....so buy your tickets and stay as long as you want... (subject to availability!). I will show you around the first day at least. :)
This is the master, just lovely, right? That headboard is for a double bed. Our king bed will fit (against the opposite wall) and so we are good. And most fortunately, that headboard thingy is detachable so we can use that space for something else.

Hideous curtains must come down! What were these folks thinking with this headboard?
The girls' bathroom, well actually no one really uses it...if you notice the shower has waterproof wall only half way up. So it's great if you want to bathe. We are working on this one so hopefully we have two fully-functioning showers soon!
This is our en-suite bathroom. We are thankful for actual storage and cabinets. We just can't gain too much weight from all the bread that we are eating or we won't fit in our shower... seriously!
Somehow after packing out months ago, our stuff didn't beat us here. UGH! Hopefully just in time for Christmas... then we'll just put bows on our boxes and get surprised with all that we've forgotten that we shipped. Until then, Tim's work loaned us temporary furniture and kitchenware, and we have our 12 large suitcases, two boxes and four carry-ons worth of stuff that we THANKFULLY brought with us on our flight.