Life in Romania

Hello everyone! So, I got an e-mail from one of my friends this past week and realized I need to give some details about where we are living here in Romania. We live in an apartment building similar to those you see in the picture on the center-left. We're on the top floor (the 5th floor) in a 2 bedroom apartment. This is a view from our family room window. Oh, can you see all the birds flying overhead? On one of our first days here we watched these black birds fly past for 10-15 minutes. There were hundreds! They must've been in the middle of migrating- we had never seen so many birds. It was pretty neat.
Anyway, our apartment has carpet in the family room and the two bedrooms. But its not the kind of carpet you're thinking of. It is very, very thin and just laid right on the wood floors with no padding and it is not stapled down or anything. The carpet in the family room was pretty gross when we got here so thankfully Spencer found some extra rolls in the closet. It is much better now. I actually feel like we can play on it and sit down on it now- a must with little Maylee! And thank heavens we have a vacuum. Again, its not what you're thinking of, but it works and that's really all that matters. The Romanians all cover their couches with blankets so our couch is covered with a lovely blue and green checked fleece blanket. It actually makes it quite nice for when we get crumbs on it- I just take it off and shake it out the window! It works great!

Next is our kitchen... It is growing on Spencer and I and is a quaint little place. It has turqouise linoleum with a little table with two stools. We have a one-sided sink where we hand wash all our dishes and have a drying rack for them to dry on. We have a little oven and stove very similar to those we had in Argentina on my mission. It's gas and works very nicely. We haven't cooked much in the oven because you can't set the temperature- it's just a flame you set from high to low- kind of like a gas grill. So, I don't know how long to cook things I'm used to cooking or how hot to keep it. So we have a lot of pasta and chicken cooked on the stove. Oh, we also have a medium-sized fridge and freezer, again, just like in Argentina. And, my favorite is our little hutch. I've always thought hutches were so quaint but they just don't always fit when you already have built in cupboards. I love the little hutch here that holds all our pots, pans, and dishes. It's white and turquoise/green. Spencer says the kitchen reminds him of a 30's or 40's kitchen. It suites our needs. I do miss having a disposal though. And, I kept saying how much I miss cooking with non-stick pans that Spencer surprised me with a new, beautiful, non-stick frying pan!

Then comes the bathroom. Well, lets just say I'm grateful we have running hot water. We have a tub/shower and everything else in a normal bathroom. It just doesn't have a finished floor- it has a cement floor covered partially with thin carpet and two bathroom rugs. It's not the prettiest or nicest place in our apartment, so we don't spend a whole lot of extra time there. We do have a washing machine that is also in our bathroom. It's just a little one but, after finding the manual in English, it really works great! I had to wash my clothes by hand most of the time on my mission and I'm extremely grateful I don't have to do that here. The washing machine was such a wonderful invention! We hang our clothes out to dry on a drying rack we've put in the kitchen next to the heater so it only takes about a day to dry.

I hope I've painted a pretty good picture of where we live and the conditions we live in. It's quite nice, but we pay way too much for it! But that's a whole 'nother story! We'll have to see if we can get some decent pictures of it to post. We've decided not to buy another camera since we just need to fix the flash on ours. No one in our city repairs Canons though. So, we can take pictures if there's enough sunlight, but most of the days here have been overcast so far. Hopefully we can get them taken soon!

Well, we love you and miss you. I'll post again soon! Have a great day!