Bienvenido a mi Casa!
We would like to welcome you to a photo tour of our home. Today, I will start with some background & photos of the first floor of our home. As most of you know, we have moved into the home of our friends, Matt, Esta, & Mateo Jesch. They are MTW missionaries, but are preparing to serve long-term in Guadalajara, Mexico. They have spent the last year and a half doing language learning in Bogota. They will return for a visit to the states this month & go to Mexico later this summer. They have been super helpful to us in many ways. Their son, Mateo, has become a good friend to both girls. Matt & Esta are our closest friends here. It seems like we just said our goodbyes in the states, & now we will be saying goodbye to them in one week.
This home is in a great area of the city. It is about as far north as you can get in Bogota. It is a 5 minute walk to the Transmilenio, which is the public bus transportation that has its own lane. It is also a 5 minute walk to the mall, which has banks & the grocery store where we shop. So yes, I have to go to the mall to go to the grocery store! Our landlord speaks English, which is great for us. The house is what we would call a townhouse in the United States because each house is connected. It is in a gated neighborhood, which most neighborhoods are here. Security is very tight here. I'm getting off a little, but a cultural difference is you see security a lot here. For instance, to leave the grocery store you have to show security your receipt whether you have one bag or twenty. This neighborhood has a park, and we like it because each front door opens to the neighbor's house and not the street. We learned from being at the Baptist house, the streets are very noisy! So, let the tour begin!
**I apologize for some of the blurry pictures. Didn't have the time or energy to re-take them :(**
This is the front gate of our conjunto, or neighborhood. This picture was taken from the inside of the neighborhood.
This is the outside of our home.
If you want to write letters (we can't accept packages), our address is:
Calle 187 #46-55
Tejares Del Norte 1, Casa 88
Bogota, Colombia
Our flower bed. It is in need of some fine tuning!
This is the view looking to the right of our front door & the way we walk to the mall & grocery store.
This is the view looking to the left of how we would walk to the Transmil station or to the park.
Here is part of the park with the tennis courts.
And then a playground.
Come on in! From the front door, this is our living room. The walls are concrete & the floors are all tile.
(from another view)
This is our new chair & sofa. I still need to buy some throw pillows, & maybe eventually a coffee table & rug. But we are trying to pace ourselves in the things we need to buy. There is so much to buy upfront.
From the front door, the living room is to your left & stairs to the second floor are to your right.
From the living room, you look right into the dining room. We bought this kitchen table & chairs from the Jeschs. We pay to have drinking water delivered to us each week. We also have some plates, cups, mugs, Colombian World Cup Coke bottles, pottery, & cross decorations on these shelves.
Brook has been collecting these since we arrived.
This is Isabella's representation on the shelves!
Gibsons mug on my Colombian pottery filled with supporters names to pray for.
Our drinking glasses representing Memphis!
Above the table, we have our Bogota poster that many of you signed along with photographs of some family & friends. Other pictures are hanging in another room.
We love looking at these!
In the corner across from the table, we have a coffee station, along with vitamins, & sunscreen. Even though we have cool temperatures here, we have to wear sunscreen every day because we are so much closer to the sun here.
A view of our kitchen from the end of the kitchen table. So much counter space, right?? Really, that small space between the sink & the cooktop is it. On the other side of the cooktop is a utility sink and then our stackable washer & dryer. I am thankful to have a dryer, even if all the words on the washer & dryer are in Spanish!
At the opposite side of the sink is our drying rack area. That's right, no dishwashers here. And what do you think about our stainless still counters?
We do have 4 burners. There is a small oven underneath, and I just learned how to light it this week. You have to light it with a lighter & I finally bought a long one so I can turn on the oven without a strong potential of setting this place in flames. The oven is so small, I had to buy really small bake ware. I brought my smallest cookie sheet from the states & it was too big for the oven. I measured the oven & did go find one baking dish, one baking tray, & a 6 muffin tray that would fit in the oven. Oh yeah, & the oven only has celsius numbers, so I have to convert to farhenheit when I want to preheat the oven. To preheat, there are no lights, so I just wait 10-15 minutes & hope the oven is at the desired temperatures! And then of course I pray I added the right extra ingredients, if necessary, for high altitude baking. The moral of all this, don't take your oven for granted!
Across from the oven is a pantry with microwave.
There is a door in between the pantry & refrigerator in the kitchen that leads to a garage. We don't have a car, so it is a storage room for us.
We did buy this cute bistro table to have out here. Avery got a bike & one was left here that the girls could share.
I am in the midst of hanging Christmas cards from last year in here. If you notice, there is a stack on that green bin I haven't hung yet, so if yours isn't seen, it is in that stack I promise, & will be hung up soon with care!
Thanks for visiting floor one (piso uno). Tomorrow, we will go up to the next level.
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