home sweet home

The house has been such a blessing. It's so nice to have a quiet, (relatively) private place to come back to. I love it. I'm checking out paint prices to make it even more cozy. We're thinking a nice cream might like good. It's hard to find something to go with the pink floors though..

Thank you to those who have helped us in this process of finding a house, working out kinks (i.e. the water only works at certain times during the day), moving in, and making it a home. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

The view from the foyer. To the right is our "living area," and to the left our kitchen/dining room.

The entranceway

See that sink in the back right corner? First sink I've had where I'm living in six months.
I literally jumped for joy and broke out into song when I saw it.

Our reading nook

Our back. The cream door leads to a bathroom.

  

Our cooking area. We have a two burner stove and an aluminum box
that sits on top of one for an oven. It actually works fairly well.

See? I'm making bread! Thank you, Asia (and Nina), for making me more domestic.

The ladies share this room

And this is mine! There's a bathroom to the right with a western toilet.

It's actually quite roomy.

Just had to post a picture of the final product. :)

 

the summer in pictures

What a summer. Vacation, visitors, new roommates, moving... A lot's gone on. To make things simpler, here's a glimpse of what I saw.

My new house! Despite not having any previous tenants, it still needed a bit of work. Finished pictures to follow.

We got dressed up in the traditional kubayas and went out and took photos. It was a very girly day.

Borobudur - one of the 7 Ancient Wonders of the World

 

 

Buddhist holy waters

Balinese fire dance

Terraced rice patties

tikus island

This post is long overdue thanks to my recent war with dengue (which, by the way, I'd say I'm 95% over - just working on getting my energy back now), but here it is finally.

A couple of weeks ago, back when Jerushah was still here, we got a group of friends together and went to the little island about an hour off the coast called Tikus Island, or Mouse Island. It definitely deserved its name; the place was tiny, but it was beautiful. Drop. Dead. Gorgeous.

We first had to get a group of 15 people together because you can't just take a normal ferry over. No, that'd be too easy. You remember those fishing boats from a couple of months ago? The long, wooden, brightly-colored ones? Yeah. We took one of those. Somehow, two navy guys joined our excursion, and they were a huge help climbing into the boat as we waded in and fought the waves (sadly, my phone was a casualty). One stood at the front of the boat; the other in the back. It felt so official. There isn't really anything on the island itself, only a couple of buildings, but there is a tower you can climb up. I've overcome many of my fears, but I've decided I'll always be afraid of heights, particularly climbing up high ladders with no sort of protection at all.

The water was crystal clear thanks to the corral surrounding the island, and a beautiful shade of blue... so gorgeous. We borrowed snorkeling gear from some friends and went snorkeling... if only my camera could take photos underwater. So many fish! It was unbelievable...

Sadly, I don't have any pictures to share of snorkeling, but here are some from the rest of the day:

Can you tell I can't keep a straight face?

Just a little excited