Adventures in Paint

by Jason

We set a new family record today. We got our whole house painted in 11 hours! They started working at 9:30 this morning and at 8:30 tonight I turned off the lights and closed the door behind them. It would have taken us weeks to paint all that. But it wasn’t quite as simple as it sounds…

It started earlier in the week. I called our painter—the same guy who painted our last two apartments—and asked if he was available. He said he was, so on Wednesday he came to see the place and tell us how much paint to buy. We explained the color schemes a little and he told us how many gallons of each color he would need. In the past, he’s preferred to mix the colors himself—by hand, on location—but we wanted to pick some colors from a paint store and have the computer mix it.

We learned today why our painter “doesn’t trust the computers” to mix paint. You see these two lids? The numbers on them are the same! They’re supposed to be the same color, the teal one. Somehow, the computer didn’t put enough green in the second one, I guess. But my painter was able to add some tint to it and make them both the same.

Today started with a wake-up call, followed by several hours of running errands. Ahab the Painter called at 8:15 to tell me they were on the way, and would be here in “about half an hour.” At 9:15 he called again and said they were here. I walked over to our new place (just a block from our temporary place) and let them in. I showed them the paints we had bought. They started setting things up and then asked me if I had any masking tape! “Wait a minute,” thought I to myself, “aren’t they the professional painters here?” I told them I’d go look for some tape and some light bulbs, since several were missing in the new flat.

They also asked about a ladder. I have one, but it was at a friend’s house, so I told them I could bring it a little later. They started asking the doorman at the building if there was a ladder around, but there wasn’t, so he asked if he had an old barrel they could stand on to paint! (No barrel, either).

I walked to the nearest light bulb shop and got some bulbs, and that guy happened to have a few rolls of masking tape, too. Walked back to the new house and delivered that, then came back home for breakfast. After about an hour, he called back and asked about a broom and squeegee for the floor. So, I headed back down and bought those and delivered them. And came back home. Again.

I was about ready to go get the ladder when the doorman at this building brought a couple by who are thinking about buying this flat, so we spent 10 minutes showing our house. After that I did go get the ladder and delivered it to them.

We had company coming for lunch at 1:00, but at 12:30 the painter called again to tell me about the non-matching paints in the girls’ room. So I went to see it and see what to do. That’s when he volunteered to just fix it himself rather than sending me to the store to try to explain that they’re not the same color.

He thought it was going to take 2-3 days to paint all those rooms, but he ended up with 5 guys working on it rather than 2. The three extras had planned to work at another site today, but weren’t able to work there, so they all came to our house. The other reason it’s so much faster here than in the States is because the floors are all ceramic tile. So where we’d spend hours taping plastic to the floor to keep paint off the carpet, these guys just let it drip and then wipe it with a wet rag. It also dries pretty darn fast with so little humidity in the air!

I went over to see it a couple more times this afternoon. Things were progressing quickly. About 8:00 he called and said come see. We went on over and found a beautifully painted house! See for yourself...

Here are Sawyer & Sarah Claire with one of the men who worked so hard on our house all day.
He asked to get in the picture with them!:) 

Another shot so you can see the green walls better.

It's definitely teal! Perhaps a bit brighter than her mom would have chosen,
but Lee Anna knew just what she wanted.

No more red and yellow for our bedroom. Hooray!

And the hallway and living room (not pictured) are a lovely beige. 

Now it's time to fill up those rooms with some furniture! If the movers will work as quickly as the painters, we'll be ready to move in in no time!

Say Cheese!

While we were in the states last fall, some sweet and very talented friends offered to take photos of our family. We are so grateful for these amazing photographers who used their gifts to bless us. We'll be enjoying these photos for a long, long time!

There are many more, but these are some of my favorites...

Our (Soon-to-be) Home Sweet Home

I have debated whether to go ahead and post these "before" pics of our new flat now or wait until we get it all set up and post before and after pics together. Obviously, I decided to go ahead and share some photos, BUT I feel the need to make a few disclaimers/explanatory comments. 

First, I hope that it will be clear to anyone who looks at these that painting is going to be an immediate priority! We already have painters lined up to come the day after we sign the contract, so we will NOT be living in a red and yellow house. Currently, even the ceilings are bright yellow! I mean, if they had tweaked it just a bit and gone with garnet and gold, we might have considered it (not really!), but bright yellow walls AND ceilings are just too much. 

Second, because we live in the desert (well, in a huge city surrounded by desert), any surface that is not frequently cleaned ends up disgustingly dirty. This apartment hasn't been cleaned in a while, so all of the floors in these photos are VERY dirty. There is nice white tile underneath, though, and a little soapy water and a big mop will have them looking great again soon!

So when we're looking at apartments, we have to look past certain easily-fixable things to see the things that really are most important (layout, location, etc.--the same kinds of things you would look for in a house). We had to do some explaining to the kids about why we didn't want to choose another apartment that was located very close to this one. That apartment had normal, muted paint colors and was sparkling clean, but the layout and size were not quite as appealing as this one. We can fix paint and dirt, but we can't fix a bedroom that's too small for our furniture!

Okay, so here we go on the Grand Tour:

The door in this photo is the entrance to the apartment. That spot to the left will be perfect for our shoe cabinet. In this part of the world, it's customary to take your shoes off when you enter someone's home, so we make a habit of doing that at our house, too. The door is sort of located in the middle of the apartment. When you walk in, a large living area is in front of you, and then the hallway you see above leads back to the rest of the house (kitchen, bathrooms, & bedrooms). First, the living area... 

This is the view directly forward from the front door. The area by the window will most likely be our school "room," and then in front of that (nearer the door) will be our dining table.

I took this photo standing in the same spot, but turned slightly to the right. The sliding doors lead to a balcony that overlooks the mosque and small garden area in front of our building.

And this photo is also taken from the same spot, turned a little more to the right. Where Sawyer is standing (what is he doing, anyway?), we'll put our living room furniture (couches, love seat, recliner and entertainment center). I love the windows across the side wall. While they do add to the heat some in the summer, I am a big fan of sunlight, and this room will have lots of it!

If you turn around and walk past the front door and down the hall, the first door you come to is the kitchen.

Our dishwasher will fit nicely in the spot right by the sink. The empty spot on the right side is where the oven will go. There's not an oven in the apartment, so we'll get to purchase our own. On the other side of the kitchen (where I stood to take the photo) is an empty space that will be good for a small table and chair and possibly some shelving or storage of some kind. We're not sure exactly what we're going to do with that space, but we're excited to have it! The kitchen also has a door that opens to a tiny balcony.

As you continue down the hall, you come next to the guest bathroom.

I don't have a lot to say about the bathroom, except that it will work fine. Our washing machine will probably also be in this bathroom (with our dryer possibly in the other one). Washers are usually located in either the kitchen or the bathroom, and dryers are almost unheard of, so there's never a good spot for them.

The three bedrooms are all close together in the back of the house. First, Sawyer's room...

then the girls' in the back corner. I'm not sure why this room got left stark white when every other inch of the house is ridiculously bright! Ironically, the girls want to paint their room teal, so it won't be plain for much longer!

The girls' room has doors that lead to a balcony off the back of the apartment, but we're probably going to end up putting some furniture in front of them. We can still get to the balcony from our room, and it will work best with the girls' furniture to use that wall (plus, then we don't have to worry about kids going out there unsupervised!).

Finally, the last bedroom is the master.

The red wall has some texturing in it that we'll probably just leave and paint over. The other three walls (and ceiling!) are yellow. We'll be changing that to something a bit more understated.

 Here's the master bathroom...

and here's a view back down the hallway from the end.

And that completes our tour! We very much look forward to showing you updated pictures as we get things painted, bought, moved in, and unpacked. We are excited about living life here.

And here's one final picture: This poor building is across the street from ours, and it was meeting its demise the day we went to take these pics. The buildings here are made entirely of concrete and rebar, so that's what the big machine was (loudly!) working on demolishing. Sawyer watched, mesmerized, as it worked, and must have said at least six times, "That machine is AWESOME!"

As you can see, the building next door to it is also unoccupied, but there are plenty of other buildings with residents in the neighborhood. It is a quiet area, but located just two short blocks from a major street with all kinds of stores, restaurants, and other places that we'll frequent. We are so grateful to have found a place that we believe will work so well for our family, and we're looking forward to all that is in store as we settle in this new part of town!

Living It Up!

We've been absent from the blog for quite a while, but it's for a good reason: For the last eight months, we've been busy spending face-to-face time with many of you! We traveled to the U.S. last May, and spent the summer and fall making memories, visiting people and places that we love, and re-connecting with lots and lots of friends and family! I'm not even going to try to blog about all of the amazing experiences that we had, but here are just a few highlights:

We soaked in some gorgeous sights, like this one...

this one...

this one...

and this one!

We ate our favorite American foods, like Blue Bell ice cream 

(even better when you can eat it with your cousins!)...

corn dogs (a new discovery for Sarah Claire this year!)...

and lots of Chick-fil-A!

(not to mention all the other foods we enjoyed, like steak, seafood, Tex-Mex, barbecue, and so much more...)

We enjoyed sweet reunions with friends...

and family...

and made some fun memories with them, like a color run...

and a visit to Disneyworld!

We enjoyed American sports like baseball...

and FSU football!

We had a blast celebrating U.S. holidays like Halloween...

 and getting to be with extended family for Thanksgiving and Christmas!

We even got to make an exciting announcement while we were still in the U.S.!

It was an incredible year, and we are so grateful for the opportunities we had. We're back on the other side of the ocean now, but still treasuring the sweet memories we made, new friendships we started, and the encouragement we got from so many of you. Check back soon for an update on our adventures on this side of the world!