Good morning! So glad you are loving the home tours! Thanks, Daniela for sharing yesterday. I have a post all set about the boys rooms but something else is on my mind this morning. So detour here we come. And no time for edits so here ya have it…

When we settled into our new homes in Bogota and Switzerland I remember it took a long time for it to feel like home. The funny thing is that each time it took leaving for it to feel more familiar and like our place. Even a weekend away would make coming “home” that much better. Home felt more like ours than the places of adventure we had just explored. The breaks from home are important to gain some perspective and have appreciation for what home is.

When we arrived in Herndon we hit the ground running with getting the house in order for the start of school, new job, etc. A few weeks after we arrived we had a wedding to attend in Virginia Beach. At the time I was so excited to go to the wedding and see friends but could not fathom stepping away for a weekend when there was so. much. to. do!!!!!! But somehow this same little phenomenon happened, leaving home made the coming home so much sweeter. Instead of being overwhelmed with our home to do list we were happy to be home. It reminded us that it is our space and somewhere we were becoming really comfortable with. In fact as we walked in from the weekend Jackson said a jolly  “home sweet home” as we walked through the door. I laughed at the time that he had added that in appropriately with no previous rehearsal, but it was so true.

I don’t think leaving home always needs to be a trip or even leaving for huge chunks of time. Lately in the midst of our new fall bustle I have been sneaking out on Sunday afternoons by myself to have time to have complete thoughts and some quiet. I have made a habit out of heading around the corner to our Starbucks and ordering a salted caramel mocha…have you tried it yet?? I know I would probably love the other seasonal option too but one of these puppies and I was hooked.  This hour, maybe 2 if I can sit still and read long enough, is so refreshing and makes coming home so much sweeter. I can come home with perspective on what I appreciate….my family, the roof over our heads, a fridge stocked with food to nourish our family, heat on a chilly night…the list goes on.

So if you haven’t left home in a while, take a little detour. Not to the grocery store or the dentist. If salted caramel mochas aren’t tempting…step out for a walk or take your family on a little day trip if you have the time and resources. Break out of your routine knowing that you will make great memories and you will return with some perspective! At the end of the day carry sleepy kids in from the car, tuck everyone in and let out that sigh that says “whew, we’re home”.

Up today is a tour of our friend’s Daniela and Miguel’s flat in Switzerland. It  is so welcoming and has been the place where we got lots of first hand experience in Swiss culture! You might remember seeing Daniela before on here from our jam making, bread baking and many Swiss adventures. I first really started to get to know Daniela when I took her a meal after she had her baby. I’m sure she thought I was so crazy bringing this American tradition to Switzerland…but in the end she agreed to let me bring the meal and we  got to chat on her porch when I stopped by. Daniela taught me so much about thinking practically about my home. I loved that she wasn’t concerned about things being just so, she was concerned that people be comfortable and feel welcome.  So make a cup of hot chocolate and have a read!

What makes a house a home?

When Kristen asked me if I would blog for a day and send some pictures of my favorite spaces in my house, I was a bit surprised. Our 70-square-meter-three-room-flat in the first floor of an old Chalet style house near Bern, Switzerland, doesn’t strike me as the kind of living space you would publish pictures about. But then I agreed. Even if our little flat isn’t stylish or modern nor decorated in a very special way, it definitively feels like home to us. And about this I’m happy to blog.

Our Kitchen Table

This table is the very heart of our home. The kitchen is in the middle of our flat, and much of our living takes place here. Peeling potatoes and paying bills, chopping veggies and wrapping gifts… As I don’t have a writing desk I sit here with my laptop or school work too. Here we have individual breakfasts and joined family dinners, and if we have guests, we mainly sit here. The table extends, and we have placed up to eight people around it. I like the old wooden make of it. We found it on my grandmother’s attic when looking for furniture for our first flat and have had it since.

The hook

You maybe wonder why this hook could be important enough to blog about. It’s our faithful babysitter. Not on its own, of course. But this beam runs through the middle of our kitchen, and for the first seven months of Anna’s live we had a baby hammock hanging on it. With a string from my foot to the hammock I could rock her gently when sitting at the table or standing at the stove. It saved us many hours of crying.

Later Kristen lent us a baby jumper, which again, Anna LOVED, and in which she spent many happy and very active hours. The third thing was a little swing. We took it away now as Anna feels too grown up for it, but soon the hammock will be put up again for our No 2. 

My bed

I think anybody’s bed is what makes them realize they are back home after a holiday or some time away, sleeping in different ones. It’s just not the same. Often when cuddling into my blanket at night I’m reminded of all those people living in the streets and under bridges, children sleeping in cardboard boxes, refugees without any shelter, people who’s houses have been bombed or shaken by an earthquake, and then I send a prayer and am just  filled with gratitude for my warm and cosy bed. During day time we cover it and make it extended living space for reading or watching a movie. Anna thinks it’s a trampoline…

Anna’s room

This is probably the room I like best in our flat. Although it’s mostly very untidy. It was originally our lounge, and Anna sort of grew into it. First we just put in her bed, later the changing table, then the “baby cage” (there must be a proper English word to this, but I don’t know it J ), and eventually she conquered the bottom two rows of the book shelf for her toys and books. I like the little couch, to watch her play, but also to sit and chat with other ladies while the kids play on the floor. And I like the corner behind the door where the bed fits perfectly. It makes for a snugly little nest, and as our flat is not very big,it’s only five steps away from where we sleep. So Anna is on her own but still close, and we can hear her without a baby monitor even at night.

Squares

Looking at the bookshelf in Anna’s room and this favorite piece of furniture in our bedroom, I realize I like squares. Those handy draws hold everything, from ski socks to medicine to jewellery to passports… they’re great.

 Personal space

I think part of the “home” feeling  is made by a space which you can arrange and decorate to your own taste, where you can put or leave some personal items: the toothbrush in the bathroom, a postcard on the fridge. That’s different when you live in somebody else’s home for a while or in a shared flat with not very friendly people (not that this had happened to me…)

In a family it’s important for each member to have their personal space too, not necessary their own room, but a cupboard, a shelf, a draw or a box, maybe a desk to themselves. Even though our place is rather small, I like for Miguel to have his study corner and sound studio rather than us having a very elegant living room.

Having guests

Further, home is home to me if I can receive guests. The room I was given by my boss when going to work in a restaurant in the mountains was as small as a cupboard. My first thought was: If my room is not big enough to put a mattress on the floor beside my bed, my brother cannot come to visit, and so I don’t want to live here not even for a month (I found another place then, and my brother visited about six times in four months, bringing different sets of friends with him to go skiing. It was great fun with all of them).

Also now I prefer to have a bed for guests rather than a fancy couch.

 And also this next item is essential if I wanna be a young and trendy host in urban Switzerland. Of course not only our guests enjoy a proper cup of Espresso, we both are big coffee drinkers too.

Tadaaaaa… our balcony

To finish let me show off  the one thing that is really special about the specific house we live in. It has a view. Not only a splendid, 180degree view over the valley, on the close hill to our left, some villages and church towers at mid distance and the very impressive Bernese Alps with eternal snow on top in the background, it even has a big covered balcony to sit, put your feet up and enjoy it all.

When we sit there with Anna we call the view our children’s book, animated and in 3D. We discover cows, horses, lorries, post cars (the yellow ones, if you’ve been to Switzerland you know what I mean), motor bikes, bicycles, tractors, more cows, and we’ve observed rainbows and spectacular sunset reflections (it faces south east, so no direct sunsets), thunderstorms with lightening, and fireworks… it’s amazing.

and with a bit of zoom at noon and in the evening. No kidding, this is real. No photoshop! Really this balcony and the view on the mountains would be the one thing I would very much miss in a different place (as well as our lovely neighbors and landlords of course, but that is another topic).

So yes, our flat might not be very modern, or very elegant, or very clean and tidy (hardly ever…), but it definitively is home to the three of us, we love living here and hope to stay much longer.

Thanks, Daniela!! Makes us miss you all so much as I read this! Thanks for sharing your home!

When we arrived the house looked like this….

There was spider grass literally trying to grow under the front door. Our sweet friends had already come by to work on stump grinding and clearing fallen trees. Each and every neighbor we meet talks about the fallen trees and wondering who on earth lived here. Since then we have dug, and uprooted, thinned out, dug a little more and had a gardener come and do the final digging of the spider grasses that had a million root bulbs. The previous owners had put in azalea bushes and a funny variety of things that could have been pretty but they were so overgrown. So we started trying to trim them back and give them some shape. We wanted to keep as much as we could. But as much potential as they had, they had grown out of control for too long. I promise I won’t spiritualize every part of this house renovation but honestly I see so many similarities with our faith. The plantings were good intentioned but not maintained and disregarded. When things built up the homeowner just didn’t care or chose not to put in the time. Fortunately or unfortunately the plants continued to grow even without the proper care. But they were not living up to their full potential to be beautiful and enjoyed by the viewer! We literally dug up cement chunks that had been buried between the bushes. Do the regular weeding folks, the jungle grows fast and the nasty roots go deep.

So in the end we kept 2 small grasses (that got transplanted) and a couple of flowering plants, tore everything else out and shopped garden sales to fill the rest.

Over the last weeks we have added Crepe Myrtles (that reminded us of Texas), knock out roses and lots of perennials that we had in our garden in Switzerland like cone flowers, Black-eyed Susan and lambs ear.  A couple of days ago I spread mulch so that everything won’t die in the winter and then today we put the finishing touches on the yard with the addition of 2 trees and 2 hydrangea bushes. We bought a tree for each boy…(check out the end of season sales if you are in the market for trees….who knew Christopher Columbus was a good reason for markdowns)

It will be along time until these boys can climb these trees but our hope is that they will one day enjoy them! And that they will provide pretty shade.

Here is the finished product! Just like the trees it feels like it will be a long time before everything is matured and looking full but in the meantime it looks fresh and rid of the jungle!

ps- I am still resisting every urge to paint the front door red while Seth is at work one day…probably because I know once I do the door red I will have to get going on all of those shutters! Someday!