The Apartment

The view from the rooftop, where we often eat dinner.

Seeing as both sets of parents have expressed interest in our housing set up, here's an overview.

We rented through airbnb.com, a service where people post their own homes as vacation rentals. We couldn't get even a rather crummy hotel room within striking distance of where I need to be each day for under $4000 (for just 3 weeks!!!), and besides, we knew we couldn't/wouldn't afford to eat out more than a few times in this city so needed kitchen accommodations. We looked through a ton of options to find this apartment, which was priced just barely within my F&M budget, had space for all four of us (most places in our range were studios or teeny 1-bedroom), was in decent proximity of my work, and had hosts who were open to such a lengthy stay. Not an easy needle to thread in one of the most expensive cities in Europe! Needless to say, we couldn't be happier with how it worked out. I'm viewing the 90+ stairs to our top floor flat and the fact that my walking commute to work is more than half an hour as a fitness blessing rather than a detraction.  :)

We feel so very, very fortunate—it's clean, it's filled with light being so elevated, the hosts left many things to warmly welcome us and make the transition easy, and the styling has this Scandinavian-modern-meets-Texas vibe that I couldn't imagine working yet totally does. Rather different from our home -- way more hip than we could ever pull off!  :)

The little balcony, with two chairs and covered with plants (veggies, herbs, and flowers).

The view just over the balcony, down 6 stories to the courtyard / play space.

A couple of balcony close-ups.

They have super fun light fixtures throughout. This copper ball hangs in the kitchen and is big—at least 24" across. I don't have a proper picture of the kitchen, but you can kinda see it reflected here! The kitchen isn't huge but more than adequate—bright, pretty, and fully equipped. 

This hallway photo faces down to the kitchen, and to the right is the main bedroom (which I haven't taken a photo of). Taking the pic, I was standing in front of the entryway door.

Prepping for class. The table is in front of the balcony, as you can see. Josiah took the picture and was standing in front of the entry door but facing away from the hall. The words on the heart are the last names of the apartment owners. It's of one of those melty plastic bead projects you might remember from 5th grade summer camp!  :)

 Just beyond that table is a comfy couch and chair. Also a Texan with a rifle. Naturally. 

 

 I love their postcard Penguin Book covers accent wall! This is right at the entryway, between the hallway down to the kitchen and the open area with the white table, couch, etc.

Their little daughter's room is suiting the boys just fine with two mattresses on the floor.

  

The street entrance. Gettin' ready to tackle those stairs!

Around the City...

On Sunday afternoon we enjoyed walking around a bit of central Copenhagen. We walked for miles and were thankful for the stroller our hosts left for us! I'll just post photos with short captions.

 Art is everywhere, even on random barrier walls on rougher side streets.

 

Enjoying the stone orbs at the Kings Gardens

We've recently learned a bit about bees, and William asks me to take a picture of every one we see on a flower!

 Rosenborg Castle

Buying cherries on the street.

The statue on the left is Hans Christian Andersen. We're reading his full The Little Mermaid in a few evening installments.

Street performers. 

Josiah's been taking some photos of his own! He has promised a future blog post.

When we got home (late) we took our dinner to the roof again. Seeing as the boys didn't get up until 11:15 a.m., we figured that dinner at 9 p.m. was okay...

They asked for their pictures to be taken with the sunset, with food hanging out of their mouths.

I obliged, although I haven't the foggiest idea why. My boys.

A Hard Day's Night

When I last posted, it was late-ish on Saturday evening and the boys were sleeping. Mmmm...pictures of sleeping children are among the most delightful, don't you think? Here's what they looked like:

Alas, it didn't last. 

By morning, we had this:

In between the pics:
Before Jesse and I even got to bed ourselves (exhausted as we were from going ~30 hours on just a nap or two), Josiah popped out of bed thinking it was morning—2 hours after falling asleep. Of course then he was unable to return to sleep, the nap having taken the edge off and his body clock feeling late afternoon.

The next several hours were ugly. They involved Josiah becoming genuinely miserable, in and out of bed...William awakening (no surprise)...Jesse lying down between them for 2 hours while they were indeed quiet and quite good but just couldn't drift off...William eventually sleeping...both Josiah and Jesse returning to the bed where I was sleeping...Jesse instantly falling unconscious in utter exhaustion and, poor man, commencing snoring...Josiah weeping uncontrollably in the bed beside me in his state of near breakdown with fatigue...me needing silence and space and eventually heading to Josiah's vacant mattress (once he was holding it together)...me waking up a few hours later with a splitting headache, and to the sound of William, in his sleep, hitting his head repeatedly on the hard floor(?)...    This all within the scant 6 hours of darkness Copenhagen offers per night at this time of year. And in fact it didn't even quite end there but just reliving the night is making me tense so I'll stop!  :)

In the morning, Jesse and I got up and ready for church—but Jesse ended up going alone since time kept passing and neither of us could muster the will to wake the children. They slept until 11:15, refreshed and greatly improved!

Copenhagen

We made it. We're in Copenhagen. After a frantic final hours on Friday morning pulling things together (while Jim and Tillie *so* generously kept the boys so Jesse and I could FOCUS), we headed off to the airport, arriving just after noon. We had a tiny hop-flight to Washington, D.C., then on to Denmark. A few delays, nothing too awful. We landed around 1:45 a.m. body-clock time, i.e., 7:45 a.m. local time...collected our bags...navigated multiple trains getting to our accommodations...and spent a while wandering the streets trying to figure out where the heck the apartment was (heavy bags, exhausted kids, not fun).

But! We found it eventually, and Sarah (our host) ushered us up. And I do mean up. Up 90+ steps to the top of the 6-story building where we're staying. No elevator. Sarah, her husband Michael, and their little daughter are off on a 3-week trip to Greece compliments of the money we've paid them to vacate their home. (Thank you, airbnb.com—we couldn't afford staying in the city any other way, even with the hefty stipend F&M allotted me for housing!) After a super quick tour, Sarah was off. We were somewhat very grimy, exhausted, and travel-worn, so I hope she didn't have too many misgivings about these scrubby American guests she was entrusting with her home as she headed out...

We all napped for a couple of hours until early afternoon then headed off, baseball gear in tow (yes, we brought it) to find an open enough place for our Very American Boys to play their Very American Sport which they Very Desperately Couldn't Wait Another Minute to Play. We made it to a park which was packed (it was a gorgeous Saturday!) but had one relatively empty, enclosed dirt area where kids were playing soccer on one end. It was good enough for our purposes. We got a few stares and points from other kids!

Then we found a grocery store and loaded up with as much as we thought we could conceivably carry the mile walk home in our haggard states. Jesse made much of the journey home not only with heavy bags but with a pooped and super-grumpy 4-year-old on his shoulders! I made a chicken and veggie dinner, which we brought up and we ate on the roof of the building, looking over the rooftops of Copenhagen—just gorgeous. Then showers for the kids and to bed for them. It's now about 9:30, still reasonably light out, and Jesse's off on a bike ride to explore a bit.

I'll attach a bunch of pictures here from the day...er, I guess the last two days. It's my hope to stay sort of up-to-date on the blog during the trip, although I have a feeling that once class starts (on Monday; my students arrive tomorrow!) it'll take most of what I've got to keep up with work. At least I'm starting with good intentions.   :)

Getting dropped off at the curb at the airport. Thank you, Jim and Tillie, for the ride, for the boys' little suitcases, and for everything!

 On our first tiny flight to D.C.   How happy and rested we look!

 Disembarking in D.C.

 The thrill of a train to get between terminals in Dulles airport. (William obviously was demonstrating that he did *not* need to hold on.)

On the overnight flight to Copenhagen, the boys were utterly thrilled with the TV screens in the seat backs, the pillows, the bottled water (Scandinavian Air is generous!). The also loved the blankets. William spent the first several minutes trying to decide whether to wear his as a scarf or whether to be a ghost. He eventually rejected both options and decided to try to capture Josiah and me with it, net style over the head. 

 Playin' ball. (Jim, these pics are for you!)

Rooftop dinner. We'll be doing this as often as weather allows, I think!