We have worked hard over the last two months to get our house organized and have finally reached a point where we feel like we can start to entertain again. We have had a couple of dinner parties and last saturday we had our official house warming party. Over the course of about 12 hours, we had about 30 new and old friends join us to celebrate our new home. Tsegaw had the brilliant idea to rent tables and chairs. So for less than $10, we got tables and chairs that we were able to set up in the lawn and enjoy the garden. Now, we are getting ready to welcome our first official guest, Laura Plattner, a friend from Swaziland, who arrives tomorrow. Book your trip now before it fills up!
Here is a quick tour of our nearly furnished house.
Our front patio now with grill and Garrett's great Mozambican chairs.
Our living room with our Chinese couches, my little Baobab Batik chair and our Habesha coffee table. This was made to order and a steal. I did not even bargain, his first price was so reasonable.
The house was obviously built in the seventies so has a lot of character with its dark lacquered brick wall and lighting fixtures. All of these little touches have become more endearing as this has become our home.
We found a young man, Nebiyou, in Piazza who crafted the dining room table for us.
We visited a number of different shops including one in a mud and stone workshop. Where we saw first hand that all of this furniture is constructed with hand tools.
Nebiyou was the nicest though and gave us the best price. This has paid off for him as well because he did such a nice job and delivered on time that we have not only used him again, but gotten him other ex-pat business.
Another Nebiyou creation are the cabinets below, which gave us much needed counter and drawer space. We are still not sure what to do with that back corner, but we are discussing putting a traditional Ethiopian coffee table and chairs there.
I am enjoying our new gas stove. I have even gotten use to the big gas canister standing directly next to it. It looks a bit excessive with six burners and a large oven, but the other ovens were tiny. It was only after getting it home and having the delivery man run through the features with me, that I realized there is a rotating spit in the oven. Who even knew this was a possibility? Can't I just have another wire rack? Guess we have some experimenting to do.
Our bed and side tables were also made by Nebiyou. It is the largest bed I have ever owned. Garrett's feet don't even hang off the end.
For our guest room, we ordered a bamboo bed. This was our only bad experience with a carpenter. It required multiple days of me calling and almost two weeks after his initial deadline for us to have the bed and both bedside tables. The bed is fine, but the bedside tables are pretty crap and not at all what we agreed upon. They were supposed to match the weaving in the bed and have a door below the drawer. I paid him because I was ready to be done with him, but I kicked myself for it later. We were happy to be able to get our mattress off the floor and it served us well until we got our new bed.
Finally, our game room, which may some day be an office.
The house still needs some finishing touches, like hanging pictures on the walls and finding duvets for the beds, but it is already home!
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