It feels like there has been a lot going on over here, so I thought it was time for a bit of an update.
Lets start with some of the good, shall we?
We had our first visitor stay with us! Ken’s cousin, Pamela, is on a once in a lifetime adventure through Europe. Luckily, she was able to work in a trip to visit us while on her whirl wind tour. She arrived on the best weather day we’ve had since we landed here, so we took full advantage and had our first picnic in our backyard! Since we were celebrating Pamelas arrival we went all out with cheese, bread, fruit and of course, champagne!
We did our best to show her around during her week here and I’d say it was a very successful visit! I just hope she wasn’t too shocked with the lack of privacy for a week. Our place is quite small and doesn’t have a second bedroom so she was sleeping in our living room on our pull out couch. But I guess it’s better than staying alone in an expensive hotel 🙂
Now onto the frustrating and bad updates I have to share.
If you watched our last vlog (watch HERE) or keep up on Instagram (follow HERE), you would know that we’ve had bit issues with our hot water supply in our apartment. Well, if you thought was was bad, you’ll love this….
We also lost our heating for 2 days! AND it was while Pamela was visiting. Great hosts hey?!?
“oh yah, come and visit us – sleep in our living room on our tiny pull out couch and also, there is no heating in our place :)”
Sounds lovely, doesn’t it? Yah, worst time for that to happen. SORRY Pamela! It was a chilly few nights here but we all survived, there were no incidence of frost bite, and thankfully (after a day of sorting it out) the heating is back on.
That’s not all! We also lost our internet. It just went dead one day, we couldn’t figure out what the heck was going on. So, we called the company that manages our place and it turns out the landlord had cut off our internet because he was changing the service provider without telling anyone. Long story short, the management company made a run down to the new service provider, picked up the new wifi box, came to our place to help set it up and we were up and running again. However, 2 days later, it’s back down again. So I’ve got an e-mail back out to have them pay another visit. Thank goodness Europe has super cheap cellphone plans so I can hotspot to blog 🙂
On the bright side, Ken found me the most amazing roses the other day (the pink ones in this post), we both got hot showers this morning and the house is heated – for now 🙂
Always sandwich the bad news with more good news! I was always told in Nursing School that the best way to deliver news is with the sandwich method (good – bad – good).
While Pamela was here, we did our best to take her to all the “must see” spots. On Wednesday, we made our way into Paris to visit the Louvre. When we arrived we were SHOCKED to see the line to get in. It must have been a 4 hour wait. Little tip for you – all you have to do is buy your tickets online and you can almost walk right in. You can even do it on your phone is just a few minutes. We got through security in about 10 minutes and hit the ground running. We spend about 4 hours wandering around before hoping back on the metro to get to the Eiffel Tower. We took a few tourist photos at the tower before heading to one of our favourite restaurants called Cafe Constant. We gorged on beef stew, fish and steak – yum! We were basically waddling home.
On Saturday, we had another full day in Paris. We started out hunting for Macaroons – which we found at a shop Ken and I had been to before called Gerard Mulot. Once we had our hands full of sugary treats, we made the 5 minute walk to the Luxemburg Gardens. It was a beautiful day out but super windy so we didn’t last too long there. We hoped back on the metro and made our way to Moulin Rouge – we didn’t spend much time there either – that street isn’t exactly our favourite. So we hiked up the hill (if you aren’t into walking up hills – there is a funicular that takes you up) and into the touristy area of Montmartre. By the end of that, we were pretty hungry so we fuelled up with a pasta dinner before saying goodbye to Pamela at the Metro.
It was a a jam packed few days!
Ken and I also had another day in Paris on Sunday for a little photoshoot that was kindly offered to us. So we got some amazing shots of us twirling under the Eiffel Tower that will serve as a memory of ‘that time we lived in France’. Stay tuned to see those! Once I get the link for them from Kelly I will certainly be sharing them here 🙂
That’s all for the updates at the moment. Make sure to follow along on Instagram (follow HERE) to get the real time updates! I occasionally vent about the challenges of living abroad on my Insatgram stories – so you don’t want to miss that 🙂
Xo, Andrea
Your husband & sister look so much alike. The flowers are beautiful I like how you had them siting on the window ledge. Thank you for posting the photos of your travels love to see them. With all the issues going on in the apartment do they lower your rent when the water is cold & there is no heat let alone the internet? Thanks again for posting I never wore high wasted jeans maybe I will give them a try
So funny you mention they look a like! Never thought of that☺️We have asked about mortifying our rent but everything works at a snails pace here. Not looking like anything will happen. Thank you for following along! And commenting 😁 and yes you should definitely try high waist pants! They are the best ☺️