Sweet goodbyes...

A big thank you to all that were able to join us for a wonderful goodbye/skating/sledding party! What fun! What a great community! We loved seeing all the friends and family - even if its a bit of a tease as we weren't able to spend the time we would have liked with each one of you.

But Theo loved playing hockey with all his pals. Gracie had a blast skating with friends and cousins and hanging out on the turtle chatting. Dan visited and I hugged and cried over many dear friends and family. That's okay because there aren't really words to describe how fortunate we feel to have you all in our lives. We feel bouyed and supported and sent off as the most fortunate of folks.

I should add our updates as well. We rented the house! The suspense has ended. When I wrote three weeks ago about finding renters and that things couldn't get much more last minute, my 26 year old sister Caitlin commented that she hardly considered three weeks last minute! Well, how about three days! We signed a year's lease on Friday night to a really nice couple that are moving here from Seattle. Whew...

And despite the appearance of my mother-in-law's house with boxes and suitcases, electronics and clothes strewn everywhere (sorry Jackie) we will somehow finish things up tomorrow and board a plane on Tuesday morning and really start our family adventure.

Thanks for such an amazing send off!

Affectionately,
Laura, Dan, Grace and Theo

Party/bring snacks/sledding and skating

We are having a goodbye party on this Sunday the ninth- so bring sleds and skates and snacks to share if you can. We rented the rec room in Lyndale Farmstead Park on Bryant Ave on thirty ninth street from 4-6 pm. Hope you can come.

We checked the temperature in Santiago and tonight it was 79 degrees F. at 9pm. Think how warm it would be in the daytime! We're having lots of renters look at the house these days -hurrah! Were all doing well… happy new year from Grace.

Happy new years!

Happy new years! All we did on new years eve was pack. Pack pack pack. We packed two whole bookshelves of books and a lot of pottery. The funest part was staying up until midnight. At eleven-fifty-nine we counted down to midnight. Then we all said happy new years! at the same time.

Theo

You name this post...

Well, our too-good-to-be-true renters....were just that. Unfortunately, yesterday they backed out the day before they were to sign the lease for reasons that are their own to understand. What can we say? Another step in our journey that makes us want to cry but hopefully we will laugh about later. Dan said that this wouldn't be nearly as interesting if everything were easy and effortless. I think I could go for less interesting...

So onward. Here's a picture of our attic - you can see our storage feats! After adding quite a few more items this weekend, we will still be moving out to Dan's mom's house. So the house will be ready whenever some renters are. Here's a photo of the kids with their Christmas presents...Kindles for both of them. They are avid readers these days and electronic books seemed the best solution as we leave behind three bookshelves of treasures. Grace and Theo are also enjoying new journals from their auntie, from which I'm hoping they might share some of their thoughts here on the blog later.

Well, that's all for now. In an effort to recover from our disappointment, we are trying to joke about a title for this entry. Here's our suggestions this morning. We invite you to suggest others.

Grace, "Too good to be true" or "blue baboon."
Theo, "Doom, gloom and misery" or "Sad but true".
Laura, "No pain, no gain"or "the Renter Rollercoaster"

Our love and smiles to you all,
Laura, Grace and Theo (Dan's at work this morning- but he'd probably suggest something along the lines of "No use in worrying about things beyond our control").

Happy New Year!
(now back to packing)

It's happened!

In the last six months, we’ve visited with several families who have done some type of similar year abroad. Each time, when asked about renting their homes they said that it all worked out great – usually some connection by word of mouth, often fairly last minute.

Since we are leaving in less than three weeks, surely things couldn’t get much more last minute for us, but…it has happened too. Not through Craig’s list, or Rentals.com, or the University housing, or sabbaticalhomes.com, or the seminary housing services, or any of the other official housing sites where we posted! Our serendipitous meeting occurred via a family connection…a phone call as we were preparing to head out the door - the kids getting ready for a program in which they were performing, costumes, breakfast, showers – “No we hadn’t rented the house yet and yes, this was a bad time to show it (certainly no 8 hours of cleaning prep!!!)”. But the family was leaving town for 10 days that same morning and as we spoke driving by our house on their way. “Yikes, yes, of course, please have them stop in.” In a half an hour, we all realized it was a great fit! This lovely family had just arrived in town after three years of living abroad and wished to be close to family in town, also hoping to get their three kids into the school nearby. The house, the park across the street, our neighborhood, all our furnishing would work well for them, while they take a year to decide about their long-term plans. And while they had no particular hurry to rent, having a great deal of family in the area and many offers of lodging, they were happy at the thought of having a new place to settle into by January 1^st.

It would be an understatement to say this comes as a great relief to us. I won’t dwell on the weight that has been lifted. Mostly, I want to thank everyone who mentioned our house to friends, to their networks, at their places of worship, posted it on their Facebook page, sent folks our way, gave us suggestions of other places to post it and supported us as we navigated a big hurdle in our journey.

I’m not much of one to speak of holiday blessings, but that is what comes to mind – not when I think of finding a family to rent our house, but of how I am again reminded of the incredible community of friends and family we have. Thanks to everyone so much for your help and support. What a gift you are to us. Happy holidays.

Laura

FAQ's continued...Where will you live in Chile?

Less than a month to our departure date! A quick update...we're still packing up the house (kind of in waves - not everyday), still looking for a renter (thanks so much to everyone who has sent folks our way - you rock!), and getting ready for the holidays as well! We are hoping to move to Jackie's house, Dan's mom, which is about 3 miles away in Edina by the end of December, so our house is ready if need be. Excitement and near panic fill me (can't wait to travel and how will it all get done).

Now, another FAQ. Folks have been asking where we will live once we get to Chile. Our plan is to arrive and spend some time in several different cities and then decide. We are planning on visiting Valparaíso, Viña del Mar, and la Serena. We've been in e-mail contact with friends of friends in all these cities and have done just preliminary research on schools primarily. They are all coastal cities with interesting aspects to them all. For instance Valparaíso is built straight up the hills away for a harbor and has a series of outdoor elevators that help residents with the daily climb (pictured here)! Viña is known as the garden city and has lots of great beaches where many Chilenos head for the summer break (Jan/Feb). The mountains not far from La Serena are host to several international observatories and it's clear skies are one of the best places in the world to view the heavens.

It will be summer when we arrive (sigh of relief) and after spending about a month visiting the friends of friends and these cities, we will join the throngs and take a two-week trip to southern Chile and visit the Lake District and perhaps northern Patagonia. After two weeks, we'll head back to central Chile and settle in to one of these communities (or perhaps one we don't know about yet) and hopefully have the kids enrolled in school and have a place to live by March 1st.

That's the plan for right now. Vamos a ver!
Laura

making empanadas del pino

Last week my sister and I made Chilean empanadas. My mom’s friend from work came and helped us make them. I thought they tasted great! Here’s how we made the filling-

- lb of ground beef

- 3 medium-sized yellow onions, diced

- 2 cloves of garlic, minced

- 2 tsps sweet paprika

- 2 tsps ground cumen

- 1\2 tsp dried oregano

- 1\2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

- 1 cup of beef broth

- 1 tbsp of all-purpose flour

- 11\2 tsp of kosher salt

- 1 tbsp of vegetable oil

Cook the above in a frying pan…

and add the following when putting together:

- 3 hard boiled eggs, sliced

- 15 olives, sliced

- seedless raisins (optional)

The dough

- 4 cups of all-purpose flour

- 1tbsp of baking powder

- 1 tsp of salt

- 1 cup of vegetable shortening

- 1 cup of warm milk

Let dough sit in warm place for half an hour, then roll out log sized pieces flat. Put filling in and close and then bake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes.

See what you think. Post a comment below.

Theo