Welcome to Oxford!

We have a blog!

Again!

Some of you may have noticed a trend that a) Joel is bad at keeping updated blogs and b) Jess is bad at keeping updated blogs.  So here's attempt number I-don't-know-how-many, inspired by Anna's Brilliant Blog, in which she actually maintains a blog about her family!  Between that and Kyrsten's blog, I have now at least seen examples of blogs that work and have every intention of keeping this new blog updated!

So I thought I'd start out the new blog with a quick tour of our apartment, for those who haven't been here yet and may not get here anytime soon (because of a large body of water in the way).  So for those of you stuck on the other side of the ocean, here's the quick tour of the apartment!

This is from our front door.  Welcome!

From the front hallway just inside the door, the kitchen is to the left, the living room to the front left, bedroom to the front right, and toilet (bathroom) to the right.  The phone on the wall lets us ring people in from the front gate and does absolutely nothing else.

Obviously, below is our kitchen.  I was in the middle of making a Mexican burrito feast when I took these photos, so ignore the bunch of coriander on the counter and the pot on the stove.  Plus my cookbook and all the other random stuff...

Please note the Union Jack oven mitts.

This is our beautiful living room!  This is the view if you just walk in...

Please note the Union Jack canvas.

...and this is what you see if you turn around.

Please note the Union Jack cushion (not pictured: matching Union Jack cushion).

First is the view from the window in the living room, and second is our bedroom as seen from the hall.

And for the benefit of those who haven't seen a picture of us in ages, here's a story accompanied by a picture: Joel and I had our friend Mary over for dinner (the lovely Mexican burrito feast) and went to a meeting of the Tolkein Society afterwards.  While we weren't exactly prepared for the zealous nature of the group of Tolkein lovers, we were impressed by the surroundings, as they meet in Christchurch College, which is where many scenes from the early Harry Potter films were done!

We're convinced that the staircase featured in this blurry, low-quality photo is indeed the same used in films 1 and 2.

Happy Saturday!