Winter Treasures

Boy oh boy~an American Christmas will keep you busy.  I remember feeling the hustle and bustle of the holidays a lot through college what with final exams and papers, shopping for Christmas presents, and using that short break between semesters to see family and friends you haven't seen in ages.  Martin Luther King day is my official rest-from-the-rush-of-Christmas holiday.  Well, this year I don't really have an excuse to feel the hustle and bustle.  No school, no work, just homemaking.  What keeps us super busy?  Holiday parties galore.  Not just holidays, but birthday parties as well.   So far there have been 6 December parties, and there are two more this weekend.  How did Kyle and I fall into this after having been off the grid for a year?  In spite of it being a bit overwhelming to look at a full calendar, I have a few treasure that have come from these festivities.


1.  Kyle had a fancy Christmas party at work.  Imagine a wedding reception and then throw in jolly attitudes and a good bit of cultural diversity (as one of Kyle's coworkers said, at ADVA they are more international than the United Nations).  It wasn't like the office Christmas parties I had seen in movies (the Santa Clause, The Holiday, etc) nor like the ones on television (Arrested Development, The Office, etc) much to my chagrin.  However, it was a great environment to meet and get to know Kyle's new daily companions.  We also walked away with this goody...

You can't tell, but we were posing in a sleigh that Kyle must have found a bit uncomfortable.

2.  My birthday was on Monday, but as a family we celebrated on Sunday (it's what we call Leah's birthday observed).  I don't think I had asked for much this year; I'm really just in the mood to read a lot so there were plenty of books on the list (yes, my mom still requests our birthday/Christmas lists and this usually occurs sometime in mid-June when Christmas is the last thing on your mind).  There was one gift that was inordinately large and preposterously heavy.  This mystery gift of the behemoth persuasion turned out to be a most wonderful thing.  Behold the newest fixture in my kitchen:

Christmas cookies will be your first task...

3.  The last thing is a bit incomplete.  Tonight we are to attend an ugly sweater party.  After searching high and low, near and far, I cannot find one suitable for Kyle or me in a reasonable price range (Belk~let's be real about the value of a Christmas sweater...).  Short of a miracle, we will simply have to dress festively for the event sans tacky trimmings.  Alas, that can't dampen the joy of Christmas.  Here's to hoping our third Christmas treasure comes to fruition.

Have you had any special Christmas surprises?  I should include my favorite treasure is seeing lots of friends and spending time with people we've missed so much this year.  If only there were more parties for that!

A Christmas Tree Analogy

A few weeks ago, I set out with a shopping list and a highly caffeinated body (as many do) to Ikea.  Last Christmas, Ikea provided nearly all the ornaments and holiday trimmings for our dorm.  I thought Kyle and I were starting pretty much from scratch with our hall-decking and selected some wonderful ornaments at seriously good prices on this trip.  What I was surprised to find is that they weren't necessary.  Kyle had some really cool Georgia Tech ornaments, and I had a stash of ornaments from Christmases past (a fair number were handcrafted and featured tiny pictures of a tiny crooked toothed me).  We inherited a few strands of lights and wooden cranberry beads.  With an old fashioned star on top, our little tree was complete before we opened our Ikea ornaments (with the exception of 4 plaid orbs~I have the matching wrapping paper!  We are celebrating our first Plaidvent Season!!!)

After filling our tree, I was struck with how our home has filled with furniture, and everything has a place.  We bought a few things (bookcases~this girl dreamed of owning bookcases to fill with glorious books.  also~tables and chairs for a workspace).  Just like our Christmas tree, we have more than enough.  It's amazing to me that just a couple of months ago, I didn't know where I'd be living, how we'd furnish an apartment, and (to a lesser degree) what ornaments we'd have to decorate a tree.  It was a complete mystery, but I give God many thanks for knowing all of that ahead of time and providing us with more than we need.  It feels like a first Christmas with my husband all over again, and I love it.

If you'd like to come over and enjoy our holiday splendor, we'd love for visitors to be with us.  Merry Christmas!

Cadeau Empoisonné

The French have this expression~Cadeau Empoisonné~ which translates to poison gift in English.  We learned what a poison gift was from a very friendly Delta employee in Paris, who said our buddy passes were both a blessing and a curse.  They're a blessing because they give us discount rates on international flights, but a curse because there is no guarantee we could get on the flight we wanted.  We definitely experienced both of those things on our return from Metz.  Since then, I have found some other applications to such a useful expression (is there seriously no parallel to it in English?  Perhaps the old~don't look a gift horse in the mouth...).

Well, since being home we've found a few other good examples of the poison gift.  As (sort of) newly weds, our families helped us out with lots of home furnishings to fill the gaps in our home.  My family gave us a white microwave.... that didn't work any more.  They gave us another microwave they had stored in the garage... that also didn't work.  As it turned out we had to buy our own microwave (no biggie), but then dispose of two useless metal boxes.  Kyle's mom set us up with a really fantastic fake Christmas tree.  I know I know~fake tree?  I have serious allergies and can't always tolerate living in close quarters with conifers.  Shameful~I agree.  Anywho, on extracting said tree from it's box, we find there is no tree stand.  Do we really want to invest in a fake tree stand or just purchase another tree?  We are now the proud owners of two artificial arbors.

Do you have examples of cadeaux empoisonnés?  We're not talking something a gift you got that you didn't like or want.  Both the microwave and tree were things we really could use, and we were grateful for receiving them for free, but they turned into unexpected tasks or inconveniences.  Perhaps you have been more fortunate with your gifts.  I hope so...

Literary Pigs

In this (sort of) new blogging venture, I wanted a certain theme.  In  the past, it was dictated by our settings.  Well, now I'm back in the south.  I must admit that I don't feel particularly southern.  I don't speak with a charming drawl or refer to that unpleasant time in the mid-1800s as the war of northern aggression.  In the essentials, I am completely southern~ I refuse Pepsi for Coke, always say (even type) yall, and favor a warmer (though ridiculously humid) climate.  All this is to say that the theme for this blog wasn't going to be about discovering or exploring life in the south.  I chose to focus it on family and home.  These things are so important to me that it's in my name, or at least my old one (my maiden name Heim is German for "home").  So with the catchy new title compliments to my clever husband, I wanted the welcome to reflect the words.

Now anyone who knows my sweet husband knows he has a tremendous weakness for all things plaid.  This, too, may be hereditary since Hamilton is a serious Scottish name.  Above in the background is one of the Hamilton tartans.  What's a tartan, you ask?  Traditionally it is woven wool with a pattern of horizontal and vertical strips in various colors.  Since the 1800s certain patterns were associated with Scottish families or clans.  We happen to love remembering these traditions, so naturally I wanted to incorporate Kyle's heritage into the design.  Above is the standard Hamilton tartan.  On a brief tangent, here are a few other Hamilton goods we happen to love....

Kyle sporting his Hamilton hunting tartan tie among more Hamiltons.

I rock my Ham hunting plaid scarf for an extra layer of warmth in chilly Metz.

Behold the clan crest perfectly etched on a frosty glass.

So you could say we're Hamilton enthusiasts.

On a not so special day many months ago, Kyle and I referred to ourselves by accident as the Ham fam.  Well, you've seen me exploit our shamelessly self-dubbed nicknames all over this blog.  The Ham abbreviation of our last name simply progressed to a fine swine theme.  How perfect would it be to have pigs in the intro?  I looked no further than my younger sister, Miss Foo, who is a gifted artist with one simple request~could you illustrate literary pigs?  While developing the idea on a very bumpy unpaved road in Corsica, Kyle seemed puzzled by the concept of a literary pig.  For you see there are all sorts of pigs~country pigs, cartoon pigs, real live pigs, guinea pigs, cooked pigs... the list goes on, but I'll spare you the Bubba Blue illustration.  A literary pig is best defined by John Tenniel's (The Adventures of Alice in Wonderland) or Pauline Baynes' (first edition Chronicles of Narnia) style illustrations.  You could also recall the cover of Charlotte's Web to imagine a literary pig.  Quite different from a Porky Pig, Piglet, Pumbaa, or (my favorite) Pippo of Sanrio/Hello Kitty collectibles fame.  Thankfully, Miss Foo had no trouble rounding up these pigs; she drew them one evening last week on her computer.  She has serious skills. 

There you have it~the story behind the new look.  Hope you all had happy Thanksgivings and are happily looking forward to this wonderful Advent season. 

What a cheeky little ham!

Beauty in the Breakdown

Some say that culture shock when visiting a foreign land is inevitable.  They do a grand job of explaining how you'll always be looking back to your home and never seeing the forest for the trees.  Once you are aware that you are holding on to your home at the expense of a grand adventure, you are one step closer to letting it go and living in the moment.  In a grander scheme, I believe it is analogous to how a Christian can feel about the world when there is plenty to hope for and enjoy in God's kingdom.  If you could only see how much more joy you'd know by letting go of your idea of perfection or at least home, than you could really open up your eyes and take in the glory all around you (though not always visible).  I run in a lovely neighborhood where I see beautiful homes made of brick and wood, but I imagine myself in a wide open field where hay has been cut down and rolled into large bales.  I see cars and friendly faces who wave as I pass, but I am imagining the smell of fresh mirabelles growing on short trees to my right as I breeze through the countryside.  It's overcast and rainy in both my new neighborhood and my imagined Lorraine so they feel more closely linked.

Aren't you happy to be home?  Well, I need to pick apart the answer.  I'm happy to be near my family.  Yesterday I saw my big sister and brother-in-law for the second time since Kyle and I got married a year and a half ago.  I've feasted on many of the marvelous meals that can't exist in Europe~ no doubt a great treat.  We are finally starting to put to good use all the wedding gifts our generous friends and family gave us.  I am really enjoying reconnecting with our friends here, too.  It looks and feels right, but all has not been well in my soul.

Now typically I'm a pretty upbeat girl, and I don't want my forlorn word meanderings to weigh us down.  I didn't love living in Metz for a long time.  I grumbled constantly about the arctic climate and my utter dependence on public transportation.  What I'm trying to get at is that I'm not elevating our experiences abroad in my memory to something they were not.  It has everything to do with my state of mind there.  When we first arrived in France I was so challenged by my job, the food, the weather, and even some of the newlywed adjustments that come with living with a man for the first time.  I wasted a good bit of time explaining to Kyle that Metz didn't feel like Europe to me because it was so different from Salamanca, Spain (where I lived 4 months in 2006).  I remember focusing my attention on God out of sheer fear that I was going to fail at French life.  I had my Bible, spent quality time with Clive Staples everyday, and immersed myself in George Macdonald's Phantastes.  We also prematurely invoked the season of Christmas so that (in the famous words of Kate McCallister from Home Alone) we could rest on the "season of perpetual hope".

Was I escaping from reality, having a transcendental experience, or something else?  One of my preferred religious teachers tells me to set my heart and mind on things above while I get rid of all those frustrations and anger about my circumstances.  Sitting, reading, and learning produced in me a renewed (perhaps even refreshed) mind.  That definitely wasn't my intention at the time, but it gave me relief from my troubles and ultimately advanced my knowledge of God.  As I try to mimic the same method now, though, it hasn't fully assuaged my discontent.  Why?  Goodness, why?  I tell you, my God is funny like that.  Just as soon as you think you are at the end of your rope, he answers you as you're sipping coffee trying to shake off the sleep from which you had emerged a mere 10 minutes beforehand.  Through Clive's words he says to me, "Hope is one of the Theological virtues.  This means that a continual looking forward to the eternal world is not a form of escapism or wishful thinking, but one of the things a Christian is meant to do... If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next."

Clive goes on to make an analogy about healthy living.  If you desire to be healthy and make it your objective, you are likely to become a "crank" and think there is something wrong with your body when there isn't.  He says we are only likely to become healthy when we want and enjoy other things more; in the case of health, we should learn to desire good foods, games, work, fun, and open air more.  Living in the U.S. again has been quite an adjustment, but I believed that once I had made our apartment into a nice home or had some kind of routine or friends and a good church to attend, all would be resolved.  I say that because those kinds of external things made life in France a real joy.  I have been missing (much to my chagrin) what motivated me a year ago.  I didn't pursue any of those things for the distinct purpose of having them; it just happened when I was looking straight to God for fulfillment.  I don't want to be constantly looking over my shoulder and mimicking an authentic pursuit or dependence on God that I had in Metz.  I also don't want to blame my circumstances as I am apt to do when life in this world isn't all I thought it was cracked up to be.  It's not living a "normal" life in the suburbs or missing our "home" in France that is bringing me down~ it's that making my life good became my object when it ought to be pursuing God.  Lesson learned~ application beginning now...

Nomads No More!

It's weird~like the changing of the seasons, so too this blog is changing from a travel/life as a teacher journal to the chronicles of domestic life as a domestic wife.  Kyle and I are totally entrenched in suburban life not too far from Atlanta.  We're settled in to our new place and already starting to get to know folks in the community.  It's a whole lifestyle change, and I enjoy this writing business much too much to just drop it.  Well, for now it's bedtime.  A bientot!

Adieu, adieu to you and you and you

Queue the Von Trap family singers; it's time to officially bid the ad-FRENCH-ure farewell.  Dry your tears, friend.  The Hamiltons have not stopped having adventures, and I'll be happy to share more right here!  New blog title & look to come soon.  Today, I'd like to leave you with a medley of tiny European doors as this door in our life has closed....

I don't know what else to say, but why are there so many tiny doors in Europe?

Les Désastreuses aventures de la famille Hamilton

We departed from Rome with no problems and arrived in sunny Sardinia.  From this point, our adventure felt more like a romantic comedy where everything goes wrong.  I'll recount our troubled tale, but hopefully I'll still be able to communicate how much fun we had and what a bonding experience this trip became. We rented a little Smart car for fun and headed to our B&B to check in.

Oh no!  We flew past our destination!

Our place was out in the middle of nowhere.  The roads were lonely and wide; there was sandy orange stone and  tufts of dry grass for miles. The owner of the B&B, Graziano, was thoroughly delightful.... but we had no common language.  Thankfully all my studies of Latin-based tongue paid off; somehow we deduced how much we owed him and that there is no breakfast in September with mixed French, Spanish, and Italian.  So I guess you can say we stayed in a B&.  He also helped us find a restaurant nearby for dinner.  Since we were hungry, we tossed our bags in the room and went straight to the local pizza place.  We ordered a delicious plate of local cheeses and charcuterie (heavily influenced by the boars on the island~they make a delicious sausage).   We sampled some island brews (beer, not coffee), and ate a ridiculous amount of pizza.  We did all of this in the dark.  For some reason, the power kept going out at the restaurant.  Thank goodness we were in Italy where all good pizza is perfectly baked in wood burning ovens.

ichnusa is ichtasty

Not exactly a candlelit dinner... those are the flood lights that prevented us from depending solely on the moon.

We had some good plans for day 2 in Sardinia.  We got up to take a jog and discovered that we were stationed in the midst of a large neighborhood of vineyards.  It seems the harvest had already begun as many of the workers in the fields seemed puzzled by the two English speakers running by their rural workplace.  I could jog that little area everyday and be quite content.  We then set out to do a little exploration by car and try to take a peak at Neptune's Grotto.

Glorious grapes!

We (read: I) didn't wear appropriate shoes to explore Neptune's Grotto. 

There is not a bad picture taken on this island.  Not possible.

Our trusty tiny car~ I look like a giant!

Don't you want to go for a dip?

For the afternoon we were set to take a ferry from a nearby port to Corsica.  When we arrived at the dock for our ferry, we found it was not meant to be.  You'd have to have been living under a rock to have missed the incredible number of strikes which have occurred throughout France the last couple of months.  On this particular day, all French transportation workers were all for la greve.  This even included French ferry navigators who work between the Italian & French islands.  I was distraught, but Kyle had the presence of mind to get a refund on our tickets and patronize an Italian company who had not abandoned their boat posts.  This meant a later ferry from another port farther north on the coast.  Thus we had to mix up our hotel arrangements as we'd be arriving in the evening 3 hours away from our hotel.  Kyle took care of it all; he is so patient.  We drove to port #2 for the day and had enough time for a cappuccino before our departure.  Kyle's phone rang with an unknown number.  The new hotel he booked for the night didn't actually have any rooms available.  *sigh*  We hunted down an internet cafe and found another hotel to book so that we wouldn't have to sleep in the Smart car on our European honeymoon.  Thankfully for the rest of this day, everything went smoothly.

A floating parking lot!  Seriously, "ferry" doesn't seem to adequately describe what this machine can do.

Corsica~we've arrived.

We were back in France!  Something about traveling to exotic places yet still being able to communicate is a great comfort.  Corsica looks very similar to Sardinia, but it felt great to be back among the French.  Sadly, we woke up to a cool, rainy gray day.  Just when we thought we could enjoy a day at the beach...  Alas, that doesn't spoil our fun.  We went out and got coffee and ice cream for lunch then went for a good walk at the beach where we found such delightful treasures.

Out of the rain with a lovely view

...and who needs sunshine?

This little number is supposed to be a Corsican specialty.  They are made with chestnut flour but aren't the most delish.

We explored rocky paths and took crooked self-timed photos....

...saw wind surfers....

...and kite surfers....

... and found a cat!

Kyle even liked her.  He named her Suity (pronounced sweetie) because it's like the French word to follow.  That's what she did; she followed us.

Sometimes we followed her.

We also enjoyed a Corsican beer.  This is Kyle's artsy picture.  A good day was had by all.

The rain couldn't be the only thing to thwart us this day~that would have been too simple.  We got a call from America; my dad called to let us know we needed to change our flight plans because our day was filling up quick.  We were set to return back to the U.S. in less than a week so it meant rearranging our plans for moving out of our dorm and saying farewell to friends in Metz.  Again, Kyle masterfully filled all the gaps, and we went back to enjoying our honeymoon trip.

We had been staying in Bonifacio which has so much to see.  There are beaches, the beautiful port, tons of great restaurants, and plenty of shopping.  All of this exists in what feels like two cities~the upper and the lower.  We had only spent time in the lower part because it was easy to walk to from our hotel.  We spent our second day in town exploring the upper level.  

It was chilly but totally worth an uphill hike.

What a place for Christians to worship.  I'm struggling with coveting...

Homes on the hill

Crazy curvy port

Kyle went all out on our next stop~a breathtaking B&B (with breakfast in September) in Porto Vecchio.  I wish we had stayed there from the day we departed from Rome.  In addition to staying in the most gorgeous place ever, the sun finally came out and we could finally go to the beach!  We soaked in a lot of sun, read a lot, and enjoyed a Corsican beer.  I do have to note that it was a bit windy~  or maybe it was terribly windy.  Not a bad thing on a warm day, but it is definitely unpleasant to be pelted by stinging sand at the beach.  We found sanctuary from the grainy assault behind some large beach rocks.  No problems.  For dinner we went to a really cool restaurant where the menu changed each day based on what the chef was interested in cooking and what was available at the market.  The menu was written on a large chalkboard that the waitress carried from table to table for patrons to make their selection.  Kyle and I opted to get an appetizer and entree to split.  It wasn't until we were about to enjoy our kirs when we noticed some small print on the chalkboard~ non CB (meaning no credit/debit cards).  Yet again we were in a pickle as we had a very small amount of cash on us.  We were about to pay for our drinks and depart when the waitress insisted that we could eat today and pay tomorrow.   I felt like Wimpy from Popeye~ "I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for delicious shrimp pasta dish today."  Crisis averted (though we went to an ATM after dinner to pay for the lovely meal~ not a quick task when the closest ATM was a 30 minute drive away... crazy island life).

My bud + books + beer + beach = best day ever

Since you can't photograph the wind, you can at least show it's violent wake.  Exhibit A: restaurant sign knocked over covered in sand.

Ah, who cares about the wind?

This B&B was my favorite.  Can you believe that's our view?

Breakfast~the word alone inspires happiness.  French breakfasts are usually yogurt, baguette, fresh butter and jam, orange juice, and plenty of coffee.  Simple bliss!  We got a little something extra with our breakfast~ bad news.  We have ventured into the absurd with vacation obstacles at this point.  That wind I mentioned yesterday was none other than the legendary and terrifying Mistral.  I had learned about it in my French culture class and how it wreaks havoc all over Provence.  Never in a million years would I expect it to interrupt our trip to an island in the sun.  The lady who owned the B&B informed us no ferries would be braving the waters for a few days because it's too dangerous with the winds.  No kidding~these natural ports are surrounded by imposing rocky cliffs.  For Kyle and me, we knew we were trapped.  Here we had an Italian Smart car which had to be returned to the airport in Sardinia as well as a serious deadline to be back to Metz for moving out and then Paris to fly back to the U.S.  Like, this was Sunday and we were going to fly back to the states on Wednesday.  Cutting it a little close, I'd say.  Just to make sure we knew how seriously impossible it'd be to leave the island, the wind decided to kick it up a notch.  We stayed in our beautiful room all day long and read in bed.  I've never seen or heard anything like it, but now I truly know the fear the 3 little pigs must have felt.

After many prayers and not the most restful night of sleep, we drove to the port in the hopes that the ferry would arrive and carry us and our tiny Smart car back to Italian soil.  We waited~ no one at the port knew definitively whether or not it would make the crossing.  The clock kept ticking; our departure time came and went.  Then. We. Heard. The. Fateful. Sound. Of. A. FOGHORN!!  A large ferry came into the port, unloaded it's cargo and passengers, and it was our turn to board!  They couldn't have dragged us off that boat if it were on fire~we were going back to Italy.  We had a long ride back and met some lovely Canadians who were retired teachers (all French speakers).  Back in Santa Teresa, we drove the car back onto solid Italian ground and happily set out to Castelsardo where we would stay one more night before returning home.

Let me on that boat!

We're all aboard and headed back to Sardinia.

Adieu Corsica.

Kyle again chose a beautiful place for us to stay, and the only hiccup we faced in this town was that many restaurants weren't open on Monday for dinner.  No biggie.  We loved our last day on the island~a great breakfast, beautiful weather, great conversations, lots of thank you prayers to God, and the best way to bid farewell to Europe.  It was just the best to get a week of time with just Kyle without any obligations to just be together and reflect on the incredible year we shared in France.

No complaints here.

A little poolside sunbathing before our flight.  Farewell, paradise.

Best moment of the trip?  You see a small house in the middle of nowhere with the word "formaggi" painted on the side.  You say to yourself, "Self, it says cheese, but does it mean there is cheese within?"  Well, I have a bold husband who has a weakness for pecorino romano....

Would you be tempted to enter?

This is how much cheese you can get for 7 euros.  No knives, just spoons.