What does your flat look like and what do you do?

So, here is our apt. complex. 115 Ladysmill Court, Falkirk, Scotland, FK29AP.  We enter from the parking lot side to the door on the right. You have to have a key to get in. There is another apt. building to the right as well. In between are the garbage cans we pull to the short shrubs and they are emptied every 2 weeks for the wet garbage, and every week for the recyclables. So, now I am forced to recycle.

This is the front of our building and our flat is the top left now. This is one of the 45 stairs that we go up and down each day. So far our record has only been 4 times which is only 360 stairs. Why go to the gym and do the stair stepper when you have your own free source of exercise?

There is a large window on each floor.

We are home at 115.

Our view looking down the stairs.

Welcome to our home. When people come to visit, they ring up on the phone. At first I didn't know know there was a buzzer to ring them in so I would go down the 4 flights to let them in. It only took a few visitors and the sisters to tell me I could buzz them in.

Our master bedroom. They like hanging things over the lights so we have a cute purple thing here, black one in the hallway and clear plastic and black in the living room. We love our views. The grass stays green all year round, even in the winter. Not so bad. The second and smaller bedroom is Doug's office. I have my stuff on the kitchen table.

Our dining room at the back of the couch area. I used dish towels to cover up the problem seats. Notice the wall heaters. They are heated with the boiler which we control. Only used it once so far. That was when we came back from the Highland games and had been in the rain for 3 hours straight. Also that was the night of our Chinese Laundry.

I love my kitchen. I can turn on the gas burners now without any help. My oven is electric and has some issues, but is functional. Life is good. Notice my happy face on the fridge?

Notice the beautiful drapes. We found those on sale downtown and pulled the strings at the back and attached them to the wooden strip on the wall with three screws each side. Pretty good huh?

This is the problem toilet. Now it only takes 2 flushes to work, so live is good. The inside of the toilet water above is spic and span now. I cleaned it well with Clorox like wipes when the worker had it all apart.

So you can see our color scheme in the bathroom. The towels are always damp because of the humidity.

This is our cute light fixture in the hallway.

When I do dishes I see the picture above. On the corner to the right that you can't see is a store that looks like a video store. We went inside to see if they had a telephone book, we needed to get a number for the internet service. We walked in and found it was a Gambling Place. Woops! The man was very nice and helped us and I gave him a pass along card.

We see this out our bedroom window. A more close up view of our parking area. Notice our grey car on the left. VERY narrow and so are the spaces. Just barely enough room to get in, and then if you are lucky you can get out of the car without touching the car next door. Our car doors open properly, but some open opposite so the front doors open like in America, but the back doors open on the same side the front doors open. Does that make sense? So if you aren't looking right, you tell the driver you can't get out of the car because the doors are locked, but they really aren't. You are just pushing at the wrong place.

Driving is on the left side of the road here, but the speed is in MPH, the petrol (gas) you purchase is by Liter. We bought petrol Tues. for  1.30 pounds. A liter is smaller than a gallon and a  pound =$1.65. So you do the calculations. We have given up. The freeway is only 2 narrow lanes on each side and is 70/mph. They have round abouts everywhere here and they are very involved. We may do 10-15 going one place. Very tricky because people are always entering in and you are trying to leave in one of the 4 exits on the round abouts.

Doug is studying most days to take the drivers test. Our licenses from the states are good for one year and then we have to have a UK drivers license. You have to be a resident here for 6 months before you can take the test. It is very involved. The written test is hard. One example. If you need to buy a bottle of milk for the bairn (baby) do you take a bicycle, walk, take the bus or drive your car? The answer is walk. The other part of the test is a video and you have to push a button when you see a dangerous situation. If you push it too soon, or too late, you fail the test. Then if you pass the test you take the driving test. You have to do this part almost perfect or you fail. Rarely do people pass the first time. You have to pay money to take both the written test and the driving test. So, I will be studying also. We will tell you when to start your prayers.