Church Sanctuaries

My church is a spiritual sanctuary, and we call our worship space just that - the sanctuary. But what if your church was your physical sanctuary? The areas we saw in Romania have seen centuries of strife and fighting, and so they have a heritage of fortified churches. Several of the fortified churches we saw are still in use today, so their worshippers still experience passing through the outer walls to come to their church.






Prejmer fortress



The crumbling walls of Arkos Unitarian Church

We also saw, but didn't get any pictures of, the 13th century walled Unitarian church of Székelyderzs . Talk about a sense of history - this church has a tradition of families storing their surplus food in storage boxes inside the outer wall, and curing their meats in the corner towers. This way, if they had to retreat to the church when attackers came through the village, they would have food in there. The families of the village are still continuing this tradition, using the same boxes and hooks that their families have used for hundreds of years. They also have family pews in the church, also going back hundreds of years. A very different sense of it being your family church than we have around here.

I love Squares

I just wish my home town had a space for people to gather in that looked like this.

Castle Bran

Our second day in Romania took us to Castle Bran, the castle associated with Count Dracula in the book by Bram Stoker. Although the castle has actually nothing to do with Dracula, it is marketed that way for tourists and surrounded by cheap souvenir stands carrying tacky vampire stuff. Carbon might have been horribly disappointed in the castle if we hadn't done our homework beforehand, reading that it would not be spooky or actually have anything to do with Dracula. He was prepared, and the castle turned out to be cooler than he was expecting. It is in excellent repair and was an enjoyable self-tour experience.

We also took the tour of the luxury castle, Castle Peles, which I don't have any pictures of because they charged 50 lei (about $17) "photo tax", and it didn't seem worth it to me. If you like Baroque opulence, this castle delivers, but it wasn't what Carbon expected from a castle.

Our Big Adventure, Day One

Despite all my fears about traveling abroad for the first time as an adult, Carbon and I arrived safe and sound in Bucharest and met up with our tour group. The jet lag wasn't too bad, and the itinerary started off nice and slow for us. Day One, we arrived in the mountain resort town of Sinaia and got some much needed sleep. Then, up into the Carpathian mountains in a cable car. It was very reminiscent of The Sound of Music up there.

Up, up and away

Carbon and I are off for an adventure. I won't be able to update the blog while I am away, so there will be a two week delay before you get to hear all about it!

Lego loving

The new Summer 2010 Lego Catalog recently arrived in the mail, and around here that is a Big Deal. It has been carried everywhere we go, taken to bed, and poured over for hours. Each time a new catalog comes out, Carbon discovers more legos that he just has to have.

But this time the catalog has been more inspiration and less consumer-fantasy. The new lego boardgames? Yeah - they are really cool! We bought the Minotaurus game when we were in legoland, and we all agree it's a pretty fun game. But with the new catalog out, Carbon has instead made up his own boardgames, as it turns out that it's really easy to design a board and playing pieces with legos.

"World Racers" is a new line in the catalog. It looks like a sort-of ultimate race with weapons and lots of different crazy vehicles. Carbon would love to buy some, but in the meantime he and his dad built racers from the existing lego collection and had their own "world race" across the living room floor.

This is why we all love legos - the creativity is pretty awesome.

My Happiness and Health Project

To recap, I am doing a modified version of The Happiness Project, and one area that I am making resolutions in is my health. I've resolved to drink more water, take my vitamin pills, and consume more fruits and vegetables. The fruits and vegetables are a lot easier to do this time of year, but also I love to Juice.

Juicing is easy* if you have a good juicer, and I love mine which was a gift many years ago and continues to run strong. I buy huge bags of organic juicing carrots at the grocery store or our local food co-op, and then I add whatever is on hand. In fact, my kids have a bad habit of taking a few bites out of an apple and then just setting the rest down and wasting it. If I pop those in the frige and cut off the bite marks the next morning, I can add those to my juice and avoid the waste.

This juice is carrot, apples, and beets with their greens. Tasty and very healthy!



* OK - it is a pain to wash up the juicer afterward, but I am trying to just do it anyway. But that might really put people off this as a habit.