A moving story (more precisely, a story of us moving)

November 1, 2017 Agnès Comments 0 Comment

And here we are, celebrating the end of our first year in Cincinnati (in fact that was two months ago, but close enough), and it’s more than time we post a lil update in here! Since we came back from our vacation in Belgium this July, we’ve been enjoying the extended summer that the midwest has to offer, before the ice age takes over the city for the next 4 months. We spent the beginning of September moving into our new apartment -the 4th in a little over a year, or 5th if we include the one we left in Leuven, Belgium before moving to Cincinnati- I’m starting to think we really enjoy moving! Good thing I was made to carry heavy pieces of furniture… Not. Luckily our new apartment is just a 15′ drive away from our old place so we were able to do a few trips to get everything moved. Emptying our apartment led us to realize how many sorts of nuts, flours, natural sugars and seeds of all kinds we had in our kitchen and have been using in our numerous homemade breads and baked goods… I guess that’s how you know you have a passion for baking and nutrition! We used to make fun of both our moms for cooking with weird healthy ingredients… Guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree after all 🙂

We really love the new place and especially its location, right by the Ohio River and the Reds stadium, and at a walking distance to downtown. We’ve lived in two different places downtown before this apartment, as well as in a place closer to campus, and this one is our favorite location by far! There are tons of fun events along the Riverfront year round, as well as beautiful parks, cool restaurants, and street music waking us up on Sunday mornings 🙂 And also, you get some really nice and flat (which is not common in Cincinnati) places to walk/bike/run in the area which is just perfect for us. We also enjoy the stunning view from the rooftop of the building, right at the 27th floor (although our own apartment is located on the 2nd floor, pretty much the same ;-)).

Arnaud admiring the view from the rooftop

View towards downtown Cincinnati and the Reds stadium

A beautiful fall day for a walk in the riverfront park

View from Purple People Bridge, a few steps from our apartment

Work is following its course for us (ok, just its beginning for me), with Arnaud pursuing his lots-of-numbers-and-computers thing (truth is, nobody knows what he does), and me, now working in an arts and crafts store from which I come back home every day covered in glitter (I guess dreams do come true!). Since last week, it has already started to feel a lot like Christmas in the store, and for those who know me you know that I am beyond happy about it! When we have time we also try to keep helping UC XC and track teams (even Arnaud started doing it now) and we had the chance to go to a few XC races this fall which is always really exciting!

Something I’ve only seen in this part of the country: after a XC race, all the participants gather at the finish line to pray together 🙂

After waiting for so long, we also finally got the chance to visit the Cincinnati Zoo (yes, the one that is famous for the Harambe story), and it was pretty amazing! We even got to see Fiona, the baby hippo who is a real rock star around here (she even has her own instagram account!). The zoo is huge and beautiful, the sun was shining, and we were hanging out with two good friends so needless to say we had a great time!

Also on the menu these past few weeks: we went to see one of UC football games, and one of the Reds games too (oh my, how slow this “sport” can be!). We also got the visit from our friend Sofie (a Belgian athlete who studied at EMU) and her boyfriend, who both live in Detroit now. They even brought us some Merci chocolates (from Belgium) :-), we had a lot of fun!