Natural Crimea

[Faux Pas]

Hiya Roy! Good to see you back posting. What a great looking couple. What's your plans going forward?

[SANDRO43]

PS: Anyone care to tell me how to post photos inside the text area? Don't care much for this way and wasted a lot of time as it didn't show up in the Preview mode.

Roy, the text area accepts ONLY remote photos linked from the Internet, not local photos from your PC - the latter can be shown in a post only as attachments, as you did. Incidentally, it's VERY dark.

Therefore, if you want to use the other method, you should first put your photos on some Internet repository/location.

BTW, welcome back. 

[The Natural]

Hiya Roy! Good to see you back posting. What a great looking couple. What's your plans going forward?

Hello FP, thanks a lot. I thought I'd write some about our plans here, maybe put some photos too. I intended to write more in the previous post, but it accidentally got posted. Well, at least I could then see than the photo DID go along. Right now I must go to work, but I will write more when I have the time and inspiration, hehe.

[The Natural]

Roy, the text area accepts ONLY remote photos linked from the Internet, not local photos from your PC - the latter can be shown in a post only as attachments, as you did. Incidentally, it's VERY dark.

Therefore, if you want to use the other method, you should first put your photos on some Internet repository/location.

BTW, welcome back.

Thanks for that Sandro43.

[Hammer2722]

Great to hear from you Natural. Right now I am quite jealous! haha. I wish I could have my girl spend such time in my home. Great to see she liked being in your country. 

[ML]

Hi Reidar, welcome back.  Nice looking couple there.

[The Natural]

Great to hear from you Natural. Right now I am quite jealous! haha. I wish I could have my girl spend such time in my home. Great to see she liked being in your country. 

Thank you Hammer2722. Getting the girl to stay for several weeks is just a matter of making sure she is unemployed 

[The Natural]

Hi Reidar, welcome back.  Nice looking couple there.

Thank you very much ML. As Sandro mentioned though, the photo is dark. It's because my camera, which is a video camera, needs a lot of light. But I will put out a few others that's better.

[SANDRO43]

As Sandro mentioned though, the photo is dark. It's because my camera, which is a video camera, needs a lot of light.

Here, I retouched it for you, and made it a little smaller and easier to look at .

[The Natural]

Always the gentleman, thanks a lot Sandro43, looks much improved.

[mendeleyev]

Great photos, especially you and the lady.

[ML]

Thank you very much ML. As Sandro mentioned though, the photo is dark. It's because my camera, which is a video camera, needs a lot of light. But I will put out a few others that's better.

There are many software programs which can lighten (or darken) already existing pictures, and change them in many other ways.  Probably such a program came with your camera.

One that is free to download is:  IrfanView

[ML]

Looking again at the picture . . .  WOW, those walls are more than a foot thick!!  What sort of insulation is inside the walls?  Do you know the R-value?

Given the thick walls, I was surprised that I couldn't see a double set of windows also . . . for the insulation value.  Are the existing windows triple pane with Argon gas inside?

[The Natural]

Looking again at the picture . . .  WOW, those walls are more than a foot thick!!  What sort of insulation is inside the walls?  Do you know the R-value?

Given the thick walls, I was surprised that I couldn't see a double set of windows also . . . for the insulation value.  Are the existing windows triple pane with Argon gas inside?

Yeah, the walls on this old house is thick. It's made of brick and from around 1952. The brick walls are more than 35 cm thick ( a foot is 30,5 cm)and where it's fully isolated, it's 50 cm, like in the photo. Here there are 10 cm isolation on the inside wall. The isolation here is called Glava. I'm not sure if they use the same words for the isolation value like R-value that you mentioned, so here's what it says on the roll of Glava:
 
D= 0,037 K/m K
RD= 1,35 m2 K/W
 
I have changed most of the windows on the house and they're all double glass with Argon gas, yes. A couch-surfer from Spain commented on that as they probably don't have that as much there. Here it's obligatory and there are also requirements of isolation on new houses, for example 30 cm above the ceiling. Most used here is Glava but also Rockwool.

[The Natural]

Great photos, especially you and the lady.

Thank you mendeleyev, that's nice of you to say.

[The Natural]

She was a bit overwhelmed by her new surroundings, but that lasted only for a couple of days. She quickly adjusted and learned how things in the house work, like how to use the dishwasher, washing machine, operating the TV/cinema/computer with numerous remote controls (yes, I know I should get a universal control) in the home cinema room. She kept in touch with her mother back home via Skype.
 
She of course met my family and friends also. We often visited my mother and my brother and family and they all got along great. My brother’s wife and my girl visited each other, went for walks and stay in touch also after my girl left and went back to Kerch.
 
The first 3 weeks we had a few arguments. They were of minor things and it all came about because of misunderstandings between us. We managed to talk it through, resolve it and the last 7 weeks were the most wonderful as we got to know and appreciate each other ever more.
 
When she came here, it was at the darkest period of the year and that was naturally very strange for her. No sun! But we went for walks and also up a mountain which she liked, especially walking through a forest of spruce trees and looking at the view from the mountain top. We also went a couple of times to see some whales feeding on herring in the fiord. The whales moved around and was not easy to spot but we got some glimpses of them as they came up for air and dived down again. At this time we also got to see the first appearance of the sun.
 
During the winter months I take solarium sessions whenever I’m in the city. She wanted also to try but was a bit skeptical because she was once burned after only 3 minutes when she took it in Moscow. I explained to her that this is totally different and strictly regulated and she had solarium sessions of 15-20 minutes whenever we were in town. She loved it!
 
The past 25 years or so I have been making what is called a Tower cake. It’s made of almonds, powdered sugar and egg whites. I decided to make a few cakes for family and friends for Christmas and showed her how it’s done. She very quickly wanted to try on her own and she got the hang of it amazingly fast. So she ended up making all of the cakes with me just being an assistant  Look at the photos of us in action. It’s nice making food together.

[The Natural]

A few photos from Christmas Eve and one of my girl talking to her sister on Skype:

[noelscot]

A few photos from Christmas Eve and one of my girl talking to her sister on Skype:

I really enjoyed reading your trip report. I'm happy that things went well for you! Looks like you two are going to be quite the pair. You do look like Putin. lol.

[Muzh]

Roy, no wonder she is smitten with you.

You are the spitting image of Vladimir Vladimirovich himself!!

[The Natural]

Sometimes when I say to her that I was so surprised to learn that several people including her mother think I look like Putin, she smiles, shake her head slowly and say to me in a very soft and loving voice: "My Putin". 

[Gator]

It is always splendid to read a happy story, especially with photos.  Thanks for sharing. 
 

Insulation - interesting.  Glava must be what we call a blown fiberglass wool.   
 
R-value in insulation is a measure of thermal resistance.  Those few countries who use the metric scale  would report it in units such as m²·°C/W (or K/W on the Kelvin scale, which is your reported number of  1,35 m2 K/W or 1.35  square-metre kelvins per watt)
 
In America  we of course use the simpler forms of Fahrenheit, British Thermal Units and feet-inches or  ft²·°F·h/Btu.   We also throw in a unit thermal conductance factor, and I am not sure what that is about.   Americans are easily confused so we never report the units and just say R value.   You value of 1.35 m2 K/W  has an R-value of about 8.
 
That seems to small and in fact would not meet our code requirements for new residential construction.  Thus, I have converted incorrectly.  I tried to find my error and I give up.  I am too old for this now.     
 
 

[Misha]

Congrats!!! You look like a very sweet couple in the photos!

[Daveman]

Yes indeed! Congrats!  Great photos! 

[Chicagoguy]

Seems you have found a keeper !

[The Natural]

It is always splendid to read a happy story, especially with photos.  Thanks for sharing. 

I aim to please.
 

Insulation - interesting.  Glava must be what we call a blown fiberglass wool.   
 
R-value in insulation is a measure of thermal resistance.  Those few countries who use the metric scale  would report it in units such as m²·°C/W (or K/W on the Kelvin scale, which is your reported number of  1,35 m2 K/W or 1.35  square-metre kelvins per watt)
 
In America  we of course use the simpler forms of Fahrenheit, British Thermal Units and feet-inches or  ft²·°F·h/Btu.   We also throw in a unit thermal conductance factor, and I am not sure what that is about.   Americans are easily confused so we never report the units and just say R value.   You value of 1.35 m2 K/W  has an R-value of about 8.
 
That seems to small and in fact would not meet our code requirements for new residential construction.  Thus, I have converted incorrectly.  I tried to find my error and I give up.  I am too old for this now.     

I must be getting too old as well, haha. Searched for some info on Glava and R-value but gave up. Here they use U-value and something called Lambda which the number for Glava A37 10 cm. is 0,037.
 
Maybe this info make sense. As for me it gets too technical:
 
http://www.knaufinsulation.co.uk/solutions/10_introduction/15_the_science_of_insulation.aspx