We have a Region! ALTAY!

Much to my dismay, we are getting a new consultant from our agency. After all, this will be our 4th one! I loved our last one! As we near the end, we want someone good. After speaking to our new consultant, my mind was set at ease. She seemed to be on top of things and was very nice. Plus, she gave us some great news! They have selected a region for us. . . .Altay! Yeah!

Here is a little bit about the region:

The name "Altay" (or "Altai") comes from Mongolian "Altan", which means "golden". Altay mountains are truly one of the nature's most marvelous gems, amazing by its diversity and beauty. Stretching for nearly 2000 km from north-west to south-east, Altai mountains form a natural border between the arid steppes of Mongolia and the rich taiga of Southern Siberia.

Three major factors make Altay mountains a recreational domain of great value: amazing natural diversity (various landscapes, climates, abundance of wildlife); thin population, historically nomadic (Mongolian and Kazakh ethnos), who have a very natural way of life; and remoteness from any industries (the region lives only for tourism and agriculture).

The modern population is a mixture of indigenous Altais and Russian settlers, some of the latter still leading in their villages the life of Old Believers, with strict rules and very much isolated from civilization.

Altai montains is a quite remote region. The closest big (more than 50,000 inhabitants) city is Gorno-Altaisk, located just at the beginning of Altai mountains, on Katun river. Slightly further is Biysk.

Project Number One!

This kind of shabby looking dollhouse has been through a lot. It was made especially for me one Christmas when I was about 7 yrs. old. I absolutely loved it.! After, I grew out of it, it stayed at my mom's until I was married for about 4 years. We acquired the doll house about 8 years ago and so it has been in storage for a little over 20 years! After the nursery was decorated, we took the dollhouse out of storage and put it in the nursery and found that it matches exactly! With quite a few scratches and missing pieces, I decided to fix it up. I found on ebay the furniture sets that have long been forgotten. It is an old Tomy set. I replaced some of the doll family and some place mats. I only need a few more items. Then I scraped off all of the old glue and washed off the old scrapes and grime. Next is painting. The after pictures will be soon coming I hope!