I will miss our Baton Rouge house when we move to North Carolina. Of the three houses we’ve owned, this one is my favorite. The floor plan is a wonderful use of space for us. It has an abundance of natural light (which was *absent* in our last house). The kitchen has a ton of cabinet and counter space, and the closets are spacious. The neighborhood is beautiful; next door is an open field with stately live oaks that has served as my portrait studio for the kiddos. But the funny thing I’ll miss the most? Newgrange in our living room.

The house has an interesting astronomical feature that we refer to as “Newgrange”. It’s a circle of light that shines on the living room wall at sunrise during certain months of the year. In October and February, the house is positioned just right relative to sunrise that light shines through the peephole on the front door and makes a rainbow circle on the back wall.

It’s the perfect height on the wall for Patrick to reach up and touch. It’s fun to be the first person in the house to shout Newgrange! on the sunny mornings that make it possible, especially when we haven’t seen it for a while.

It moves on the wall over time, and I’ve considered charting its path with Patrick as a fun science project. Since we haven’t charted it, I’m not sure that it’s only in October and February. Those are the only months when I have photos of it.

Does anyone else have interesting images made by the peephole in your front door? We named ours Newgrange after the 5000-year-old passage tomb built in Ireland which is aligned with sunrise to illuminate the inner chamber for only a few days around winter solstice. We know about Newgrange (and think it’s a cool feat of Neolithic ingenuity) because we toured the tomb on our 2003 vacation to Ireland.

To our friends who will be the next owners of the house, we’re very excited that you will be living here! And feel free to check out this National Geographic – Tomb of Newgrange video and enjoy a fun bit of astronomy in your own living room. Maybe I can recreate something like it in our next house?!