A Swiss Vista

One of Tom's co-workers took this picture on his walk home from work back in October. This place is about 5 minutes from our apartment. We thought it was so typical Switzerland that we just had to share it.

Axalp Air Show

Tom went to another air show about a week ago. This one was unusual because the attendees had to drive to a town near Interlaken and then hike for 2.5 hours to the viewing site. You can see the line of people hiking in the picture to the left. He went with a few of his co-workers and really enjoyed the show, even though it ended early due to too much fog. Tom and Michael can be seen posing above the clouds below.

We Named Our Cat....

Cloé!!

We actually named her about a month ago, I've just been slack in posting about it :) It's pronounced like Chloe, but we liked this spelling better. My dad sent me some name suggestions, one of which was Clotilde (a queen of France who was born around 475) who is know for converting her husband to Christianity. I thought the modern version of the name was cute and it stuck. She just keeps getting bigger and bigger. She's into all sorts of mischievous things - scratching up the walls, scratching up our hands, pouncing on our feet, shredding Kleenex from the trash, etc. She's adorable, though. Maggie is starting to get along with her, but it is still slow going - she still doesn't know quite what to think. Below are some additional pictures of our kitty for your viewing pleasure.

Here she is in one of her rare cuddly moments. She sat with me for a long time while I was reading. Below she's in a more typical pose - ready to pounce!

Charmey

There was a festival in Charmey (about 30 minutes from us) the last weekend in September to celebrate the cows descending from the mountains. While we were on our way, we ran into one of these processions. The cows were so close to our car that we could have reached out and touched them!

Once we got there, we saw more decorated cows and even some sheep and some goats. We also poked around the little markets there and bought some delicious dried fruit and fresh, home-made caramel. The whole time, we could hear local music -some even included alphorns.
After the festival, Tom and Dave went on a hike. It had just snowed in the mountains earlier that week, so they saw snow at the top of their hike! It was a fun day and we felt like we experience some Swiss culture.