My sister comes to visit!

My sister Lisa and her friend Jeremiah came to visit us at the beginning of March and we had a great time! We shocked them into the time zone by heading to a surprise party for a friend of ours the night they got here. We had lots of good food and it was fun to show them some Swiss culture. They did great and stayed awake until we left at about 12am! The next day we got up early and went skiing. It was Lisa's first time and by the end of the day she could do the run without falling down (much). Fortunatly, we'd found some slopes that were conducive to learning (ie not at a 45 degree angle with pro skiiers zooming past) so it worked out well.

Another highlight was taking a day trip to Thun. We explored a castle that had some beautiful views and a Toblerone museum. The basement had formerly been a pottery making studio, so there was a re-creation of what it may have looked like. Lisa (a potter herself) enjoyed this very much. Then we girls bored Jeremiah by poking around in all the fun little shops on the main street. We found a few expensive second-hand clothing stores, a Christian book store, a pottery shop (sadly the potter wasn't there), a necklace shop and an olive oil store. We topped the day off by eating traditional German fare of rosti and sausage at a nearby restaurant.

Then to finish off their visit, we all went to Cinque Terre, Italy for 3 nights. It was beautiful! It's an area on the west coast with 5 small towns right on the water. The houses are all very colorful and look very pretty set against the hills and the water. We enjoyed walking around, sampling the focaccia, and eating yummy, yummy Italian food. My overall impression of Italy was good, but it was nice to come back to the order and cleanliness of Switzerland.

It was fun having them here and I was sad to see them go. It was so nice to have a shopping buddy! Let me know when you guys want to come back!

Skiing at Les Diablerets - it was COLD!

Lisa and the old pottery making room in the Thun castle.

Being silly (the castle really does look like the one in the picture, though)

One of the Cinque Terre towns.