It's a...

Girl!!

We went for our 20 week ultrasound back in June and found out that we're going to have a little girl :) Everything looks good - 10 fingers, 2 kidneys, and all other body parts were accounted for. She's kicking up a storm most days and I'm enjoying being in the 2nd trimester of pregnancy. Here's another belly shot for you... It was taken right after I had a much over-due haircut in which the stylist spent 20 minutes fixing it. I wish it would look like that every day!

Flying in the Alps

One of Tom's friends recently received his pilots license here in Switzerland. He asked Tom if he'd like to fly with him sometime and of course, Tom jumped at the opportunity! Here are some pictures of his flying adventures one sunny, Sunday afternoon.

Michael and Tom ready for flight

Lake Geneva (I think)

Pretty mountains

Our house! Can you find it? If you click on the picture to zoom in, there's a brown circle around it.

Coming in for a landing. Even though it was quite windy, Tom said Michael did an excellent job of flying and especially landing.

Hola Barcelona!

I've been wanting to visit Barcelona for awhile, so when we found super-cheap tickets back in January, we jumped on them and went at the beginning of May. It was a fun trip, especially since my sister, Lisa, met us there and my neighbor, Chantal and her friend, Frederic, joined us.

Our first night there, we ate at a hole-in-the-wall around the corner from our apartment. The food was excellent and even we picky girls were satisfied (Lisa is a vegetarian, Chantal doesn't like seafood, and I didn't ever know what I was going to like :). We had a pica-pica meaning just a little bit of a lot of dishes. It was a good way to sample a lot of the cuisine. The desserts were the best in my opinion - cinnamon ice cream, orange-chocolate cake and Catalan cream crème brûlée - yum! And just so you know, if you get paella negra (a black rice dish), it is black because of squid ink, no wonder it tasted so fishy...

Yay, Lisa made it! She had a 3-leg plane trip a 10 hour layover in Paris before arriving in Barcelona. Our first full day there, we took it easy and had a relaxed beach day. The water was freezing, but the weather was perfect for sitting on the hot sand. Lisa and I got our feet wet wading in the surf while looking for sea glass and cool rocks. What we realized later is that we'd unintentionally found one of Barcelona's nude beaches - whoops! All part of the Spanish experience, I guess... Fortunately, Lisa's head is blocking the topless woman behind her :)

There were special seats for me everywhere! I felt loved. We laughed when we saw this sign, though. She is the strangest looking pregnant woman I've ever seen!

We took the funicular up to the top of Tibidabo - a mountain that looks over the city. We had a great view and got there right at sunset. So pretty!

The mountain-top church all lit up at sunset. There was also an amusement park up here, but we didn't have time to explore it before it closed down for the night.

Barcelona's famous Sagrada Família. Construction on it started in 1882 and they plan to finish in 2026 or so (they were working on it while we were there as evidenced by all the cranes). It's original plans were drawn up by Gaudí and he worked on it for much of his life. It was unlike any other church I've ever seen - very intricate and detailed. Maybe I'll get to see it one day in when it is completed.

Cool little alley way that we walked down on our way to dinner one night. We had tapas that night - a meal consisting basically of appetizers. They were very rich and very good.

Gaudí's House of Bones (though I prefer the unofficial name - The Dragon House). It's called the house of bones because the columns in front look like bones when you're up close. Tom and I toured this house one morning and it was impressive. The inside is even more unusual that the outside. To me, the funny thing was that people actually live there. Tons of tourists tromp through the first floor and then up the steps to the roof, but all the other floors contained occupied apartments. Wonder what the residents think of all the tourists.

Yet another Gaudí attraction - Park Güell. Our only group picture on the twisty mosaic bench. We girls are all sporting our shopping finds from the day before.

I'd heard about the bench, but it was a lot longer than I realized. Here you can see about half of it twisting around the raised courtyard.

Lisa liked the lamp posts, so got a picture with one of them.

In the apartment showing off my burgeoning belly :)

Visit from Tex and Melissa

We had our first visitors in 9 months back in April. Tex, Melissa and Maggie decided to come visit us again this year. It was fun to see them and see how much Maggie has grown and changed in one short year. Tom and Tex enjoyed squeezing in a ski outing before all the snow melted. Right before they left, we all went to Lucerne together for the day. The weather was perfect for site-seeing and it was nice to spend the day together.

Tex and cute Maggie after dinner one night. Note the candle burning in the lower right corner... Maggie insited that we burn them and then took great pleasure in blowing them out after we were finished.

One of the famous wooden Lucerne bridges.

The Lion Monument in Lucerne. It was sculpted to remember the Swiss Guards who died during the French Revolution in 1792. I really liked it.

Taking a break with Melissa while Maggie picked flowers.

Thanks for coming, guys! Maybe we'll see you again next year :)

Cat Post

Just a few fun pictures of our cats :)

Maggie thinks she is hiding.

Cloé enjoys drinking out of the sink faucet in the mornings.

Yes Sir,

That's my baby!!

In case you haven't heard, Tom and I are expecting! We're very excited and looking forward to meeting the new little person that God has given us. The baby is due at the end of October and we will be having it here in Switzerland (and no, sadly it won't have Swiss citizenship). We've had our first doctor's appointment and so far so good! We even got this great picture of the baby and it's only 2 inches long!

Anyone want to make a guess as to the gender or the due date? My technical due date is Nov 2, but when I went to the Dr, they moved it up to Oct 22 based on the baby's measurements. So we shall see...

Swiss Snow Fun

We've had a lot of snow here this year, and while yesterday and today have been beautiful examples of spring (finally!!), I thought I'd post some pictures of our snowy day activities.

Skiing with some friends on a beautiful winter day. There was a run here that went all the way to the bottom of the mountain - after a few runs of that and my legs were shot!

We came out one morning to see our car absolutely covered in snow - you can see the accumulation on the top of the garage door.

We never had to shovel snow when we lived in GA, so this is a new experience for us. Here's Tom clearing our driveway even though there is still snow coming down.

We went for a walk in the snow one day just around our neighborhood. I should have worn waterproof pants. The boots worked perfectly, but the snow was higher than the tops of them.

Another ski day! Tom, April and I met our neighbor at the Moleson for a day of skiing.
There were about 6 inches of fresh snow and a cloud covered the mountain the entire day. Both conditions made skiing different than usual. After a challenging morning, we were ready for lunch. This was what April and I got - it's Rosti (similar to hash browns) with bacon. We laughed when we saw that they'd made a face out of it.

It was a cold day - as evidenced by our frozen hair!

With the cold, the cats want to go out, but decide rather quickly that inside is a better option. So here they are asking to be let back in - a common occurance.