Update on Baby Girl :)

It's hard to believe that time goes by so quickly! Little girl will be here in less than 2 months now!! We had our last ultrasound 2 weeks ago and everything is looking good. She was about 3 pounds and moving around like crazy. I feel her moving all the time now and she frequently has the hiccups :) It still amazes me that there is something alive and moving in my stomach.

We've been busy getting ready for our little one to arrive. I enjoyed doing some shopping for her while we were in the US. There are way too many cute baby girl clothes in the world! I could have spent endless amounts of money on adorable clothes that would probably only last a month or two! As far as things here, the former guest room (now the guest/baby room) is painted and has furniture back in it. We just have to buy a mattress for the crib, buy a pad for the changing table, and put away the pile of things that we have accumulated and the room will be ready. The dresser drawers are stocked with clothes and the changing table is replete with diapers and wipes - ready for little one's arrival. Thank you thank you to everyone who has already given/loaned us things. It has been a HUGE help!

This past weekend, Tom and I traveled to Zurich to attend a birthing class in English. It was very helpful and really nice to meet some other couples in situations similar to ours. We also could understand everything and were able to easily ask any question that popped into our heads. It was also fun to take a short trip to Zurich and do a little exploring there.

So that's where we are at the moment. We're looking forward to welcoming her into the world and introducing her to you all! Enjoy the picts below and hopefully I'll get some of her room posted soon as well.

Ultrasound picture from June 15

Ultrasound picture from September 2
(the thing next to her nose is the umbilical cord)

Strawberries!

El and I picked strawberries in a nearby village. We came home and made a strawberry pie, strawberry shortcake and strawberry smoothies.

Tom and Ellie took a walk one day in Fribourg. Above is them and the La Sarine (the river that goes through the city). Below is just one of the many colorful plants at the botanical gardens they visited.

Climbing

We took Ellie to the climbing wall one afternoon. After one false start, she climbed right to the top like a spider. It probably helped that Tom was a good, patient instructor!

She made it!

Just having a little fun.

A few days later, we hiked to a place where you can climb on real rocks. It's a very different feel from the climbing wall and fun to be out in nature. T & E climbed all the way to the rock you can see poking out just to the left of the center.

Ellie at the midway point. If you blow the picture up, you can see me sitting and waiting at the bottom which is what I did for almost 2 hours. I should have brought a book...

At the top with Lake Gruyeres in the background.

Just because she's cute.

La Côte d'Azur

We've been wanting to visit the French Rivera, so we used Ellie as an excuse to travel there :) The above is the view from the balcony of our rental apartment in a little town called Cap-Martin (20 min outside of Nice).

The medieval town of Cap-Martin was way up on the hill where this castle is. We walked (yes, walked!) up there our first night to have dinner. The town was really cool - lots of twisting streets, old stone buildings and roads, and a feeling of being from another time. We forgot the camera, so no picts of it :(

Welcome to Monaco! One of the smallest countries in the world with an area of 0.76 sq miles (D.C is huge in comparison at 68 sq miles). We were just a few minutes from here, so had to take a day and explore the country. You could tell it was a very affluent area (not a good place for me to go shopping), but fun to walk around. It turned out that the next weekend, Monaco was hosting the start of the Tour de France, so it was good we went when we did.

In front of the Monte-Carlo Casino. We didn't go in, but enjoyed looking and watching all the really nice cars drive by.

The Prince's Palace where the royal family lives which we got to take a little tour of. We even managed to time it to see the changing of the guard. If you are a fan of Grace Kelly, you'd have plenty of company here - she was well loved and you can find her likeness everywhere.

On the other side of the bay after looking out on a lot of nice yachts.

Our second day was spent mostly in Nice. It was a hot day and crowded as the Ironman competition was starting there the next day. We had fun spotting all the competitors walking around the city - many were quite obvious :) We took went up to the top of a hill and got a great view of the city where we took a break from the heat with some ice cream - yum!

Later in the day, we took to the beach. The beaches there are all very rocky, so it was a bit hard on our feet, but nice all the same. Ellie and Tom got in and did some swimming, but I was a wimp. After being hot all day, it rained as soon as we got to the beach just enough to significantly cool things down. I did get in up to my knees, though.

On our way back we stopped in a little town called Eze where we were planning on having dinner. However, we soon realiezed that we were a little out of our league. On our way up to the village, we saw the valet parking lot of one of the hotels. It had an 1930s Rolls Royce, an Aston Martin, a Lamborghini, 2 Porche, a Mercedes and an Audi. Then we saw the menu prices - 100 Euros a plate - so we made other dinner arrangements. It was a fun town to walk around in and that part was free!

On our way back to CH, we stopped in Avignon. We had lunch within view of the famous Palais des Papes (Palace of the Popes) and did some shopping. I was in heaven with all the cutsy little shops and didn't have nearly long enough poke. It was enough though and it was fun to be able to talk to the store keepers a little. It was actually really nice to vacation in a French speaking region. Our French is still far from fluent, but it is good enough to get by, which is better than I can do in any other language!

The well-known Avignon bridge. There's a song in French about this bridge which we sang some at the daycare, so I had to go see it. Right behind us is a beautiful, fragrant field of lavender.

Verkehrshaus der Schweiz

After Lausanne, we headed the the other direction into the German-speaking side of Switzerland to visit the Swiss Transportation Museum (that's what the title says...). It was huge and a bit crowded, but full of trains, planes and automobiles. Tom and Ellie were most interested in the aviation section :)

Since trains are have been used for so long and are still a big part of transportation here, the train section was extensive. This was just one example of an old engine.

My favorite train - the chocolate train!

As Tom's dad is in the process of building a Volksplane, Tom was excited to find a small exhibit on them.

The entire museum was interactive. Here, Tom got was able to simulate flying one of the Wright Brother's planes. The controls were linked up to a computer program, and he did well - not crashing at all!

Yet another interactive exhibit; this one simulated paragliding.

Here, Tom got to drive a race car.

Lausanne

Tom's sister, Ellie, came to visit us again this year. Her first weekend here, we took a day trip to Lausanne to visit the Olympic Museum and see the town. It was a beautiful, sunny day so walking around Lake Geneva (and finding a gelato stand) was a great way to spend the day.

Lake Geneva, a water skiier and the Alps.

The Olympic Museum had a large park outdoors with various sculptures and exhibits. Inside they had information on each of the Olympic games as well as the medals and torches from each. It even had old uniforms, shoes and gear of some of the athletes who competed in the games.

This is the world record for the high jump. It's crazy, I can't even reach the bar and someone has jumped over it!!

The area we were in was called "Ouchy." I thought Le Chateau d'Ouchy was amusing and that the building was very pretty.

Lausanne has a gorgeous cathedral. It was worth the uphill hike to see it. Right outside there was a market of some sort (maybe their version of a communal garage sale?) so I enjoyed poking around and looking at the stuff.

Via Ferrata

A few weekends ago, Tom and some co-workers decided to climb the Moléson by way of the via ferrata. (You may remember that Tom took me and Ellie on this last year.) Anyway, I wasn't about to do it again, even had I not been pregnant, so Lu, her 3 kids and I took the cable car to the top and met the guys there for lunch. It was a great view from the top and there were even para-gliders preparing for take off so we got to watch a few of them walk off the mountain and take flight. Then after a lunch of rösti, we all hiked down the mountain together.

Via Ferrata means "iron way" in Latin, and you can see the metal ladder type rungs that the guys are climbing. You are attached to the mountain via a harness and a connecting strap to a metal bar next to you, but it's still a challenging and daunting climb (at least it was for me).

On the top after a successful climb (Dave, Olivier, Michaël and Tom)

Kacey was super-excited to see her Dad and ran out from the restaurant to meet him.

Later after hiking over to watch the para-gliders take of, Kacey took time to pick some flowers. This picture conveys her "joie de vivre" to me - I love it!