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.

Ireland

We had some friends going to Ireland for vacation, so we decided to take advantage of the cheap airfare and join them for a few days. We enjoyed ourselves and had fantastic weather for our trip. Guess it made up for all the rain we had in England!

Bunratty Castle - a restored 13th century castle. We toured the castle during the day and then came back at night for a medieval banquet. They entertained us with live harp and violin music and then some singing of traditional Irish songs. For dinner, we drank our soup from the bowl and then the rest of our dinner with our fingers. It was very touristy, but fun nonetheless. The evening finished with a a guy playing the bagpipes.

Cliffs of Moher - a beautiful, though crowded vista of Irish cliffs and the Atlantic Ocean.

We took a short hike in Burren National Park. The whole area we were in on the west coast was the rockiest country I've ever seen. There were rock walls everywhere - sometimes it seemed like there were walls just to do something with all the rocks. It was pretty in its own way, but it wasn't the vivid green I expected of Ireland.

The roads in Ireland and especially this area were rough. They were narrow, very bumpy and curvy too. It was an adventure - we couldn't believe the speed limit on these roads was 60mph!

A neolithic tomb in the Burren (it dates to between 4000 and 3000 BC)

Clonmacnoise - one of the ruined monasteries we visited (it dates to 545 AD). It had some beautifully carved crosses - an example of which is seen here.

We met up with Thomas and Laura Davison on St. Patrick's Day in Dublin. Here are Tom and Thomas on their respective 6-inch diameter posts. They watched the whole parade from these vantage points. They definitely had better views than Laura and me, but our ground positions were less trying on the leg muscles.

An Irish bagpipe band.

An Irish wolfhound (at least that is what I'm assuming). There were guys carrying all sorts of random stuff on their backs made out of some sort of foam material. The guy in front of the dog is carrying a 10-12 foot boat!

The parade was full of non-Irishy things as well. This is an example. Many people dressed up in elaborate costumes and dancing around. What impressed me most about the parade was that except for a few cars, everything was propelled by manpower. A huge float would pass by and you'd see 8-10 people behind it pushing! And they did this for the entire parade.

A round tower from the second monastic ruin we visited - Glendalough (also from the 6th century.)

Glendalough means "glen of two lakes" - this is one of them. We hiked along the entire right side of it on this beautiful day!

The fanciest McDonalds I ever did see...

Newgrange - a passage tomb that is 5000 years old, and we went inside it! This mound was designed so that at the solstice, the sun would enter the tomb and shine on the floor and it still works today. You enter the internal chamber through a narrow rock-walled tunnel. And even I had to duck to get through! The tunnel takes you into a small chamber with three small alcoves off of it. The entire length is probably 1/16 of the diameter of the mound. So this huge mound was built for a teeny little chamber. And the original stone roof infrastructure is still in place - crazy to think about when you're inside standing under a 5,000 year old roof!

We were in Ireland right after all the lambs were born. They were all over the country - you could see them bounding after each other or just hanging out with mom. Tom said I pointed out every single sheep we saw, but I think that's a bit of an exaggeration. I did like seeing all the sheep, though :)

Visit to Maryland (also belated)

Tom had a business trip to Maryland last September. Since he was there for 5 weeks, I went and joined him for 2. We have quite a few friends in the area, so it was good to see them and Margaret even flew up from Atlanta to hang out for a few days! Tom enjoyed the food - he ate countless burgers and steaks while there. But mostly it was nice to catch up with some friends we hadn't seen in awhile. We even got to attend Craig and Sarah's daughter's birthday party! We also got to see Thomas and Laura a few times, but alas, no pictures to prove it.

Margaret introduced me to picking crabs in Annapolis. It was really good, but it was also a lot of work. I think I picked 1.5 in the time it took her to do the rest of them. The crab cake we got there was also delicious - I could get used to the Maryland food!

Stephanie and Matt live in the DC area, so we got to see them a few times while we were in town. Margaret, Stephanie and I met up a few times as well - this picture was taken right before Margaret flew back to Atlanta.

Visit from a fellow Techie (a little belated)

Back in September, we got an e-mail from our Tech friend, Ben. He was coming through Switzerland with a friend and wanted to see if we could coordinate a quick visit. Things worked out and he and Carolyn arrived in Fribourg at 11pm, came to our place where we ate and chatted until 2am. We then got up the next morning, had a grit casserole (a touch of home!), talked some more and got them back to the train station in time to catch the 11am train to Zurich. Though it was a quick trip, it was fun to see him and catch up a little. Carolyn and I discovered that she went to the same tiny, Christian college in Indiana as my cousins - she was surprised that I'd heard of it!

The four of us on our balcony. Looking at this picture makes me wonder if it will ever be green here again. The snow is great and beautiful, but can't compare with the lush green foliage of spring and summer.

Taking a touristy picture at the train station. We're in a hurry - that's their train pulling up to the right!