10 More Days til Christmas!

Not a whole lot going on here. Last week it snowed pretty much constantly for the majority of the week so it's rather cold still. I can't wait for April. I finally ordered a Swiss adaptor for the Wii so hopefully I will be seeing that in the mail soon. Nick and I are stoked. I spent some of this last weekend in Zug again. Heidi, Amanda, and I went to Zug fairly early Saturday in order to walk around the city and enjoy the decorations and the scenery. It's a really pretty little town with a great lake. We stayed with Jill again, who made us a delicious fondue dinner which we washed down with gluhwein (a popular warmed red wine this time of year here). Except for the semi common occurences of the house almost being burned down by children because Swiss parents let them play with things like lighters and knives and other dangerous tools, last week was fairly average. The whole family has been sick and coughing all over me and my food so inevitably I also have a bad cough right now. I am trying to get all of my Christmas vacation travel plans organized since we are only 10 days from Christmas! Right now it looks like we will be heading to Florence to celebrate Heidi's 23rd birthday. Today I was supposed to have off except for sending the kids to school in the morning but Jana and Christian decided to do some Christmas shopping together for the kids so I got to spend the afternoon home. Of course I was annoyed by this last minute change of plans that seems to happen often, especially since I am working so much this week already. I just can't wait for next week.

However, I took (or rather was forced by the kids to take) a couple of videos of the kids at the lake from this afternoon that I thought I would share. First is of Sanja, who found a crooked stick and thought it was hilarious to walk around like an old lady. I did, too actually and here is the video:



Also, the kids had so much fun with this fallen tree branch. We were down there for about an hour or so and they were playing on this branch most of the time. They would sit on it like a teeter totter and rock back and forth and they would also act like it was a horse. It was rather cool. But here is a video of Nick that is pretty funny:

Ja, Si!

I LOVED Spain.
I can't really say why exactly I liked it so much. It was wonderful being able to use Spanish a little bit and actually understand what locals were trying to say to me. I guess I just didn't feel as helpless as I do here in Switzerland. I also very much enjoyed the weather. It was December yet the sun was warm and shining every now and then. It did rain a little the Sunday we were there but it didn't last long and it was still waaaaay warmer than it is in Zurich. Except for one instance in a lame cafe with an extremely rude hostess, the people were generally pretty friendly and helpful. We even had a couple of people stop us and ask if we needed help when we were looking confused and holding a map on the streets. People in Switzerland definitely do not go out of their way to ask if you need help, they are known for their stand-offish style. The hostel we stayed in was very nice. It was clean and the staff was friendly and helpful. The three of us - Heidi, Amanda, and I - had a room to ourselves with a shared bathroom just outside our door. The hostel was also in a pretty good part of town where we only had to walk a few minutes to the main areas. We were a few blocks back from the beach and towering above us was the Castillo de Santa Barbara.
When we got into Alicante on Saturday afternoon, we checked into our hostel and found a place to get a bite to eat. I have to say that I am not a fan of Spanish food. I'm not sure what I was expecting (tacos, enchiladas, salsa, guac?) but there did not seem to be anything very unique on the menus. I did have paella one day, which is a Spanish dish, and which was probably the best thing I ate the whole trip, but this was not really anything special. I ordered a hamburger at a cafe before we left and I received two plain beef patties without any bun or vegetables and some french fries. Even the ketchup was not very good.
The three of us decided to hit the town Saturday night. Unfortunately, we did not realize that most people in Spain go out really late at night, like midnight or later, and we were already pretty tired by this point. We went to several different bars and just walked around the downtown area but were back to the hostel relatively early.
The next day we headed out to do some more sightseeing. Our goal was to go to the castle but the lift to take people up there was not working. So we decided to just walk around town instead and we actually ended up making our way up to the castle on our own. It was a little bit of a hike but it was worth it once we got to the top. We could see all of Alicante and the ocean, it was beautiful. And the castle itself was also very pretty. I wanted to go down into the dungeons to see if there were any dragons down there but unfortunately this was locked.
After touring the castle and hiking back down to our hostel, we took a little break before heading out to explore the city some more. We walked along one of the main roads near the beach. There were some really pretty parks along the way and we had fun taking many pictures. Alicante is a big tourist city and so there were not a lot of people around this time of the year. There is a big casino there but when we checked it out it was all closed, which we found odd.
Again, we went out on the town Sunday night. Amanda, Heidi, and I went to a really cool restaurant/bar. It was called Lizarran I think and it was pretty unique to anything I'd experienced. The servers brought around large platters of food with toothpicks in them and you just grabbed some when they went by. When you were finished they would add up your toothpicks and charge you this way. The food was pretty good and the atmosphere was fun. After this place closed we went back to our hostel where Heidi and I had a nice chat with some of the other people staying there as well. Amanda was having problems of her own because she had stepped in dog doodoo on the walk back and ended up getting it on her sheets.
The next day we woke up to check out of our hostel and do some more touring. We went to a few cathedrals, namely the cathedral of St. Nicolas. This was gorgeous! It was so pretty inside and very plain looking outside. We also wanted to check out this market we had heard of. After finding it, we were extremely disappointed. It was mainly just a market of fish and meats and vegetables/fruits that the locals would purchase. We were expecting more of a Saturday's Market but we were very wrong. We walked around a different part of town looking for a big mall. The mall wasn't anything special by the way. After purchasing some postcards, we sat in a little square in the middle of the city to write on them and then managed to find a post office to send them off. By this time we were really craving some gelato so we took off to find a gelateria. For some reason, we could not for the life of us find one and we ended up walking way farther than we meant to. Anyways, by the time we had gotten something to eat, we had to catch the bus back to the airport. You would think that this would be the end of the story, right? Well, not quite.
After our flight, we arrived in Basel around 22:30 and had to catch a train back to Zurich. Well, even after running with our bags all the way from the bus stop to the train gate, we missed our train by a minute. It's a good hour's train ride from Basel to Zurich and we had to wait for the next one, hoping and hoping that we would get to Zurich in time to catch the last bus to my house, which is outside of Zurich. So we got on the train and ran off as fast as we could to the tram stop that would take us to the bus stop that would take us to Maur. Well, even after running with all our stuff to the tram stop, we missed the last tram by 2 minutes. We tried running to the next tram stop to see if we could catch it but alas, we did not. We had about 6 minutes to get to my bus stop before the last bus left. After that we would be forced to take a cab to Maur which would cost more than 60 francs. Heidi then had the great idea to take a cab to the bus stop which was only a few minutes away. After scrambling around trying to find a cab, we finally got this really old lady cabdriver to take us to Klusplatz, the bus stop. We explained to her our situation and that we only had about 4 minutes. This was not the best idea since she then decided to go sooooooooo slow the whole way. We're pretty sure that she wanted us to miss our bus so that we would have to pay for her to take us all the way to Maur. We were still a block away from the bus stop when we told her we were getting out. She actually told us no but we did not care, we had a minute to get to our bus and she was stuck at a stop light! We ran to the bus stop and actually made it on time!!! It was quite the ordeal but we were very happy to not have to pay a ridiculous 60 francs. We ended up getting home at 1:30 AM and were very tired.
It was definitely worth it though. It was a fun trip and I really really want to go to Spain again! Below is a slideshow of some pictures I took of our trip! Enjoy!

Dashing through the snow

Before I go into my Spanish adventures, I wanted to talk about last week a little bit. Christmas is starting to pop up here. Last Friday, the kids and I went to a Christmas mart/open house thing at the grandparents' farm store. The shop was filled with lots of homemade Christmas decorations and there was hot apple cider and music and lights. The kids also had the opportunity to decorate a gingerbread star with different colored frostings. The grandparents have a really cool pool in their backyard which is made to look like a pond. The pool was frozen over of course and there were lots of little candles glowing on top of the ice. It was so pretty. Also, Santa Claus (I don't know how to spell it but here, they say something like Salmon Claus) and the dark man (also not sure how to pronounce or say his name) made an appearance with their donkey. They brought chocolates and peanuts for the kids. It was freezing outside so I mostly just stood by the fire drinking hot cider but it was so pretty, especially since it was dark and there were lights and candles glowing softly everywhere.



Earlier that day, I went with the kids and their grandpa to the Uster mart. Uster is right across the lake from Maur. Their grandpa speaks no English but I went along to help him with the kids. At first we just walked around one area of the mart looking at the many many tractors and boring farm equipment set up in tents. This got old fast. After that the kids had a chance to spend all their francs on dumb games where they won 10 rappen prizes. The kids had a lot of sugar that day. Each had their own huge stick of cotton candy as we were leaving...I was actually quite jealous. We were there from about 9:30 - 13:00 that day. And it was so freezing cold outside. And we were outside the whole time of course. I was layered like crazy, yet I was almost unbearably cold the whole time. At one point the grandpa realized we were all dying of cold so we went into a coffee shop and I had some tea to warm me up. Also, holding a heiss marroni (hot chestnut) helps, too. Nick and Sanja decided to go on a ride which ended up being a little faster and scarier than I think they realized. I (and the grandpa too I think) had a hard time trying not to laugh when the two kids would whiz by with increasingly terrified looks on their faces.



Last Thursday was Thanksgiving as you all know. I was extremely sad to be missing out on Thanksgiving at home this year. I really missed my family that day. It was so weird to me that it was just another day here. But I decided to educate the kids a little on the holiday so I had them make turkey hats. They love creating little arts and crafts like this and it was even funner that they could put it on their head. It was something I found online and it was a huge hit. I don't know if the kids really knew what a turkey was because they don't seem to have them in Switzerland. However, I told them that a turkey makes a "gobble gobble" noise, so the rest of that night, there were 3 turkeys gobbling all over the house (ok, 4 if you count me).



I will eventually get around to telling you all about my trip to Alicante. I have pictures to show off and stories to tell but you must have a little patience with me for now.

Another week down...

It is so weird to think that Thanksgiving is this week. I will be working. This is the first time that I will not be attending a Thanksgiving with my family in Oregon. It is even weirder because there is no feel of Thanksgiving here at all. I don't think that my family here even knows what Thanksgiving is actually. Although next weekend I will be in Spain, I hope that this week does not drag on and leave me feeling really homesick. However, I do hope that everyone back home has a great Thansgiving and eats lots of delicious food for me!

Last week was pretty uneventful. I went to a play last Monday with Heidi and Amanda. It was a play that is put on by the club that organizes the play readings we go to every week. It was called "Heroes" and the only characters are 3 old war veterans now in an old person's home and a stone statue of a dog. It was a 'gentle comedy' and I really enjoyed it. The acting was ok but I know of some family members who would have done a much more convincing job. As well as finally getting my books that I ordered in the mail, I recently received my first package from home! Thank you Grandma for sending me those slippers...I really do love wearing them!

Cody has recently purchased his ticket to come to Zurich! I am very very excited about that. He comes in the afternoon of Christmas day so unfortunately we will not really get to spend a real Christmas together. However, the Swiss do not usually celebrate Christmas like we do anyways. They actually celebrate on Christmas Eve. Heidi and I came up with the idea of possibly making our own Christmas dinner at her place since she has her own apartment. If her housemate is not going to be around. I think this would be really fun to make our own turkey and yummy American Christmas dishes.

It snowed again this weekend. I woke up Saturday morning to snow all over the ground. It was cool because throughout the day there were these crazy snow blizzards for a little while that would come on without warning and then they would suddenly stop. Unfortunately, with snow comes freezing temperatures. I hate freezing temperatures. Especially when we are walking around Zurich at night. Burr! This weekend, Heidi, Amanda, and I went out. We went to the same piano bar that Heidi and I went to one of my first weekends here. It was not as packed as it was last time but we met some new people and had a good time listening to the pianist.

Thursday of last week, I took Jaime and Sanja down to the lake since it was a relatively nice day (Nick was at therapy). But of course, right when we got down there the wind started blowing and it got very cold! But the kids had fun throwing rocks into the lake and finding sticks to 'go fishing' with. Sanja had a long stick she was using and when she had to go to the bathroom she let Jaime hold onto it for her. Of course, Jaime dropped the stick into the lake and was not able to retrieve it. (Though he tried, and I was sure he was going to fall in, I would not put it past him.) And of course, Sanja was upset when she came back. To calm things down, I told Jaime that he should find another stick for Sanja to use since he dropped hers. He took off to search the woods. A few minutes later, Sanja and I were standing on the dock and we hear Jaime calling to us. I look over and burst out laughing; Jaime was walking up the dock with this huge fallen tree branch he had found. It was so large he was having trouble carrying it, yet somehow managed to make his way over to us. And, oh! was Sanja excited! He had found her a 'stick' that was ten times better than the dinky one he dropped. I don't know who was more excited, Sanja for her new prize or Jaime for his accomplishment in carrying half a tree all the way over to us. I have a picture below of the branch but it does not look as impressive as it was in real life because it is kind of hard to see.



Also, I have another picture of Sanja on the dock by the lake. You can see her outfit consists of a jean skirt over a pair of pants and a jacket that is too large for her. She thought that it was pretty and assured me that 'this is ok'. She even asked me if it was pretty. I figured it would not hurt her to wear it and could maybe keep her warmer? She is such a little model poser:

Die, Der, Das - really, what's wrong with just one?

Good news!: I just bought my plane ticket for Alicante, Spain. The last weekend in November, I will be soaking up some sun (hopefully!). Heidi and I have not really done any traveling since Oktoberfest in Munich which was the beginning of October. I'm pretty excited for Alicante because it will be nice to understand at least a little bit better what people are saying around me. Although I don't have great Spanish skills, it will be nice to hear/speak a more familiar language.

I will be traveling to Alicante with Heidi, of course :), and Amanda who is a friend of Heidi's from her home in Kennewick, WA. Amanda just got here a week ago and is also staying here for a year as an au pair. So far she loves her host family and being an au pair. Her host parents do seem like great people. They are Argentinian and have lived there, in Memphis, and Frankfurt (and now Switzerland of course). So the whole family speaks Spanish, German, and English. I think it's cool that Amanda lives with such a cultured family. And it should be fun having another American au pair to hang out with.

This weekend was not very exciting. Friday night, I met Heidi and Amanda in Zurich for a few drinks. We showed Amanda how to take the train home and saw her off. Heidi wasn't feeling great so I was home pretty early. Saturday, I mostly just read Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and caught up on The Office and Grey's Anatomy in the morning and then met Heidi and Amanda in Zurich in the afternoon. We had dinner at a place called "Papa Joe's" which Heidi's host mom recommended for their great Mexican food. Out of the three or four options for "Mexican food" on the menu, I chose nachos. Not that they were terrible or anything, but this was probably the worst plate of nachos I've ever had. The Swiss so far have not had very good foreign food. Perhaps I'm a little biased or maybe it's just what I'm used to but Mexican, Asian, and Indian food here (that I have tried, anyways) has been pretty crappy. However, the regular Swiss or German food has always been delicious. The other day I had what was basically a sausage sliced down the middle and set in a hot pocket. And it was so good.
Anyways, after dinner at Papa Joe's, Amanda went home to hang out with her family. Probably the last thing I want to do on a Saturday night is to go home and hang out with my kids. But that's me. Heidi and I decided not to go out to bars since she was not feeling well and we were not really dressed going-out appropriate. We decided to see High School Musical 3 in a theater. Such a great movie, although I don't know many people my age besides Heidi who would appreciate it as much as I did. Oh and a weird thing about Europe: they have intermissions in movie theaters. Why? No idea, but the lights went up and we had a 10 or 15 minute break before the movie resumed. Personally, I thought it was annoying.

I do not have any pictures to post this week, sorry. Honestly, it's just been pretty uneventful in my neck of the woods lately. The highlight of my week has been checking the mail every day to see if the books I ordered recently have arrived yet. It's definitely time to do some more traveling!

"Uno!"

Well, we had fondue for dinner again. I love fondue nights....so delicious.

So, not too much excitement going on here lately. I was feeling a little under the weather most of last week so I did not do too much. Although it was Halloween on Friday, the Swiss do not feel as strongly about this holiday as I, or Americans in general, do. I didn't even dress up :( or go out :( :(.

I have just finished reading War and Peace by Tolstoy. This is quite an accomplishment because the book is over 1300 pages long and it has taken me several weeks to finish it. I love reading big books because I feel good when I am done. This was also a surprisingly intriguing read. I was a little hesitant at first but I honestly can say that it is one of my favorite books.

I don't think that I have mentioned before, but Sanja is obsessed with Uno. This is a card game for those of you who may not know what Uno is. I love card games myself but Sanja is sooo into this game! We literally sit for hours playing this game. The boys are really poor sports when it comes to playing games so they do not participate very often. (This is something I will have to remember to write about some other time.) Sanja can handle losing, unlike her brothers, however she is actually really good at the game. She definitely wins more than I do. And I don't even let her! After every session we finish, Sanja will inevitably shout "One more!" Every...Single...Time...
Sanja is fascinated with my shuffling abilities and I have tried showing her how. Unfortunately, her 5 year old hands are not quite large enough to hold onto the cards while shuffling/bridging. But we do take turns with dealing.

I thought I would put up a few pictures of our couple of snow days last week. The snow lasted for 2 or 3 days and it's pretty much all gone now. It still seems so crazy to me that it wasn't even Halloween yet and we had snow all over the place!
Anyways, here are some pictures of the snowman Jaime and I made. Also, a picture of Nick building a lump of snow on the little hill in their backyard for the sled to jump over.

Buurrr....

Circumstances have made it possible for me to come up with another justification of purchasing an umbrella: snow. That's right - it snowed yesterday. In the afternoon snow started coming down, mostly just mixed with rain, but then it didn't stop snowing until sometime early this morning. So now there is actually a blanket of snow on the ground. In October! It is not going to stay because it's still too early but I am so glad that I had my umbrella with me last night when I was waiting for the public transportation.

It's funny because the first thing that I thought when I saw it snowing outside was "I wonder if my class will be cancelled?" Then I remembered that I am in Switzerland...classes are not cancelled because of a tiny amount of snow that doesn't even stick to the roads, unlike Oregon. So, I trudged off to my German lesson anyways. I had a horrible bike ride to and from the bus stop though. It was so cold and I was trying to hold up my umbrella as I was riding, with my bag of books on one shoulder, so that the rain and snow didn't keep hitting me in the face as I was riding along, which really hurts! I found myself wishing once again that the bus would just come right to my house's doorstep. I hate the cold.

I thought that the first snowfall of the season is pretty significant so I took some pictures from windows in different parts of the house.

Aargh!

I know that you all have been extremely disappointed in my lack of blog posts lately but honestly, I have not had much to write about. The last week of the kids' vacation from school was pretty uneventful. Daylight Savings was this last Sunday so now it gets dark around 5:00ish which is a bummer. The weather has turned a lot colder and rainier than what it has been all of this month. One thing that I am still trying to get figured out is the temperature in Celsius ... another one of my goals is that by the time I leave Switzerland, I will be able to understand this crazy measurement of temperature.

Fun Fact: I now own my first umbrella ever. As a true blue Oregonian, I have scoffed at the umbrella previous to living in Switzerland.
Since I am taking public transportation almost everywhere I go, it is just more convenient to use an umbrella. There are not covered areas at every bus and tram stop so when it's pouring down rain and I have a half hour to wait for the next bus/tram, the umbrella is a good friend. Also, since it's a good 15-20 minute walk from my house to the nearest bus stop, an umbrella comes in handy when it's pouring then, as well. So it's official: I am an umbrella user.

To add a little imagery for this post, I will talk about a project that I did with the kids last week. We made an ocean aquarium out of an old box, string, and paper. Sanja contributed Ariel and Flounder as you can sort of see in the picture, Nick made the blowfish, Jaime made one of the octopi (is that right?). Anyway, the picture of our creation is seen below.



The kids were on a pirate/ocean frame of mind all week. One night, I went out to eat with the family. This is a huge deal. Eating out is super expensive here (for example, I spent $30 on a hamburger and coke last week...accidentally...but that's another story). I don't think there was any special occasion behind this event but the family, the grandmother and I drove about an hour away to Kaptan Jo's. I debated going and I am soooooo glad that I did. There are three kinds of fondue - cheese, oil, and bouillon - which I have just recently learned. This place had bouillon fondue and it was my first time I tried this. It was amazing. SO GOOD! The pots were full of a bouillon broth and we would dip in thin slices of frozen meat and vegetables for a few minutes until they were cooked. Then there were six different sauces you could choose to dip your meat or veggies in. These sauces were so good and made the meal, in my opinion. We were also served french fries to use with the sauces as well. After the dinner, I had the leftover broth, which they filter, mixed with some sherry for dessert. This was actually pretty good, too even though it sounds very weird.

This place was decked out as a ship on the ocean. The chandeliers were fish bowls with actual fish inside hanging over our table. This was really cool. Also, every night, the ship encounters a "storm". Everyone goes downstairs to a bar-type area where it's a little darker. All of a sudden it gets really dark and smoke starts billowing out of somewhere. A fake rat slides up and down this long rope on the ceiling. There are loud sounds of waves crashing and in the windows is a screen that shows the ocean is very tumultuous. Then, get this!, the walls and tables actually start to move and sway back and forth. No joke! The place was built with moving walls and floors! It only lasted about 5 minutes but it was a really fun thing to experience.
This dinner was the highlight of my week.

Swiss Catholic Potlucks

So you've heard of coffee and rolls, right? After church everyone goes into the cafeteria for a doughnut and a cup of coffee or hot chocolate. Well, let me tell you about "Coffee" as it's called here. I don't think I've mentioned previously that this is a Catholic church in Zurich that has an English mass. I think the church is called St. Anton and it's really really pretty, very cathedral-like. I've really enjoyed the priests, too, who have all been British up until today (there was a guest priest performing the mass from Africa today). Anyways, last week I went to the Saturday night mass where they announced that the coming Sunday morning mass would involve "Coffee" afterwards. I thought that I should go to the Sunday morning mass this week to check it out thinking that there would be coffee and maybe some bread or pastries. Heidi even came with me this week which was really cool since she is not Catholic and I appreciated the company. So after mass, we headed into the forum next door and holy coffee! we were surprised at the amount of food that was laid out. Not only was there coffee and bread, but there was cookies, quiches, cobblers, fried rice, African doughnut hole-type things, pumpkin bread, chocolate chip bread, rolls, soups, chips, chicken wings, spaghetti, brownies, several other foods from other cultures that I don't know the name of but that were delicious, etc etc etc!!!! It was amazing. It wasn't like coffee and rolls, it was like a huge potluck after mass! Heidi and I went back for seconds because we wanted to try everything since it all looked so good and there was so much of it. I thought this was really really cool and something I have not experienced in this way before. Definitely great motivation for getting me up early on a Sunday morning for church!

Just to mention a little bit about my week. Thank goodness there's only one more week left of the kids' school vacation. One day I had to work from 7:30 in the morning until around 7:30 at night! Needless to say, it was a long Friday. Also, thankfully the weather has stayed really nice. The fall is a beautiful season in Switzerland, we've had an amazing October so far. On one of the longer days last week, I piled the kids up with some firewood and a bag of marshmallows and headed down to the lake. We made a fire (after quite an effort) and roasted some 'mallows. I've mentioned the marshmallows they have here before and I took a picture of them so that you can see that they are a little different than ones that we have in the States.








Although we've had great weather almost every day, there was one day last week that just poured down rain. I had the kids most of the day, of course, and they were pretty restless. However, I decided to do something with them to coincide with the Halloween season. We made bats! As you can see in the last picture above, the kids did a great job. Haha, I especially like Sanja's pink and purple bat and Nick's "scary" bat with a huge smiling red mouth bigger than the face. The kids loved this and it killed a couple of hours for me.

I have tomorrow off because I am working so much again this week. If anyone has any ideas of fun, entertaining ways to distract the kids during really long days, just let me know. I would love any suggestions!

It's Fall Time in CH

I had a pretty interesting week last week. It was the start of the kids' three week long vacation from school and kindergarten. (Side note - usually this break is only 2weeks but this year the teachers all have to attend some sort of conference or classes for a week so the kids just get an extra week off!) Jana took off last week from work so that she could enjoy some time with the kids. This was nice for me to have her around all the time because the kids tend to behave better when a parent is here. Also, I didn't have to work quite as many hours last week...however, the downside to this is that for the next 2 weeks, I am spending A LOT more time with the kids. I just hope that we continue having as nice of weather as we have had all last week.
Since we have been having such great weather, last Thursday, Jana and I took the kids on a hiking trip. We went to a place called Braunwald and it's about an hour away from the house. I debated going on this hiking trip because I could have had the day to myself but I am so glad that I decided to go. Although it was a pretty tiring trip (hiking with 4 kids all 7 years old or younger is not an easy thing) the kids did a good job most of the way. We took a couple of lifts up to the top of the mountain and walked down. I can't even begin to describe the amazing views. The place was so gorgeous and everywhere we looked there were huge mountains looming all around us. We stopped for lunch on the way down...there are fire pits set just off the path in a few places. This was handy, we put our sausages on the grill like everyone else and soon were eating a great traditional Swiss meal. The kids' cousin Sherin joined us on the hike. She is Sanja's age and they are good friends. I love Sherin because she is such a good little girl. She's pretty quiet especially compared to the Berger children. Even though she doesn't speak English I really like having her around. It was good for Sanja to have her there because the twins have each other to play with but Sanja is left out sometimes...her brothers often try to antagonize her. I also have to mention the ice cream we had when we reached the bottom of the mountain. It was delicious! It consisted of a scoop of chocolate and strawberry ice cream with these long and skinny pieces of chocolate, about as long as a toothpick but thicker. And there weren't just a few pieces....there were tons of them in the bowl! So good!!
On Friday, I took the boys up the woods across from our house on a little hike. The grandparents live up the hill a ways and it's about a half hour hike through the woods to grandmother's house we go.... It's a pretty hike and not difficult at all. It would take an average adult about 15 or 20 mins to do it. We stopped along the way where a bunch of these flower/bushes were growing on the side of the path. The boys showed me how cool they were. If you lightly press on the bud, which is closed, the petals spring up and shoot out seeds at you! It's the coolest thing! It actually scared me the first time I tried it because I thought the plant was trying to eat my fingers. I have attached a video of the popping of these buds below because I think it's so neat.



When we got to the grandparents' farm, the boys played around while I went inside with "Muerti" as they call her for some coffee. Unfortunately she does not speak English very well and so it was a little bit awkward when just the two of us were having a cup o' joe. We tried to start a conversation but since neither of us speak the others' language, it did not last long. This is unfortunate because I would really like to get to know Muerti better. After coffee, I went outside to watch the boys and the grandfather make apple cider. The boys would throw the apples into the machine and watch them get ground up. Then the juice would pour out and the boys would help with replacing the bucket when it got too full. I took the picture of Nick below in the apple cart collecting more apples to make cider.



Another fun thing that I did with the kids outdoors last week was collected chestnuts. Here these are called "maronnis" and there are many roasted chestnuts sold all over the city in little stands. The kids love these, which I thought was kind of a weird thing for little kids to like. I actually had my first roasted chestnut the other day when I went to Zurich with Jana and the kids. I was a little surprised at the taste of them, I thought that they tasted like potatos. But I digress. The kids took me to an area down by the lake in their backyard to a big chestnut tree. They filled up quite a few sacks of chestnuts. You can see them in their work below. On the way up to the grandparents' the other day, the boys were collecting acorns from a big oak tree, too. They love to collect random nuts.





After my German lesson last Wednesday, it was pouring down rain. Jana was in the city as well for a work thing and offered to pick me up. I, of course, accepted since I did not want to swim my way home at 11 o'clock at night. Jana then asked me if I was tired or if I wanted to go out for a beer when I got in the car. I definitely wanted a beer, so Jana took me to the local bar in Maur. It was a Wednesday night in a small town so the bar was not quite "hoppin'". The typical people were there, older lonely men. Jana left me to talk with a few men who spoke English. They were pretty funny and had lots of questions for me. I think that a lot of people here like to speak English as practice. One of the men I was talking with had been a banker so we talked about this common interest for awhile. Another guy had been born in the States but moved to Switzerland when he was 6. He had not been back since, except for a trip to Hawaii, and that was in the '70s but he still had very good English and not much of an accent. He still holds dual citizenship for the States and CH. I was complimented on my English accent by one of the men. Apparently, since I am from the Northwest, I am very easy to understand because my English is so standard, "unlike someone from Texas or North Dakota" as I was told.

As you can see, I had a pretty fun week. I just hope that the next couple of weeks are as eventful.

Hiking in the Swiss Alps!

Dirndl Dirndl Dirndl!

Wow. I wish I had taken a picture of the mountains today. I tried to yesterday but it was dusk and the Alps were too far away to be seen well. They were looming above the house and you could see them so clearly the last couple of days....they're just amazing! We've had some pretty awesome and rather warm sunny days over the last few.

You know what else was pretty cool? My weekend in Munich at Oktoberfest. Ok, technically I was only at the actual Oktoberfest area for a couple of hours all weekend. This is because Heidi and I didn't believe it when people told us you had to either spend tons of money on reservations for a table in the beer tents way in advance or you had to get there before 7 or 8 in the morning in order to even get in for a few hours. As we now know, this is very true. We tried our best to get into a tent but it was not happening, we went too late in the day. It was also fa-ree-zing! But we did get a half meter long bratwurst while at the fest and it was delicious!

One of the reasons why we were so late in arriving at the Oktoberfest was because Heidi and I were determined to find dirndls. What is a dirndl, you may ask? Well, these are the traditional German dresses that girls wear, similar to the traditional German leiderhosen that boys wear. Almost everyone were wearing the traditional German garb and we definitely wanted to get in on that action. Although the dresses were a little on the spendy side, we wore them and were proud. They are a great souvenier and I absolutely plan on wearing mine again. We went to an area of Munich where there were tons of little shops and where only pedestrians were allowed. This was fun because it gave us a chance to see more of Munich than just the Oktoberfest.





It was kind of funny because we found our drindls in a regular looking department store, like a Macy's in Munich. There was a whole section with tons of dresses, little shirts, and aprons which make up a drindl. Even people who were not at the Oktoberfest but who were just walking around Munich in random places were wearing drindls and leiderhosen, so drindl sellers must make quite a profit.

Heidi and I are being very German in this picture! Heidi of course looks like the most typical German/Swiss girl in her drindl. We started the night off on our own visiting a couple of bars and cafes because it was so cold outside and since we were camping for the weekend, it was definitely warmer in a bar than back at our tent.

On our train ride to Munich we sat by a group of guys from Switzerland who were also going to the Oktoberfest. We talked the whole train ride and actually learned a Swiss card game called "Ciao Sep" which is basically the same as Uno. On Saturday night, we met up with a few of the Swiss guys and a girl from Brazil. We went to an Irish pub where there were tons of people from all over the world. We had a lot of fun talking to all different types of people. One of the Swiss guys took a special liking to Heidi and luckily for us he helped us get a cab for the trip back to our tent which was way on the other side of Munich.

Sunday morning we woke up and planned on doing some sightseeing. We hopped on a tram and worked our way through the city to a few areas that seemed appealing to us. We did really well with the public transportation, I am proud of our progress. There are some really really neat old buildings in Munich (see pic of old builiding). There are some pictures below of the places we visited. One of my favorite spots was this big courtyard garden area where people were walking around and some people were playing bocci ball. It reminded me of a garden where female characters in one of Jane Austen's books would walk with a beau (see pic of trees). It happened to be an amazingly sunny and warm day (especially compared to the snowy and cold one previous) so there were tons of people out. We ended up eating at this German restaurant. It was ok but we were almost late for getting back to the main station to catch a train because the waitress took her time in getting our check. One thing I noticed about eating out here is that people take a lot longer to eat. It isn't like get in, get out, and next customer like in the States. The train ride back was pretty fun since we sat with the Swiss guys we met on the way up to Munich. They were very loud and boisterous since they had been at the Oktoberfest all day and were continuing their drinking on the train.

The TENT was the area that we camped out at. There were hundreds of tents all over this big area. It was a fun place and it had bathrooms and washing machines and a cafeteria so we weren't completely destitute. We got into the place around 11 or 12 on Friday night and had to set up the tent in the dark. I think that it would be a really cool place to go in the summer especially, when it isn't practically snowing, because it's cheap and could be lots of fun with friends. The food in the cafeteria was good and cheap so we didn't have to spend a lot of money on food throughout the weekend, which was really nice.

I definitely had tons of fun this last weekend in Germany. It was nice to get away for a few days but I am still pretty tired from the trip. Unfortunately, Swiss kids have a 3 week break from school starting this week, so I will be having to deal with them a lot more than usual. Jana has this week off from work so I have a little bit of help with her around more but the next 2 weeks, I will be in charge of the kids all day, every day. Yikes!

I'm Really Into Vampires Right Now

Tonight I go to Zurich for my second German lesson. I have just completed my hefty load of homework and even listened to a little bit of the CDs that come with the textbooks. There's this really sweet rap song all about German greetings that we listened to in class last week and I was dying to hear it again....;) I also acquired a CD of the Rosetta Stone for German, which is basically a teach-yourself-a-foreign-language program, before I left the States. I am going to try to start using it more because it's supposed to be a really good program and I definitely need all the help I can get. I forgot to mention in my last post that there are actually two other au pairs in my class. One is from Canada and the other I am not sure about, but she did have an accent so I'm fairly sure she is from another European country. There are also quite a few Indians in the class, as well as someone from Portugal, Chile, and a few other countries, so it's quite a mix of nationalities. The teacher generally speaks German of course but when he is not speaking German he switches to English. Which I am rather thankful for.

Heidi and I have been trying to meet some new people here. I think that we have been doing fairly well so far considering that we don't know very many places to go to meet people or know German. However, last night we met in Zurich to meet up with another au pair from Latvia who Heidi had been talking to online. Well, Heidi and I show up where we say to meet but no Latvian au pair. We were stood up. Maybe she had a good excuse, who knows. The place we chose to meet was the Hauptbahnhof, or the main station. We were surprised to find tons of people gathered around an area with a large dance floor and a bunch of musicians. As we walked around the area we found two long lines of people, all with their hair done up, all wearing fancy clothes, all carrying large bouquets of flowers, and - now this is the kicker - all wearing long black capes! Heidi and I decided they were either there for a vampire graduation or they were teachers at Hogwarts. What other explanation was there? We took a few pictures of them, as did tons of other people since there was a huge crowd curious to see what was going on. As we watched, the lines then filed onto the dance floor and the vampires/Hogwars professors started doing some kind of waltz or other fancy dance I can't do or name. The musicians all started playing and there was a conductor waving his baton. They were also being filmed. Heidi and I were a little confused as to what was going on there in the train station but Jana told me later that it was a big symphony. Random? Yes, very.

One more thing I wanted to mention. Monday night is one night of the week that a group of English speakers get together in a little church in Zurich to read through a play. Heidi and I decided to see what this was all about. We actually tried going the week before but could not find the place because the directions given to us were not very good and it's a little ways off the main streets. But this week we found it. I was surprised to see that a good number of people were there. They were all very friendly, too. The reading started at 8 but people got there a half hour earlier to drink some wine and chat. Most of the people were British but there were a few Americans, too. The play that was performed/read was a little different - I can't remember the name of it but it was something about 2 violas and it was set mainly in Milwaukie. At the end of the play, there was a short discussion. I thought that all the actors were only mediocre excluding one man who was really great. He was one of the main characters and I could tell that he definitely knew what he was doing. This club was something that reminded me of my talented extended family of performers and I plan on attending another session.

This weekend is my trip to Munich for the Oktoberfest! Heidi and I are going together and we plan on camping out (pray for nice weather for us!!). We will be there from Friday to Sunday evening and are traveling by train. I am very excited because this will be my first official trip!

Life Lessons and German Lessons

Another week down in Switzerland. I have officially been here for four weeks today. It's weird because it sometimes feels like I have been here for a lot longer but then again, it doesn't really feel like a month has passed since I have been home. I have realized that I think I have already learned so much from being here. First of all, one of the most important things I've learned is that the first 2 or 3 weeks really are the hardest part. How many times did I call home crying to my mom or to Cody? (Not to say that I don't still do this every now and then, I mean come on, you probably know me better than that.) But now I definitely feel like I have more of a place here. I do not feel completely lost all the time, I am now pretty confident in the transportation system and the pointing and making random noises to communicate to people who only speak German. Another thing I have learned is that I went to a really challenging university. I say this because I was so surprised at my first German lesson and the amount of homework we received. The homework consisted of a single worksheet of about 10 or 15 multiple choice questions. I mean, really??? Apparently this is just how the classes are here, Heidi said that hers is the same way. I just hope that it is going to be challenging enough for me to learn the language. I came in to the 5th class, but I'm sure that I will catch up in no time because they seem to go at a very slow pace.

Speaking of not knowing any Deutsch, this weekend I went to a cow show in Maur. Yes, that's right...a COW SHOW. As in Miss America but for cows. I thought that Stayton was a fairly typical country town, but you should see Maur. The farmers here are very serious about the competition for the prettiest cow. In the picture here, the cows that are lined up are some of the contestants for this competition. Which one would you have voted for?

Because of this cow show, I had to work on a Saturday. Christian and Jana were in charge of serving food to all the people who showed up. However, my job was kind of pointless here since the kids just ran off with their friends and played with each other. So I basically just wandered around looking at cows for 4 or 5 hours. It is really unfortunate that I don't speak German yet because I would love to be able to speak to a lot of the people here. Especially when I am in a group of Jana and Christian's friends who I think are pretty cool, the ones who have spoken to me in English anyway, but I am always completely lost in the conversation. And no one bothers to translate for me, which is understandable because that would just be annoying for everyone. But I definitely find it hard to build personal relationships with people who I would really like to.

For instance, as I was eating my lunch by myself in the little tent at the cow show when this guy, about my age and wearing his cow gear (big green rubbery pants and a sweatshirt and cap) sat down next to me and started talking to some other people across from him. After awhile, he turned to me and said something in German. I had no idea of course what he said and I pretended not to hear him (yes, I know, it was mean but it's frustrating having to say that I don't speak Deutsch, especially in Maur where people usually don't know English). I waited a few more minutes then got up to leave in case he tried speaking to me again. I then walked around the place a to a completely different spot outside of the tent to watch the cows. After a few minutes there, I turned around to see the guy standing next to me again! He said something else in German and this time I had no choice but to just smile apologetically and say "I don't speak Deutsch...English?" He said something else in German and walked away. Apparently he didn't speak English which I was kind of sad about. I could have had a friend to talk to but the whole language barrier prevented this.

Above and below are a few pictures of Lucerne. This is a pretty touristy city about an hour train ride from Zurich. It was also very pretty. I decided to visit Lucerne since I had Friday off and was feeling like getting out of town. The city had lots of little shops and I walked around this area for awhile. There was a lake right in the middle, just like Zurich and there were huge mountains on one side of the city and gorgeous hills on the other side. I took a few pictures of the mountains but they did not turn out so well since they were farther away and it was a pretty dark and cloudy day. I also went to Lucerne because I heard about a Picasso gallery there. I decided to check this out and actually found the place all on my own! I was pretty proud of myself. The art gallery was really cool, tons of Picasso's stuff. There were also a few Monet paintings and some of my favorite paintings there were by Pierre Auguste Renoir. I only had about 45 minutes to look around since I came pretty late and they were closing soon. But I was glad that I went, it was very peaceful walking around by myself, but also a little lonely.

This weekend, Heidi and I decided to venture out to experience the Zurich night life by ourselves. We were a little unsure because we had no idea where to go or what to do. We went to a couple of different bars but they were not too exciting. We eventually wound up at this fun little piano bar where the pianist was American and was playing all English songs. Most of the music was either Billy Joel, Elton John, a few songs from Dirty Dancing, and some other oldies. Here we ran into a couple of people from Boston. We knew that the man and woman were American because we heard them order at the bar. We started talking to the woman and learned that they were just in Zurich for the night and were headed down to Milan to meet their family for vacation. They were very nice and after having a drink with them, they went back to their hotel and we wished them luck on their journey south. We then started talking to a couple of guys from Zurich. After awhile we went to another smaller and much smokier bar with them. This was fun, too but the bar had horrible ventilation and the smoke was stinging my eyes so that I could hardly keep them open. Heidi and I decided we were hungry and wanted left with one of the guys to find a kebab place. At this point, I really missed good old Taco Bell. For just a little kebab it was almost 9 francs and this was the cheapest thing on the menu. After eating, we realized that it was almost 5:30 in the morning! We were amazed at how late it had gotten without us realizing it. Last weekend we also stayed out in a town called Zug until 4:30 am and I couldn't believe that we had done it again! I thought I was too old for this! We caught the train back to Heidi's city where we had to spend another hour sleeping in the women's bathroom since the next bus to her stop didn't come until 7:15 am! We were exhausted and freezing so the bathroom was the best place for us to wait.

One last thing that I have learned so far: If you are going to stay out all night, stay out until at least 7 am when the buses then start to arrive regularly.

Lions and Tigers and Barry!

Since I have not written anything all weekend, I have quite a few topics to choose from just for you, dear readers. To start, Jaime and Nick had their 7th birthday on Friday! This was a very exciting day for them. In the evening, their aunt, uncle, grandmother and cousins unexpectedly stopped by with some gifts. I was glad that their aunt spoke English because the grandma does not. I think that their aunt is Spanish because she was speaking this language to her daughter. Her daughter, by the way, was probably only about 3 years old and had the curliest hair! It was perfect tight ringlets! I was surprised at how glad I was when I heard them speaking Spanish because I am used to not knowing what people are saying around me when they speak in a foreign language. But I could actually figure out what they were talking about and this made me feel more comfortable.

The next day was the birthday party. Oh my! I have quite a few pictures that you can view on picasaweb. But I wanted to put a few on here for those of you who are not as computer literate as others..... :)

This is the family's little cabin up in the woods by their house. It does not look very nice here but it is actually a pretty neat little cabin. It is very small but there are picnic tables and a fire pit and a huge field for kids to run around. The walk up there took about 20-30 minutes with all the kids but a normal person could have done it a lot faster than this.

One nice thing about this day was that Rachel, another au pair for my host family's friends in Basel, joined us. She is from Salt Lake City and actually lived in Dallas, OR for awhile. She is the same age as me and came to Switzerland about a week after I got here. I enjoyed her company and we plan on doing some traveling together.

The food was delicious at the boys' party. Jana and Christian (in the picture) barbequed ribs that were very good! They also had sausage, of course!, and bread rolls. I tried this darker colored roll, which turned out to be some sort of pretzel but in a dinner roll form. I loved it!

There was also plenty of candy to go around. Chocolate francs and SpongeBob candy. After most of the kids walked back to where their parents could pick them up, I stayed at the little cabin with another family friend and her two kids. On a side note, I actually was originally supposed to look after these two, Kaisja and Noah, as well as the 3 Bergers but right before I got to Switzerland, Jana decided 5 kids was too much for one person. She was definitely right. As I was saying, when I stayed behind with these two kids and Sanja, Mia (the mother of the 2) pulled out a huge bag of marshmallows. The marshmallows here are a little different than in the States. They are flavored and colorful and differenty shaped. (But they are still very good, I actually prefer them to the white ones!) We decided to roast these marshmallows with the little bit of fire we had left going. Apparently roasting marshmallows is a worldwide thing.

I was a little upset when we started eating. I had just gotten my ribs hot off the pit and Barry who is seen here (the huge bear-like dog) decided to grab the ribs right off my plate! I was so sad because there were only a few ribs left, so I got a smaller portion the second time. Grrr!

Barry, who is the grandparents' dog, is the biggest one I have seen in Switzerland! And the friendliest, cuddliest, most lovable one, too! He's very gentle, you don't have to worry about him hurting the little kids. It's hard to tell from the picture how big he actually is but you can see that even 2 year old Isabel, who is probably a quarter of his size, loved him!

This was a surprisingly fun way to spend a relatively nice Saturday in Maur. It was also good to meet some of Jana's friends, mainly because they can speak English and I am just happy to hear my own language!

Deer, blood sauce, and dinnertime in Switzerland

Well, another day done. Thank goodness.
After a pretty busy day consisting of a lot of arguing with the children, I am quite exhausted. I was allowed to sleep in for a few extra hours this morning but I chose to accompany Jana to one of the few wholesale stores nearby. I'm not really sure why I thought that giving up my much needed extra sleep was less important than going to a grocery store similar to Winco or Costco, but that's what I did. It was kind of different and I want to experience everything I can, so the trip wasn't pointless. As for the differences, even the wholesale store that supposedly sells in bulk here still did not compare to what I, as an American, would consider bulk. Everything here comes in smaller portions, there is not an option to buy bigger most of the time. Probably one reason why Americans are overweight and the rest of the world is not. The store that we went to is not actually open for most of the public, but since Christian is in gastronomy (as in restaurant or food), Jana gets a card that allows her to use the store. I thought it was cool how, when customers reached the register, they just left their carts there for the cashier to ring up for them while they sat down in this bar/coffee shop area where people are offered free coffee and/or pastries for a small price. This place is meant as a place for customers, who would have had to wait in line for awhile, actually be able to sit and enjoy themselves for a few minutes while their hundreds of francs worth of products are rung up. Once you are finished with your coffee, your cart is probably done by this time and you proceed to another register to pay, but no rush. One thing that Jana had in mind to buy when we went to this store was deer meat. It's deer hunting season right now and this store has huge buckets of no less than 10 kilos of deer. That's a lot of deer chunks! Jana also purchased a lot of sausage and other meat as well as some bread rolls and croissants; which, by the way, is usually what we have for dinner almost every night. I actually love this meal choice and am often a little disappointed on nights when dinner is something else for a change. Bread, cheese, butter, and sausage/meat is all I need for me to be happy! But I have been trying everything here (regarding food) no matter how weird or different it looks and I am usually pretty happy that I do. About a week or so ago, Christian had deer in this dark sauce that was so good. When I told him how much I loved the sauce and asked what it was, he explained that it was a mixture of several things, mainly including blood. Ugh. Just call me Miss Cullen. But, really, it was so good!
After this little outing, I had to clean the bathroom and shower downstairs. Jana helped me out and showed me how so that next week I will do it on my own. Yay. The kids came home from school soon after and Jana left for work. Then it was just me and the kids again. Not a great day in this department: Jaime was being difficult as usual when it came to homework, or really anything else for that matter. Sanja and Nick were also feeling a little obnoxious today which never helps me. I think they see how Jaime acts and try to copy his attitude. Which I would love way more if the opposite were happening. Tomorrow will be another long day but TGIF is all I can say.

Swiss Babes

Get ready, folks! Here it is! What you all have been waiting for!

Finally, my blog on life, love, and all the drama in the fabulous town of Maur, Switzerland. I am working through my third week in Maur as an au pair for the Berger family. I thought to start out my blog, I should provide you, dear readers, with a glimpse of the many different personalities that this family entails.

To start with, the "Swiss Babes" include Nick and Jaime, who are (as of this Friday, I think) 7 year old twins. They are fraternal in appearance as well as in personalities and demeanor. By this I mean that Nick is the one I can trust. Not to say that Jaime is a little devil but he generally is just a little bit out of control, pretty much all the time. For example, last Friday I was in charge of getting the kids off to school. The school bus comes around 8 a.m. and I usually have them out there completely ready to go about 5 mins before. For whatever reason, this Friday morning Jaime decides to throw the biggest temper tantrum I've ever seen in my life and runs upstairs into the attic while the bus is waiting outside for him! I tried coaxing him out for about 5 minutes, without any gain since Jaime refuses to listen to me speak English half the tme when he is not throwing a tantrum-let alone when he is screaming his head off at me, then realized how ridiculous it all was . . . time to bring in the big guns. I forced myself to wake up Christian (the father who usually sleeps in because he works late) to practically throw Jaime out the door. Needless to say, no one in this situation was very happy that morning.

As I said earlier, Nick is usually the kid that I can trust to be obedient and honest and do things on his own without me telling him 29 times like I have to do with the other two. Unless it comes to watching t.v. or Harry Potter or eating only sweets (we are very similar). However, he too almost sent me down to drown myself in the lake in the backyard just yesterday. How can a 6 year old push me so far over the edge, you ask? By locking himself in the trunk of a car that has a key to the lock of the trunk that DOES NOT WORK! I have no idea how he managed to get the trunk opened, squeeze himself in there, and actually closed. But I do know that he definitely managed it somehow. After a few minutes of trying to turn the key every which way I could, I soon had all three kids literally freaking out on me. Jaime was crying and running around, so scared for his brother. Nick started crying in the back of the trunk because he realized how stupid a decision that was. And Sanja, who was the most calm child was still almost in tears herself, watching helplessly. After a good 10 or 15 minutes, Nick was finally able to push the cover of the trunk up from the inside and crawl out over the backseat. Of course, at this point we were also 10 minutes late for his appointment that we were headed to in the first place.

Now for the last "Swiss Babe" I will mention today. Sanja is five years old and has an extremely strong personality. Probably so she can keep up with her brothers. She does not like being told no and is quite the little bargainer. If I say "5 more minutes to play Sanja," she will undoubtedly try to swindle at least a few more minutes. However, we also have a lot in common: we both love high heels, we both love jewlery, we both love princesses, and we both love makeup. If there wasn't a 17 year difference, we could probably be best friends! Sanja is also the one who will consistently speak English to me. Where the boys usually don't unless I force them to, Sanja is much better with English, probably just because she practices more.

I could go on and on about the crazy and ridiculous things these children have done but perhaps I will save those for later posts . . . I just wanted to give you a little teaser of what I can expect from this family in the coming months. Also, below is a picture of the house that I live in and a picture from the city of Zurich (about 15 mins from Maur) when I was checking things out there with Heidi a few weekends ago.