Vienna, Austria

Unfortunately, the camera stayed in the bag for most of Vienna, as we spent most of our time at the Schonbrunn Palace Zoo, in charming cafes, and in the hotel swimming pool. Here's one photo just to prove we were there (Vienna Rathaus).

Boleslawiec, Poland

Boleslawiec, the land of Polish pottery was just a short three hour drive from Prague, so Matthew and I volunteered for the expedition while Anthony, Brooke and Andrew toured Prague. We went a little crazy and this is what we came back with:

Prague, Czech Republic

Our first stop on our Christmas road trip was the beautiful city of Prague. We walked all over the old town, crossed the Charles Bridge, and sword fought all around the Pražský hrad.

Merry Christmas!

Our first Christmas without grandparents, we spent the day relaxing at home, playing with new toys, coloring, and preparing for our big road trip the next day.

Montreux

Today we took a quick trip to Montreux, near the Swiss-French border, to check out the Christmas market and the Château de Chillon. The highlight for Brooke and Andrew was the ancient potty, which drops 30 meters into Lac Léman below. If only we could get them that interested in our potty.

Christmas Tree

As promised, here's a picture of our tree with homemade ornaments. Can you guess where mommy is standing and where the DVD player was placed for this photo?

Partner's Group Christmas Party

70's theme, in case you couldn't figure it out.

Our 300 Euro Christmas Tree

We got a Christmas tree! We pulled out the adorable ornaments we spent WAY too much money on in Germany a few months ago (see Rothenburg trip), and in lieu of a star, donned our real cow bell (picked up at a flea market in Zurich this weekend). Then we boxed them all back up again as the new little "toys" proved to be too much of a temptation for our 2-yr-olds (stay tuned for photos of our cheap, unbreakable homemade ornaments).

Sledding in Arosa

We visited our friends, The Jenkins, at their adorable Swiss chalet in Arosa last weekend. We enjoyed sledding, relaxing and good company.

Here's the sledding

...and here's the relaxing

1) The boys lounging slopeside 2) Brooke, exhausted from running laps on the trampoline 3) Andrew double-fisting his newly-discovered treat: snow-dipped suckers 4) Matthew in his new expedition suit & Ashley with Emily's toasty "woolly mammoth" boots.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a nice relaxing Swiss Thanksgiving this year. They don't give time off work for obvious reasons, so we celebrated over the weekend. On Saturday we feasted with our American friends (turkey and mashed potatoes have never tasted so good) and watched the BYU game via the internet. On Sunday we explored our town on foot. We found an enormous rock, that looks like it is straight out of Stonehenge, but mostly just threw rocks, enjoyed peanut butter & honey, chased lambies and froze our little piggies.

Our little Knonau in the background

Friends

"Big Hugs"

Boots

The boot fetish is spreading!

A Beau Woodbury in the making

I think our little Matthew takes after his Grandpa. I see it most when he flashes those huge smiles, which is the way he is for most of the day. We couldn't have asked for a more easy-going, content and genuinely happy child. There is very little that can make this boy upset (tried and tested by his older brother and sister). He is a true joy to have in our family.

The end of a succesful weekend

Val Versasca

Airplanes

On the way home we stopped off at a small airfield near Val Versasca. Andrew was in heaven. We saw airplanes land and take off, a helicopter and even parachuters.

Bellagio, Italy

Lake Lugano, Switzerland

Southern Switzerland

It was a long weekend in Zug and we headed down to Lugano for a few days. We made a couple short stop-offs on the way:

Castillo di Montebello

Swiss Miniatur: model replicas of the most noteworthy places in Switzerland. A few of our favorites:
1) Anthony and Andrew in front of Old Town Zug 2) Luzern 3) Jungfrau 4) Riding the train (I've never seen all three kids so happy at the same time before) 5) Ashley and Andrew at Chateau de Chillon 6) An overall view 7) I can't remember, but it looks really cool and I hope we go see it 8) Andrew wanted to be Chick Hicks 9) Brooke was Lightning McQueen

A Swiss Halloween

Unfortunately, the Swiss don't celebrate Halloween like back in the states so we had to get a little creative with the costumes. As you can see, we didn't try too hard. We still enjoyed picking and carving pumpkins, and going to a Halloween Carnival our stake puts on for the American kids.


Brooke is supposed to be a movie star, but the feather boa and necklaces didn't last very long.

Lambies

We have some new next door neighbors! Not even the electric fence detered Brooke, who was determined to feed the lambs. (Don't worry grandparents, the voltage is very low.)

A Saturday spent in Zug

The Schaftboden playground on top of the Zugerberg. This awesome park was made to order for the mini-adventurer. The teeter-totter, tunnels and jungle-gyms are all made out of trees. There is even a zip line that unfortunately our kids were a little too little to enjoy. It was a surprisingly sunny day (albeit freezing!) and the drive to the top was gorgeous with colorful leaves and gorgeous views.

It was a little warmer underground. We drove to the Hollgrotten Caves to see 20,000 year old stalactites and stalagmites.

Happy Birthday!

Happy 2nd Birthday Kiddos!

1) An easle with art supplies will hopefully keep them entertained indoors during a Switzerland winter. (Our kellogg friends will notice that Brooke's boot novelty has not worn off) 2) Some fun wooden toys we picked up in Germany 3) Admiring wrapped presents 4) Anyone who knows me knows I can never hold out all the way when it comes to surprises, presents or celebrations. So I had to let the kiddos open up at least one present the night before. They were almost as excited about Grandma and Grandpa's birthday cards as they were their new loveys. They made us sing "Happy Birthday" about 10 times before we could put them down!

The Romantic Road, Germany

We headed up to Germany this weekend to enjoy the changing leaves and beautiful fall weather. We spent Friday and Saturday nights in an adorable old medieval town called Rothenburg and slowly made our way back home on Sunday stopping at a few more towns along the Romantic Road, including a quick visit to the Neuschwanstein castle.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Germany

Brooke is already showing signs of a promising shopaholic

Playing with leaves

Neuschwanstein Castle

Winikon Corn Maze and Petting Zoo

We drove out to Caton Luzern to take the kids to a corn maze and petting zoo. They loved feeding the cows and goats and petting the ponies. But I think their favorite part was finding all the dead ends in the maze. Andrew started to cheer every time we found one and Brooke would say, "Oh no, other way!" They spend quite a long time on this little bridge in the middle of the maze. They would hold hands and just keep going back and forth.

Everyday life in Knonau, Switzerland

(1) Playing in the sandbox in our backyard (2) Breakfast..."Annew do it" (3) We go on walks almost every day, trying to find fun places to play, or just cool scenery (see #4). I love to catch them holding hands or playing games all on their own (4) Just one of the many amazing things we see around our neighborhood (5) I am so enchanted by the beautiful homes here with real shutters and amazing window boxes (6) In the tunnel at our park (7) Playing with baby (8) Yes, that's a snake crawling across my back patio (8) Fun with crayons


(1) Holding baby (2) These kids love story time before bed. I'm not sure if they are just trying to postpone bedtime or just genuinely love it (I'm sure a little of both), but it can last for up to an hour. They pull every single book off the shelf to read. And even though they know the stories backwards and forwards from reading them so many times, they never seem to tire of them. They are now starting to read the stories to me! (3) Fun with magnets (4) Yes, we still watch "Finding Nemo" every single day (5) And sometimes "Cars" too (6) Bath time swimmming (7) Sidewalk chalk outside our apartment complex (can all our Kellogg friends recognize their sweatshirts? "We are the Kellogg Kids...") (8) Playing with our new friends (American, LDS and right next door...what a blessing!) (9) Again, in the backyard. They are getting pretty good at taking turns. "Annew's turn" "Berk's turn"