Berdorf, Luxembourg

On Monday we went to Luxembourg to a region called "Little Switzerland". And it certainly lives up to its name. It was incredibly beautiful. We went hiking everyday and in the evenings we rode the bus into the nearby town called Echternach. The amount of nature in this area was amazing. Having lived in the densely populated country of Belgium for two years, we get used to going places and there always being people around. But on these trails, for some reason, we seldom saw anyone. It was like heaven and Rowan could pee anywhere at anytime. It was a potty training dream. Here are a few photos from the trip. They are in random order.

The colorful mailbox.




There were huge slugs everywhere and they seemed to travel in pairs. Do they mate for life? I wonder . . .













While walking in Berdorf, the little town we were staying in, we stumbled across a mini golf course. It was nothing like the courses in Florida. Instead of little greens they had cement slabs with big puddles in parts of them. Also, during the first and third holes, Rowan decided it was a good time to take a poo-poo in his pants. That kid has perfect timing and knows just the trick to throw us off our game!

Visitors . . .

This week Phyllis, Bob and Emily came to visit us. It is always good to have some friendly faces from home drop by and say hello. We got a babysitter Saturday night and got a chance to go out for a meal, get some ice-cream and get a drink in the Oude Markt.






Phyllis being in town means that there are a lot of activities for Rowan. One of them being Phyllis and Rowan coloring the letters of the alphabet on little squares and hanging them on the wall. Rowan seemed a lot more into his snack than into coloring.

England

We spent a week in England. For the first few days we were in Canterbury. It was a great town. Of course we spent most of our time at the park but it was still fun. The weather was perfect.

I snuck this photo of these two guys. I was totally amazed that they were dressed like they were from the Great Gatsby. Is this the style of the future returning to us from the past?


A pint of Kentish ale. I appreciate that they fill it to the brim.

A local church.

Fish and chips.

When Colby and I graduated we both went to L'abri. He in the summer of '98 and I in the fall. Rowan and I had a chance to go back for a few days and play on their beautiful lawns and gardens while Colby went up to Liverpool for another conference.






Rowan's eminem pose . . .

the longest day of the year.

Leuven celebrates the summer solstice by closing off the main streets and having a carnival of sorts. There are no rides, just tons of booths, food and entertainment. People dress up in all sorts of costumes. For example, there was a guy on stilts dressed up like a spider. The first photo is of the spider man freaking Rowan out and the second is Rowan getting scared. Rowan continues to talk about the scary spider all day.


There was traditional dancing.


Our wanna-be manikin piss was dressed up for the festivities.


We had to stop at the park for Rowan to go head first down the slide. Why does he fear the spider man and not a possible head injury?

There are always opportunities during these events to score some free stuff. One of the things we picked up this year was a cover for your bike seat. Rowan insisted on wearing it.

Colby continues to create incredibly delicious meals. This one he made the other day and I thought it was a pretty nice presentation.

In other news: Rowan is sleeping in a big bed and is potty trained.

Utrecht, Holland.

We had a great time traveling to Utrecht. Traveling to Holland is like a breath of fresh air. The people are very friendly and actually talk to you and the use of color is stimulating. It is all over buildings and people wear a lot more of it too. The baked goods, on the whole, are great. While Colby was off gallivanting with the feminists from his conference (he was presenting a paper at the European Feminist Conference, that is why we went to Utrecht in the first place), Rowan and I scoped out parks and good snacks. Some of the high-lights from the trip include: buying Belgian french fries at a place called the mannekenpis (they were nothing like Belgian fries), Colby's name tag saying he was from Mali, drinking Grolsch beers and paying 50 cents to use the bathroom. And of course the ultimate high-light was eating a stroopwaffle.
For Rowan, I believe finding the local, free park was his highest point of excitement. There was a huge petting zoo, with 7 piglets and rabbits the size of a medium size dog. And the play park was exceptional. It had a huge water spout, squirt, thing where you could pump the water and watch it go down all these small divots and such. There was a round thing, which when you jumped on it squirted water out like a huge fountain. The castle was so cool, you could climb in it and it had a huge slide down the side of it. And finally, there was a huge sandbox with lifting devices and tunnels in which you could put the sand down. Ahhhhhh, good times. Tirzah, I wish you were there with us. I think you would have really liked the fake street set-up they had where kids could ride their bikes around and get to use the pretend signs and gas pumps.













Sometimes I find the way different countries package items fascinating. It is probably the same fascination which drives me to purchase Kinder Eggs. Anyway, I got Rowan this yogurt and was totally pumped about the clever way in which the spoon was packaged onto the side of the carton. You take out the spoon and click it together, and walllla, it is a working device! Clever!


Colby loved him some calzones.

The flowers for sale, were of course, beautiful.

This street performer was wearing a skirt, blindfolded and playing the triangle. I wonder how much money he ended up making?

Isn't this same sculpture on the campus of Wash U.?

Colorful building . . .

Wanna' be Belgian fries.


And last but not least, a few photos that made me laugh, from my Flemish book. We were recently learning all the words for illnesses and different body parts. For some reason, they chose a drawing of an old man to do the deed. This first one grosses me out . . . was it really necessary to have such large slices of snot to represent a cold?

Secondly, really, does the old man have to take off his clothes in my book?

the sun is out.

A couple of weekends ago I went to help my friend Anne cut the bamboo in her garden. She needed it done because the frost had killed them and so she took advantage of my love for gardening and hired me. The pay was quite good, a fruit smoothy and some homemade jams. I think I got the better side of the deal. While cutting many, many bamboo stalks, I found myself reflecting on all the different ways in which life has brought about such unexpected events over the past three years. But I had to smile, because of all the things I could imagine as future possibilities, none of them included me cutting bamboo in Belgium. Sometimes life is so awkardly funny.

Today we went on a great bike ride with our friend John. We drove through the Oud Heverlee forest, found beautiful walking paths and an old church.



Rowan received a ton of building blocks from his friend Liam. It is a crazy good mess in our living room.


Leaving my job at the Embassy in January was a good thing. But I missed my co-worker and friend Fabienne. I hadn't seen her since my last day and finally, her and her family came over on Saturday. We went to the park and ate Mexican food while drinking Corona's (I realize drinking a Corona on Belgian soil may be considered blasphemous.) We had such a great time and I even got to practice some of my Flemish. Here are a few photos from the park. Rowan had a great time with Fabienne's kids, Liam, Kelly and Kevin. But Fabienne's husband, Patrick, stole the show.



Rowan dancing.

Andy's visit: number 2

Our good friend Andy came to visit us again so we took the opportunity to visit Cologne, Germany. We went there last year but this year's visit was much warmer and full of more sunlight. Good times are recorded below.






We attract carnivals. This one was being set up outside our hotel room. Unfortunately, we missed its actual opening.

The Dom.


Rowan's yummy snowman.

Locks on the bridge.

Found bottle caps.

A good dinner.






On a side note from Andy's visit, we tried some Belgian pudding called "plop". Rowan gave it a try and you can tell by his facial expression how he felt about it.


A great loaf of French bread.

We went to an Eastern Rite baptism the other day. All singing and for 2 hours and 15 minutes. Rowan lasted 1 hour and 15 minutes. It was quite impressive.


Rowan's potty training sticker reward poster.

There have been a number of hard rains here. The other night, on the way home from Flemish class, I was riding my bike home and got stuck in a downpour.