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English Only, Only English

I have discovered I LOVE learning another language. It is like this massive puzzle (infinite, really) where you are doled out a few pieces each day and try to fit them together. To make it more exciting, you can earn additional pieces by reading books or magazine, watching movies or TV, or speaking with the locals. (Although in the last case, if the locals are drunk they might give you a piece that belongs to an entirely different puzzle which you aren’t necessarily interested in constructing. You won’t know this until you try to use the piece and someone laughs at you. Good times.)

A group of us were chatting at the break from German class about languages, and Bernhard, our teacher, commented on how people from the UK or NA frequently only speak English. Oh, I am well aware, and I think it is a complete travesty, as well as being fairly embarrassing. Bernhard made a good point that you really learn the grammar in your own language only when you study another language. Which is why some schools still teach Latin. And of course there is the whole narrow-focused perspective thing. Discussions about the language inevitably lead to topics about different countries’ culture, people, food, clothing and customs. Of course, I am additionally blessed in this course, as everyone else is from a different continent from me so I am pushed even further to think outside the tiny North American box (or I should say cube, this being the high-tech generation.)

Whenever I have this English-only discussion, it always reminds of my favourite post on Stuff White People Like: #78 on the list: Multilingual Children. It starts out:

All white people want their children to speak another language. There are no exceptions. They dream about the children drifting in between French and English sentences as they bustle about the kitchen while they read the New York Times and listen to Jazz.

As white people age, they start to feel more and more angry with their parents for raising them in a monolingual home. At some point in their lives, most white people attempt to learn a second language and are generally unable to get past ordering in a restaurant or over-pronouncing a few key words. This failure is not attributed to their lack of effort, but rather their parents who didn’t teach them a new language during their formative years.

White people believe that if they had been given French language instruction when they were younger, their lives would have turned out very differently. Instead of living in the US, they would be living and working abroad for the United Nations or some other organization with a headquarters in Switzerland or The Hague.

Sometimes I swear these people have a wire tap directly into my brain (see Grammar, Bad Memories of High School and Apologies), which would be deeply disturbing if it wasn’t so hilarious. And I should point out that this website is specifically referring to American White People, which can usually be transferred pretty easily to Canadian White People. Being a European White Person is the end goal…so in effect, by moving to Austria and learning German I have hit the jackpot in terms of white person ideology, as long as I get passed ordering in a restaurant that is.

Tschüss!

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Welcome to the Aqua Dome

First, let me say that my friend Sue has inspired me to join the National Blog Posting Month in November (Hi Sue! I admire your intention to have a goal for this…I’ll be lucky if I just remember to post everyday. Lots of content, poor memory.) So hopefully you’ll see a post every day on this site. If not, well, there is always next year. I’m not sure if every day will be something earth shattering, but I’m going to try to put something, hopefully something readable, up daily.

This post will be easy, as yesterday we went to Längenfeld to visit the wondrous swimming complex, the Aqua Dome, as well as to connect with a family of a school acquaintance of mine. We have been a few times to this, well, I would call it a pool but it is oh so much more, and so we knew that we would have a good time. When you have a family, it probably is one of the easiest places to spend the day and keep everyone entertained. There was only the 3 of us, as Rebecca balked at the thought of leaving the house at 9:00 in the morning on a Saturday. As if!

The complex is about 40 minutes drive from Innsbruck. It was All Saints’ Day, where all good Catholics spend the entire day at the cemetery visiting departed relatives. As no one would confuse this family of being practicing Christians of any denomination, we just appreciated the empty roads and easy drive. The Aqua Dome is a series of pools fed by a hot spring. There are adult areas, kids areas, and 3 outdoor pods that each have a wellness theme: light and sound therapy, massage and whirlpool. There is also a restaurant where you can dine in your bathrobe. Everything is accessed and paid for by an electronic wristband, so it is easy to spend way too much money without noticing. Brilliant from a business perspective. Last time we were here, Markus and I also went to the spa, which was very brave of me as those crazy Europeans walk around without any clothes on. Not even a towel around the waist. That sure pushed the limits of my North American puritanism, let me tell you.

But as we were with Annie and only had about 3 hours, we just stayed in the pool areas. The setting is stunning with mountains close enough to touch and the trees showing off their blazing fall fashions. Here are some pictures of the morning.

Annie and Markus enjoy the indoor pools...
Annie and Markus enjoy the indoor pools...
...and the outdoor pools
...and the outdoor pools
One of the swimming pods in a stunning Austrian autumn setting
One of the swimming pods in a stunning Austrian autumn setting

After our morning activities, we headed over to a different kind of adventure: having lunch with someone we had never met. A high school friend of mine, Erla, reconnected with me on Facebook a few months back. When she read that I was moving to Innsbruck, she offered to forward me the email address of her husband’s cousin. I’m up for any opportunity to meet more people at this point, so Drifa and I exchanged notes and agreed that we would come over to her place for lunch after our swim. Längenfeld has about 4,000 people living there full-time (with 10,000 visitors a year for skiing), and so pretty much everyone can see the Aqua Dome from their living room. After a very short drive, we arrived at the apartment of Drifa Radiskovic and her 3 children, Alexander, David and Sara. As you can tell by her name, Drifa has an interesting story. She is Icelandic and her husband, Zoran, is a Bosnian Serb. They met one summer working at a ski resort near Lägenfeld and never moved back. They speak Icelandic and Serbian at home, and the children are learning German and English in school. (That will be a whole other post about the travesty of our mainly uni-lingual existence in N.A.) All 3 children have blond hair and blue eyes, so the Icelandic influences clearly dominated in the gene pool. Zoran’s uncle moved to Canada and settled in Manitoba with the large migration of Icelanders to Gimil, which is where Erla’s and mine connection kicks in. Whew, this is complicated!

But in any case, we had delicious homemade pizza and Annie played a little bit with the kids until she conked out with fatigue from her morning activities. I found it fascinating to hear about their background and how they made the transition to a little dorf in Austria. I guess there is both some historic and more recent stereotyping of Serbians here, so she has experienced some discrimination. But of course has also experienced many wonderful things about living in Austria, and overall I think she is happy to raise her family here.

And so the adventure continues for all of us.

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Birthdays and Fingerprints and Angels, Oh My

A bit of this and a bit of that in this post today.

Birthday Wishes

On the 28th was Rebecca’s 15th birthday. 15!!!! Who can believe it? We had a family dinner and gift presentation, with Markus cooking Rebecca’s request for a traditional Canadian turkey dinner. Turkey, mashed potatoes, carrots and stuffing.

Rebecca did well in the ski clothes department and we bought her a mountain pass for the winter. All of her friends ski, so this should be an excellent activity. Rebecca had several gifts as well from Canada from all sides of the family . Very nice, but it did make her a bit homesick. Understandable given how far she is from Victoria. My friend from school, Ana, even remembered and gave her a lovely gift of a Russian stacking doll. So sweet.

With my wildly (yet predictably) unruly family, the pictures of them sitting at the table are crap: Rebecca with a napkin over her face, Lili completely ignoring the camera, eyes closed, mouths full…you get the non-postable picture. So here is a slightly better one of Aunt Susi, Oma Renata and Rebecca modeling her new winter vest:

Fingerprints

This week we also crossed off a few more of the long, bureaucratic tasks to finalizing residency for Rebecca, Annie and me. The one interesting event in the whole process was getting my fingerprints taken at the police station. This is a requirement of the Canadian RCMP office in order to issue an official criminal check for me. As almost no Canadians move to Austria (something like 46 North Americans moved to Innsbruck in 2007), the Politzei were a little unsure how the process worked. After we were taken under wing by an officer who was curious how this would all unfold (obviously a slow day in the policing world), we found a detective who could help us.

After checking the requirements, they determined that we would have to actually take old-school ink fingerprints instead of the digital scans I was expecting. So I was brought into this very stark white back room complete with a chair set up to take mug shots with the prisoner number. Excellent. The detective had to keep asking me to keep my hand relaxed so the prints would work properly. Not sure how someone being arrested would stay relaxed, but oh well. Here are the results, just like on Columbo:

Angels

Staying on the detective theme…On Saturday when I was at the wedding, Markus took the girls to Arzler Alm. On the gondola on the way up I guess they had a Charlie’s Angels moment. Markus didn’t have the camera so snapped this one with the cell phone. I had to include it…can’t believe that this worked out with an often camera-resistant teenager, an energetic 7 year old and a ‘not-quite-sure-what-is-going-on-but-it-looks-like-fun’ toddler. Apparently they had a fantastic time hanging out together. That makes me so happy to know that the family connections are strengthening.

Does that make Markus Bosley?
Does that make Markus Bosley?

Hilarious!

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Eine Einladung

On Friday Rukiye invited the class to her wedding reception. It was a bit tricky to piece together with the language issues, but I think she was married in Turkey but is having the reception in Innsbruck. Lauriane from class (hope I am spelling your name correctly L!) and I, both displaced Moms in need of excitement, decided to venture out for a bit. It was certainly an interesting cultural experience. Lauriane’s partner was out of town so we brought her sweet 4-month old baby girl, Juar Jua. (Now I’m pretty sure I am not spelling that correctly, so I’ll fix it up on Monday. All fixed up. Jua, I believe, is an African word for the Sun. How beautiful. Lauriane also calls her by her middle French name, Lizon, which is also très belle.)

We arrived at about 5:30 to a big hall that reminded me of a Winnipeg social (1), complete with pretzels and pop on the table, minus the alcohol of course. It looked like we were the only non-Turkish people in the hall of about 300. There was a band playing what I guess was contemporary Turkish music.

At 6:30 Rukiye and her husband arrived. Friends and family held up rose-garlanded arches and there were sparklers lining their path. Rukiye’s dress was a strapless white traditional cut with a full, multi-tiered skirt. She looked stunningly beautiful. When she walked in she had a red sheer scarf or veil covering her entire head and face. When the couple arrived at the stage, the veil was lifted with great cheers and then the couple kissed and started the first dance.

I particularly noted how the women danced to the faster music. I would have had no idea how to negotiate dancing to the strong, regular Turkish beat (Lauriane and I kept joking about asking each other if we wanted to dance. As if I would subject my very North American self into all this ceremony!), but noticed that all the women moved similarly. It is a fairly contained dance, with slight movements of shoulders, hips and feet, small isolated movements of the ribcage, in perfect rhythm to the music. Very self confident and suggestive and leave-you-wanting-more rather than overt.

Her friend and another of our classmates, Canan, was what I would call her maid-of-honour, but I’m not sure exactly how this plays out in the Turkish tradition. She was also gorgeous in an satin red dress with her thick black hair twisted up.

We decided to leave around 7:30 to get Jua home for her bottle and bed. (Lauriane has what must be the world’s best baby. She sleeps 12 hours a night without waking, naps during the day and hardly ever cries. I’m not jealous. No. No envy here. Hmph.) So I’m afraid I can’t report on the remainder of the evening. I know that after the dancing there was a gift presentation, but I’m not sure of the rest. If I’m ever invited to such an event again, I’ll have to brave the rest of the evening.

I’m sure Rukiye will never read this (I don’t think she speaks any English), but I am so grateful for the invitation. Living in another country certainly puts you in the path of the unexpected. I’m glad we came.

(1) Ahh, the Winnipeg Social…or I guess I should say the Manitoba Social, as the tradition certainly extends beyond city boundaries. With no Wikipedia entry, I found an accurate and amusing definition on a blog for my non-Prairie readers:

A local tradition that [probably came] originally from Manitoba’s large Polish/Ukrainian immigrant community, a social is when the friends and family of a to-be-married couple (or a sports team, or a Ukrainian dance troupe, or a singles group or whatever like-minded group of people) rent a hall (often in a community centre, a curling club, or a church basement) and throw a [party.]

They rent a social hall for 100-300 people (most Catholic church basements/bingo halls or community clubs will accommodate) , where they hire a D.J. to spin CDs or records, get a one-night-only liquor license from the provincial government, and throw a party (or, to be more accurate, a thrown-together one-night-only bar) as a fund-raiser. Around midnight, a bread-and-cold-cuts buffet is put out (food must be served as one of the conditions of the liquor license).

People sell social tickets ahead of time to their coworkers, friends and relatives, and whoever else wants to go out dancing and drinking on a Friday or Saturday night. You can often get a really bizarre/interesting mix of people you know (uncles and cousins and aunts) and complete strangers who heard about the social second- or even third-hand and buy tickets at the door, if there are any left.

The music is always a real mix too… not just contemporary pop/rock stuff either. We may have a snowball dance to start (especially if it was a singles social), and a couple of spot dances during the evening to give away door prizes. The music ranges from the latest dance pop and country two-step to waltzes, polkas, and the schottise (butterfly)… everything from conga lines to the macarena (in my opinion, the only dance that straight people do better than queer people). I have fond memories of one particular Transcona social where the conga line went in and out of the men’s and women’s washrooms, outside the social hall, around the block, and back inside again.

That is a great description that sure brings back visions of trekking out on freezing Winnipeg nights in tight jeans and asymmetrically cropped hair. Thanks for the memories, Mr. Rilke, whoever you are.

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Schloß Neuschwanstein

Yesterday Markus and I dropped Annie off and drove for an hour and a half to Bavaria in Germany. It was a beautiful Autumn morning and it was great to get out of Innsbruck for the day. Our destination was a castle called Neuschwanstein. It is a 19th Century palace near a small, pretty town called Füssen. It is a bit of a tourist machine, (apparently over a million visitors annually), so I was very glad we went in off-season, as we all know how much I love hanging out with pushy crowds.

The brief history we were told was very interesting. Commissioned by Ludwig II of Bavaria, construction of the building lasted from 1869 to 1886. The castle still is not finished, because in 1886 Ludwig was officially declared insane and then died shortly after; all work stopped when he died. After all those years of work and planning, he lived in the castle for only 4 months. My pictures of the front were a bit wonky, so here is one from wikipedia.

Only guided tours were allowed, so we didn’t get as much time to study the paintings and woodwork as I usually like. But it was beautiful nonetheless. The paintings are mainly depictions of the works of Wagner, a favourite of Ludwig’s. The intricate woodwork in the king’s bedroom was incredible; it took five workers four years to complete.

We also went for a walk to the Marienbrücke (Mary’s Bridge); here are pictures from the bridge and then one of the bridge from the castle.

The valley below
The valley below
Marienbrück seen from the castle.
Marienbrücke seen from the castle.

As you can see, the fog was already rolling in and by the time we left it was thick and spooky. Very appropriate for our castle tour.

After a traditional lunch in Füssen, where Markus was able to have a tasty Bavarian beer, we drove back to the warmth and sunshine of Innsbruck (the micro-climates here are crazy!)

We bought a book of castles in the area, so more to come I’m sure.

Cute Kid Update for the Grandparents

Thought it was time for some cute toddler updates for the grandparents. You might want to skip this one if you are feeling anti-cute-kid or have had enough of your own cute child at the moment.

This was the conversation in the kitchen the other night.

A: I want some pasta

H: Wie bitter?

A: Bitter?

H: O.K.

A: First you have to cook it. I’ll get you a pot.

H: That’s right Annie!

A: Here you go (handing me a strainer when she couldn’t find a pot as they were all in the dishwasher.) It is a green one! (Everything is green or orange right now, even though the strainer was silver)

H: Thanks!

A: You’re really welcome. (How cute is that!? I love the ‘really’ in there. And with a slight lisp thrown in to shoot it over the cuteness scale…”you’re rweally welcome.”)

Annie’s Germ-glish is coming along nicely. The latest is “I’m too schwer!” said with a big family pout on her lips. Schwer is heavy or difficult, so she really means whatever she is trying to move, usually to somewhere she shouldn’t be going, is too heavy. But we get the point.

I tried to take a good picture the last couple of days, but Annie has discovered saying ‘cheese’ and makes a very hilarious face like this:

Annie saying Cheeeese. Will I ever take another good picture again?
Annie saying Cheeeese. Will I ever take another good picture again?

So here is a cute one from the summer which I don’t think I’ve posted before:

Andy took this one at a playground in Victoria this summer (Hi Andy!)
Andy took this one at a playground in Victoria this summer (Hi Andy!)
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Small Steps in the Right Direction

It was a good day today. Markus woke up with Annie, which is always a delicious way to start the day…for me at least. (Geneva could confirm the time by that girl’s internal clock!)

And it was the start of the second 4-week course at school. (Hard to believe I have only been in Innsbruck for 7 weeks. Feels like much longer.) We had treats on Friday to celebrate the end of the first session and had some German-learnin’ fun playing games. Here is a picture of the class in action and one of the group. Not everyone finished up the course for one reason or another so the class is a bit small in the pics.

This morning two new students joined us, one woman also from Turkey (that makes 8,) and one woman from France. I find it so fascinating to learn what compels someone to move to another country where they don’t speak the language. Stories of work and love and hardship. Old family businesses, upcoming marriages and new babies. This is an adventure-spirited bunch for sure. Our teacher, Bernhard (hi Bernhard!), does a wonderful job of using our stories and experiences to make the learning applicable. Because really, connecting with people is the most important thing for most, if not all, of us right now in this new home.

And I am feeling that I am making some progress. Ana (from Serbia/Russia) and Amal (Egypt) and I finished our exercies and so were chatting in German. I learned a sad story about Amal losing her husband to a heart attack 11 years ago when her youngest of three children was only 3 months old. She made light of it in the end…kein Mann ist gut! and we laughed. It felt lovely to connect with someone about something real while speaking German. Markus commented that sometimes I will feel like I am moving ahead and other times feel like I know nothing. That sounds about right. I’ll just appreciate this ‘moving ahead’ day and enjoy.

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Love, Schmuv. All You Need is Friends.

I love my friends. Really, really adore them. I must have done something very lovely in a past life, because I’m pretty sure I’m not deserving in this go around to have such amazing people in my world.

You know what else I love? The Internet. Here I was at 6:00 in the evening after a tough day and my beautiful friend, Stacey (see picture below), pops up a chat on gmail to say hi. Amazing and magical thing, that Internet. During our chat Stacey reminded me that I need to appreciate whatever comes to me this year, and not expect it to be a Perfectly Charming Year in Europe with no problems or rough patches. She also reminded me that when I was pregnant, my attitude was basically: I have no idea what this is going to be like, so I’ll just take it as it comes and appreciate all facets of motherhood, good and bad. Good advice for this year as well. I guess I’ve talked myself into the myth of, “How can a year (or two) in Europe not be amazing?” Well, I think it can be amazing, just not Pollyanna-perfect every second. And there are incredible things to be learned from the tough times, as we all know.

Here is a picture from the summer of Stacey and Annie feeding the ducks in Government House in Victoria.

Overall, I feel like I’m on the upswing again. I have done an excellent job of getting out of shape in the last decade (hard to believe I used to be an elite athlete), and have vowed to try to recapture a little of my lung capacity while in the Alps. I made the first start with a 2-hour walk on Wednesday along the river and then up to Hungerburg, a residential area in Innsbruck. It was fairly steep and it certainly got me breathing.

Then today Markus and I biked to Shloß Ambras for lunch. Those royals sure knew how to live (no camera with me, so I swiped this from a tourist page.) You can actually see the table we sat at for lunch at the bottom of the picture.

Hopefully after a relaxing weekend, I’ll be feeling even more like myself. Thanks for all the support, my friends.

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This is a Show About Nothing

I discovered a new word in German last week: faulenzen. It means to do a whole lot of nothing. We could use a verb like that in English (I nothing, she nothings…). This word was very applicable for us this weekend.

When I was in the depth of misery last week, my sister-in-law, Susi, suggested: “Why don’t you just give up. Everyone tends to be happier.” Hmmmmm. So basically that is what I did this weekend…give up.

“I want some pasta.”
“For breakfast?”
“Ya!”, (or maybe ‘Ja!’)

O.K.

—

“I want to watch Kleiner Dodo.”
“How do you ask nicely?”
“Please may I watch Kleiner Dodo?”

No problem.

“Do you want to come and watch with me?”
O.K.

—

“Sweetie, do you want to get dressed and go to the Spielplatz?”
“NO!”

Fine, we’ll stay inside all day.

—

“Can I eat it (eggs) with my fingers?”
Go to town blue-eyes.

—

This was pretty much how things went for 48 hours. Luckily the tot did get some fresh air as Rebecca piped up Saturday afternoon: “I’ll take Annie out with me for €10.” Sold!! Rebecca was hoping to catch a school soccer game, thus the hilarious dressing up of Annie in a soccer shirt (sorry that it is blurry, but just had to include it.). The game didn’t work out, but they had fun at the playground and then shared some decadent torte while Mommy watched the Kremlin Open.

Rebecca decides Annie should be a soccer fan.
Rebecca decides Annie should be a soccer fan.

Of course now I have to try to clean up the mess from two days of outright sloth before Markus gets home. But overall it was worth it. I’m pretty sure I couldn’t live this way most of the time, but it sure is a good tactic in times of crisis.

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Deep Breathing Required

(Thought I published this on Friday. Oh well…here you go. I’ll have another one up today.)

I have been trying to start this post every day for a week. I’ve been waiting for things to become less depressive before exposing my life again to friends and family, but that might be a bit of a wait.

This last couple of weeks have been hell…HELL. Rebecca was sick…like cleaning puke up off the floor sick. Day 15 of waking up between 4:30 and 5:00 with Annie. (I read a funny post on Dooce where she was talking about her mean, mean baby who cried all the time. I’m starting to relate and think Annie is just starting to expressing some inherent cruel nature where she will torture her mother until death.) The neo-Nazi daycare (perhaps I shouldn’t joke about that in Austria) wouldn’t let Annie spend the afternoon, even when Annie fell asleep in childcare-provider Gabby’s arms. So Annie had a 10 minute nap that day and was just a treat for the rest of the afternoon. (It has only been 3 days that I have been allowed to keep Annie in daycare full time.) And yesterday I came down with the family cold (Markus has been tasked with smuggling great quantities of ColdFx into Austria.)

I finally realized how much I’ve taken my friends for granted, since I always have had so many everywhere I have lived (no more…you are all getting Christmas cards this year for sure.) I am quite lonely. And Markus has changed his return date from the 11th to the 13th, and also may be returning to Canada mid-November; I have suggested he pull an AbeBooks Christmas party special and only stay 3 days plus travel. We’ll see.

But I guess that there are going to be rough times in life with such a big change…some crap about appreciating the great moments or something.

The last couple of days Markus’ sister has tried to rescue me by inviting us over to her place, which has certainly helped. To prove to myself that there still is good in the world, I took this sweet picture of the cousins.

So what is good? German classes are very interesting, although it will be many months before I am able to express more complicated sentiments than your average toddler. (I was talking to our friend, Beth, whose daughter Haley has been in Eastern Europe for several months. Haley hit the nail on the head when she proclaimed she felt like a genius after returning to Canada, since she could actually formulate complicated, coherent and grammatically correct sentences.)

I continue to be in awe of the natural beauty in Innsbruck. The leaves have started turning on the mountainside and Rebecca called me to the window about a week ago to see one of the most brilliant deep red sunsets ever.

And on the cute daughter front, Annie can now have real (albeit short) conversations with people over the phone, which is so sweet to listen to. Especially the multiple goodbyes: Tshüs, Chow, Bis später, Bye! A little Sound of Music re-enactment.

And I am going to try to go away next weekend for some recovery. Salzburg is about a 2-hour train ride away and is on my list of places to see, so that is a likely destination. And visiting high school friend, Maria, in Antwerp is definitely on the horizon so I can see a friendly face. (Although I shouldn’t put it that way; Austrians are incredibly friendly and kind…I just don’t know what they are saying.)

Next time…more pictures, less complaining.

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Is Daddy in Canada?

“Yes, my sweet. He’ll be there a bit longer.”

This is how our last couple of mornings began. Annie clomps (loud hardwood floors) into my bedroom, asks about Dad and proclaims: “I’m hungry. Get up!” Nice. At 5:30 in the morning as an extra special treat.

The first 4 days have actually gone pretty well. I’m surprised I think this, given that, in that time, Rebecca had the flu, then I had the flu (luckily for both of us it was pretty mild and only last 24 hours) and currently Annie has a cold. (To be expected with the start of a new daycare.) Opa helped out with daycare drop-off and pick-up duties last week, and we made it through the first weekend without too much trouble. Luckily I was sick on Friday, so just slept for 4 hours while Annie was at Kindergruppe. If I had been sick on the weekend…Yikes!

After a wee chat about the 12-hour computer marathon on Saturday, Rebecca made up and for it by taking Annie out for 2 hours on Sunday to the park and a treat at the bakery. Very sweet sister.

I’ve also caved in on a few things. The first is painting, which I’ve been very reluctant to do, as Annie has already had lovely episodes of colouring on every page in a book, walking around marking clothes with a felt pen, etc., etc. I managed by laying down garbage bags and stripping Annie down to her diaper. As expected, she really enjoyed it!

Picasso Annie

And during a trip to a toy store, I bought her a stroller for her baby doll. She always likes these, but there was one at daycare in Canada so we wanted to make it a special treat for there. Well, I think I’m already regretting that decision. We went for a walk on Sunday and it took us 20 minutes to go 2 blocks because she wanted to walk with the stroller. After much frustration and lots of tears (because Annie was tired but didn’t want to let go), I put Annie in her stroller holding onto the baby stroller in her lap. Sheesh. However, it was pretty hilarious last night when Annie climbed into the baby stroller and asked me to push her.

We also usually only allow bubbles outside, but made an exception and blew some in the bath. This worked quite well, as Annie was already covered in soapy water so the bubbles didn’t pop when they landed on her skin. She ended up with a dozen bubbles all over her. No picture, but it was pretty cute!

Markus doesn’t have a return ticket yet, but hopefully only 10 or so days to go. (I really, really don’t know how my friends whose husbands are pilots or in the Navy manage. I guess you just get through). And next week should be easier still as Annie can start to go to daycare for full days instead of just the mornings. So far she loves it, so another blessing.