Minnesota is Heaven, But Virginia is Home

Thanks for not coming down too hard on me for being such a whiner about our hotel. Hans is right...it's not that bad. It just isn't that great, either. I was surprised that they actually came in and "cleaned" our room today while we were gone. I was under the impression that daily cleaning didn't happen in French hotels. Now I feel guilty because the nice French ladies probably came in to clean and saw my pillowcases from home. I am World War II'd out. Wow. Our first stop today was not a WWII site, but a French supermarket. We had decided last night that we'd have a picnic today, somewhere near the sea. So it was off to the market for us. It's pretty interesting going into a "local" market...I recall going into the markets in Inverness, Scotland (Tesco), Zushi, Japan (Daiei), Sindelfingen, Germany (Real) and now Insigny, France (Intermarche). We picked up some fruit, sandwiches, spreadable cheese, bread, cookies, chocolate mousse and Coke. I...

Here we are, in our grungy hotel room located, appropriately enough, right next door to a Citroen dealership. Carentan, France. First: why did I think that it was a five hour drive out here? I don't know what I was thinking, except that I was awfully wrong. On Thursday afternoon, I discovered that it was more like eight or nine hours worth of driving. Oops. So we were left to decide whether we'd leave on Thursday, after work, drive to the general Paris area and find a hotel by the roadside to overnight in, OR get up at 3:00 a.m. for an early start. We went with option B, and I'm glad that we did, because I have learned now that I should always choose my own bed over a French hotel bed. Our Normandy adventure began at 3:00 a.m., when we woke, showered and dressed as quietly as possible, then carried two sleeping children downstairs and loaded them into the car. Instead of going right back to sleep, which was part of my grand scheme, they woke right up and started hor...

For Mom, Gen and anyone else who is unable to mentally picture Mont St. Michel based on my awesome verbal description of: "It's like a monastery and a village that's like, um....on a rock? And when the tide comes in, it's completely surrounded by water"*. Hope this helps. *Except for the causeway, of course, for you anal types that have to be right about everything . You know who you are.

It's official. I'm now a true soccer mom. Josiah had his first practice today. Yesterday we travelled to the German sports store Decathlon, to pick out cleats and shinguards. I also bought an enormous pair of white knee socks for him and a pair of athletic-style shorts. All of his shorts have cargo pockets and I feel are not soccer-appropriate. When I tried to try his new duds on him yesterday, he threw a fit and didn't want anything to do with shinguards and special socks. But today, when the time came for him to get dressed, he hopped to it with zest and though I told him he didn't actually have to wear his shinguards while we walked to the field, he stated "But Mama, I want to look cool". Oh, he's a boy after my own heart...! The first thing I learned about soccer is that the shinguards go under the socks. He was one of two children there with his shinguards outside his socks. He's probably already scarred for life because I didn't Google ...

OK. I know you all are going to think that I'm a great big meanie here, but this is the stark truth: I hate Thomas the Tank Engine. There, I said it. It is a confession that I feel ashamed to make. Josiah has loved Thomas since he was 18 months old, so it has been a long, long love affair for the two of them. At first, I loved Thomas too. I loved presenting Josiah with a new train to add to his collection. I loved getting new pieces of track and new buildings to expand his railroad. I loved putting together new, challenging and convoluted railways for him to delight in. Hmmm, maybe in the beginning, the love affair was partly mine. Somewhere along the line, though, Thomas began to get old. There have been times when Josiah seemed to show some interest in different playthings and Thomas seemed to gather dust. But lately, Thomas has been back with a vengeance. Josiah sings Thomas songs all day, stages elaborate railroad accidents all day, sleeps, eats and breathes Thomas. ...

Yesterday was my birthday. Hans ruminated that he found it a bit underwhelming, but I think it was just right. Here's a quick run-down of the day's events: Dropped Annika off at the ever-popular Jen's house. Josiah has declared his undying love for Jen and his desire to marry her someday. I don't think it would work out, much too May-December, but I do hope that Josiah finds a woman just as wonderful. Josiah and I proceeded to "preschool orientation" at his new school. Remember that he went over to a different base for preschool. Now he'll be going right here on Patch, just a few blocks away. Orientation was...all right (I say while heaving a huge sigh). The curriculum appears to once again be learning the alphabet. Great. So everyone be prepared to hear me whine about how Josiah's teacher bugs me about Josiah's antisocial-ness every time I go in to pick him up. He starts school on September 3rd. I'm hoping to go over and meet his t...

Are you ready for a couple hundred pictures? Actually, it's not that bad, but the only reason there aren't more is that our camera battery went dead just as we were leaving the cathedral. I'm not complaining. This is only the third time I've recharged the battery since we purchased the camera almost six months ago...this battery has some serious staying power. But I digress (as usual). We decided to make a foray into France today, specifically Strasbourg, which is just over an hour away, barely over the border in Alsace. We had been hearing some good things about the city, which also happens to be the home of the European Union Parliament--there's your trivia for the day! (I highly recommend clicking on each to enlarge the photos) Here I am with Josiah & Annika, sitting in the front row. Despite my look of prayerful pleading, they were very well behaved (and quiet!) in the cathedral. The altar I love this one...taken by Hans The exterior. It was difficult to ge...

I just found Annika sitting in the middle of her bed, busily scrubbing her Dory fish figurine's mouth with a toothbrush. Well, I guess even fish need their teeth brushed...do fish even have teeth? Normal fish, I mean. Not sharks. Of course sharks have teeth. Duh. Josiah has decided that his latest interest is death. He keeps asking us questions about dying. When are we going to die? Mommy, will you die before me? How do people die? Mommy, will you come with me when I die? What is heaven like? You know, nice, easy questions about dying like those. Eeek. Hans made sure to tell him about hell too, which I didn't feel was completely necessary for a four-year-old. Why get Josiah immediately frightened of death because there's a small possibility that he could wind up heading in the other direction? Why not let him mature a bit and get more informed before telling him about hellfire and brimstone and Satan? I'm almost 34 and I still really don't enjoy thinking...

I just wanted to call everyone's attention to the fact that I have added more blogs to my "Blogs I Read Every Single Day" column. Actually, I check most of them twice a day because I enjoy all of them so very, very much and reading them lifts me from the sometimes python-squeezing boringness of my daily life. I thank you.

Eibsee--in particular, the beautiful color variations around the islands (double-click to enlarge) On our ramble, having a snack in Austria Random Austrian lake Random idyllic Austrian farmland shot

As the title would imply, we spent part of our day today on a long and directionless ramble through the Austrian Alps. There's almost nothing I like more than to hit the road with a full tank of gas and no specific destination in mind. Add in a beautiful sunny day, a Coke and a CD changer full of good tunes and I'm set. Oh, and my new requirement: having the GPS along so that when I do get tired of rambling, I can ask Dora to take me back to my starting point. I have reached the point where I can't see myself ever having a vehicle without navigation. I didn't fire her up until I was lost in some random Tyrolean town and decided it was time to head back, so technically I didn't break the rules of the ramble. I wish that I could describe the views today, but words fail and pictures are merely pictures. I did stop and take a few. One nice thing about German and Austrian roads is that they provide lots and lots of areas to pull over and take a break. What a road we fou...

Just a quick message for my girls out there who love J Crew and keep buying their ridiculously overpriced crap. Stop. I too have worshipped before the hallowed J Crew catalog, drooling over the cashmere sweaters, but NO MORE. I have had nothing but crappy luck with the last few things I've bought from J Crew. My beautiful chocolate colored cords? Crap. One wearing and the knees had the cord worn off them. Seriously, the knees were a completely different color. My lovely Cambridge cable bright pink wool-blend hoodie sweater? Crap. It was all pilled after about three wearings PLUS I found a big hole in it. The same for my two very cute empire-waist, tie-back tops I got last summer. HOLES in both of them, under the arms. I'm not that hard on clothes. I have a pile of J Crew's cashmere sweaters...cashmere may be the only thing they do right. That and khaki pants, capris and shorts. So, if you still feel the need to give J Crew your hard earned cash, buy cashmere o...

I'm sitting here in our pleasant room at the Edelweiss, enjoying the lovely view and thinking...maybe I should change the title of my blog? Because I'm pretty sure that Garmisch is heaven. Nah, I'm too loyal to Minnesota. There's no place like home, after all. I had a busy weekend. Saturday was Jen's birthday, so to celebrate, we went antique shopping. Do you guys remember when we went to Burg Teck a few weeks back? There are a couple of small towns at the foot of the Teck's hill, one of which is called Owen. I always think of the movie "Throw Mama from the Train" when I hear the name Owen. " Owen doesn't have any friends !" But I digress. Jen and I got to zip down there in the Audi while the husbands remained at home with the kids, which was pleasant in and of itself. She and I agreed after we'd been shopping for about 2-1/2 minutes that there was no way we could have antiqued with the kids along. No. Freaking. Way. The first store t...