Basel Swim Meet

On Saturday we drove the 1+ hours to Basel to watch Sophie in a "local"swim meet.  Some of the other meets are in Luxembourg and Warsaw so Basel seemed close.  This is one of the draw backs of International School sporting events.  Then tend to be all over the country if not continent!  We got up early on a Saturday, and headed off.  Some important things we learned as we are newbies in the swim parent world.  
            1) Wear shorts or at least bring them.  The temperature in the pool viewing area was approximately that of the tropical rainforests of Malaysia. We were bundled up as it is January in Zurich and were puddles about 10 minutes into the meet.  Noah eventually just took his shirt off.
            2)  Bring plenty of reading material.  The meet started at 10:30.  Sophie first hit the water at 1:45 where she swam for 47 seconds.  Plenty of time to catch up on reading!
           3) Bring flip-flops.  Shoes required to enter the cafeteria to buy food and snacks, no shoes required to enter the pool area.  Noah and I took our winter boots on and off about 25 times.
           4) Make sure you know how many heats there are in your child's event before you congratulate her on getting second place!  (Second her her heat does not mean second in the event when there are 4 heats!)
           5) Ear plugs would be a plus.  100+ screaming middle and high schoolers for 6+ hours is headache producing.  If you forget ear plugs make sure you have some Advil for the ride home.

Overall it was a great meet.  ICS got third place and Sophie had a fantastic swim in the 4x50 free style relay.  She put her team into second place (see note about congratulations being awarded before understanding the heat system!)  One thing we know for sure is she already swims better than either of her parents!




getting ready to swim



backstroke



Butterfly (or "fly" as I heard seasoned parents call it)




Off the blocks




a little bored with all the waiting around

           

Bike ride in January!

What is wrong with these pictures?  Nothing except the date.  Yes, these pictures were taken today. Yes, we still live in Zurich Switzerland. It is January 15th and we went for a 20km bike ride today around the Griefensee.  It felt like an April day.  Kids were in windbreakers and sweatshirts.  Eerie.  Especially last year at this time we were doing this.

Longest Rodelbahn in the World!

At the top, before the run.



Thomas at the start.  Notice the green netting surrounding the track in the background.  Made me nervous.  Why is that necesary??




Off he goes!




Jon and Sophie



Noah and I at the finish.

We had our friend Charlie visiting us last weekend so we took him to Churwalden (about a hour south of us) to go down the longest rodlebahn in the world!  It is 3.1 km long with lots of curve, dips and bends.  It has been unseasonably warm and the snow is terrible for skiing so this seemed like a good Swiss alternative!  It was great, terrifying but great.  Sophie road with Jon, and Noah with me.  Charlie and Thomas each had a sled to themselves.  You ride the chair lift up to the halfway point on the mountain.  It was strange to ride the chair lift without skis on!  You get a brief, very brief lesson how on to work the slide, pull up on handle to brake, push down to go faster.  Ok, simple enough. Strap yourself in, really the sleds had seat belts!  I wondered what it would do for me as my sled was hurtling down the elevated metal track at unknown speeds if the sled decided to jump the track.  Best not to think too much.  First ride down was ok.  We took it really slow, so slow that we actually caused a traffic jam on the track.  Second ride down we were elected to go last, hmmm.  Noah spent the whole ride down yelling "No more bremsen (german for braking)" at me.  There were little signs at each steep curve or dip that stated "Bremsen"  I took them as orders, everyone else interpreted them as suggestions.  Lots of fun although if we do it again I am sure I will be alone.  Noah stated at the bottom, "Lots of fun but we could have gone faster Mom!"  I don't agree.

Liechtenstein

Three weeks of vacation is a lot!  The first week was leading up to Christmas and we had parties to go to, shopping and wrapping to finish, decorating to complete and lots of cookies to eat!  It flew by.  Then our great week in Austria.  So what does one do with three bored children for the final week of  vacation- go to Liechtenstein.  Everybody got to add another country to their countries visited list and sleepy, sleepy Vaduz (capital city, pop. 5,000) made us feel Zurich was like Manhattan!  Fun to visit the castle (outside only) where the current ruling, royal family lives.  Otherwise not a lot to say about it.  We took a pass on the Stamps of Liechtenstein museum.

Red Sox Nation visits Vaduz Liechtenstein!  (Noah was not in the mood for pictures- his too much vacation face)

The Castle- amazed at the lack of security. We could have walked up and knocked on the front door.

Red Sox nation at the Castle

Ski show

Each year the kids are given the option to be the in the ski show at the end of the lessons.  This year it was on New Year's Eve so it had a huge fireworks display at the end.  Only Sophie wanted to be in the parade of flags (she got to carry the USA flag!) and to dance with Wanda Panda, the ski school mascot.  She had a great time and it was fun to see her "perform". 

This is the Kitzbueler horm at sunset.  (Taken from our hotel)

Ski Race 2010

The ski school in Austria does a race for all the groups at the end of the week of lessons.  Very fun, not too competitive (although there is a trophy for the fastest in each group) but everyone gets a medal.  I wanted to beat Thomas this year.  Badly.  We each ended up with a trophy, his for the fastest time overall, mine for being the fastest woman.  Um, I was the only woman.  He beat me by about 1 1/2 seconds.  Doesn't seem like much, right?  Keep in mind ski races are won by hundredths of seconds.  Maybe next year.  Then again, maybe not.

Noah coming in for the finish.

Jon- Pre-race

Sophie coming around a gate.

Unfortunately Jon, Thomas and I were all in the race together so nobody got any photos of us!

Christmas 2010

My boys jamming.



Daddy got snowshoes!




Christmas rubble




Not bad for a little Ikea tree.




Sophie modeling her new coat and toe socks.



Boys playing their guitars.

Thomas tuning Noah's guitar.



Top two items on the list- ipod and a paper jams

 I think the pictures speak for themselves.  Santa was very good to everyone this year (isn't he always!!)  Merry Christmas!!

Colmar Christmas Market

So after a warm up in Stein am Rhein we took Dan to Colmar France to their Christmas market.  It is really several markets spread throughout the town.  I love Colmar.  It is charming and picturesque on anyday and magical during the market.  Tons of booths with hand crafted items, lots of yummy baked goods and chocolate and of course gluhwein.  I am not actually a huge fan of gluhwein (think hot, sweet, spiced wine) but I am a fan of the mugs it is served in.  You pay around a euro for the cup which you can get back if you turn the mug in when you are done.  We keep ours and have several from the different markets we have been too.  We found lots of goodies and showed Dan France truly is charming!


typical house



enjoying some donuts

finger licking good!

hanging decorations

by one of the stalls

they had to spray paint the trees to look like snow!

A couple in traditional dress, we bought a photo for our travel wall from them.

Noah's Art Show

The Primary School art department held an art show showcasing all the kid's work from the first semester.  Noah had a paper mosiac of a wolf's head on display.  Danna would have been so proud!

Stein am Rhein Christmas Market

We took Uncle Dan to visit a small Christmas market to practice before we hit the big one. Stein am Rhein is a a very picturesque old town about an hour from us. They had the standard fare, bratwurst and hot chocolate with an addition of garlic bread. Yummy! It was cold, perfect weather to carve ice sculptures. Fun to watch. I loved the life size wooden nativity scene and Noah wanted to bring a goat home.

We took Uncle Dan to visit a small Christmas market to practice before we hit the big one.  Stein am Rhein is a a very picturesque old town about an hour from us.  They had the standard fare, bratwurst and hot chocolate with an addition of garlic bread.  Yummy!  It was cold, perfect weather to carve ice sculptures.  Fun to watch.  I loved the life size wooden nativity scene and Noah wanted to bring a goat home.