the rest of our Christmas weekend!

It is hard to believe that Christmas is already over! We had an incredible weekend packed full of activities!

We picked up Ben's parents late Friday night, along with my friend Courtney who was returning from an adoption placement in California.

On Saturday, we started out the day with showing Ben's parents our honeymoon pictures. It was fun to relive that trip once again. It made us miss Italy even more after looking at the pics of us wearing t-shirts and shorts! We lounged around quite a bit, which was very welcomed. We went and saw Marley & Me on Saturday afternoon. I wasn't quite prepared to cry so much! I hadn't read the book before, so I didn't know what to anticipate throughout the movie. What tearjerker! This was probably the 2nd or 3rd movie that I've been to where people clapped at the end. Definitely an unexpected great movie! Saturday night we made cornbread salad, yum.

Yesterday Ben & I went to church and then we met up with his parents and went down to Red Mill burger for lunch.. yum.. that place continues to amaze me. After lunch, we went down to the Pacific Science Center and went to the Imax theater, where I almost lost the burger from watching the movie about rafting up the blue Nile River. We went to the exhibit there and then went to REI to try to scoop up some sales. Yesterday night we watched Ironman, which I have to admit, I wasn't super excited about in the beginning. I was pleasantly surprised and actually really enjoyed it!

Now it's back to work.. blah.. It's so hard to come back after a holiday. Fortunately, this week is very short because I have taking a 1/2 day on Wednesday, and then Thursday & Friday totally off.

Here is our annual stack up pic that Jessie & Mark created through photoshop.. we are soon going to need a ladder when anymore nieces/nephews come along!

every time a bell rings an angel gets its wings!

I thought i'd start this Christmas post with a quote from one of my all time favorite Christmas movies! Unfortunately, we haven't gotten to that one on our Tivo selection yet, but I imagine it wont be too far behind!

We had an absolutely wonderful Christmas & Christmas Eve. It was definitely different not being in AZ or CA, but it was extra special because it was a white Christmas. The snow has not stopped yet!

On Christmas Eve, Jessie, Mark, James, Ben & I headed out on our annual holiday light extravaganza. This year we called it the extreme holiday light extravaganza because of all the snow. The honda handled like a pro except for a tricky spot on a side street. I can't say the lights here compared to Arizona's 100,000 lights put to music homes, but there were still some good houses.

Christmas morning we woke up and took our friend Courtney to the airport. We then opened up our stockings & presents. We were both really spoiled this year! I got a cool winter hat (seen in all the Christmas day pics), gift certificate to get my hair done, slippers, fleece pants & top, a Willow Tree statue that i've been wanting forever, and a really creative "date box" with lots of different gift cards of places we like. I got Ben some slippers as well, an ESV study bible, a couple games, glass blowing lessons, pea coat, dress shirt, pj pants, wallet, and a charging station for his cell phone, ipod, etc. After gifts, we headed over to Jessie & Mark's to open family gifts over Skype with my parents. That was a fun little twist on Christmas!

For the rest of the day we baked cookies (you have to try this recipe), ate a fabulous prime rib dinner (easily done with our handy electronic talking thermomenter), played lots of games and busted out some super mario kart.


today Jessie & I hit up some day after Christmas holiday sales. I got a wreath, angel for the top of the tree & a card holder all for 26 bucks!! sweet! We are now waiting to make another run to the airport to pick up Ben's parents. They will be here until Jan. 3rd. My mom is also heading up on Dec. 31st so we should have lots of fun to post about soon!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

ugly sweaters & sugar plum ferries

The Christmas season is in full force at the Crowls. Despite being in the middle of a huge snow storm all weekend, we managed to still have lots of fun.

Friday night we were supposed to babysit for James while Mark and Jessie went to Mark's work's Christmas party. It ended up getting moved to Jan. We went over there anyway and ate some tasty chicken tenders, played hand & foot, watched a movie called Transiberian (remind me never to take a week long train ride across Russia) and made ice cream sundaes. yum!

Saturday night we went to an ugly Christmas sweater party hosted by our community group leaders. it was a blast! There was a white elephant gift exchange. Here is what we brought.. I stole the idea from this blog Don't worry, Ben & I managed to win most creative sweaters! Here is a shot of our handiwork.. all handmade! yes those are battery operated LED lights coming out of Ben's sweater!


Today we went to church, made some cookies for our neighbors, and went to see the nutcracker at Edmonds Center for the Arts. We really enjoyed the performance! We dont have any pictures to post from the nutcracker because it was like a blizzard outside and we didn't want to stop and take a picture.

And of course, i cant leave the rest of the world wondering how much snow we have accumulated over the past few days. Here is a picture from our apartment parking lot.


ok not really, but we have probably 6-7 inches on the ground.

Snow Day!

We got quite a bit of snow for Seattle last night. Ben & I had some fun building a snowman in the parking lot.

No work for me this morning.. if only Ben didn't have to go in too!

oh the weather outside is frightful...

Just when I was thinking that it would be a mild winter, we woke up to this on Sunday morning!!

It was a slippery ride to church, but we made it!! This weekend was a blast. It started out with a big surprise! Ben had told me that he planned for us to go out to dinner on Friday night, but wouldn't tell me where. Once we arrived at our restaurant, my sister & Mark walked in! They had planned to meet us there for a surprise double date! The food at Flying Fish was absolutely wonderful!! We had a sampler of crab cakes, fish tacos, salad and shrimp. The next surprise was that Jessie & Mark bought Ben & I tickets to the last comic standing tour! We had watched the show faithfully and were so excited to see some of our favorites perform!


Saturday night we went to Ben's old bosses Christmas party. Parties are always a little interesting when you only know the hosts, but we played a board game which helped break the ice a little bit. The food was fantastic!


It's hard to believe Christmas is 10 days away! I am pretty much finished with my Christmas shopping which is a relief!

so bring me some figgy pudding..

Another fun weekend! Friday night we headed down town for the great figgy pudding caroling contest with some of our community group friends! Unfortunately, we didn't judge traffic on a Friday night into downtown, so we crawled along the freeway and got downtown around 7:15- right at the end of the caroling. We were also pretty hungry so we ended up eating in the food court & caught the end of the carol-off on the stage. Next year, we'll pack some food and leave about 40 min. earlier :) Pics to be posted later..

Saturday Ben & I split up and did some of our Christmas shopping- I ended up returning some of my impulsive buys that weren't so great after I got them home. Sat. night we had Ben's old college roommate over for dinner. We had a wedding gift for them that was long overdue to give to them (about 7 months) They are expecting their first baby in two weeks, so we also got them a little fuzzy outfit! It was fun to catch up with them and eat some tasty food. We discovered that Trader Joe's makes chocolate covered jo jos.. needless to say, the entire container was devoured in a matter of a day (we'll blame it on our dinner guests :)

We finally got our Tivo hooked up, and we have been enjoying lots of Christmas movies. So far we've watched Christmas Vacation, Home Alone & the Grinch. I was bummed when we went to watch Miracle on 34th street and it was a version from the 70's!

Tonight we're going caroling at a senior center with Jessie's community group, and tomorrow we're having some friends from community group over to dinner. I need to go shopping! It is supposed to snow here on Friday/Saturday, so that should be fun. Nothing like the high being 32 degrees!!

ps- today I got to work and had this sitting on my chair .


Inside? A beautiful silver cross.

Turkey was so 4 days ago, bring on Christmas!!

What a wonderful four days off from work (or in Ben's case, 3) It was so wonderful not having any worry or thoughts about work during that time! Thanksgiving morning we went on a walk around Green lake with Jessie, Mark & James-o. Not as crowded as a sunny day in the summer, but still busy enough to have some quality people/dog watching.



After some cooking (we were in charge of mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes and cranberry jello) we headed over to Jessie's for a feast. Everything was so delicious, we all definitely learned about the potent nature of mustard sauce. I think we all had a moment where our face turned bright red & our nostrils ignited. We are already out of leftovers- that creole stuffing never lasts long enough!


Friday morning Ben & I braved the early morning shopping and went to Office Depot. It was surprisingly not as vicious as I thought it would be. No pushing, running or stealing from other customers! We were able to get evertyhing that we wanted- a web cam, dvd player, wireless router & an external hard drive. Ben had to go to work on Friday, so I did some more shopping with my sister & cleaned our house.

Saturday we set off on the adventure of getting our first Christmas tree! I have to say, I think we might have scored the best one out there! We didn't quite judge the height of our ceiling very well, so we had a flashback of the movie Christmas vacation where the tree was bent at the ceiling because it was so tall. After some sawing, it fit just perfectly.
Here's some pictures of our new living room furniture, plus our tree!!

murder mystery & mondo burritos

Well another great weekend! I had Friday off, so I was able to spend some time with my friend Adelle in the morning and also have some time to clean up the apartment. Friday night we went over to Jessie's for a murder mystery dinner. I had done one a while ago in youth group, and remembered having a good time. It was a blast! I was a bit disappointed to not be the murderer, but I was able to figure out who really was!

Saturday morning I had to work at an adoption fair at Evergreen Hospital fair, but Courtney was also there representing her agency, we we were able to chat in between talking to people. Ben cleaned up trash along Queen Anne Ave. with the chamber of commerce and was rewarded with a free burger (tally that up to 3 burgers in one week for him!) Sat. afternoon we went over to Jessie's and babysat James while they went out to dinner.

Sunday we went to church, bought Ben some jeans, and then ran some errands. Sunday night we went out to some yummy mexican food with Courtney (take a wild guess what I had) It was delish! Check out the size of Courtney's burrito!

We're so excited for thanksgiving! Ben & I are in charge of sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes & Ben's mom's yummy cranberry jello. Friday Ben has to work (boo) so I will probably do some shopping if there are some good deals. Saturday we will get our first Christmas tree together!! I can't wait for this Christmas season!!!

my hubby is the best

I got this special delivery from Ben yesterday, my favorite kind of roses! What a catch.

bikes & burgers

What a wonderful weekend! We were so happy to have a break from the rain for a few days which allowed us to get out of the house for some bike riding!

We started out the day taking pictures of Jessie & Mark + baby James. Ben was the photog, I just tried to make James smile. Here's me taking a break from the pics to do some glamour shots of my own :)

After James' nap, we headed out to North Bend for a bike ride. Because it gets dark here so quickly, we had about an hour ride. We started out on this interesting "singletrack" trail. This was James' first time in his baby seat, so needless to say, the branches whiping his seat did not go over too well. We turned around and found a large, gravel road. It was wonderful just to get out, but also depressing because my legs were burning after about 1 minute.

We finished off the night with some tasty food and drinks from XXX rootbeer. I made the mistake of feeding James some rootbeer float in the very beginning, so he was all about getting some more! That's what aunts & uncles are for!

Yesterday we went to church & babysit for little James-o. We also ran some errands. I'm planning on posting some pictures of our living room and the new decorations we've added soon!

Happy Halloween!

Fall is definitely here! The leaves could not be more beautiful and the weather is certainly getting chillier. I have had many moments within the last week of wanting to stay under the warm covers all day! We have had to fight the urge to buy hot chocolate & chai teas everyday!

After work on Friday, I headed down to Edmonds with Jessie, James & Mark to the halloween trunk or treat. It was fun to see the cute... and not so cute costumes. James was a little intimidated by all of the costumes & loud music, but it was still a fun time. We then headed to Chipotle and got wrapped up in our tin foil burrito costume!



Saturday we got our flu shots & then cleaned our apartment. Saturday night we went over on the ferry to eat dinner with Mark and Jenni. We had an awesome time playing games (I got smoked in dominoes) and eating some tasty ribs! I tried out Jessie's moon pie recipe and it was super tasty.. perhaps we had one for breakfast!

Unfortunately I had to work today, so we'll go to church tonight & then i'll be able to take some time off of work tomorrow to do some grocery shopping & get ready for the week!

Hope all is well!

non-professional wedding pictures

Here are some of our non professional wedding pics I've collected

party party party

This has been an extremely busy weekend! The festivities started on Thursday night when I picked up Jane Butcher, Mark's mom from the airport. Mark had no idea that she was flying in and thought that Jessie & Mark were getting pizza delivered. It was quite the surprise when he opened up the door and saw his mom standing there!

Friday I had an early day at work and left at 3 to babysit James. I had the privilege of hearing his second word (even though no one was around me to witness) I was at work and I said "are you ready to go dude?" and then he goes "dude" it was so funny. We had a fun time playing with blocks, push toys & his sword. He also enjoyed his dinner of black bean soup! yumm!

After dinner, Ben arrived and we had lots of fun dancin, dancin, dancin to the music.. or more like rainforest noises.
Saturday I went to a baby shower for a girl from our community group. it was a wonderful time to spend with some amazing women, and of course I got to hold the baby :) Ben & I then headed over to Jessie's for Mark's birthday. We had a great time- it was quite the full house! There was quite an array of tasty food.. spicy artichoke dip, pizza, queso dip & fruit salad. Nothing lasted more than like 10 seconds, so it was tough keeping everything stocked!

After the party Ben & I went to Courtney's for some yummy minestrone soup. It was so great to see her and share pictures from our honeymoon adventures!

Sunday was a really fun experience for us. We started out by going to brunch at Salty's. We have wanted to go here for a really long time, but because it is a little pricey, we've held off. It could not have been a more gorgeous day to go. It was a beautiful, crisp, fall day. The colors of the trees were so vivid and the sky was very blue. We were seated on sea level view, so we had an awesome view of the skyline. The food was incredible!! There was so much to eat, it was almost overwhelming. We definitely had our share of crepes, omelets, mac & cheese, fruit, scrambled eggs and not to mention the massive dessert table. There was one little accident though-- I was in the middle of a conversation with Jessie & didn't realize that my entire hand went into the chocolate fountain! Woops!

After brunch, we went on an errand frenzy! We went to REI, West Marine, Shane Co, Williams Sonoma, Macy's , Target, and BBB. We then went back to the house to pick up some items that we forgot that needed to be returned to Macy's, and we went back to Macy's , Target & BBB. Needless to say, we got a TON of new stuff & were pretty tired! We finished off the night with another wonderful dinner at Jessie's.

Well i'm exhausted writing this post, so it must have been a busy weekend! i'll post more pictures when I get them from Jess.

we bought an entertainment center!

Here is a picture of the entertainment center that we bought yesterday! Our place is finally starting to feel like a home. So long to the massive bookshelf & the desk that served us well as a tv/computer table for many months!

the rest of our trip + James-o bday

Well I guess it's time to wrap up our trip on here! Our last day in Rothenburg we walked around the medieval town wall that surrounds the city. We did some much needed laundry and then headed out on some more trains for Bacharach. We got in a little later than we expected due to some delays, so we went straight to dinner at this wonderful old rustic home called Altes Haus. We enjoyed an incredible dinner + dessert. It was really really cold out, so we opted out of the town walk for the time being and retreated back to the hotel. The next day we headed out bright and early for a Rhine river cruise. It was such a beautiful day, but very chilly! We wanted to sit on the sun deck of the boat in order to be able to see both sides of the river easily, but we had to retreat below a few times because it was so brisk. We saw so many incredible castles built into the hillside and lots of little towns. It is hard to imagine having to stop at all the castles in order to pay a toll to pass through. There was even a castle built in the middle of the river!

We stopped at a small town named St. Goar. After a hot chocolate and pastry pit stop, we headed up a vineyard trail to the Rhinefels castle. What a neat place! It was so neat to imagine the old markets, cellars, and butcher shops. We even went down into these old tunnels that were used to trap people trying to invade the castle. it was quite scary down there because we didn't really have a decent map and there were lots of little dead end tunnels that used to store gun powder. The tunnels were never more than 3 feet tall so we had to crouch and crawl through the pitch black tunnels. We did have my trusty head lamp though. We ended up making it out and we were glad we did it! After our castle exploration, we headed back down into town and ate a picnic at the waterfront town before catching a train back to Bacharach.

We grabbed our bags from the tourist information office and then headed out to catch a train to Frankfurt. We ended up sitting by this guy who works at the airport. He spoke excellent english, so it was really interesting to learn about the scenery we were passing. He also helped us find the shuttle bus stop at the airport so we could take the free shuttle bus to the airport instead of paying for a cab. We didn't explore frankfurt at all, we were just too tired. We grabbed some dinner and then watched some tv for a little while.

Now we are back home!! It has been quite the whirlwind! On Sunday we celebrated James' 1st birthday. Ben & I dressed up as James' birthday table. It was a wonderful time with great people, food and fun. Of course it was also fun to beat Jessie & Mark in hand and foot a couple times ;) The fall celebrations are not over yet- this weekend is Mark's birthday!

and to finish my post- I leave you with my current favorite wedding shapshot "gettin jiggy with it"

we´re coming home...

we´re in Frankfurt waiting for our shuttle to take us to the airport. Can´t believe it´s over! We´ll post about the rest of our trip when we get back to reality.

goodbye Italy, hello Germany

so sorry it has been a few days since we have posted. We have had a whirlwind of a few days! We are now posting from Rothenburg Germany. Here´s a recap of the past few days...

Our second day in Rome was fairly busy. I felt pretty bad from the cold, so Ben started out his day by touring the National Museum of Rome. He saw the discus statue and a few other statues and old coins. He came back to the hotel and we headed out to the colessuem and the roman forum. What an incredible place! We enjoyed a tasty lunch and then headed back to the hotel. I again wasn´t feeling well at all so we decided to stay in and eat dinner at the beehive hotel cafe.

We left early the next morning for our train to Venice. We soon discovered that I was not as sick as we originally thought.. there was a resident cat at the beehive, so we think that about 50% of my sickness came from the cat. I felt a lot better once we left and got on the train. Venice was incredible. We were pretty muesumed out, so we opted to exmplore St. Marks square, people watch, get lost in the city, explore the back alleys, tour St. Marks basillica, eat some more gelato and of course, splurge on the romantic gondola ride. Boy was it worth it. It was so wonderful to sit back and hear nothing but the sound of the paddle moving through the water. We also took a tour of the city on a water taxi while listening to Rick Steves audio guide that went along with it. We were sad to leave Venice, and even sadder when we realized that we didn´t specify which type of cochette we wanted on the night train (a cochette is a room where you sleep) and we were matched up with 4 other people in a tiny cabin. Oh well, it was an experience. of course the best sleeper in the cabin was the one man who snored very loudly. He fell asleep almost immediately. We made it through the night and eventually made it to Munich where we took two more trains to Fussen.

We arrived in Fussen and discovered that the town was in the middle of the fall leaves changing. It was absolutely gorgeous. The red looked like fire, and the gold was incredible. We took a stroll through town and went on a little walk to a local waterfall. We then took a bus up to the big castle that i´m not going to even attempt to spell. We walked up to this beautiful bridge overlooking the castle and river below. We then took a tour of the castle and then went back to town. We were so tired from not getting much sleep the night before that we took a two hour nap, ate a quick dinner, and then went back to sleep. We have never slept as well as we did last night.

Today we took some more trains and arrived in the midevil town of Rothenburg around lunch time. The leaves here are also beautiful. We did a town walk, ate dinner, and then went on a nightwatchmans tour. It was really funny and gave some great information about the history of the city. Jessie, was it the pastry balls here that Rick Steves said not to try, but they looked so good you tried them anyway? Well we are so tempted to buy one, but we haven´t yet.

Tomorrow we head to our last stop, Bacharach. Hard to believe our trip is coming to a close. To add to our flavors of gelato, we tried cafe, peach and we did find apple, and it was quite tasty. We are definitely ready for some American food. Ben has his first meal set on Red Mill, while I am leaning towards a bean and cheese burrito enchilada style.

Well, I am about to pass out from second hand smoke in this internet cafe, so I must go. oh ps- we did forget to mention that Ben got one souvenir in Italy, a bee sting.

Happy Birthday to my wonderful sister and best friend, Jessie, and to our little nephew, James-o (we can´t wait to hear duck)

Ciao from Roma

Well we survived Florence and one day of Rome so far. I was pleasently surprised by Florence, I had some mix reviews before we left. I liked the fact that everything seemed around 10 min. away walking distance. We didn't have to worry about public transportation and did not feel very exhausted by the end of the day. We arrived in Florence around 11 and went and checked in at our hotel. We loved the place we stayed. It was a quaint and cherry place that kind of reminded me of a grandma's house. The room was huge and we got a discount for using Rick Steves.

Once we got settled, we did a Renassiance walk through Florence. We started out at the accademia- i couldn't believe how HUGE David was-- I was expecting that. We then went to the Duomo church and hiked up the 400 step bell tower for an impressive view of the dome. The weather was nice and warm, with a cool breeze at the top. We are definitely getting used to climbing stairs after cinque terre. After the Duomo we walked down a pedestrian only street lined with gelato shops and expensive stores. We saw the Orsanmichle church, palazzo vecchio and piazza republico. After our long tour, we headed back to our hotel for some r & r and then went to dinner at a local pizza restaurant. On Friday we started out by going to the medici chapels (unforuntately there was a lot of construction going on inside, but it was still nice) We then went to the bargello museum which is a sculpture museum. We saw Donatello's David and a cool statue of St. George. We grabbed lunch and then went to the Uffizi gallery where we saw birth of venus and some other neat paintings. We had the best dinner ever last night- we went to this dim, candlelit restaurant on a back alley by a big market and Ben had his florentine steak and I had some yummy tomato soup. After dinner we strolled around the duomo and admired it at night.

We left bright and early this morning. Sadly enough, I now have Ben's cold, so i'm feeling a little tired and sick today. We still had a pretty busy day though. After checking in to our fun little hotel called the beehive, (free internet!!) we took a crazy bus to the Vatican. We toured St. Peters basillica. Some of the stuff we learned was so interesting. It gave us an idea of really how massive the church is. There was a seemingly small stained glass window at the end of the church, but the dove inside the window was actually 15 feet wide. There was some gold letters written across the ceiling that looked like maybe 1 ft. tall, but they were actually 7. After the church, we went to the vatican museum and zoomed past a lot of art. We mainly focused on Rafael's fresco rooms and the sistene chapel. I did not know what to picture for the chapel, and I was so taken back by the beauty of it. We sat there for probably close to an hour and just soaked up all the detail.

It is pretty warm here.. i cant imagine coming any earlier in the summer. We are headed out tonight for a night walk across Rome and a nice dinner and death by chocolate ice cream.

Oh and in case your wondering, here is a list of all the flavors of gelato we have sampled:
pistacchio
cookies
dark chocolate
stracchetelia
mousse nutella
hazlenut
tiramasu
cinnamon
after 8 (mint chocolate)

My favorite was the cinnamon and Ben's was stracchetelia.

Tomorrow we will do the forum, colleseum, pantheon, capital hill area. The following day we head for Venice. We can't believe that we only have 1 week left. It's not time to go back to reality yet!!!

Love you all.

Greetings from Vernazza!

We have had an incredible past 3 days. The first day was fairly uneventful with 8 hours of train rides. The ride from Switzerland to Italy was beatuiful. A large portion of the ride was along the italian coast. We did not miss any of our connections! The day was not without excitement however. Once we arrived in Cinque Terre, we went to check into our hotel (it was 8 pm) for some reason I had written down the wrong hotel, and the only information I had was an email address named Annamaria. Fortunately the town is not very big, so people were pointing us in the direction of an Annamaria that rents rooms. Well apparently thats a very popular name because we ended up going to 4 different places!!!! Finally we found the right place, but Annamaria was gone and only her mom was there who speaks solo italiano. It was hilarious watching Ben try to bust out his italian from college. He managed to confirm the price & check out time.

Yesterday was an incredible day, besides the fact that Ben's cold that he has been figthing since before the wedding set in full force. We ate breakfast at this cute little shop and got custard filled croissonts and fresh squeezed oj. We checked out of our hotel and headed 3 towns away to Riomaggorie where we spent last night and tonight. The hotel is absolutely incredible. It has a huge balcony that is aimed directly at the medeateranean sea. There was a cool breeze all day. We spent a large portion of the day reading & playing cards on the balcony. We also managed to head into town and do a town walk, eat gelato (twice) and have some tasty italian food.

Today was a very rewarding day. We hiked the coastal town from our town to town #4 (vernazza) The first part of the trail was very smooth, wide and easy. Each town got more difficult. The last part had a large portion uphill, which was pretty difficult. The weather was absolutely gorgeous (around 75-80) Once we got to Vernazza we were really warm so ben decided to go for a dip! The water took his breath away, but he said it was very refreshing. We then took a boat back to our town and was able to see all that we hiked. For dinner we headed back in to Vernazza after long showers and had a tasty meal on the waterfront. Have no fear about us working off too many calories on our hikes and walks, we have been eating so much pasta, pesto, and gelato!!!

We are actually really sad to leave tomorrow. We both agree we could stay here at least another week! But it is time to head to Florence. We leave bright and early and will be in the city by 10:30 tomorrow. We'll be there for the next 2 days. It's hard to believe our trip is over 1/2 way over, it has been so incredible!!

ps- our photographer posted two "teaser" pictures from our wedding. Check them out at www.kaceyluvi.blogspot.com

lazy days

Hello from Murren Switzerland

We have had two of the most beautiful days. We left Interlaken yesterday and were greeted by another gray day. We took the scenic route up to Gimmelwald and we were soon in the middle of a snow storm. We got off at Gimmelwald and hiked up to our hotel. Yesterday was complete opposite of our trip in Paris. Instead of rushing to catch subways and speeding from site to site, we laid on a back patio, stared at the mountains, and made shadow puppets to pass the time. We did a small walking tour around the 100 person town, played cribbage on our back patio overlooking the alps, and napped. After we woke up from our nap, the sky had cleared fairly significantly so we went outside again, but didn't last long because it was freezing!!

Our hotel cooked us dinner (which was very conveinent because there are no restaurants in town) We met the other guests staying at our little creaky fire hazard place. There was one couple also from washington state. We are following their almost same travel schedule, so that was fun to swap stories.

Today we were thrilled when we woke up and saw a totally cloudless sky (thanks for your prayers Jessie). We ate breakfast and then took a scenic gondola up to the town of Murren. We LOVE the place that we are staying today. The woman who runs it is from britian and she is so sweet. Our room is incredible. When we first went in, the windows were wide open and we have an awesome view of the alps. We dropped off our stuff and headed up 2,500 feet to the Schilthorn. Again, we just cannot describe how beautiful it was. This was the third time on the trip that i've said "I think this is the most beautiful place i've ever been". It was a 360 degree view of the most incredible snow covered mountains. We took lots of pictures and then watched a short film showing clips from the James Bond movie that they filmed there.

After we got back to Murren, we had a panini and are now here typing to you. We got free passes to the local sports center to we are going to the hot tub after this. Tomorrow we head for Cinque Terre. We are hoping to actually be able to use our capris and shorts..Talk to you soon.

52.00 cheese fondue???

Hello again from Interlaken! We will not have internet access for the next few days, so we thought we'd post tonight instead of trying to remember 3 days of adventures. We were a little disappointed when we woke up this morning and it was very rainy and drizzly. We figured that we would have a lazy day of laundry, etc. but we were happy when the rain stopped and the sun started to come out around 12. We had a picnic lunch and then took a walking tour of the town. It was just beautiful. Old buildings with flowers hanging out all the windows. At one point we walked downstream along one of the two rivers that run through the town. There were some beautiful swans floating around. We then took a local bus to a town about 20 min. away. Interlaken is a town located in between two beautiful glaciar blue colored lakes. The bus trip took us right alongside one of the lakes. Trying to describe this beautiful place is too difficult. It is literally a slice of heaven. There were huge HUGE snow covered mountain peaks, a beautiful waterfall, and this beautiful lake down below. We hiked around, took a ton of pictures and were in awe. We originally planned to take a boat back to Interlaken but we didn't have enough francs with us so we decided to walk back to a closer town to catch a free bus. I'm glad we did the walk because we got to walk along this trail (definitely a Wornick woman type of trail in the middle of the woods and nice and flat) We got back into town and went out to dinner. We went to this one place recommended by our hotel. We were shocked to find that cheese fondue was 52.00 and it only came for bread. We opted for a pizza that was still 18 francs for barely two servings. We topped off the night with getting dessert at a different restaurant. Ben had a macaroon and I had this huge piece of chocolate cake. We did not escape the price gouging however... Ben got a cappuchino for dessert and it cost 4.90! oh well.. we're on vacation as my mom would say. This was truly such an incredible day. There is going to be snow where we are going tomorrow so again, we're glad to have warm clothes. We'll spend tomorrow night in a small town called Gimmelwald and then the next night in Murren. The following day we have another longggg day of trains to Cinque Terre.. we can't wait to be sitting on our private balcony overlooking the water and eating pesto pizza. Love you all. Happy Birthday tomorrow dad..

mmm chocolate!

Hello from Switzerland! After nine hours of train rides, we arrived in Interlaken around 9:30 pm. Before we left France, we went in the morning to the palace of Versailles. Wow, what an incredible place!! We expected it to be beautiful, but were not prepared for how beautiful it was. The kings that lived there were quite into extravagance. I can't imagine having one room for parties, one room for playing cards, two bedrooms, one room for "planning" one room for war, and don't worry, one room for peace. Plus, a HUGE hall full of mirrors, 26 chandeliers and gold statues to hold up even more crystal candleholders. We have really been enjoying the Rick Steves audio podcasts we have been downloading- he is quite the humorous chap. After Versailles, we ate at this delicious crepe place. There was probably 150 different kinds of crepes. Ben had a hamburger, tomato, and garlic. I had ham, cheese, and mushrooms. For dessert we had milk chocolate and pear... yum!! Of course 9 hours of train rides do not come without many stories :) We started off our adventures by trying to use the bathroom in the station in France. I got up there and realized that they charge to use the potty. After getting some euros, I went back up and handed them to a lady. She gave me a token and some change. She was very rude and annoyed at me that I couldn't figure out which one of the like 10 doors to go in. First, I attempedt to go through a turnstile until I realized that there was a man peeing in a urinal right in front of me.. eek! Then I found the "dames" bathroom, and I put in my token, but the turnstile didn't turn. I looked over at the lady for guidance, but she just kept yelling at me in French. Finally she came over and let me in the exit. oh well. Our next adventure came when our first train arrived 10 min. late so we missed our connection. We were running frantically around Geneva trying to figure out where to go. Luckily we hopped on one shortly after. Our last connection in Bern was also an adventure. Because we were running late, we were catching random trains. The one we got on that was heading towards Interlaken was reallly nice and so we thought it might be reservations only. We kept getting on and off deciding if we should stay or not. Finally we decided to risk it and it paid off because it went straight to Interlaken. Today is very cold and rainy, so we plan to do some laundry, do a town walk, maybe go swimming and if it clears up, we will go on a boat trip to some nearby caves. Switzerland is beautiful from what we have seen. Our current hotel/hostel reminds us of being in college again. There is two twin beds pushed together and the bathroom is down the hall. Time to bust out the flip flops! I have banged my head on the wall in the room about 10 times and counting now :) And Mark, we are taking your suggestion and have been eating many desserts. Tomorrow we will head up to Gimmelwald, and it is semi clear, we will take the lift all the way up to the Schilthorn. We are having a great time- many laughs and many more stories. Hope all is well!

Ahhh Paris

What a beautiful city!! After 11 hours of sleep we were ready to go!! We started out the day at the arc de triumph. It was incredible watching all the 12 boulevards ,anuver around the traffic circle. We then "sauntered" (as rick s. would say) down Champs Ulysses and admired all the things we couldn,t afford. We ate lunch in the tuleries garden and then toured the louve. >Our favorite thing in the louve was the apollo room. After the louv, we went to the Orsay mueusm and looked at all this beautiful impressionist work including monet, van gogh, manet, and renoir. It was breath taking. We weren't done yet!!! We then headed back to our hotel and stopped at various markets around it to collect picnic food. We headed towards the Eiffel tower and ate dinner on a bench in a nearby park. We headed up the tower right as the sun was setting. We stayed until dark and watched the lights twinkle on the hour.. After about 300 unsuccessful night time pictures, and saying no to about 400 people selling blinking plastic Eiffel towers and other various trinkets, we finally got a good snapshot!! We finished off the evening with our second banana nutella crepe...

tomorrow we head to the palace of Versailles and then on to interlaken switzerland. So glad we brought our fleece and rain jackets.. its been rainy, windy and chilly both days. We stand out like sore thumbs because all the pairisains weqr tight pants, tall boats and fancy coats and there i am with ,y hooded visor marmont :) Talk to you all soon!!

We're married!!

Saturday was an incredible day!!! Surprisingly everything went really smoothly without many issues (besides almost forgetting the vows, and the wrong music playing during the processional) I can't believe that I am Mrs. Crowl now!!!

We're heading out this morning for Paris so we'll write more when we arrive.

Our photographer should post a few pictures from our wedding in a week or less. Her website is:

kaceyluvi.blogspot.com

Love you all!!

2 weeks and counting!

The wedding is almost two weeks away! I can't believe it! We have quite a few things to do this weekend including moving Ben's stuff out of his apartment, making our place cards, printing our programs and table numbers, and packing for the honeymoon!

Of course we'll take a little time out of our weekend for some fun. We're going to play kickball on Saturday!

It's hard to believe that in less than one month, this is where we'll be:

we're starting a blog!

We're joining the ranks of the bloggers in order to keep friends and family updated on our life! We probably wont post much until we are on our honeymoon due to the craziness of the wedding being only 20 days away!