Monday, October 27, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
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. 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!
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.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
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!
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
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 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"
Friday, October 17, 2008
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.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
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)
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)
Saturday, October 11, 2008
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.
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.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)