It's Springtime!

Since Easter, the weather has cleared up, allowing us to do more fun things outside. The great thing about where we live is there are loads of things to do near the lake. We took a great trip across Lake Geneva to Evian, France. There we could drink Evian water right from the source -- free! Here we are, in front of our ferry.
Hanging out on the boat.

The view from Evian. If you look carefully, you can see Morges in the background -- straight across the lake.

Anna Claire and her golden hair. Btw, she will NOT let her Mommy put anything in her hair.

Playing in the park by our house.

Hanging out with Daddy on the waterfront. Now, don't they look alike???
It's time to practice our biking again! Actually, the girls have a little race course that goes round and round and round the apartment.

Snowtime fun!

We returned home from our Easter vacation to a Winter Wonderland. The kids were thrilled to get to play in real snow in our backyard. I was thrilled that the snow was actually sticky. Growing up in Utah, the stuff was so dry that I could barely make a snowball.
Mariah is testing out her snow walking skills.

Anna is checking out her snowman.

Our fort -- which was already melting by the end of the day. Note the green grass underneath. None of the dry, brown stuff we had in Utah.

Easter in Italy: Firenze

On Easter Sunday, we headed into Florence. It was the least crowded I have ever seen the place. (And I spent 5 weeks studying there during law school.) We arrived just in time to see the parade of different trade groups all dressed in colorful costumes. By the afternoon, though, it was pouring rain and the girls were exhausted, so we cut our trip short.

I'm back, 11 years later, after studying here. Check out the Ponte Vecchio.

Here are Rob and the girls on the Ponte Vecchio. Can you believe it? No people!

Anna Claire marched right along with the parade!

Doesn't David look great surrounded by colorful flags and costumes? This must have been what it was like when Michelangelo first unveiled it.

In the main Piazza with my girls!

Mariah is jamming to the band music!
Check out the flag throwing!

By the time we made it to the Duomo, the girls were tuckered out.

At the fountain in the train station. Right after this photo, Mariah tried to climb in and fell in face first. I got soaked reaching in to catch her.

Here is the view as we returned back to Switzerland. Beautiful first snow -- in March!!

Easter in Italy: A Day in Siena

We planned an Easter trip to Italy, hoping that we would find sunny weather and good biking. Instead, we woke up Friday morning on the day we were to leave to a huge snowstorm. Unbelievable! It's the first time that it's snowed this year in Morges! Anyhow, we finally decided to brave the storm about noon and drive to Italy. Unfortunately, Italy was hitwith snow and storms too, so all our biking and swimming plans dissipated quickly. But, hey, it's still Italy, so we still had fun.

I must mention our lovely accommodations. We found nice, cheap "trailor park" lodging just outside of Florence. It looked okay on the website. But I realized something was fishy when I discovered (fortunately just before we left) that we needed to bring all our own linens. Anyhow, it was freezing and the trailer's gas stove barely heated a 2-foot radius, which meant that the girls slept in our tiny kitchen and Rob and I shivered all night in our tiny bedroom, complete with a lovely rock-hard mattress. By the way, the place was four-star -- camping, that is!

The next day we made a trip to the old town of Siena. The town is surrounded by a fortress and cars are not allowed inside, so we had a tough time trying to find close parking. But getting to the main Piazza was worth it. The place is huge (big enough to have a famous horse race around it) and perfect for little kids to run around. Chasing pigeons seemed to be the favorite pasttime for Anna Claire and Mariah.

On the steps of the Duomo.

Good Times!

The weather was beautiful the other day so we decided to walk along the lake and hit the beach. The girls dug around with sticks while I basked in the newfound sunshine.

Anna Claire strikes a pose.

Reading time on the rocking chair. . .

Bathtime. We're finally reaping the benefits of having two girls close in age. They have loads of fun together. Mariah wants to do everything her big sister does.

MORGES TULIP FESTIVAL TIME!

It's been a late spring so the tulips haven't bloomed much yet. But the girls still had fun running around it.

A Day at the Park

Happy Ides of March! The weather this morning was gorgeous so we took a little family trip to this gigantic park called Signal de Bougy. It's got loads of play structures (the fun, risky ones that they don't build in the U.S. anymore for liability reasons), a miniature zoo, and bumper boats and cars -- my favorites.

At the duck pond -- but where are the ducks?

The bumper car section was not open when we arrived, so Daddy got to push the girls.

Again, Daddy, again!

Okay, Daddy, this is a little bit scary but it's okay.

("It's okay is one of Anna's favorite phrases. She often says it to me when I'm stressed out -- "It's okay, Mommy.")

Daddy's Birthday!

We celebrated Rob's birthday today. I think the whole event was more fun for Anna Claire and Mariah than for Rob. Anna Claire has a new book with loads of pictures of cakes. She picked out the cake that she thought Daddy would like -- a basketball cake, because Daddy used to play basketball. It also kind of fit in with the gift the girls gave Daddy -- a new, real-sized soccerball. (Yes, this is a little self-serving because it's so that Daddy can kick the ball around outside with the girls.)

Here's the cake. We burned out on chocolate after just a couple pieces so we had to give most of it away.

Anna Claire proudly displaying her masterpiece. If you look carefully, you'll see she just stuck her fist into it.
Happy Birthday to you. . .

Happy Valentine's Day!

Earlier this week I had to go to the hospital for 24 hours for a little surgery. That was rough on the kids. So this week we've done lots of fun activities to make up for it. On Wednesday, we made Valentine's Day cards for Daddy and the grandparents. Next, we had a special Valentine's Day picnic (outside on our balcony). Anna Claire set out all the plates and food and poured water, while Mommy made sandwiches. The girls love doing these picnics. Anna Claire sets out everything nicely and Mariah happily messes it all up.

Valentine's Day (and evening) itself became a family occasion this year, mostly because I neglected to get a babysitter and Rob has been working crazy hours. The girls and I made chocolate heart cookies and when Daddy came home, we frosted them with pink and chocolate icing and loaded them with M&M's. The M&M's ended up mostly in Mariah's mouth, however.

Mmmmm, this chocolate stuff is almost as good as the green beans I just devoured!
Yum. . .chocolate to my heart's content.

Afterwards, we had a family Valentine's dance. That was the best part! As you can see, Anna Claire got a new dancing outfit. Mariah got to share some costume jewelry, but she mostly chewed it up. (She was a big chocolatey mess so we had to strip her down.)

Past Blast

My friend Tzili came to visit this weekend. She's a friend from my joint-degree program and is an amazing advocate for women's and children's rights. She came to Geneva to present a paper to one of the UN committees and then spent the weekend with us. She dragged me out of my children-crowded world back into the world of law and advocacy for a couple days. Here we are in front of the oft-visited Chateau Chillon.

Dance with me!

With more days cold and rainy lately, we are spending more time inside. The girls love to listen to music. Both of them drag out all our instruments (including the toy violin rented from the Ludotech) and jam to the beat. Mariah climbs up on the coffee table and bops around. The other day, we were listening to Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" while Mariah napped. Suddenly, I heard a little voice singing to the music, "La la la la la la la la. . ." Mariah had woken up, heard the music and was singing from her crib. She's destined to be an opera star!

Hangin' out on the sofa.

Anna Claire can't stop dancing to music either. She puts on her little swimming suit (which has a skirt like a tutu), pulls on her sparkly tights and her "glass slipper" shoes (some dressy, white shoes from back when she was a flower girl), and twirls and leaps around. I need to get her some real dress up!

Mariah's Birthday!

We celebrated Mariah's first birthday today. I can't believe it has been one year since she was born. So much has happened, yet it seems not long ago that she was a tiny new born. She has already taken a few first steps. Goodbye baby, hello toddler! Mariah is picking up new words almost every day. Starting with "uh-oh" and "bubble," she moved on to "Da-da" (why is he always first?), "Ma-ma", "duckie", "ball" and, of course, "Nana" (which usually means her favorite sister Anna, but also means the fruit when she's hungry).

Actually Mariah adores Anna. She speed-crawls around the house calling her name. In the mornings when she wakes up before Anna, she'll crawl over to Anna's door and push it open, waking up Anna Claire while happily chanting "Nana, Nana".

We had as much fun getting ready for Mariah's birthday celebration as having it. Anna Claire has figured out that birthdays are fun even if they're not hers. She helped me decorate Mariah's cake and make her birthday crown. Mariah absolutely loves duckies (we see them in the canal and the lake almost every day), so we made her a duckie cake. It was easy. I just created a little pond and added tiny rubber ducks, Swedish fish and gummy frogs. (I had to make the pond green, though, because I couldn't find blue food coloring here. Hey, most ponds have algae, anyway.) When Mariah saw it she screamed "duckie, duckie, duckie". Aaaaah! I love how babies are so easy to please.

Mom, inspecting her accomplishment, with Mariah thinking, "Quit taking my picture and just let me eat the thing!"

Mmmm, delicious! And this time I can make as much mess as I want!Time for presents: Hey, Nana, that's MY phone!There you go. Hello, how are you? Gotta go!I must say that Mariah's big birthday gift was a bit of a disappointment. Not for her, but for me. I bought a little toy lawnmower in the US (it doubled as a learning toy, so I needed it in English). Anyhow, I thought it would be like those cute popping vaccuum cleaners, and also could serve as a little walker for Mariah. Well, the handle doesn't stay up by itself, so it doesn't work like a walker. And the thing is soooooo loud (the part that doesn't turn off) that it will bother the neighbors below. What a waste!