Laowai

So this will be the subject of alot of my posts now – my house, my house, my house.

The linen closet upstairs has these pull out drawer boxes that have handles. Cute.

Bea’s bedroom – she is loving her wallpaper.

She set up her trinkets on her window sil right away.

My favorite dishes – unpacked and thrown into the hutch.

Oh what an exciting few days we’ve had. Mom, Jenna and the girls and I headed to Wilmette on Saturday. The girls were so excited when we first arrived – they ran around the whole house from room to room in about 3 minutes flat. Mom and I had a great time looking over the old blueprints of the house after the girls went to bed. I’m falling in love with our house and realizing what a long-term project it will be for us.

We walked down to our little local grocery store. I think I will love it because I can walk there like I did in Switzerland and it’s called Treasure Island (very kitschy). We met some of our neighbors – the neighborhood seems full of young kids. I had to do some errands one day and it was boiling hot so we stopped at the hardware on the way home and bought a hose and a sprinkler for the girls. I love seeing them playing in the backyard. On Monday our stuff that was in storage was delivered. I was reunited with my nice dishes, some favorite knick-knacks and my KitchenAid mixer. Yeah! The girls played in empty boxes and jumped in the mountain of packing paper. In the picture below Jenna and Bea are just returning from a walk in the new neighborhood. They were pleased with themselves – going for a walk all on their own.

The girls and I flew to Michigan on Sunday. The movers came on Monday and packed up all our stuff. Brian will stay behind in Zurich for about six weeks – living in an empty echoing apartment.

The last few days at our home in Switzerland were not that fun – lots of sorting through stuff. I packed our bags and tried to get every last bit of laundry clean. I dreamed my to do lists and didn’t sleep that well. I was anxious to get on with things and be done with our long day of travel.

We’re moving on…

I finally got some pictures of our strandbad. It’s the most pleasant and happy place to be on a hot day.

Well we’re finishing off our time here with a bang. We were excited to find out, earlier this year, that the Tour de Suisse was going to go right by our town. Brian got a kick out of the fact that the race was going on all the hills that he is so familiar with from his riding. We saw the racers go by twice. Once on Friday just steps from our house when they were almost done racing for the day. And then again in Rapperswil (a town towards the bottom of Lake Zurich) when they had just started their day. 

It was our hottest day yet – they’re eating ice cream sandwiches.

The girls got into collecting free stuff from the sponsors. Claire was funny – when a car was coming I would say – put your hands out girls – and she would do just that. She’s a cute little begger. We got a bunch of trinkets and candy that we don’t need.

My newest hobby is watching the men working at the construction site next to our apartment. It’s nice to see a couple of them that are tanned and toned, but really I just like to check in with the progress on the building. It’s interesting – really. They put up a big crane yesterday. I think they could use it to lift the furniture out of our house on Monday.

They got a big delivery of Dow styrofoam yesterday – I was telling Bea that Dow started in the town where her Grandmas and Grandpas live and I was going on about how Grandpa J. and Daddy worked for Dow (Corning) and Grandpa C. worked where Mr. Dow lived. She finally said “Mom, I think you’re more excited about that than I am.” Oh – I was just feeling proud of my home town.

We made cookies for Bea to take to school today – her last day of kindergarten. Wow – what a journey it has been. I took a ton of photos because I just love the kindergarten room and I want Bea to be able to look back and remember. This afternoon I will pick her up and help her bring all her stuff home. 

I love the organized, vibrant chaos of the room.

The kids keep their “work” in their binders:

The coat room – where they change into their slippers and hang up their orange vests.

Her teacher sends notes home in these recycled pringles containers – kinder post.

Here’s a t-shirt that the kids made for Bea:

Here’s Claire grinding some wheat into flour – they bake frequently.

Circle time:

Reading a penguin book just for Bea. Early on when Bea struggled at school she always took her stuffed penguin to school. She would say penguin (and nothing else). The penguin was her special way of communicating and playing with her teacher. The other kids would play with her penguin and say squank. Her teacher told me for all her life she will think of Bea when she sees a penguin.

The front door to the school. In winter her teacher puts votive candles and other little decorations on the table next to the door. It’s very welcoming on a dark cold morning.

A  couple views of Bea’s walk home from school:

Heavy hearts.

— A stick of butter equals 115 grams

— Eggs are better here
I'm not saying that there aren't good eggs in the US. It's just that the plain inexpensive eggs that I buy here are much more yellow and tasty than the plain old supermarket eggs that I used to buy in the US.

— Cars can isolate us
In ways I do look forward to having a car again, but living for three and a half years without a car has shown me that they do not promote a feeling of community. If you are outside on the sidewalks of your town you see your neighbors and your neighborhood up close. You can say Grüezi to everyone you meet and you feel part of the community.

— Plain white floors with little kids are ridiculous.

— Convenience is overrated. 

— How to play pass the parcel
Thanks to all the British friends I made here I learned this cute party game for kids. Here is a really long explanation of how to make the parcel (it will put you to sleep and she says brilliant a lot!). And here is a video of some kids playing it. 

— I like A4 better than 8½ x 11

— The food products in the US are sometimes gimmicky and unnecessary. After shopping in manageable sized grocery stores here I feel overwhelmed by Meijers and Target. Several choices of toothpaste are nice – 20 choices – that's just too much. And I don't need green ketchup or oatmeal for women.

— How to make Zopf

For our last weekend outing we went to a peak called Stanserhorn. To get to the top we first rode a funicular and then a gondola.

The gondola just opened a year ago. It’s the first of it’s kind – it has an open air upper deck. Poor Brian stayed downstairs but the girls and I enjoyed the ride with the wind in our hair. I thought it would be scary but it was so gentle and secure feeling – it almost felt less scary than some of the other gondolas we’ve been on.

We had lunch and then did a little hike.

A little snowball fight.

Bea is looking for marmots in the little marmot enclosure. Isn’t their house cute. We didn’t see any.

It was quite busy – I think everyone wants to be outside after the long dreary spring that we had. My dad would call it a zoo – but that’s how it is in Switzerland. The beautiful mountaintops are accessible to everyone.

There was a lovely picnic and grill spot. Look at that charming little wood shed. There’s paper and little kindling sticks in the top – it’s there for the taking. Another nice thing about Switzerland – come grill here in this beautiful spot and here take some free wood. 

On our way back down.

The funicular station was cute. All the people working for the funicular and gondola were nice retireees. They seemed so happy and helpful. I wish I could have a job like that when I’m 70.

We stopped by the town of Stans for a little while to get some ice cream and play in the playground.

And that was that – on our way home I had to snap a picture of the typical small town train station. I’ll miss these little trips.