What Frozen Things Do in Summer

Hopefully you have all seen the movie Frozen and get the joke that Cuddles looks like a snowball, basking in the summer sun.  The boys went for a sleepover with new friends, twin 12-year old boys.  Their dad went so far as to go for an interview at our school, but they decided to go to the American School.  Bummer.

What I am doing meanwhile is making beaded jewelry with friends.

This friend had been eying chunky jewelry in blue and orange on ETSY, so she knew exactly what she wanted. 

     Meanwhile, I have a new computer, a new camera and a new steam cleaner, all at once.  You who know me know that I am NOT the early adopter, so this is a lot to figure out all at once.  I took Troy´s camera to a photography class.  I guess I was hoping for someone to know something about  a photography club.  The title of the class was ¨Get out of Auto,¨and it was exactly that: how to set the settings manually.  The first thing the teacher said was, ¨I hope you brought your manuals.¨ I was thinking, ¨I am in class so I don´t have to read the manual.¨  I left the class very frustrated, never having budged those settings, and had to look it up in the manual.  But this morning I figured it out and hopefully there will be good photos in the near future!  My friend above had a ghastly green tint to her, and I already cleaned that up.

     Wyatt took over my laptop for Minecraft, so Troy very kindly set up the Macbook Air for me.  He is probably already regretting it, because he has to listen to me screech and complain every time I turn it on.  Cut and paste?  I have to look it up.  Right click?  I have to look it up.  Screenshot?  I have to look it up, plus I have to look up more stuff because I don´t understand the instructions.

     The steam cleaner I would call a polisher, for after you have already cleaned.  Troy thought it would make my life easier.  And maybe it will, but it hasn´t yet.  Instead of trying to CLEAN with it next Monday, cleaning day, I will have the boys mop the floors with it.  That is actually what it is designed to do.  

Birthday

Thanks for all your birthday wishes :-)

I went to the new hipster neighborhood for breakfast, and Wyatt had this perfectly carved bird for me when I came home.  

Troy told me they were working in the basement on a mat for weight-lifting.

But really they made me a cake, with three kinds of chocolate melted over it that says MOM or WOW. 

They had me completely fooled. Tristan even kept the secret when I decided to make brownies to go with the ice cream. We had perfect cool weather, I updated a bunch if computer stuff, we played tennis and swam, Troy took me out for the fried peppers that I love... Thank you again. 

Filial love

We are back in Madrid, settling into summer routine. Wyatt is in a delightful stage of filial love and self-sacrifice.  He was nagging me to use my computer to play Minecraft, but then flopped on the sofa and said, "I guess it is good that Mama wants to learn Spanish."  Then I told him that there was a time before cancer that I wanted to be in heaven. He knew immediately what that meant. "But what about me, what about us?"  When I said, like a cancer patient I saw yesterday, that I love life and appreciate small things, he said, "I want to give you a hug and a kiss. No, two kisses."

And thirdly, his favorite quote right now is from that book about cancer kids, when you realize that the whiney girl narator loves her mother: 

There is only one things in this world shittier than biting it from cancer when you're sixteen, and that's having a kid who bites it from cancer.

John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

The Sunny Side of Lake Zurich

 Wyatt has been very vocal about wanting to swim. So even though the forecast called for rain, we researched all the toddler-friendly swimming spots and picked a park on the lake. 

This is a public park, with grass and sun and shade and steps down to the water. 

My friend grew up on the other side of the lake, and so had not been much to this side. It is the sunny side and therefore the swanky side. Those are three baby swans in the foreground. 

And in the background, is our five kids in this crazy paddleboat with a slide.  

They had great pirate adventures and we could hear Wyatt from miles away, yelling "hard right," and "hard left."

Winston wanted to take the turtle boat. 

It sits low in the water so that it can pass under the bridges of the river. The river was too high, so we got off and took the tram. 

Winston got his wish. And Elisabeth got her sea legs. 

The Abbey

We stayed at the same place we did three years ago.  We were on the third floor of the Lake House. 

I love walking out at the foot of the cathedral and feeling like an ant.  They were set up for a summer theater program and had a concert in the sanctuary. The programs were all in German, so I don't know what the productions were. We saw a scruffy-looking troup helping an actress into a harness for a rehearsal, so that might've been fun to see. I'm sure it was not Peter Pan, though, because Abbey guests are all older and contemplative. 

There was a group of special needs adults there for a retreat with their families. 

On a clear day you can see the snow capped peaks from the back terrace. We only saw a hint of them because of the haze. 

Inside detail of the cathedral. 

This is the celebrated 23-your old cat. She didn't seem that old: not stiff or creaky or in pain. She just moved slowly or not at all and everyone thought she was elegant. What we could all learn from a 23-year-old cat!

River walks

After church in Lucerne, we stopped at the bakery for a picnic and had lunch on the river. 

Chasing pigeons. 

Making out on the Lover's Bridge. Lucky for you those pictures did not come out. 

Laughing at the big ugly feet that swans have. They kick one big, black flipper up behind their backs and flap it around. Why?  I don't know. 

Then we went to my friend's favorite river from her childhood. We were looking for the trout restaurant that you can only get to by walking. 

We did not find the trout place, but we did find this awesome waterfall. 

The ivy grows down on curtains from the log. 

Wyatt wanted to swim, but this little beach was underwater. The current was a little scary to me. Those ripples were actually waves; that's how high the water was. Wyatt was afraid of the snakes and things that might be under the water. Tristan fished up a rusty nail, and that was the end of the swimming. 

This covered bridge was one of many bridges. 

Young farmers buzzed through on motorbikes. There are no dead ends in Switzerland. You think the trail is ending at someone's farm, but it keeps going. It is a lovely place for pedestrians. 

Even though our trail ended up underwater, we made it back in time for dinner. There was already an alternate trail worn into a pasture by the indefatiguable Swiss hikers. 

Hiking Lite

I call it Hiking Lite because you take a funicular halfway up. You can take your backpack, your stroller, your grandpa in a wheelchair, or whatever else you can think of,...

Because this paved road runs all the way across to where you catch a gondola to go down.  You think you're really somewhere remote until you almost get run over by a resident farmer (or restaurant employee) in a Volkswagen. 

These road signs for hikers are all over Switzerland, with distances given in hours. For example, that peak might be three hours. The peaks are the Seven Sisters and they all have names and trails. 

We went the other way, because my Swiss friend said to go east. She had a stroller and we did not. You can see where alpine meadow changes to Alpine Forest. It seems like the trail might disappear. 

We stopped on a crumbly farm wall to eat. 

This is not a frisbee but rather a six pack of ready-made hard-boiled eggs.  They are always decorated to distinguish them from raw eggs. You buy a tube of mustard to go with it that comes in the same kind of metal tube as foot cream.  I have to say the tube packaging is very handy for picnics. 

That is Tristan gazing up at the spectacularly tall pine tree. 

I wanted a picture of the cheerful yellow flower and awning, but what really strikes me is how beefy my husband is. My Spanish friend joked that one of Troy's arms is bigger than her husband's leg. 

     At the bottom, after the ride down on the chairlift, your ticket includes a bus ride back to the carpark. This is my kind of hiking, Hiking Lite.