At the risk of you all thinking all we do is day trip, eat chocolate and go to the circus every day I am going to post these picture highlights from the summer.  Like most of you, I don’t often get pictures of the rough days so if it seems dreamy just give me a call and I can fill you in on the other side! Lots of these I thought I would devote time to blogging individually but Fall is here and it is clear that I am WAY behind. so here it goes…

On August 1st we celebrated Swiss National Day with our Swiss friends here. We went up the Gurten, the kids played and then we all ate dinner together. We headed home before the fireworks, got the kids to bed and then watched the fireworks show from our front lawn. The show ended with a big smiley face firework. Our neighbors went on into the wee hours of the morning with their own fireworks shows.

this was just before Ella fell off into the water, poor girl! Jackson was so proud to be pulling her across.

she paid him back for bumping her into the water by bumping him in the little cars!

Owen begged and begged until Seth finally took him too!

this is sweet Matthis, he is a month younger than Owen!

In August, Seth got tickets for Jackson and I to go to the Swiss National Circus. Jackson was ecstatic and loved that it was a date just the two of us. His only disappointment what that there were no clowns. As we passed the circus truck on the way out he asked to have his picture taken next to the clown that he thought he would see.

Last yr we arrived just before the Toblerone festival…this yr we knew we couldn’t miss it! In mid-August we headed downtown to get ourselves some FREE chocolately goodness. We didn’t hang around for the chopping up of the giant bar like we did last yr but the kids participated in games and we got lots of sweet samples!

Wait, see, you just had that little thought creep in that life looks dreamy over in Switzerland and then….

BAM. Back to reality. Owen is cutting 2 yr molars, Jackson and Owen have colds, and it was a rough napping day today!   It’s good to look back at these pics and think of happy times when we are having a rough day! Life is good.

A few weeks ago my brother Graham came to visit with his wife Tina! It was so much fun to have them and the boys got spoiled so quickly with their attention. They arrived late on Monday evening and left early Saturday morning so we filled every minute to be sure they got their moneys worth! We took them to the Rosengarten, Grindelwald, Neuchatel, out to dinner in downtown Bern (just the adults!!) and had a fondue night!

doesn’t Graham look so natural pushing  a stroller?

they were so close to gliding down the mountain! eeek. no thanks!

take a look at these views, mama!

once in a lifetime view from the swing!

ipad time with Uncle!

Owen helped Aunt Tina make jalapeno poppers! Yum!

Thanks for coming guys!! We loved having you. Can’t wait to see you at Christmas!

Last week was Jackson’s first week at a new school and his first time in real preschool. He was loving the English Speaking Playgroup but we were seeing a need for Jackson to be in a setting with some more structure (i.e. learning) and work on more specific areas like fine motor, etc that he will need when he goes to kindergarten. And after looking at some programs I love that Feusi offers a classroom with a span of ages so that Jackson has some older kids modeling for him.  He is in the English class and then has lunch with the German speaking children as well. I have absolutely no confidence that he will learn German more than a few words but that isn’t our goal. Many Foreign Service parents pride themselves in how many languages their children speak. Not me. We roll with it and I refuse to put them under stress for their resume to be beefed up. Jackson learned Spanish when he needed to and I am positive when there is a need he will learn whatever languages come along. Enough said about that.

Anyhow, back to the first day. He did beautifully. He settled right in with maybe a shedding of 2, that’s one two, tears. And by the time I picked him up he was wanting to take the time to personally say goodbye to everyone he had met. That’s my boy. Yesterday Seth took him for the first time and he enjoyed every minute of their grown up commute together. His favorite part of the morning from what I can tell is that after lunch they all brush their teeth. He got to get a new toothbrush to keep at school so he is feeling super cool being a dual toothbrush boy.

And now I officially have less than a year to begin preparing myself for his first day of kindergarten. I won’t lie and tell you that I can’t imagine a day at home without my kids. I love my time with my kids and I love the times when my kids are being taken care of by loving, capable adults other than myself.  But I am positive that I will cry when I say goodbye as kindergarten starts. Owen and I will certainly go through withdrawals at home without him and I know I will eagerly wait for the school day to end so I can pester him with questions. It’s just not right how quickly they grow.

Here is our preschooler on the first day at Feusi…in an outfit he insisted on picking by the way, red trim socks and all.  You win some, you lose some.  If he was excited enough to pick his clothes I figured he really didn’t need a polo and khaki shorts!!

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Well, I must say that yesterday was one of my biggest mommy mess ups!

A few months ago I picked Jackson up from school and he had a piece of masking tape on his shirt with his teachers contact info and address. I was puzzled and asked the teacher what it was for. She said she had been talking to Jackson about the animals near her house and she would love to have him out to see them. He had asked for her address and phone number so that I could call her and make a plan. Oh my. We have been so busy this summer that it took me a while to get it together but yesterday we went for a visit. Her house is in Bolligen, a small town just on the edge of Bern. She lives in the top floor of a big mansion that I believe has been in a Swiss family for a couple hundred yrs. The cement steps had grooves in them to tell you how old it was.

The boys were ecstatic. Owen started mooing as we pulled in next to the cows. Before going out to see the animals we went and had a drink and snack on the terrace. As we walked onto the terrace Jackson’s teacher said, “the only problem is that the railings are low”. Um, yep, they were low alright. If Jackson had tripped while walked toward the edge of the terrace he would have launched right over the edge. It was below his waist. Which of course means that Owen could easily climb over! So as the 2 teachers sat and enjoyed visiting with Jackson I feverishly followed Owen to be sure he was safe.

After our tea time we went outside and picked prune plums. I am no expert on prunes or plums but I thought prunes were just dried plums. Apparently, there are plums from Italy that are known as prune plums. Anyhow, Jackson’s teacher grabbed him a bag and helped him pick a big bag full. Owen (my picky eater mind you) thought they looked good and started popping them in his mouth. No big deal except for the big pit. So I chased Owen around during our plum picking to ensure that I could help him pop out the pit. He was in heaven running through the tall wet grass, picking up freshly picked plums! They were like candy to him. As we finished the plum picking I remember sighing a sigh of relief thinking “whew, done with the terrace and the plum pit popping, now we can just enjoy looking at the animals and head home”.

I pulled out the camera and let Owen toddle down the dirt path ahead of us toward the cows. As I watched him walk with excitement ahead of me I made note of the fence and saw that he could not get too close to the cows or pony. I snapped a couple of pictures and headed his way. When I was about 10 steps from him he let out a huge scream and was thrown back from the fence. You guessed it, my sweet Owen got shocked by the cow fence. He had grabbed on with both hands and it threw him back and he plopped down crying and holding his hands out. I felt HORRIBLE!!! Here I thought I had things under control. Luckily he was not burned and he was fine beyond the initial shock.   We can now check “letting your child get shocked by a cow fence” off the list of mishaps!!

I have to add this for all of you parents with kids starting school…The irony of Jackson’s teacher inviting him over is that when he began last year she really had a tough time with him. For about a month or more I would go to pick him up and she would have some complaint. She didn’t quite know what to do with his energy and I think he really challenged her with his millions of questions. I literally started picking him up quickly and rushing out so she wouldn’t tell me about the morning. He was loving school and I reassured her that we had just made a move and left all of his friends and that I knew he needed time to transition. Pretty soon I noticed that she greeted Jackson cheerfully in the mornings and had made a special bond with him. He had become a helper in the class which was using some of that extra energy and she now “got him”. It was a tough transition and it was so hard as a mom to know that I had to relinquish my control and let him learn to be a part of a class. It made our adjustment to Bern quite hard.  But, a yr later Jackson had tea with his teachers that he once struggled with and they expressed to me how much joy Jackson had brought to the class and how much they would miss him this year. My prayer for Jackson is that God would provide teachers that “get him” along the way and that he will be able to use his strengths to continue to impact the lives of others.  He has an extra dose of energy that I myself struggle to channel but I hope that we have the resources along the way to help him grow and be a successful learner!