Bonfire, Luxembourg Style

This is how Luxembourgers light a bonfire.  Well, these two fire-breathing friends of ours are Luxembourgish.  So one must naturally conclude that this is how they do it.

Luxembourg's "Little Switzerland"

Two outings in three days! Look at us go! 

We're trying to make a better effort to "do stuff" on the weekends now that we have a car and the weather is improving, fitting in some short outings after Saturday church band practice and/or Sunday church.  We finally made it out to Little Switzerland today, a lovely forested area in the northeast of Luxembourg.  

I've never been to Normal Switzerland, but this particular area of Luxembourg has some similar rock formations and topography.  From the half-hearted Wikipedia page, I get the sense that the comparison may be a bit of a stretch.  (Perhaps it was written by a Swiss person.)  

Nonetheless, this was a breathtaking spot, and we're already making plans to go back soon to do a proper hike, armed with our freshly purchased trail map.

Our friend gave us the tip to park at Camping Martbusch, north of Berdorf.   I'm only mentioning it because it was difficult to find this specific sort of info online.

We wandered in the general direction of the forest and found a viewpoint nearby.

not bad

From there it was easy to see where to head down between the rocks. 

There's a metal ladder down there to the next level here.  Not stroller-friendly.

The rocks soon opened to forest and a network of trails.

We stuck close to the rocks near where we climbed down and did some general exploring.

There were a couple "holes"  like this, and we saw several serious hikers go down with headlamps.  We just took a quick peek with the flashlights on our phones.

lots of great spots for kid climbing

snack break

Regular Switzerland must be beautiful!

I'm still quite often surprised by what this tiny adopted country of ours has to offer.

Castles of Luxembourg: Back to Bourscheid

Last summer, on our grand tour of Luxembourgish castles with my parents, we did a quick drive-by of Bourscheid Castle in the north of the country.  On our May Day holiday today, we finally went back to take a closer look.

in the fireplace

The highlight of this castle is definitely the panoramic views.  James, however, was really into the extremely dry audio commentary.  He was the only one of us that made it through all 24 stations.

still going...

before Daph and I gave up

But on to the views and such.

that's me

Apple Song in Luxembourgish - The Series

You may remember way back in October of 2012, just a couple months after the kids began school in Luxembourgish, James attempted to sing an apple song for us.  He only had a handful of the words figured out, but it was a good effort, and the cuteness of the hand motions more than made up for the mistakes.  He was nearly 5 years old.  Here's the video I posted at the time:

You can tell that he was just starting to put sounds and words together back then.  And just a couple weeks later, he wanted to give it another shot.  He'd already improved a bit:

And now, a year and a half later, Daphne and James both sing this song around the house (Daphne learned it somewhere along the way at school, and now she's worked it out on the piano as well).  Basically, they go apple picking, an apple falls and knocks them on the head, but it gets its comeuppance when they take a bite out of it!  Anyway, here he is at age 6 1/2:

Nailed it.  Six and a half is apparently too cool for hand motions and sound effects, though. :(

German Schoolwork (2nd Grade): Pirates!

Just a quick post to share what Daphne's been up to in her German studies lately:

Piraten!

8th workbook in the Mila series she began in 1st grade. 

The 3 main pirate characters: Pim (left), Pam (center), and Pum (right)

she has homework every day this year

They continue to work through the alphabet as they build vocabulary and spelling skills.  Here they're on P.  (Papagei is one of my favorite German words.)

they've been doing more reading comprehension this year (with an accompanying textbook) and also memorizing poems

In the video below, she explains some of her work and recites a short poem (apologies for the awkward camera angle).

)

And below is a song in Luxembourgish about (sung by) some "mean pirates" (not Pim, Pam, and Pum).  I asked her what the pirates are doing in the song.  She said, "Well, just what mean pirates normally do."  You might have some fun trying to decipher the Luxembourgish to figure out what that is.

It's quite a long song, but I think it's worth sticking it out until the end if you can!

)

Because it's really hard to stop taking pictures of the Eiffel Tower

See, that's the thing about the Eiffel Tower.  

Every time you happen to glance at it, you think to yourself, "Wow, that is so beautiful!  I must take a picture!"  So you end up with 4,000 photos of it.

Here are all 4,000 photos.

Kidding!

A dozen wasn't so bad, right?

The American Church in Paris

The kids are on Carnival break from school, so we drove (yes, in our fancy "new" car) to Paris for a long weekend.  It's only two hours by train, but the tickets are really expensive unless you grab them at the perfect time and further in advance.  We opted instead to drive the 3.5 hours and leave the car in long-term parking, relying on public transportation during our stay.  Driving in the center of Paris is best avoided when possible.

blue is our driving route

This trip was part "business" part pleasure, as our primary destination was the American Church in Paris to observe their contemporary worship service and meet with the music director.  We actually met the head pastor of the ACP several months ago here in Luxembourg at a leadership meeting for our church, and discovered he hails from our hometown in Oregon!  We bonded over our Oregonian-ness, and he gave us some great ideas and inspiration regarding building and growing a church music program.  He even graciously offered to have the ACP host us sometime if we were in town.  Well, that sometime came!

ACP is on the Seine river between the Eiffel Tower and the Musée D'Orsay

The American Church in Paris is the oldest American church outside the USA, established in 1814.  If my math is right, this year is its 200th anniversary.  200 years.  When you think about it, that's older than most active American churches on American soil.  The ACP has inhabited its current building on the Seine since 1931.  The facility also functions a community center, hosting everything from workout classes to a Montessori school.

There's its spire to the left of the Eiffel Tower.  The building's beautiful facade is currently under restoration.

the courtyard

The "parsonage" building on site houses several of the staff, and includes a 4th floor guest apartment.

And Pete and I were in Paris on Valentine's Day!  Well, with these two monkeys.

Valentine's Day snuggles

A highlight for all of us was our partial view of the Eiffel Tower, especially when it sparkled at night at the top of each hour.

The ACP has a highly respected traditional music program, but its contemporary service is less than a decade old.  Nevertheless, they have a group of stellar musicians who put on a great contemporary service at 1:30pm each Sunday (a.k.a. the crack of dawn for young Parisians).  We were privileged to attend their Saturday rehearsal as well as the service on Sunday, and then we met with the director on Monday to discuss all our questions, ask for advice, and learn from her experiences. 

Sunday afternoon pre-service

This all may sound like a boring time in Paris to you but it was completely fascinating and fun for us!  Even the kids told us the music at church was a highlight of the trip.  Perhaps this means we have thoroughly brainwashed them, but I suppose there are worse things than enjoying music.

We still managed to get out and about some, though.  Daphne's had her heart set on visiting Paris, and specifically climbing the Eiffel Tower, for several months now.  She keeps a little album of postcards from each city we've visited, and she's told us many times, "I just need to go to Paris.  Then I won't have to go anywhere else in France.  I can go some other places too if I want to.  But I have to go to Paris."

For a variety of reasons, we decided to only ascend to the second level instead of ride to the very top.  The view was still spectacular and Daphne seemed quite satisfied.   We climbed the stairs (with no advance reservation and there was no line), and at only 16 € for the four of us it was one of the cheapest things we did our whole stay.

We also figured that when you all come visit or we meet you in Paris soon, we'll go to the top together, right?

Jardins du Trocadéro

top in the clouds

Champs de Mars

Jardins du Trocadéro from the other side

On Saturday after the rehearsal we visited the close-by Musée d'Orsay at the discounted-after-4:30pm rate.  We only had about an hour to look around, so I threw together a quick scavenger hunt on notebook paper for some of the most famous Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings and artists.  I think we saw most of them on my list!  It was quite a whirlwind tour so I'm sure we'll be back another time.  Daphne especially loved it, and it was also quite meaningful to me: I first fell in love with many of these paintings while looking at them books when I was about Daphne's age...very cool to see them in person.

quick break at the Musée D'Orsay before they started kicking people out

We've learned that boat tours are usually a hit with our kids when we travel, and the Bateaux Mouches dock is just across from the ACP.

Sailing by Musée D'Orsay

And, of course, our favorite thing to do when we travel is "walk around and look at stuff," so we did plenty of that.  Can't beat exercise and can't beat free.

Pont Alexandre III 

blue coats, blue bus, and blue sky!

Did I mention blue sky?  We were quite fortunate for Paris in February.

It only hailed on us once.  And the aftermath was nice.

We took just one longer métro ride to Sacré-Cœur before heading back to retrieve our car.

Now I finally understand why that silly funicular to the top exists...to lure up 6 year old boys who've already had their fill of sight-seeing for one day.  Pete and Daphne took the stairs.

happy with the view, though

We try to eat at least one typical local food out when we travel somewhere.  In addition to a constant stream of fresh baguettes brought back to our apartment, we chose crèpes this time. 

Le Bretonne in a sea of crèperies in Montparnasse - apparently the crèpe district

We tried a few kinds and all were delicious, but 3€ for a butter and sugar crèpe is pretty much perfection.  Plus it was nearly empty except for the chefs next to us.

Lastly, we couldn't leave Paris without satisfying a couple of strictly American cravings:  

1) Starbucks!  (Grammy, you will be pleased to note that upon entering, James said, "It smells like American stuff in here!")

and...

2) Mexican food!

This was definitely a memorable trip for all of us - the kids' first time ever in Paris (loved it, devastated to leave), Pete's first time not-for-work-and-not-by-himself, and my second time here, this time not by myself and for more than a few hours.  Paris has its share of faults and flaws to be sure, but its difficult not to love it just a little bit.

Daphne summarised her experience this way:  "If I have a boyfriend when I'm older, I'd want to bring him to Paris."

She might be onto something there.