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Swiss National Day

Swiss National Day

by | Aug 6, 2023 | Blog

We made it back to St. Louis and started right back to the usual: projects at Alex’s house and hanging out with the fam.

August first is Swiss National Day, marking the date of the signing of the original Letter of Confederation in 1291, so we decided to do a few things to celebrate. We cut out paper shapes and glued them together to make Swiss flags. We talked about William Tell, but only for a moment. We also made chäschüechli (little cheese tarts made in yummy bread crusts) and a flourless chocolate cake (not strictly Swiss, but we had to have chocolate of some sort). Teddy liked filling the bread crusts with Grandpa.

We built new shelves in the pantry and laundry room and got things organized, which was so satisfying. We went to two different libraries, the farmers’ market, and to the Magic House (a delightful children’s museum in the city). We were also able to fit in some board games and a couple chances for the Mommy and Daddy to go on a date.

Our time here is coming to an end. It has been a treat to spend so much time with the grandkiddos and with Alex and Hanna. We’ve enjoyed seeing how the boys have grown since we were here at Christmas and they’ve grown up a bit just in these three week. Peter even started crawling while we were here.

Next stop: West Virginia and the other two grandkiddos!

B-day & Chicago

B-day & Chicago

by | Jul 31, 2023 | Blog

Howdy!

Remember when I said this trip would be less vacation-like and more like real life? Well, this week was a bit of both.

The beginning of the week was real ife. We worked on projects, including patching walls and painting the boys’ room at Alex’s place. Teddy helped with the painting, so that was fun and exciting 🤪. It actually turned out great and we had no major incidents.

We also got to celebrate Alex’s birthday on Wednesday. We went to the top of the Gateway Arch and then to Fitz’s for dinner and bottomless frosty mugs of root beer.

Thursday, we jumped in the car and headed north to Chicago for a long weekend. We have really loved our few visits to the city and this one was the best yet. We stopped in Springfield on our way north to have a bite and tour the Lincoln Presidential Museum.

Activities in Chicago included catching a taping of the radio show Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me!, jazz at Andy’s Jazz Club, and the Willow Springs Blues Festival. We also got out of the heat and saw a couple of movies.

We also go to Chicago for the food. We did an outstanding food tour (Megan Bauserman, you need to do this one!), we did a “taco crawl” in the River North neighborhood, and we made a pilgrimage to one of our favorite bakeries in the world, Hewn.

Now it’s back to St. Louis for another week of fun and family.

Hope you’re all healthy and happy!

At the Studebaker Theater
A mural on our food tour in Uptown.
Pasteries
We Did It!

We Did It!

by | Jul 21, 2023 | Blog

We finally did it. We left. We’ve been talking about this for years and we finally did it. A little backstory…

Nathan and I retired from full-time employment at the beginning of 2019. We immediately left for Mexico on a humanitarian project/vacation and that kicked off what we thought would be several years of on and off travel. We tried leaving for an extended trip to Europe that summer and we really liked it. We were prepared for more of the same. We just had to sell our big, time-consuming house and figure out our next move. Cue the pandemic and two grandkids.

Covid was good for us in that it forced us to stay home and get the house ready to sell. But it really put a damper on the travel plans. However, rather than jetting off to some foreign country, we became road-tripping experts, driving thousands of miles across our own country to visit lots of National Parks and to spend time with family. It was a really fun couple of years, but still not what we were planning.

So we moved into yet another house and started projects there. I also decided to go back to school to finish my degree. That dragged it out even further, although it wasn’t a drag. Nathan had a most glorious ski/snowboard season with all that amazing Utah snow. I finished up my penultimate semester of school. We spent time with friends and family, we went to lots of movies with El, and Nathan worked hard to make the house absolutely beautiful.

But it was time to move on. We have now accomplished our goal: we have renters in the house, we have our belongings packed away, and we ran away from home!

So, what are the plans, anyway? The renters have a two-year lease, so we need a place to crash for a couple years. The plan right now is to spend the first year in Europe and then come up with something else. Since we are moving with no real commitments, we are keeping the plans loose for now. Leipzig, Germany is our first destination and then we’ll play it by ear after that. Part of our decision-making will depend on a residency visa for me, but Nathan can stay as long as he wants with his Swiss passport. We will wait and see.

First stops, however, are Missouri and West Virginia to play hard and get grandkid snuggles before we go far away. We already stopped in Kansas City for our favorite barbecue and we will be taking a couple of weekend trips to Chicago and to Detroit, just for fun.

This week was full of driving across the country. We stopped in Kansas City for our favorite barbecue to celebrate getting the house all done. We’ve been enjoying time with Alex’s family and in a few days we’ll celebrate his birthday with dinner and a trip to the top of the Gateway Arch.

This trip will be a lot less like a vacation and a lot more like real life. We won’t move around as much, but we will dive deep into one place or another. We will also be doing day trips and weekend getaways to explore more areas in Europe that we haven’t experienced yet.

Thanks for coming along for the ride. We’re not the greatest at journaling, but if it’s more like writing a letter, we will be more consistent. So thanks for being willing to read these messages once in a while.