K's Café: The 30 Second Blog

The Schilthorn

Taking two more cable cars up from Mürren, we had to feel really good about three different kinds of special Swiss cards we had in our possession:

1. The "Half Tax" card for David and me (most public transport in Switzerland at half price, including trains, buses, boats, trams, and some cable cars; for an annual fee that is totally worth it)
2. The "Junior" card for Jason and Emily (they travel free in the company of a parent)
3. Our Migros grocery store loyalty "Cumulus" card (they were offering a special deal for the 2nd adult travelling free!)
With this combination of cards, we ended up paying one sixth of the price we would have without them.

We were rewarded all the more for our travels with views from the top of the Schilthorn, in Kanton Bern, Switzerland:

From left to right, the famous peaks of the Eiger, the Mönch, and the Jungfrau. Some say that "Eiger" means Ogre, and the "Mönch" (monk) in the middle is separating the ogre from the "Jungfrau" (young lady). :-)
At the Schilthorn summit, there is a rotating restaurant called Piz Gloria, which featured prominently in the 1969 George Lazenby/Diana Rigg James Bond movie, "On Her Majesty's Secret Service." We ate lunch there, and the restaurant abruptly stopped rotating while we were finishing our main course. The lights went out. The cable car stopped running (our route down through the snow). It turned out that the power for the whole valley had gone out, and stayed out for an hour or so, while they extricated a poor soul's paraglider from the power lines...we had seen one taking off just as we were coming up in the cable car. This guy was only 21 years old. You never know when your last day will be. Especially if you jump off mountains near power lines. But then it's probably worse getting in your car, right? While we were up on top of the mountain, we didn't realize how serious the incident was, and we were just enjoying the most amazing place to be stuck.

Even if it was a rather vertiginous drop in certain areas...I held for dear life onto the cable provided, as we walked along this dropoff into the snow, ice, and fog.

Mürren - Take Two

We visited Mürren on our reconnoitering trip to the German-speaking part of Switzerland, a year before we moved here. Then we went back last month for a weekend. Stunning as ever.

We stayed in a little hotel on the edge of a cliff, overlooking a deep, deep valley with a river way down in the bottom, whose rushing waters lifted their rustling noises all the way up to our balcony, echoing off the mountainsides. Lauterbrunnen is at the bottom of the valley, and we took a cable car and train to get up to Mürren, a car-free village with real, white-bearded mountain men in the cafés... The mountains kept drifting in and out of the opaque fog, revealing different views varying from just grayness to these crisp, snowy peaks. Next post: one more cable car from Mürren up to the Schilthorn, location of the very old James Bond movie, "In Her Majesty's Secret Service."

Seasons of a Blog

It must be winter for my blog. It's been hibernating. In the meantime:

David, Emily and I learned how to make mosaics in metal cases on our dining room table (David's intriguing idea).

Jason made a tall domino tower.

Emily built a large model of the steep, hillside town of medieval Cortona, Italy, with her classmates, based on a field trip they enjoyed together.

We've enjoyed a couple of roaring fires.

And a friend of a friend treated us to a complementary family photo shoot outside.

We also visited Mürren for the 2nd time, but those are photos for another post...

Delémont, Jura, Switzerland

See the story and photos here of our day trip to Delémont, the capital of the Swiss canton of Jura. A silvery statue, a dove engraved on the pavement, a ruined tower, a cool crêpe menu...you know you're tempted to click on the link.

It's SO much easier to post photos at Picasaweb (or Facebook) than on Typepad. Sorry to say. Blogging with photos has become difficult compared to sharing on other media. Maybe I'll find a better blogging platform at some point.

Autumn Colors & Indoor Rock-Climbing

On a happier note, I had a great time watching Jason conquer the tall indoor climbing wall at his school yesterday. He's part of a weekly climbing club there (in this photo he's the one at the top of the wall!). And the beginning of Autumn completely passed me by yesterday, but the pretty neighbourhood reds and yellows should have been a clue:

Not the best day

It's been a fairly depressing day.

My husband is ill in another country, trying to get home.

One of his colleagues had an accident abroad including breaking teeth and glasses and had to be flown home prematurely.

I heard sad and disturbing extended-family news.

I received a business-type letter I'd been waiting for for 16 days as a response to my letter, and it was not worth waiting for. A complete rejection of the things I value. I had been hoping for an apology and a change of direction, and got only "surprise" and the hint that I was just not mature enough to deal with certain rigorous and challenging things.

I splattered a little pesto sauce on my shirt at lunch.

I'm having iPhoto problems. I'd like to see my photos rather than just big grey exclamation marks. I was happily rating, labelling, cropping, and making new film rolls by event...and CRASH. Then came the exclamation marks (and the loss of all my changes). I think the next version is in store for me.

I have a headache.

I'm hoping tomorrow is better.

As an aside, really neither here nor there, but adding to the weirdness, our 6th grade daughter is also abroad (in a different country from her dad) for 5 days and I have no way of hearing any news or reassurance until we see her again Friday night late.

Do you know where the phrase "This too shall pass" came from? It was originally from a Jewish folktale (not in the Bible) involving King Solomon, and then:

The phrase "This too shall pass" [was] made popular by Abraham Lincoln in his 'Address Before the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society, Milwaukee, Wisconsin' on September 30, 1859:

It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words: "And this, too, shall pass away." How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride! How consoling in the depths of affliction!

Interesting. And for something that is in the Bible:

The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

(Psalm 34:18)

Plenty of Bounty

This is what they're calling Bounty now in Switzerland:

German Bathroom Confusion

If you ever visit a German-speaking country and you need to use a public bathroom, keep in mind:

If you see HERren on a door, it's not talking about "her", as in female.

If you seen D MEN on the other door, it's not talking about "The Men." An important letter has fallen out of the word - the A between the D and the M.

 "Herren" - Gentlemen.

"Damen" - Ladies.

Someone told us recently about his experience with finding out the hard way which was which!

Living Life is Taking All My Time

Sixteen days since last posting...and life is coming fast and furious here at the beginning of the school year at two schools and the beginning of all our school-year church activities, ones in which I am either participating or leading...

Jason started 11th Grade at his new school much closer to our house, Emily started Middle School (6th Grade in this case). They are both thriving and enjoying many new benefits.

A locker for Emily (she's been waiting her whole life to have one), and the thrill of being more responsible and travelling around to different teachers and classrooms on her own. The greatness of specialist teachers who are each passionate and knowledgeable about their own subjects and dedicate the whole of each period just to that. Knowing she'll have math every single day. Even if they did start with math haikus, which is a lot more like English class...but still. She's back in her community drama class and loving it as usual.

For Jason, a school with a huge built-in gymnasium with climbing wall and equipment for fencing, lacrosse, and other fun, unusual sports he's never tried before. And a big, green field for outdoor P.E. His previous school, although it had many benefits and wonderful staff, is currently working on a new facility with a gym and field, but they don't have it yet, so this is a great step up from last year in this domain. Also, Jason gets to do all his work on a tablet laptop provided by the school, which is a lot of fun and means they hardly use paper at all. They just write on the tablet, and share files. He can log into his computer with his thumbprint! High-tech stuff! Jason has started AP courses in Economics, Physics, Computer Science, and Calculus. Exciting hard-core stuff. He's continuing German and taking pre-AP English, and the fun P.E. class with a delightfully Scottish-accented teacher. He's also joined the indoor climbing club and the jazz band as a drummer.

We hosted some more Covenant Players (a travelling theatre group) for four nights at the end of August, which was a delight - they helped a great deal with our languishing landscape puzzle on a table in the living room, played stunningly beautiful piano music (some of which Emily picked up in a musical exchange, as she taught the visiting pianist one of her pieces), did a little drama for us, and helped us practice our German (they were all German nationals this time, a first). Always fun.

I've done a lot of baking: Apple Crumble, Chocolate Zucchini Cake (yum yum yum), lemon squares (didn't turn out so well), Neiman Marcus Cookies (which aren't pronounced like they should be if that first word were German), Oatmeal Raisin Squares, and I can't remember what else. We've had our spare freezer replaced (the main one is too tiny to hold much of anything, never mind an ice cream maker bowl), but now we're having trouble making ice cream. Something is not working (like possibly the bowl isn't cold enough, even after a week in the new freezer). Had a couple lunches and/or prayer walks with friends new and old.

This Saturday we drove about 2 hours west to the French-speaking Swiss canton of Jura, and visited its capital, Delémont. Maybe photos to come later. We had crêpes for lunch and then clambered up to a ruined castle there (Chateau de Vorbourg). The kids actually scaled the castle ruins, while I watched safely from below. We enjoyed speaking French. Did not enjoying slipping and falling on my rump in the mud on the steep and loose trail. Did not break my camera which was in my back pocket, yay.

I am drowning in school information in countless emails and links to click on to get up to speed on everything; and enjoying seeing who God brings to the two ladies' groups I am co-leading. One is a "Moms in Touch" prayer group for our kids and their school (for Emily's school - I'm trying to start one up for Jason's school now, too, but no leads there yet). The other is a ladies' Bible prayer group - we read daily readings on our own, and then discuss them and pray over them together once a week. Each has met once so far, and I hope people are finding them useful, encouraging, and productive. I just know I need God's help with everything, my children, parenting, leading, and being His. And I know I need His Words to guide me and comfort me, steer me and correct me, teach me and help me, encourage me and touch me. And I know I need accountability and fellowship in these things. So I stumble on in leading and hope people see past my mistakes, to God and His greatness.

Today I went to German class at 10am (what an improvement in my understanding since a year ago! Wow), then straight to check the air in my tyres, then to help out with a special event for Jason's school ("Advisory Adventure" scavenger hunt around Zurich), then straight to pick up Emily, drop her at home, pick up Jason, drop him at home, take Emily to drama, come home, now the dryer calls, and then I have to pick Emily up, drop her at home, and go with David to an informational meeting for middle school (and about Emily's week-long field trip to Cortona, Italy). It's been, shall we say, a BUSY day. Quite par for the past two weeks. I feel almost one with the driver's seat of my car. And thankful God is mobile, too. Or rather doesn't need to be. He's got instant simultaneous teleportation to all points of the globe and beyond down cold.

More Wisdom from Karen Hancock's blog

From the blog of one of my favorite authors, Karen Hancock:

"Then today in mid morning I caught myself doing the weird, tense, things-are-bad-and-wrong thing and sat down to figure out what exactly I was feeling. Turns out it was anxiety and condemnation. Again. Because, again, I had somehow started focusing on all the things I thought I had to do, plus the things I wanted to do, a list, as I said, far too long to ever complete. Knowing it unconsciously, I became tense and anxious, condemning myself because I wasn't working enough. Getting enough done.

Weird how subtly it sneaks in and the next thing you know you're in this weird place. I needed to recall that it's God's plan that matters, not mine, that there's always time to do the will of God, and that if I'm confused about what I should be doing, since I have so many options, perhaps I should stop and ask Him what He wants me to do.

Peace returned. And then tonight in the basics class the pastor-in-training reminded us... the Christian life is about falling on our faces and getting up again, over and over and over. But it doesn't matter how many times we fail, only that we get up and keep on going. He talked, too, of how when faced with a problem or overwhelming circumstances we so easily revert to human viewpoint and start focusing on how we're going to solve the thing, rather than recalling that the problems aren't ours, but God's."

Karen obviously has exactly the same tendencies as I do - only she comes to her senses faster.

Hiking in Elm, Kanton Glarus, Switzerland

We drove for 1 hour 15 mins, from the canton of Zurich, east-south-east through Schwyz, and into the canton of Glarus. I guess that's "canton" in English and French, but "Kanton" in German, hence the confused non-consistency. Up a side valley, at the very end, sits the secluded village of Elm.

At the end of an unlikely-looking narrow road, a man sat on a wooden bench waiting for customers to ferry up the mountain. Riding a little, 4-person cable car up, we were able to begin our hike at a higher elevation. There were only two of these blue cars going, one on each side. One went up while the other went down (8 minutes each way). Can you see the hole in the mountain rock face on the left? It's Martin’s Hole, a "natural spectacle." Twice a year, in March and October, the sun shines through it onto the church tower in Elm. Kind of cool. It's 16 metres wide.

On our hike, we passed several waterfalls, streams, and wildflower species.

We climbed up to the top of the waterfall, and beyond, to a plateau where the river was flat and fun to play in. That's my foot on the right, above, and see the rest of my family way down the hill by the stream? No? The three of them are down there resting/playing, just before the stream plunges off the mountain, and that's how steep that hill was, right over the top of the waterfall. I was sitting on an overhang suspended over lots of nothingness. Quite a rush. I had to climb down backwards!

I just love fields at high altitude, filled with random collections of happy, free flowers planted by God.

Post-vacation, ramping up to school

We're back home in Zurich, Switzerland. Had a truly wonderful summer trip to the U.S., and it was equally truly fantastic to return home here, within sight of the pre-Alps, in the fresh, dry air (no more East Coast humidity) and international community.

It took me a long, long time to go through all the photos from this summer, because we saw so many extended family members and had so much fun. But I finally managed. I've posted a ton on Facebook, so if you know me, you can see them there.

A few highlights for the rest of you in this photo album: Summer 2009 (25 photos with comments). Below, the highlights of the highlights:

Now off for a family hike, I hope, on the last weekend before Jason starts 11th grade at his new school. Good orientation day yesterday, at which he received his tablet laptop with fingerprint recognition to log in...very cool.

Fun, fun, fun in the summer sun

Since I last posted, it's been fun, fun, fun - with the odd ear infection (Emily) and torrential rainstorm (on the way to the Boston airport). I was out of internet access for ten days - resulting in about 163 emails to wade through upon my return (still working on them). Instead of internet activities, we engaged in:

1. Family Reunion with about 25 people from my dad's side, at my cousin Sarah's in Massachusetts

- kids swimming for 8 hours straight with cousins (hence Emily's water-in-the-ear problems)
- meeting more relatives for the first time (e.g. my cute, twin, one-year-old second cousins once removed :-), and my first cousin's sister-in-law and family)
- 3 dogs interacting with everyone
- catching up with everyone we haven't seen in years

2. InterVarsity Christian Fellowship Family Camp in New Hampshire

- meeting up with old college friends on both David's side and mine
- making many new friends, both for us and the kids
- discussion, reflection, study, singing, worship, and prayer over the topic of "The Way" as described in the Bible and as relating to personal and family life
- pond swimming, canoeing, kayaking, and diving off the floating dock ten times before going ashore
- semi-spontaneous 19th Century Dance Evening which I had the pleasure of calling/teaching
- bonfire with s'mores
- games, games, games (e.g. Hearts, Mafia, Guillotine, a pretty butterfly puzzle, and new-to-us strategy board games: Power Grid, and Ticket to Ride)
- ice cream at Kimball Farm in Jaffrey, NH (try Chocolate Peanut Butter, Coconut Almond Chip, Vanilla Swiss Almond and Moose Tracks - with peanut butter cups)
- pitch-black night-time glow-stick-lit ultimate frisbee for the teens (they wore glow-stick necklaces, and the frisbee lit up, and the goals were likewise lit by glow-sticks - it was surreal to watch, as I couldn't see any of the people, only the disembodied floating red and white necklaces... very cool)

3. Beach Fun at my mom's River House on the Rappahannock River in Virginia

- more kayaking, canoeing, swimming and beach playtime on the lagoon and tidal river
- more games
- more fun interpersonal interaction
- celebrating my mom's birthday (what a blessed daughter am I)
- finally back to internet access!

Only a few days left of our summer vacation...and I'm very, very thankful for all of it.

Fireworks, Fireflies, Smores, and a Jig

This evening at my aunt's farm here in Virginia, we had a lot of types of fun (me, my son, my daughter, my mom, my niece, my aunt, two of my cousins and my cousins once removed, and some more family from other sides):

- I caught my first firefly in my hands, and watched it in a jar for a few minutes before letting it go

- We swam in the pool and danced the Virginia Reel in the water (8 of us)

- I swang in the hammock under the trees

- I walked down to the gazebo by the pond with my niece (16) and my son (14) and watched the sunset reflected in the still water and had fun taking photos of each others' silhouettes against the scenery with my iPhone

- We enjoyed interacting with the 3 dogs of varying sizes and breeds, and the 4 cats, and we saw 3 deer strolling in the evening air, and cows and horses in the pastures. We tried to converse with the bovines in American Cow, but it must have come out more Swiss Cow, since they didn't really seem to get our point.

- We danced mini versions of the Jolly Gordon, In-Out-and-Across, Sheena's Saunter, Soldier's Joy, Sellenger's Round, and the Pattycake Polka in the living room (with only 6-8 dancers! A very small circle!)

- Some of us played croquet

- We enjoyed an all-American meal: grilled hamburgers, hot dogs, ketchup, baked beans, potato salad, macaroni salad, corn on the cob, green salad with walnuts and strawberries, and watermelon, and then made s'mores over a fire outside. The onions for the dinner came straight out of my aunt's garden just before we ate - I had never seen onions in the ground before. Thrilling somehow. She grew them from seed.

- We waved sparklers in the dark, and then set off a couple of ground-based fireworks while singing songs like the National Anthem and America the Beautiful.

- For good measure, we also sang some Christmas carols in harmony there outside in the dark. Not so surprising we would think of that, given that my aunt keeps two Christmas trees lit up in her living room even in July (this comes from my grandmother, who had a Christmas room all year too).

- We hugged and chatted and enjoyed being together

Thank you, God of all good gifts, for this lovely evening, and the rain going away in time, and for my family. Talked about my husband and how nice it would have been to have had him there. I do miss that uniquely wonderful man. Get to see him soon, yay.

This is a test post to my blog from my email

Today I really need to pack for my trip to the U.S., but here I am
testing the New Typepad interface...and how I can supposedly enter a
blog post from my email. I'll have to comment on it if it works...I
wonder if I can add a photo? How about this one of the view looking
down from my bathroom window?

Our First Bread-Baking Session in Zurich

Jason, Emily and I started at 9am:

- activate the yeast with sugar and warm water
- mix the dough
- knead it
- let it rise
- punch it down
- let it rest
- shape it (and be creative with cinnamon, pecans, butter, brown sugar, poppy seeds, honey, chocolate chunks...)
- let it rise again
- bake it

And lo and behold, by 12:30pm, we had bread of our own designs!

Thanks to my mother, who baked bread when I was growing up, and passed along her recipe. What fun! My fourteen-year-old and eleven-year-old and I all enjoyed ourselves and felt satisfied in more way than one after eating some of our creations for lunch. I also thank God for wheat, yeast, children, and ovens. And summertime leisure in which to put them all together.

What starting place would you recommend to someone who's never read any of the Bible?

One of the four gospels, almost certainly?

Those cover the Rock Bottom Essentials of Jesus' life, teachings, death, and resurrection. Perhaps the Gospel of John? It's got all those great "I am..." statements like I am the Good Shepherd, the Gate/Door, the Life, the Truth, the Way, the Resurrection, the Bread of Life, etc. But the beginning can be a little mystifying without some orientation, referring without explanation to Jesus as "the Word" (though mystery can be good, too).

Or maybe the Gospel of Mark because it's the shortest and most straight-forward/simple? Or the Gospel of Luke followed by Acts because they go together and continue the story of the early believers in Jesus, by the same author?

Or what about Paul's letter to the Romans? It has so much great explanation of the basic state of humanity and how exactly the good news of Jesus affects us.

Genesis would start from the very beginning with the foundations of humanity and what went wrong and how God dealt with it...

Would you consider Psalms? Maybe one a day, gradually (along with other readings)...such a deep collection of human emotions poured out to God unashamedly and boldly, acknowledging His sovereignty and care about what we're going through. But then that's a really long book.

Proverbs has a lot of really great wisdom to offer on very practical matters...

Hebrews could be a very interesting way to start for Jewish people wanting to understand Christianity.

Philippians is short and sweet and has those great parts in chapters 2 and 4 about Jesus' mission and the flavor our lives can have with Him...but really is better with a gospel understanding first.

Ephesians is truly rich and thick with description of how God sees us and what He offers us if we bow to Him, the deep blessings that accompany kneeling at His feet in surrender...

Let's just face it - I love it all. If you haven't tasted it, or not in a long time, maybe this is the summer to go for it.

If you have already been feasting on the Bible, what book do you recommend for first-time tasters?

Non-Move Summer Butterfly

I realized as school ended for the summer that this is NON-MOVE SUMMER for our family...a nice treat :-) We get to do other things than pack, unpack, sort out stopping and starting utilities, address changes, etc. Very, very nice.

We get to take walks with the kids and smell the buddleia and admire the butterflies:

Enjoy your summer! (Whether you're moving or not.)

Gattikon Pond & Wood Flowers

From our long walk in the woods and by the pond a few weeks ago, on the edge of Gattikon, a neighbouring village. Foxglove flowers are so striking.

More from the Yard this week: Hydrangea, Snail, Raspberries

In our garden:

And from the garden at the Château de Chillon last weekend: