Stein am Rhein

We have since moved back to Texas from Switzerland. I first drafted this post before we left. One of our favorite places to visit in Switzerland is the tiny medieval town of Stein am Rhein. We can take a train (the S29) from the tiny depot near our flat in Oberwinterthur to Stein am Rhein [...]

Read Full Post »

Trash Stickers

I feel really guilty. We didn’t recycle hardly ever before we moved to Switzerland because they don’t do it in our neighborhood. We still don’t have it here, but the problem is, people are tightwads in our neighborhood, and even though our annual homeowners fee is only $125, people pitch a fit if we even [...]

Read Full Post »

Euros in Switzerland

We have since moved back to Texas from Switzerland. I first drafted this post before we left. Just a quick note in the midst of our preparations to leave… Switzerland is not part of the European Union, however they abide by certain of their laws and even accept the Euro for currency. Well, they are [...]

Read Full Post »

Home!

Well, just a brief note. We are back home in Texas, our cell phones and home internet finally turned on, and all of our things have arrived as well (though we’re only half-way through the unpacking process – when did we acquire so much stuff?). Many of you have asked what I’ll be doing with [...]

Read Full Post »

Our Schedule…

In case anyone wants to know how crazy things are, and how you might be able to fit in and help…

Read Full Post »

Unexpected Christmas Difficulties

He may be a little young for it, but we decided to get our son a toddler bike similar to this one: Most kids here learn to ride a bike this way, and they start as a toddler. He might not use it much until this spring, but since there are such a wide variety [...]

Read Full Post »

Some Helpful Langauge for Visiting (Northern) Switzerland

Ok, so my phonetics are probably a bit off, but I thought this might help someone so I’m publishing it anyway. One of our visiting friends wanted to learn a few more phrases, so I made this list for her of the words and phrases I use the most in my every day speech here [...]

Read Full Post »

Vocabulary Fun!

Even though I got really frustrated with learning German, it wasn’t always a struggle. One of the interesting things about learning German is how certain really long words are just a series of words strung together. Once you figure out which word is what, you can usually decipher most or all of the word. One [...]

Read Full Post »

Makes Cents!

Pardon the pun. I recently saw an article about the decline of popularity of the American penny. It got me thinking about the Swiss money system. The Swiss equivalent of a cent is a rappen. You can only get rappen as small as 5. The denominations are 5, 10, 20, and 50. Also, the Swiss [...]

Read Full Post »

And the cow says… MOO!

Sorry, we’ve been reading far more children’s books than adult’s books lately. But it relates to my quick post of the day. For some reason over the past week or so, if I have the north-facing windows open, I will quite clearly hear a bellowing cow. The nearest ones I know of are a handful [...]

Read Full Post »

Interesting snacks

I always like to try new food items and you never know what wacky food combinations will work well. This week I grabbed two new snacks, Snips and Schoko Pfeffer-Nüsse, and two favorites I discovered last year, Lebkuchen and Quarkini. Snips are the same consistency of Cheetos (maybe a little less gummy on the teeth), [...]

Read Full Post »

Altstadt Market in Winterthur

One of my favorite things about Switzerland is all the local food. I’m a big advocate, whenever possible, to eat locally and try to reduce our carbon footprint by regularly eating goods that are transported hundreds or thousands of miles. The Swiss are very proud of their local foods, and all foods are required to [...]

Read Full Post »

Announcement!

We are moving back to Texas in January! Lots of details still to be ironed out, but I’m sad, happy, worried, and stressed all at once. We still plan to take a few more day trips and at least one weekend trip within Switzerland, so I’m sure I’ll have more to post in the next [...]

Read Full Post »

Team Building Hiking Trip and the Alp Aufzug

A month or so ago (I’m late as usual to posting events) my husband went on a Team Building hiking trip thing. His team took a train to bus to a cable car up a mountain, and then hiked back down the mountain, going down on scooters partway, and stopping for the occasional beer. The [...]

Read Full Post »

Schloss Hegi

In the town of Winterthur, there are two castles. The more well-known is Schloss Kybourg. It is a bit confusing to get there by public transportation, so while it is on our list of places to check out, we’ve not exactly been there yet. A fun little castle that is very easy to get to [...]

Read Full Post »