Lake Moro, Italy.



Wiley and me on a paddle boat up in the mountains.

Questions that are answered by Wiley. . . thanks Lily for this cute tag!


1. what is something mom always says to you? "No, no, no, no,"
oh dear, now everyone knows . . . I'm so mean.
2. what makes mom happy? "hmmm...kisses from me, . . . that's all."
how nice that he thinks this is my happiest moment each day.
3. what makes mom sad? "when I'm naughty, or when I'm super naughty. "
I'm not sure what the difference is between naughty or super naughty.
4. how does mom make you laugh? "when you tickle me, except that I'm not ticklish "
this is a current super human trick that Wiley has just developed.
5. what was mom like as a child? "nice, . . . ahhhh pickles, I don't know"
Pickles is Wiley's swear word.
6. how old is your mom? "thirteen"
He means thirty but as usual he is just a little mixed up, there is no way I could pass for thirteen.
7. how tall is your mom? "hmmm...taller than daddy. "
This is funny, Ben heard this answer and laughed hard. I think he is just trying to be silly.
8. what is her favorite thing to do? "ummm play, actually that is a tricky question "
Play what, house? All my interests seem to involve my less-than-observant children, of course.
9. what does your mom do when you're not around? "you get my homework ready, I don't really know, why are you asking me such hard questions?"
Really, it seems as though he has no imagination at all.
10. if your mom becomes famous, what will it be for? "a famous Battleship player. you've beat dad like six times"
It's true I am good at Battleship, and lately we have played a lot of Battleship. I've quit cheating, that's the secret to my success!
11. what is your mom really good at? "uhh, checkers, but not baseball "
Checkers yes, because I don't just let Wiley win, although he always asks me to let him jump my players or not to jump his players. I guess I'm not that nice. Baseball on the other hand, we haven't played lately and I don't know where he gets that answer.
12. what is your mom not very good at? "video games, you gotta learn to play video games mom"
Yes that would be true...I'm not good at video games. If I were I think Wiley's respect for me might rise a bit.
13. what does your mom do for her job? "I don't know"
Does he think this is a trick question?
14. what is your mom's favorite food? "fondue"
This is actually Wiley's favorite food but it up on my list as well.
15. what makes you proud of your mom? "when you win games like battleship"
hey, maybe I don't have to learn how to play video games to be cool!!??
16. if your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be? "Superwondergirl. Mom, I'm not good at this game."
I think this is what he thinks I wanted him to say. he he
17. what do you and your mom do together? "we play, that's all, . . .actually lots of stuff, work too."
I like to crack a whip, what can I say?
18. how are you and your mom the same? "our hair."
He looked me up and down to answer this one.
19. how are you and your mom different? "our eyes, I have blue eyes, you have brown eyes right?"
Actually mine are hazel.
20. how do you know your mom loves you? "I can tell in my mind. . . cuz you are my mom. Mom is this the last question? I'm not the world answer questions boy. "
He is very fed up with answering questions! what a crack up.

Blatten, Switzerland

If you are too lazy to hike in the Alps, we recommend taking a tram up the hill and then trotti bike down. They are like a bike that you stand on or they also look like over grown scooters.

Zermatt, Switzerland.

If you have the chance to see the Matterhorn, rather than settle for the Disneyland version of it, why not see the real thing!




This was the best picture of the Matterhorn that I could get, some of those clouds are actually mountains, look close.

Wiesbaden, Germany

Fall in love with Thuringer broutwursts. Only found in the southern parts of Germany.

Eisenach, Germany

Get sleep anywhere possible.



We are at the castle where Martin Luther translated the Latin Bible into German in the 1500's.

Lake Como, Italy.

Eat gelatto all the time.

What a great place to spend time as a family. Look at that back drop!




Rosie at one of our favorite parks. Many of the parks around here have a water feature for kids where they can pump water in an redirect it all over the sand. The kids love it.

Rosie at the Frankfurt Zoo. She is at the goat petting zoo in this cute picture. She kept saying tickle tickle, baa baa. We've been twice now. They are fans and the zoo is quite a good one.

Wiley at Kronsberg Castle and at the Conigstein Castle ruins.

Lesson #4 Own a bike in Frankfurt.





Everyone or nearly everyone, (because I don’t have a bike) owns a bike. Most are not fancy but all of them have baskets on them. The great thing is bikes are allowed on the street cars (similar to the cable cars in San Fran), busses, subways and there is always a bike rack near by. People with children have kids seats attached to the back or front of the bike and many have bike trailers for their kids. Every street in the entire town as a dedicated bike lane and if it isn’t in the street then part of the side walk is dedicated to bike riders. I should also mention that most bikes also have a little ringer on them, are equipped to ride at night with lights and reflectors, and all children have to wear protective head gear.

What is cute is that on any given day, I see tons of business men wearing suits on their way to work with a briefcase or satchel in the basket on their bikes. Women in dress suits with a flat of flowers in their baskets, couples on a date with the girl in stiletto heals and skirt. Also, age doesn’t matter. Old and young ride bikes here. Boy do I wish I had a bike.

Lesson #3 Go Green


Frankfurt, as well as all of Germany, has taken recycling to a whole new level and everyone participates, not just the hairy-legged tree-hugger around the corner or the PTA mom trying to be a good example for her peers (it's less about what her kids think). The reason is this: you will be fined 80Euro for not participating, and the garbage men will make note of it. Many homes/apartments just have three colored coded square garbage cans in their kitchens. Plus a plastic bottle recycling center at every grocery store where a machine will print out what each returned plastic bottle is worth, where you can then get money back as much as 15 cents per bottle. Plastic grocery bags cost money as much a 99 cents to help encourage people saving their bags to reuse them for the next trip to the store, which everyone does or they bring their own special grocery carrier. The recycling categories are slightly different than ours in the states though. Everything fits into a category.


Paper, cardboard and newspaper
Packaging-any form that isn’t cardboard
Compost-Banana peels, etc. And anything else that doesn’t fit into the other categories.


Now I know you are all wondering about one major category -- glass. About every few blocks one can find a large recycling drop off for glass. They actually categorize the glass by its color. Clear, brown, green -- yes, you guessed it those are the colors of beer bottles.









This is the outside of our apartment. We live on the bottom floor, those bottom three windows are ours.









A lot of the old buildings have this great tudor feel to them, with all the neat woodwork in the plaster. It looks like Hansel and Gretel still live there. Really this place is right out of a fairy tale!

Picture Update
Remember to click on picture to see it larger.

Roman Baths about 75 A.D.
10 minutes from apt.

Old Frankfurt
destoyed during the war, rebuilt to look the same in 1950's

about 10 minutes from apt.

Bruenfels Castle from the 1400's

about two hours from our place via street car, train, and bus.

Note- Wiley was too afraid to put his head in the whole. He insisted on a picture though.