Spring Break: Stockholm, Sweden

Okay, sorry it's been so long since we've posted here. My computer broke down a couple of weeks ago, right in the middle of Ian's busiest time. We moved a desktop (that was originally here in the apartment anyway) back to the apartment from the classroom, but we've just been really busy, including a trip to Zürich last week. Our time here in Strasbourg is rapidly coming to a close, so I'll try to catch up as much as I can over the next couple of weeks.

During spring break, at the end of March, we took a short trip to Stockholm, which turned out to be a really great trip. Stockholm is a beautiful city on the water, and although it was cold while we were there, the weather was beautiful for most of our trip.





A view of the Nordic Museum:


We took Sophie to Skansen, a living history park/zoo. They had large versions of a typical artisan craft, the painted horse:


And they also had this weird pig area, which Sophie absolutely loved!


They also had pony rides, and although Sophie was a little concerned about the movement of the horse, she loved the ride.


Here's a short video right before her pony ride:

After Skansen, we headed off to the Vasa Museum, which houses a 17th-century warship that sunk on its maiden voyage, but was kept mostly in tact for hundreds of years. These statues were found in a garden outside the museum:


And the amazing warship, Vasa, itself:






We were busy that day. :-) We headed back to our apartment at sunset, which turned out to be a beautiful time of day to walk around in Stockholm.

The One Where We Meet Toni Morrison

Yesterday Toni Morrison was signing books at a bookstore a few blocks from our house, and we decided to go. We brought Sophie along, crossing our fingers that she could sit still for the hour interview that both Ian and I wanted to see (which she did with a little bribing). We got there a bit early, and luckily, there was a short line for the book signing (at that point, at least!) We bought Morrison's most recent book, A Mercy, asked her to sign it, and when asked, she was gracious enough to pose in a picture or two with Sophie. Sophie may not appreciate it now, but we sure do!

An Early Birthday Cake

The students leave on Monday morning, and since we were hosting the last student tea and dessert yesterday, I decided to make a birthday cake a little early for Sophie this year so that she could get the experience of a big group of people singing "Happy Birthday" to her. I made a vanilla cake and cupcakes with strawberry filling (Sophie's favorite fruit) and pink frosting (her favorite color).


Do you think she's excited about the cake and singing?


Right after blowing out the candles:


She chose to eat a cupcake...and definitely enjoyed it!

Birthday Presents for Sophie

This post is for any of you who are planning on getting Sophie a birthday present for her 3rd (!) birthday later this month. Since we're going to be heading back to the States a little over a month after her birthday, we'd like to ask that you don't send any presents to France for her. We're already going to have a tough time getting everything back as it is, so if you'd like to send something, please wait until after July 5th (our landing date in the U.S.) and send it to our Kentucky address. We've prepared Sophie for the fact that we'll celebrate two birthdays for her: one here when we'll go to the zoo in Basel and one in Kentucky when she'll receive her presents, so please don't worry about her not having her special day...she'll actually have two!

We are trying to scrape together money to get her a nice swing set/jungle gym, so if you'd like to contribute to that, please let us know. Or if you'd like any other ideas, just let me know, and I'll email you some.