It's Christmas, Charlie Brown

It's Christmastime, Charlie Brown, and we've got a Charlie Brown tree to celebrate the occasion. They do have real trees here that you can buy, but given that we have a 9-month-old puppy who likes to chew and knock things down and then chew them again, we figure we'd be safer going with an inexpensive artificial one.

And thus....

Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown!

A Good Day

First, we went to the German Christkindlmarkt (try saying that three times fast, especially while munching down on some bratwurst, reibekuchen (potato pancakes), and pretzels). Although all the markets they've been having on base have been cool, this was definitely the most organized and decked-out. Chalk it up to that German efficiency, I guess (man, I love me some German efficiency). After that, we went to see St. Nicolas at mall near our house (Le Grand Pres). Luckily St. Nicolas was able to speak English to the kids (of COURSE!), although it turns out apparently the kids were supposed to hand him their wish-list letter. (No worries, Jack and Ellie's letters have been safely dispatched to the North Pole). After some chatting with St. Nicolas, and ok maybe a waffle or two, we headed over to Seussical the Musical, which was put on by the local kids' theater group. Made for a long but very fun day. A good day.



Yeah, Ellie looks a bit crazy-eyed, doesn't she. I think she was just keeping an eye on that sly ol' St. Nic.

Heading in to the musical

A few things

(1) I get to skate through yet another Thanksgiving without making a turkey! (And if my mom lives to be 100 as she has promised, I have many more years of laziness ahead of me!) They obviously don't celebrate Thanksgiving in Belgium, but we got invited to a Thanksgiving dinner hosted by another American family. All we need to do is bring ourselves and some mashed potatoes, which I think is pretty good. Of course Jared got called away to a last-minute trip, so he'll miss out on the free turkey, so I'll have to 'eat for two' on his behalf. You're welcome, Sweetie.

(2) I started my French lessons today. My tutor is Miss Dominique, and she is tres bien, merci. My first class went well although my inability to pronounce the vast majority of "r" sounds (which in French are these weird gutteral, spitting kinds of sounds - sorry, French people, it's true) was a bit frustrating. Since the word for 'sister' has that sound, from now on, I only have brothers. Sorry, Jeanene and Jeanette.

(3) That, my friend, is a fence. Gaze at its beauty. Drink in its awesomeness. We have been without a fence (and thus taking Oliver out to pee roughly 8,675 times per day) since August 1st. Almost 4 months. Roughly 120 days. Times 8,675 is, well, a really big number of times we have had to take Oliver out to pee. But yesterday all the fencing was finally put in. And now? Open door, push dog out, DONE. Ah, the joy, the rapture.


(4) Would you let your kids hang out with these guys? It seems the Belgians really got the short end of the stick with their Santa Claus. Although I'm not sure this IS their Santa Claus, actually. I'm quite confused by it - they actually get presents twice - on December 6th for St. Nicolas Day (that's this guy), and then on Christmas. I think from Santa. So there might be both. I think. I'm confused. Oh, and that creepy guy with St. Nicolas? Oh yeah, he comes along with St. Nicolas to deal with the naughty kids - in some stories, he carries a stick to beat them with, in others, a bag to carry them away. Um yeah, kids, don't misbehave in Belgium.

Kiss Me, I'm Danish!

Well, ok, so I'm not really Danish, but part of Jared's family is, so that makes me Danish-by-Marriage, right? So of course we had to to the Danish Christmas Market they had today in Brussels - gotta check out the heritage! So we bought some Danish crafts, including a handmade-while-we-waited wooden craft, which was really cool. Then we tried some Danish food - not really my cup o' tea, so if we visit Denmark, we may want to look for the McDonald's there. Although they did have some yummy sausage that was put into a hollowed out baguette - yummy. And of course we saw lots of tall, blonde Danish-type people.

Kysse mig, jeg er dansk!


The market took place at the Scandinavian School of Brussels. And OK, so these students TOTALLY go to school in a castle. Which considering what they pay per year, is probably appropriate

It was really cool to watch the man carve our wooden sculpture

The food? It was ok. Some good, some not to our liking. But hey, we can say we had some Danish food.

Touch the Monkey!!

Since we got here to Mons, we've been trying to find the famous Guardhouse Monkey. Located outside the City Hall, touching it is supposed to bring you good luck. Well, finally, someone pointed it out to us (it was rather smaller than we were looking for). We've now all touched it - that's 4 points of good luck, so I say we're set for a while! Or at least until after Easter, when they do the Ducasse de Mons, where they recreate the battle of St. George and the Dragon - grabbing one of the dragon hairs will bring us even more good luck. Hey, can't hurt, right? TOUCH THE MONKEY!!!

Don't say you're in a hurry

Yesterday Jared and I went to 'host nation orientation,' which was intended to introduce you to Belgian culture and basically make sure you don't embarrass yourself or your country in front of the local Belgians. There was a lot of practical stuff the first day - all the in-processing stuff we have to do, all their different laws, some helpful hints (aka threats) from the Customs people, etc. But on the second day, we got to go on a field trip. Yay! We headed out in the morning and first learned how to take the bus. Yes, we should probably already know how to take a bus, but hey, it's a different country, and the stuff is in French, so it was helpful. Then we headed into downtown Mons, which of course is just a 15-minute walk from our house, so we didn't think we'd see anything new. Wrong!

Our tour guide took us up to the belfry, which is the highest point in Mons, and we got to see a beautiful park (who knew they had grass downtown!) and a great view of the little town. We also went to a church called Sainte Wardru - it's a beautiful, big, old church from like the 1600s, I think, named after the patron saint of Mons (you guessed it, Sainte Wardru). And although it sounds a bit creepy, they actually have her remains in the church. After that, we went to the city hall, got to tour the local hospital, learn how to shop in the local grocery stores (hello, they sell horse meat), and then went to lunch (which luckily did NOT include horse meat - I checked). Afterwards, she showed us a waffle place and a gelato place that we hadn't actually noticed on our visits downtown. Which is AWESOME. And yes, I ate BOTH. Don't judge me.

Oh, and one of the cultural things we learned? You're never supposed to tell a Belgian you're in a hurry. Rude, I guess. And really, if you give me one of those waffles and some gelato, I'm in NO HURRY at all.


Looking down on the town of Mons from the belfy

Heading into Sante Wardru

It's a REALLY BIG church. And quite chilly inside. But hey, would you want to pay the heating bill on that thing?

This is the golden cart - once a year, they have a festival to celebrate Saint Wardu - they put her remains in the chariot (gross, I know), then push the chariot several kilometers around town. If it gets stuck anywhere (or can't make it up a hill), it's considered bad luck for the next year.

Lunch - fries, of course - they serve fries with EVERYTHING. And steak. On a rock. You cook your steak on a rock at your table. Very cool.

You can't tell from the picture, but there's chocolate IN the waffle - not on the waffle, but cooked INTO the waffle. Words can't describe. Oh yes, they can. Heaven.

Reindeer, Moose, and Glogg, Oh My!

Three things I learned this weekend:

(1) "Moose Milk" does NOT actually come from a moose. This was strangely disappointing to me when I learned it. But it DOES come with quite a 'kick' to it, which was strangely NOT disappointing to me.

(2) Reindeer meat does indeed come from a reindeer. And I must say it's tasty. Sorry, Rudolph.

(3) And it washes down just fine with a cup full of glogg. I just like saying glogg, by the way. Glogg. Say it with me.

One of the really cool things about living here is that there are people from 29 different countries here since it's a NATO facility. And so your kids go to school with kids from Finland, Turkey, Italy, Ireland, you name it. And, it turns out, a lot of them host Christmas markets on base. This past weekend, there were two markets - Norway and Canada. Now re: Canada, let's be honest - they're basically Americans (sorry, Canadians), so things at the market weren't very 'foreign' to us. But they did have some yummy treats, including Moose Milk. Now, prepare to mock me, but I was picturing some big ol' moose being milked, but turns out that Moose Milk is a kind of spiked eggnog. And it's quite tasty. My dad, who is an eggnog connoisseur, would love it, but I don't think Moose Milk would ship well. Sorry, Dad.

After the Canadian market (and a visit from their Santa - who looked just like OUR Santa, so I felt kind of jipped), we headed over to the Norwegian one. Where we were introduced to reindeer sandwiches. I felt kind of guilty that we were eating some of Santa's helpers, but hey, maybe these were the mean, not-so-useful reindeer that we ate. And besides, they were tasty. Along with some Norwegian cakes, and of course some glogg (say it again! glogg!) to wash it all down.

Can't wait for next weekend's markets!


OK, I admit it, I made Jared taste everything first to make sure it didn't kill him. He's kind of my royal taster. I got photographic evidence just in case he croaked, but he survived and we were safe to drink the Moose Milk.

And the reindeer - yum

Now that's progress

Now I can breathe.

Our things have arrived. So now we have luxuries like, I don't know, spoons. And we're actually quite close to being unpacked - at least there's a big enough path through the boxes in the garage to get to the washer/dryer. Progress!

Oh, and did I mention we FINALLY figured out the dryer? Who knew you had to empty a water container thingie after each load? Perhaps everyone EXCEPT US. But now we do. And so our dryer actually .... wait for it .... DRIES OUR CLOTHES. It's a beautiful thing. Progress, I say.

My car has arrived. My pretty little lovely car has arrived. So now I don't have to rely on Jared to drive me everywhere. And he can actually get in a full work day without having to drive the wifey somewhere. Progress, indeed.

And let's not forget that the kids have a FULL WEEK OF SCHOOL without any holidays this week. Progress, progress, progress.

So now I can BREATHE.

Now that's progress.



Hello, Lover.

And goodbye, kiddies! Have fun storming the castle! (And yes, that IS their school bus, my kids aren't heading off on a tour. And yes, their bus stop is a strip mall. Which thrills them to no end, because there's a toy store there.)

Huizingen, Here We Come!

We had the day off today (AGAIN - these kids have had a LOT of days off!), and a beautiful day at that, so we decided to take the kiddies and the doggies to a park. We found a really cool one about a half-hour away called Huizingen. It's on the way to Brussels, and is in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. And it is BEAUTIFUL. Acres of walking paths, a petting zoo, and tons of fun play structures. We'll definitely head back there in the summer, too, when their mini-golf, pool, train, and boats are open. But even with those attractions closed, we had a fantastic time. Can't wait 'til the next time, Huizingen!

Playing in one of the several playgrounds

The kids loved the trampolines

Now THOSE are some cool slides

They had some really cool play structures

And rock walls

And here you could TOTALLY play pirates or storm-the-castle - although the kids looked at me kinda funny when I suggested that

Oliver just did not know what to do with the donkeys

It's hard to tell from this picture, but they have a really beautiful chateau there, that has a restaurant inside it

Missing

So far, we're really enjoying getting to know Belgium, and I know it's going to be a fun adventure. But that being said, there are a few things I'm missing from home.

My dryer - I can't emphasize enough how much this European dryer SUCKS. I don't know if it's all European dryers, or just mine, but it SUCKS. Meaning - it doesn't dry my clothes. I end up sending each load through 2 or 3 cycles, then giving up and hanging them to dry. Given that I'm trying to rush all the laundry in the evenings and weekends (utilities are obnoxiously high here, so you try to do stuff during non-peak hours), it's really a pain. I miss you dryer!

Colorful clothes - anyone knows me, knows I like me a bright top or skirt. But not here. Apparently, it's in the laws of the land that all Belgian women (or at least all women in the Mons area) must wear black. Or perhaps gray, if you're feeling wild. But otherwise, black. Part of me wants to wear my bright, bright colors just to be my lovely individual self, but part of me worries that will scream AMERICAN and get me shot by some anti-American crazy. I miss you colors!

Vegetables - I can't believe I'm even saying this, because vegetables are not my thing. But I'll be blunt - they don't really serve vegetables at restaurants. And after a while, you really start to crave some stinkin' broccoli, or a big salad. And while we're at it, how about soup? Wouldn't you think that French Belgians would eat a lot of soup? Apparently not, because it's quite hard to find in a restaurant.

Mexican - and while we're talking about missing food, I'm missing Mexican. They have quite a few types of cuisine here - lots of French of course, lots of Italian, Chinese, Mediterranean, Greek, you name it. But I have yet to see a Mexican restaurant the whole time I've been here. I miss you Mexican!

My pride - yeah, that' out the window at this point. They speak French here. I don't speak French. I'm trying, I'm really trying, but I just don't speak it yet. So I embarrass myself quite a bit. Sometimes they look annoyed sometimes amused, sometimes just sad for me. I miss my pride!

Reconnaissance Operation, aka, Paris-in-a-Day

We've been really busy getting settled in at our new house, so we haven't had the time (or frankly, the money) to do 'big' trips. But we've been trying to do a lot of day trips to "recon" the areas we're interested in, and see what we'd like to come back and spend some more time with. So yesterday, our job was reconnaissance on Paris. So after dropping the doggies at a dogsitter for the day, we hopped in the car and drove down to the Charles de Gaulle airport outside Paris. We figured our first time out we didn't want to try out driving in the heart of Paris. We're really lucky - we can get there in 2 hours from our house. We parked at the airport, then took the subway down to the Eiffel Tower. It was a Saturday, so way too busy to actually climb up the tower (unless you buy tickets ahead of time), but we walked around and checked it out from the ground. Then we hopped on a bike taxi over to the Arc de Triomph. When you climb up to the terrace, you get a gorgeous view of the whole city. After that, we strolled along the Champ Elysees, checking out the fancy shops and grabbing lunch at a very non-fancy fast food restaurant. But it's Paris, so even their fast food restaurants have yummy desserts, and I helped myself to 1 or 10 yummy beignets. Then it was time to head back to pick up the doggies, so we grabbed a taxi, and were back to the airport in no time, and back to Mons by dinnertime. Reconnaissance, complete!


Very excited for our first glimpse of the Eiffel Tower

Our attempt at the Eiffel Tower Selfie

So, ok, we're not so good at the selfies, so one of us will just need to take the pictures

Looking up at the tower

Strolling down the Champ Elysees

At the Arc de Triomph

The view from the terrace of the Arc de Triomph

A few beignets before heading home!

Friday Night Fun

We've had a long week - and frankly, I've had a long day, having to work while also entertaining the kids since they had yet ANOTHER day off from school. (Have I mentioned how many holidays these Belgians seem to have?) So when Friday night dinner rolled around, I was apt to suggest a trip to the mall, or even (don't slap me) Pizza Hut delivery. But luckily Jared was in the mood for a walk, and suggested that we walk to the downtown. They call the downtown square the "Grand Place," and it's only about a 15-minute walk from our house - as the crow flies, not much more than a mile. So we decided to give it a whirl, and were really glad we did.

Little did we know that they were hosting a carnival at the Grand Place - for what occasion, I have no idea (remember that whole not-speaking-French-yet thing), but we didn't care. So the kids did a couple of rides and got some cotton candy, and we decided to get some dinner. There are a ton of restaurants right at the Grand Place, and we chose a Spanish one. Yummy tapas and paella, and even a stuffed bull thrown in for character. Of course Jack wanted to coat his tummy beforehand in case he didn't like the Spanish food, so we swung by a trusty McDonald's on the way. Turns out he didn't need to worry, though, because the food was muy delicioso. Then just a short walk back to the house, and voila, a fun Friday night!



Walking into the Grand Place - it was a pretty short walk there, although there were a couple of sketchy alleyways that I would probably have not ventured through if I didn't have my Big Strong Man with me

The Grand Place, all lit up with the carnival

We decided on Spanish food for dinner - but Jack insisted on grabbing a McDonald's burger before trying the unknown Spanish food. He got his burger and fries - and I got some yummy macarons. Macarons at McDonald's - who knew!

Yummy tapas - truthfully, I wasn't sure what some of the stuff was - but it was all yummy!

My paella - although it was easily big enough for two

Yup, you guessed it - we're "those people" who play with the stuffed bull - see, this is where it comes in handy that we don't speak French, so we didn't hear them mocking the stupid Americans

After dinner, we strolled through the carnival - and Jared and the kids checked out the fun house - I think I've mentioned that around these parts they don't quite follow the same safety standards we're used to - and my kids are very happy about that - I mean, where else can they get tumbled around like a load of laundry?

A little (or a lot) sugar to end the evening.

Necessity

When I first noticed that our house had a clothesline in the utility room, I thought it was so .... quaint. So old-fashioned and sweet and, well, AMISH. That's all I thought about it, since I had absolutely no intention of using it. After all, we were getting a nice European washer/dryer.

Well, that was before I actually USED aforementioned European dryer. And discovered that they have apparently designed it to take approximately 80 hours to dry a single load of laundry. So, not having the patience or time to wait approximately 80 hours for my laundry to dry .....



Although I really feel like I should have been dressed like Alice from Brady Bunch while I did this. Who am I kidding - Alice had a proper dryer.

Meanwhile, necessity also dictated that we pick up these overpriced things.

Not because we want to spoil our dogs. But because WE WANT TO SIT ON OUR STINKIN' COUCH, THANK YOU VERY MUCH. GET OFF OUR COUCH, YOU MANGY MUTTS!

At the Piscine

We learned an important lesson when we went to our local piscine (swimming pool) - they have a strict ban against board-short-style swim trunks, and they have a strict ban against any definable muscle on a grown man.

The pool is actually cool - complete with competition-sized pool, recreational pool, a lazy river, and a crazy-ass slide that had like three levels of what I'd call toilet bowls that finally dumped you into a not-so-lazy river. (I'm thinking it MAY not pass U.S. safety standards.) And it's within walking distance of our house, which is great. But we discovered when we walked in today that Jared and Jack's board short-style swim trunks were not allowed. So we had to quickly buy some snuggy-snug shorts. Theirs were on the longer side, but the majority of the men there wore more traditional speedos. And you know, perhaps they shouldn't have. There was nary a muscular man to be seen (besides my ruggedly handsome American, of course), and I was sorely tempted to go up to them and suggest that, perhaps, a chest press or two might be a fun idea. But I didn't. Oh, and I didn't even swim, either, because it turns out my suit was unacceptable as well (it's a tankini with little 'boy short' bottoms - no shorts, apparently!). But hey, now we know! Next time we go to the piscine, we'll be ready with our snuggy-snug suits!

Just Right

Like Goldilocks, many Americans have a hard time finding houses here that are "just right" - either the houses are too small, or too crazy-big (they have chateaus here, people), too close in to the sometimes-sketchy city, or too far out in the country. But I think we lucked out and found our "just right."

So we finally moved in two days ago - two adults, two kids, two dogs (we sprung 'em from the kennel!), and a LITTLE bit of stuff. Our 'household goods' shipment still hasn't arrived, so the military provides some basic loaner stuff - some dorm-style beds and wardrobes, things like that. Luckily, we have most of our clothes, and are making due with some very basic stuff otherwise. But hey, we're in our house, and that's AWESOME, and we're gradually learning it - learning it, because things are a bit different. So, you wanna see our house? Here goes:


Our house .... is a very very very fine house ... with two cats in the yard - oh wait, that's not right

Here's our cute little family room - hopefully it won't always be full of boxes and crates, but you get the point - off to the right is what would be the dining room portion of the room, but we'll put the kids' study area there - you know, so we can pretend that our kids actually study

The couch is the one piece of furniture that is actually ours (since we just ordered it here in Belgium)

And here's our teeny tiny kitchen

Complete with itsy bitsy teeny weeny oven - my cookie sheets haven't arrived yet, but I'm the Queen of England if even one of those fits in this Easy Bake Oven - time to get creative, people!

And speaking of teeny tiny, see that sink in our powder room? I think that used to belong to Barbie

In here for a 'short trip'? Push the flush button on the left; An, um, LONGER stay? Push on the right. Too much thinking if you ask me, but hey, it could be worse - at a restaurant today, I had to pay to go to the bathroom.

And while you're scratching your head, could you explain these washing machine graphics to me? Yeah, I have no idea - I'm just going to push start and hope something happens

This is a little garage that they converted into a storage room - which we'll definitely put to good use

And this will be the office / guest room - I'm fairly certain a bed will actually fit in there

Now, let's head on upstairs - this is Jack's room - I mentioned the word 'tiny' before, right? But according to Jack, it's just right for him

Each bedroom has these cool cubbby-type things all along one wall, which is nice, since most Belgian houses don't have closets

And here's Ellie's room, which she already loves

Our room is actually bigger than this photo conveys - but yes, it DOES look that institutional right now, with the government-provided furniture

Now, please meet Ellie's very very favorite part of the house - our VERY pink bathroom

And my very very least favorite part of the house - the 'shower' - in other words, no shower; apparently, Belgians aren't as fond of showers as we are

They don't like trash either, which is why you have to purchase special trash bags depending on where you live and you have to recycle like crazy - the white ones are for the 'trash trash,' the blue ones are for "PMC" (plastic / metal / cartons), then you put your cardboard/paper stuff in another container, and you take your glass to a recycling center - I think having to pay for each trash bag is supposed to deter you from being trashy - but they don't know us well - we are HAPPY to pay for our right to be trashy, thank you

And finally, Otis and Oliver's favorite part of the house - the nice, big backyard - see how green that lawn is? That's what it's like everywhere here - all the grass is super-green, thanks in part to the fact that it rains like 200 days out of the year. But hey, it makes for a pretty yard.

A yard that is just right for frisbee. And a house that is just right for us. Welcome home, Sorensons!