Brugge

Looking down one of the canals in Brugge.

Well, nothing spectacular for the week.  We've kind of taken January easy.  Most of the interesting stuff we've done is local.  This morning, we loaded up and drove up to Brugge, Belgium.  The city has maintained a huge amount of its medieval architecture and layout.  The canals still run throughout the old sections of town.  When it's warm, gondolas move up and down the canals.  This morning, some canals had a thin layer of ice.  Obviously, none of us were getting on a boat with 30 degree temps.  Isaac did request a bath in the first canal he saw.  Thankfully, he asked, so I was able to head that one off before he pulled his pants off.

Other news, Emily bought chocolate molded in the shape of rats this afternoon.  I have no idea why.  She then insisted we take pictures of them before we ate them.  I refused to put the pictures on the blog.  (Seriously, she wanted to put the pictures on here.)

The restaurant we ate lunch in had a sensor over its door.  Every time the door opened it buzzed.  Isaac kept insisting that Emily apologize for passing gas when it buzzed.  Emily insists that I announce that she tried mussels for the first time in her life today.  She had one mussel from my plate.  Wait, I've been corrected.  She had two mussels from my plate.  She's apparently now an expert.

Another One Down

Well, today is another birthday down.  Thanks to many who mentioned it on Facebook.  It's not been a bad day.  Emily and I went to dinner on the Grand Place in Mons last night.  Today was a long run in marathon prep with a friend.  Afterwards, I squatted down to help Isaac tie his shoes.  I stayed down until Emily helped me stand back up.  I ordered my Garmin Forerunner watch (birthday gift), and currently a huge pot of jambalaya is on the stove simmering.  Overall, very good day.

We also gave Claire her first taste of baby food at lunch today.  She liked the sqaush enough that she would get excited when we put a spoon full in her mouth, she'd start to laugh and spit it back out.  She would end up eating the same spoon full of squash three times.

Isaac feels that he's been patient enough waiting for me to play "letters" with him, so I'll close for the time being.

Breaking a rule

Emily and I have a rule we normally follo whenever we have to move.  It's something we started on the first move after we married.  We never evaluated a place we lived until we had been there for six months.  We've almost at the four month mark, but I asked Em what she tought about our new home.  I guess the topic came up because we were picking up after a party at our house.  It was a friend's suprise party that we hosted.  (Low country boil did not help how much I miss Southern cuisine).  Anyway, Emily likes the layout of our house.  (It's a great house when we aren't snow bound).  The fact that we can easily to travel throughout Europe is another huge plus.  I think the thing that is helping us feel most at home is that our battalion has a real sense of family.  We'd heard about the sense of family in military communities, but this battalion really embodies that sense of community.

On the family front, Isaac managed to make it through a 2 hour lunch with flying colors this afternoon.  A friend's baby was baptized this morning, so we went to the Anglican chapel service.  Afterwards, we had lunch with them at Maison Du Berger, which lasted the mornal time for a meal at a Belgium restaurant.  Isaac never complained.  He never tried to get up.  Basically, there was no problem at all with a two year old at a restaurant for two hours.

Sick Kids

Let's recap the last couple of weeks.  We're getting back into the routine after Christmas.  We're getting scheduled for vacation and family visits over the next months.  Isaac had a stomach virus for a couple of days this week.  Today, the rest of us came home from chapel with the bug.  The funny thing was this evening.  I'm on the couch.  Em's in the recliner.  Claire is in her "bouncy seat."  Isaac realized no one else felt good, so he tried to take Claire's temperature.  He actually bounced and entertained her for about half an hour this evening.  I finally had to have hime come take my temperature so he'd stop sticking the thermometer in her ear.  We were pretty impressed with how well he handled everyone else being sick.

Isaac seemed to be better after 24-36 hours, so we're hoping to be better tomorrow.