Clap along if you feel like a room without a roof....

Things that made me happy this week...

I made some sweet little bunnies for sweet people I know....and pom poms make everyone happy!

I got this awesome hutch top out of the trash one night on my way home from the store. I have big plans for it....stay tuned..

M.O.C.A. met at our house this week. It is our Mother's Of College Age prayer group and is so dear to my heart. We all have adult children back in the States and just "get" each other. I look forward to every time we get together, to share our hearts and our concerns for our "big kids" and lift them and each other up in prayer. What a huge blessing it has been to me this year, being so far away from the kids.

And the pastries brought a little smile, too.... ;)

I got this adorable retro-looking cart (IKEA), some sweet fabric at the Stoffmarkt, and my love brought me the new spring-specialty Ritter Sport...

And the thing that made me the happiest this week. This face:

3 months old already, with the biggest personality I've ever seen...oh my heart..

And God made two great lights....

We have been having such fun this year in science. We are using this book

as our main text and adding in lots of fun extra activities and investigations. 

So imagine our delight when we found out that we would be able to experience a solar eclipse here! And not just a regular, run-of-the-mill solar eclipse, but one that occurred on the same day as the vernal equinox! And after a night with a super moon! 

This would be a partial eclipse for us here in Germany, not total, but we determined to make the best of it! 

We studied the different kinds of eclipses, how solar eclipses happen (fun fact: the moon is 400x smaller than the sun, BUT 400x closer to earth than the sun, creating a 1 to 1 ratio! Science AND math!), what scientists can learn from studying eclipses, and why we should care! 

And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. Genesis 1:17-18

We also found out WHY it is not safe to look at the eclipse (partial, not full) with the naked eye and we made a pinhole viewer a couple weeks ago so we could try it out before the real deal. 

Then it was time! We woke up to the forst foggy morning we've had in a while and anxiously waited for the sun to get high enough in the sky to burn it off. And it did! 

The eclipse was to begin around 9:30 am. We invited some homeschool friends over to watch with us and we made some celestial snacks for energy during the viewing. :)

We ended up trying four different viewers, all the pinhole type, to see which one gave us the best image. The long one (in the mailing tube) ended up being best, but all but one worked great!

Isaiah 48:13-My own hand laid the foundations of the earth, and my right hand spread out the heavens; when I summon them, they all stand up together. 

Psalm 19:1-The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handiwork.

 

Psalm 8:1-LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory in the heavens.

It didn't get dark, even when the sun was 80% covered, but there was a golden, kind of eery, tone to everything, kind of like just before a summer rainstorm on a sunny evening...

It was a great morning-the kind that makes homeschooling even more "worth it!" 

And great news! The U.S. is expected to be able to see a solar eclipse in 2017! 

Isaiah 40:26-Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things, that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth.

What to do with four days....

We had a long weekend. I'm not sure why, but in keeping with our "take advantage of every opportunity to explore" mantra, we did a little looking around to see what would be fun.

We decided on Switzerland. Die Schweiz, for those of you fluent in German.

We made a three day trip of it-although there was no work on Monday, we did have other commitments we needed to be back for.
We had a general idea of what we wanted to do, packed some hiking shoes and jackets, dropped the dog off to be boarded, loaded the cooler with salami and brötchen and apples, and we were off!

First stop, Freiburg im Breisgau in the Schwarzwald. We hadn't done much exploring in the Black Forest and thought this town looked like a nice place to take a break. The little kid woke up with a cold and a slight fever that morning so we decided to keep things nice and easy.

medieval statue in the center of town (You can see all the criss-crossing cables from the trains) 

The gothic Münster (cathedral) built around 1200 a.d.

Unfortunate pillar placement ;-)

McDonald's in a medieval gate

There were little canals on all the streets. For irrigation and fire-fighting.

Checking out the Lego displays

We had a delicious and beautifully presented lunch upstairs at Karstadt (department stores have such great restaurants here) and then it was back on the road.

I didn't take a picture of the border but it was quite a bustling place! No passports were needed, but we did have to purchase a vignette to put in our window, allowing us to drive on Swiss roads. Kind of like a toll but paid all up front. Crafty, those Swiss are....

The drive was absolutely gorgeous. Beautiful green meadows with a back drop of snow-covered Alpine peaks. Just stunning. 

We made it to our hotel after dark but when we woke up the next morning we got to enjoy this view from our breakfast room!

Our breakfast was a selection of European items with the highlight being cheese, of course...

After breakfast we did some exploring around Lake Thun.

 We stayed outside Interlaken, which, in itself is not the greatest town. But it makes a great jumping off point for other locations and activities. Because the boy was still feeling under the weather,

we took things a little easier. We drove through a lovely little town on our adventures. It seemed like we had stepped back in time...

and we had a very un-Autobahn-like drive on the Swiss interstate through the mountains. There was a lot of this...

and SO. MANY. TUNNELS.

We made it to our stop for the day--the Victorinox Visitor's Center in Brunnen. We had a very expensive lunch (Swiss francs are currently faring better than both the dollar and the euro) at a lovely little restaurant

and made our way across the street in time for our appointment. The guys were getting to make their own Swiss Army knives! Definitely the highlight of the trip, we got to explore the small museum, learn about the history and some fun anecdotes related to Swiss Army knives, and then they assembled their own knives, all the way down to the tiniest little brass fasteners inside. So cool.

They got to choose what they wanted to engrave on their knives and type it in to the computer.

That night we went out for dinner. What to have when in Switzerland? Fondue, of course.
So much cheese....maybe a little more than enough.

We spent a good bit of time walking on the paths by the lake the next day before checking out. The boy was feeling much better. :)

skipping rocks

and we headed to Bern to visit the Bernisches Historisches Museum. We had read great things about it and it did not disappoint!

based on the size of those hips, I'm pretty sure this belonged to one of my ancestors

view of Bern (capital of Switzerland) from the top floor of the museum

very cool modern entrance to the large Einstein exhibit

And then it was time to come home. It was a lovely weekend with great weather and although there were so many things we COULD have done and packed into the week, we really enjoyed taking it easy, just enjoying the views and nice walks and exploring a place we had never been!