Why doesn't everyone speak english?!

As you all know Brett and I went to Prague a few weeks ago. It was amazing! Amazingly beautiful and amazingly cold!!! I have never been so cold in my whole life. So after buying hats and gloves and scarfs we were off to explore the city.

Brett served his mission in the Czech Republic and spent 2 months in Prague, so he remembered where a lot of things were. Which is kind of amazing since it was 9 years ago that he was there. We took an overnight train from Frankfurt to Prague. At first I was terrified, after hearing lots of bad stories about people being robbed on over night trains. But once we got on the train and ended up having the sleeper room to ourselves, it was the greatest night sleep I have ever had. Sure it could have been because I was exhausted, but I think it was the gentle rocking of the train. Ahhh, it was heaven.







We got to Prague around 11am. It was a beautiful day, the only day of sun we had the entire time we were in Europe. We walked from the Metro station to our hotel, which was on a tourist street in the area called Lesser Town. We were just below the castle and our hotel room looked right up at it. The first day we toured around the castle and walk to the mission home. Brett was excited to visit the mission home. I've never been to a mission home, so it was cool, but the elders there were kind of lame and not super nice. And why is it ok for elders to wear stylish skinny pants but sister missionaries have to look like nuns?

The street our hotel was on. We were not very observant and walked all the way up this very long street and steep hill while pulling our luggage, trying to find our hotel. Once we got to the top and didn't see it, we asked someone. Yeah, it was near the bottom of the hill. Oops. All I can say is it was a good workout pulling that stupid bag on the cobblestone streets.

From our hotel window

The castle

St. Vitas Cathedral, inside the castle

Inside the cathedral

It was so cold inside here that we could see our breath. I would have hated to have to go to church in this building.

Gold, EVERYWHERE!

When I got to Frankfurt I put my hands in my coat pocket and found one of Gwen's binkies. It was fun to have a little reminder of her with me the whole trip. We thought it would be funny to take pictures of the binky everywhere we were. So here's the bink in the cathedral.

We also crossed Charles Bridge for the first time that first day. It is so beautiful, but they were doing construction on the bridge, so the tarps kind of blocked the view.




Day 2 we went to Usti Nad Labem to visit a friend of Brett's. Unfortunately we didn't get to meet up with him, so we looked around the small town and then took the train back to Prague. Brett will post more about Usti later, so here is just one picture of the city. Just like everywhere else we went in Prague and Frankfurt there were McDonald's, Burger Kings, and KFC's EVERYWHERE. It's kind of sad that America's crap food has made it all over the world.


By the time we got back from Usti it was almost dark. Brett hadn't ever seen the sights at night, so we ventured back up the hill to see the castle and the Cathedral. It was beautiful.





This is Gold Street. It used to be where a lot of the kings alchemists lived. Now it's a continuous row of shops. You go in one shop and can walk all the way to the end without leaving a building. We went to see it during the day, but now you have to pay to even go down the road during the day, so we didn't do that. But it was neat to see it at night. Kind of creepy. The buildings are hobbit sized, so it was even more creepy, but still totally cool.

This was a really cool sign for a restaurant on Gold Street. We need better signs in America.

Brett hadn't been on European time as long as I had, so he was still having trouble getting sleep during sleep hours. The next morning he woke up really early and decided to go take picture along the bridge. They are beautiful.

This staircase was on Mission Impossible. The whole bridge was really.

Later that day we had a walking tour of Prague. My friend Lindsey suggested it and we are so glad she did. It was awesome to learn the history of things. Maybe it wasn't such a genius idea to walk around for 5 hours when it was below zero degrees, but it was fun! We have never been so cold in our entire lives. Never. Ever. Not exaggerating!

We met our tour guide in front of the Astronomical clock in the part of Prague called Old Town. It was really cool. Every hour on the hour the 4 sins , vanity, greed, death and something else, animate and the clock rings. Death rings his bell and the other statues barely move. Then the 12 apostles take turns looking out the windows above the clock. That's not a great explanation of it, but it's cool to see. The really amazing part is that it was built in 1400 something (I think) and it shows the stages of the moon, the time of sunrise and sunset, everything a farmer would need to know.

The last day we were there we walked 10 miles! TEN MILES! We walked all around Prague to see everything we might have missed. This is the National Theater. It's beautiful.

This is the Lennon Wall. It's awesome and the largest group of Americans we saw was at this wall, which was funny and totally expected.

These are the stairs to walk up to the castle. They are never ending, I was glad I'm in shape. I didn't really have a problem climbing them, Brett on the other hand, got winded really fast. HA! We just saw these on a commercial the other day to!

Ok, so I had to take this picture! I was waiting for a really cute guard to rotate in, but it never happened. It was totally awkward. He knew I was there and taking a picture of him, but I didn't feel like I was allowed to talk to him, so that's why I was making a funny face.

Along the river

The Dancing House

Wenceslas Square- a very expensive shopping and business square. The large building behind the statue is the natural history library. It was beautiful too. We went in but it was too expensive to go through it. We tried to take some pictures, but the guards wouldn't let us. Apparently part of Mission Impossible was filmed inside. Cool.

Brett used to set up street displays on this square.

This is back on the Old Town square. I stood in one spot and Brett went around me in a circle taking pictures. It's an amazingly beautiful place. Everywhere you turn there is something awesome to see. We also went to see the Mucha exhibit in a museum just to the back of the square. Brett was in heaven and probably could have spent a few hours just looking at all of his prints.

Funny story. We were on Charles Bridge and we asked this guy to take our picture. He took the camera from us and started to take our picture. I asked him to kind of move to our left to get more of the city behind us. He said, "trust me, this will be good." So he took this picture.

Good? Yeah. But then he took this next picture. After he took it he said, "yep, this one was better." hahaha. Ok, maybe you had to be there. It would be even better if Brett's eyes were totally open.

Our last dinner was at a really cute restaurant near the Old Town Square. We walked in and the only tables available were a 4 seater and a VERY small 2 seater. So we sat at the 4 seater so we could be comfortable. A few minutes later a couple with 2 small kids came in. The server said the only thing available was the tiny table in the corner for 2. So they sat there. It was comical seeing this family of 4 squeeze into that small table. So Brett and I gave them our table. When we went to sit at the smaller table, we realized just how small it was. It was a freaking sewing table! My Nana had one I used to play on when I was a kid. It had the peddle and all underneath, which meant there was no room for our legs. As uncomfortable as the table was, the food was delicious and it was fun to be there.



After we left the restaurant to walk back to our hotel, Brett made me walk down this scary street. Most of the streets look like this, so it wasn't really that scary, but still. I told him my mom would be pissed if she knew he was taking me down this street at night!

Beautiful shot of the castle from the other side of the river.

Walking across Charles Bridge there was this man playing the violin. It was totally romantic and a perfect end to our perfect trip. A special moment that we will never forget.


And to ensure that we will return to Prague someday we rubbed the statue for good luck. The superstition goes that if you rub this statue you will return, we rubbed it every time we passed it.


We had an amazing trip and we feel so blessed that we were able to go. I started writing this post a while ago and in the meantime we received a letter from Brett's friend that we missed while we were there. It was heartbreaking. He was so sad he missed us and it made that part of our trip even more bitter. We have agreed that we will go back to Prague for our 10 year anniversary, and our main objective will be to see Vladamir.

Fa Fa Fa Frankfurt

I was sent to Frankfurt, Germany to demo the Slice for MM. I was sent all alone which at first scared the crap out of me, but ended up not being so bad. It was a great opportunity but TONS of work! Four days straight of standing all day long and trying to communicate with people that don't really understand what you're saying. Germans never take a break, so they pretty much expected me to never take a break. It was rough, but I made it through. We stayed about 30 minutes away from Frankfurt, I think we were in Rodermark... I think, I don't really know. The problem with staying that far away is that Germany had gotten the most snow they had gotten in 30 years. (In reality it was only about 2 inches of snow, but that was a lot for them) Soooo, the cities had run out of salt and didn't really have the equipment to take care of the roads. So what should have been a 30 minute drive to and from the show, ended up being close to 2 hours. It was awesome. And another thing Germans don't do, turn on the heat in their cars! So it was a freezing 2 hour drive, with people that didn't really know how to speak English. Slightly uncomfortable, but a great experience, none the less. Here's a few pics of the show.

This area where the man is standing, was where both Ruth and I stood.
The smallest workspace EVER.

Hyka, me, Wendy, Ruth

These were the girls I worked with. Hyka was pretty much the funniest person I've ever met. She was trying to teach me bad words in German and then would tell me to NOT remember them. She was so fun! Wendy is from Tattered Angels. She was the only other American that really talked to me. She and her husband were beyond kind and generous to Brett and I. Brett met me there on day 3 of the show, on day 4 we had a train ride to Prague that didn't leave until 1 am. Wendy and her husband were worried about what we would do until our train left, so they got a hotel room in the city, instead of staying where we had been, and let us hang out with them until it was time for us to leave. Then they drove us to the train station!! She even offered me a job if I ever want to move to Ft. Collins, Colorado. I love Ft. Collins, so you never know... The last woman is Ruth, she was my German translator. If someone came up that didn't understand me she would step in. She was so sweet and a joy to work with. She said that she never keeps her eyes open in pictures if she looked straight at the camera, so she looked off to the side. Funny.

This is the hotel I stayed at.

The company I was working with said they like to stay here because it gives them a traditional German experience. Funniest part about that is that they are mostly all Germans.

And here is my traditional German closet. I mean room.

It was so funny how small it was. And I didn't realize that they were booking me a single bed, so when Brett showed up we had to have a cot brought in. There was maybe 6 inches between the 2 beds.

The sun came out the last day we were there. The only day there was sun.


After the last day we went out with Wendy and Kyle and found this cute little area.


Dinner

We also found this cool bridge that had a beautiful view over the river.

And that was all of Frankfurt that I saw. Sad that I didn't get to see more, but we saw a ton in Prague. That post is still to come.

Look at banner Gwen

We made this cute little banner for her.

We also found this cute little dress that had a tulle skirt and a cupcake on the front of it.

Gwen is ONE! I can't believe that it's been a year since we had her. She is such a blessing and joy to have in our lives. Every week I get an email update from Babycenter.com titled "My Baby This Week." Well today's email was "My TODDLER This Week"!!!! WHAT? My little baby is now a toddler?!

To celebrate we had a little party for her. We invited our family and had a great time! I just wish we had a bigger house so everyone could sit and talk and enjoy themselves more comfortably. Maybe for her next birthday.... maybe.

Brett and I were up late the night before preparing for it and started early the morning of the party. It was a lot of work but it was a lot fun and totally worth all the work!

She is so grown up. Things she likes to do at age 1 are:

Walking! She has taken a few steps for the last few weeks, but just today she started walking around like it was no big deal. She still seems to like crawling better, but I'm guessing that will change while I'm in Europe for the next few weeks.

Talking. She loves to jibber jabber. Nothing makes any sense yet, but it sure is fun to listen to.

Scream, squeal and laugh. She is always laughing and smiling and making everyone happy.

Crawling up AND down the stairs. As I dropped her off at the babysitter's house this morning, she climbed up the stairs, no big deal. Well then she turned over to her tummy and slid DOWN the stairs!! As I'm freaking out about my genius baby, my friend was wondering why, because she has been doing that for a while now. Well she wasn't sliding down the stairs at home! So it was sooo exciting to see her do that.

Growing teeth. Number 5, her first tooth on the top, came in the other day!

She didn't really dig into her cake, she mostly patted the outside of it and got some of the frosting on her face and a little in her mouth.

She was SO excited about this baby doll!

Thanks everyone for all of the gifts! We had a great time and were so happy you could all make it.

**** If anyone can tell me why we titled this post what we did, you get a special gold star! ****

Firsts

Gwen took her first, unassisted steps tonight! Side steps, but still, STEPS! She's growing up so fast, it's so fun.

In other news, my first half marathon. I was training to run my first half in Carlsbad, CA on the 24 of this month. But then I injured my foot, my trainer was worried it was plantar fasciitis. So I took 3 weeks off (the most crucial 3 weeks) and iced it and took lots of ibuprofen, and the pain went away! So back to running I go.

However, last week I was offered the opportunity to go to Germany for a trade show at just about the same time as the race. So... I'm off to Germany! And training for the SLC half in April instead. Since opportunities for a free trip to Europe don't come around that often, we decided to splurge and pay for Brett to come with me! So he'll meet me there around the end of the trade show and then we are off to the Czech Republic... where he served his mission. We're so excited! G-dub will be staying with my friend, that is also her daily babysitter. I'm terribly nervous, since I have to travel to Germany all by myself, but I think it will be a great experience, and I'll only be alone for a few days before Brett gets there.

And lastly, Gwen's FIRST birthday is just around the corner! We're so excited to celebrate, we've just got to get on the ball and organize the celebration.