the many faces of Carsten

I love taking pictures of Carsten, and sometimes I like to do a bunch of photos and try to get as many faces as possible from him. He makes a lot of faces, and is constantly getting new ones.

Beginning of the photoshoot

Our smiley boy

He's beginning to get a pretty focused when he finds something he wants. This photo and the next really show that well.

Love his blue eyes.

In other noteworthy events, I made lasagna for the first time! The noodles that I could find at the store are flat and about half the length of normal noodles (picture below). The lasagna turned out yummy, and ended up being a cross (in taste) between my mother's and mother-in-law's lasagna. Also, it's not that pretty because we don't have shredded cheese, so there's fresh mozzerella on top.

My first lasagna!

I also love taking pictures of Andy playing with Carsten. Here's a photo of Andy 'bench pressing' Carsten. Carsten does a great job of keeping his body straight, and actually grunts the whole time, which is cute.

Just had to throw this one in here - so cute!

A new thing he started two days ago is sort of a spitting raspberry. So when he's playing you'll now hear some new noises, and this has messy repurcussions when we're trying to feed him... No pictures of this yet as I'm afraid to get the lens too close... :)

Baby food

Ok, so here we again learning new things about how the Swiss do things. Last night I spent some time shopping for baby food online (which is better than in the store because I can take my time to translate words instead of just picture shopping). What I learned is this: there are very few single food baby foods and some that are listed as 4 month old food (beginners) contain strawberries & raspberries, which I've always understood to be a 12 month food. The single food items are not what I would have thought of for the most part: apple, pear, chicken, ham, beef, carrots, zucchini, and potato. They have a lot more fruit & veggie medleys than I expected to see, and a lot of 'meals' like complete pasta dishes. For now, it makes me think that introducing single foods every couple of days will be difficult since I will have to very carefully select different medleys. Perhaps what I need to do is get an immersion blender to make some baby food of our own, but the problem with this is that I think I will be doing this all the time (very little freezer & fridge space for large batches). Hmmmmm

Has anyone made their own baby food? And, how much time & freezer space did it take?

Carsten eats solid food

For the last couple of weeks, Carsten has been seeming more and more interested in solid foods. In fact, one time last week, he saw me eating yogurt and proceeded to get upset. We finally got our high chair two weeks ago, and we've had him sitting at the table at suppertime, so perhaps that also helped him get interested in food. We started out his adventures in solid food with rice cereal on Friday night. He didn't seem to like it that much, but I think that was perhaps our fault because I think we didn't make it runny enough (it was a bit on the pasty side). We tried again Saturday night and had much more success with a very runny version of rice cereal. In fact, he ate the entire bowl. Sunday night went even better. We skyped with my parents while we were feeding him and by the end of the bowl he was trying to get to the spoon by leaning forward. On a side note, has anyone ever tried this stuff? It's really not that good... So hooray! His first venture into solid food seems to be going very well! I would like to also say, thanks Mom Huisman for the amazing bibs! She makes these wonderful bibs from hand towels that do an amazing job of catching most things on the actual bib. These photos are from Friday night, when the rice cereal was a bit on the pasty side.

"Mom, have you tried this stuff?!"

"I have, and I'm not so sure..."

"Yep, it's pretty gross."

We've been excited for some time to start trying a sippy cup. Somewhere in the midst of moving from Madison, our extended Christmas holiday, and moving to Switzerland, he lost the ability to take a bottle nicely. So, we've been excited to get him fluids in an alternative way. Here we have not had as much success, he'll suck on it a little bit, but not overly much. However, last night, just out of curiousity, I got out a bottle to see if he would take it while in his chair. To our surprise, he did take some of it (normally he just screams and screams and screams), so I think we'll try the bottle route again today and maybe we can reintroduce it that way!

Last week also marked a breakthrough in rolling for Carsten as well. Two weeks ago or so he rolled from his back to his tummy twice, but last week he spent a great deal of time perfecting that skill. In fact, he even perfected it in his crib, but this practice time had its downsides for him. Even though he's rolled from his tummy to his back quite a few times, they've been sporadic so I'm not sure I'd call it a skill that he's mastered yet. So, when he rolls in his crib to his tummy, he's not always the happiest to fall asleep in this position and he has a tough time getting back to his tummy by himself. We had some really rough nights and days where any time he rolled onto his tummy he would wake up mad. After about two days of this (going in and rolling him over and then he wouldn't fall back asleep) I put him down for a nap and he'd immediate roll onto his tummy, so I'd flip him back and he'd do it again. I didn't want this to become a game, so I let him roll onto his tummy and then cry for ~45 min before he fell asleep. I felt pretty awful about it, but I think the results have paid off. He'll now fall asleep on his tummy with only a little bit of complaining and it doesn't make him mad to roll onto his tummy in the crib anymore (unless he gets stuck in the crib bars). Plus, I don't feel the need to flip him over since I know he can sleep successfully on his tummy. Last night we finally settled back into our night-time sleeping routine of him getting up only once during the night. It makes such a difference to us! And most likely to him, he's been very tired during the day the last week, due to more interrupted sleep.

Now, a little bit about our weekend: We spent most of the day on Saturday hanging up photos and artwork. This was no small task since all but one of the walls we tried to hang stuff on was cement. I must say this: Andy is a champ! He got all of our stuff hung up (seriously, it took us all afternoon and we just had a few things), and he even helped me make dinner (tomato, bacon, and mozzarella pasta). What a guy! Sunday was very nice and relaxing, and we even spent most of the day in our pjs (Carsten too!). We don't usually just sit around and relax, but it rained all day, so getting outside for a walk was not an attractive option.

Allright, I think that's a pretty good summation of our week. Today is laundry day, and I only have three loads to do, which is nice. And, I've already achieved two goals for the day: dishes are done and so is this post! Sometimes it's difficult to be productive (especially last week with Carsten being overtired and not napping very well during the day), so I have to celebrate when I am :).

A few frustrating things about Switzerland

1) The Swiss apparently do not have rocking chairs. What?! I asked some of the moms at the Moms and Tots group and they said the best thing to do was to go to Germany. Seriously?!

2) The Swiss do not have a lot of baby equipment that I was expecting, like a baby jumperoo. Additionally, sites like ebay.ch, which have baby jumperoos, (Ch is the abbreviation for Switzerland) do NOT ship to Switzerland. How is that possible? There is an amazon.de (for Deutsch), but they also do not ship to Switzerland. In fact, NO ONE ships to Switzerland due to their insanely high import taxes. Once again, I fear the solution is 'go to Germany'.

3) Yesterday, we went to the secondhand furniture shop in town (to see if they had a rocking chair), and what we found was an extremely overpriced fancy goodwill. A used chair (did not rock) was still 500 CHF (exchange ratio is about 1:1). Perhaps we don't know how things are priced, but 500 CHF will buy some pretty nice furniture from IKEA.

4) Ryan air, one of the really, really cheap airlines in Europe, does not fly in Switzerland. Again, seriously?

These things are definitely not deal breakers, but they are certainly annoying at times. It seems the Swiss are very protectionistic, which I knew but did not expect it to this extent.

Anyway, happy Thursday everyone!

Settling in...

Andy and I are starting to feel settled here, in the sense that it's real that we live in Switzerland. We are adjusting to life in a quiet Swiss town where really the only thing to do is take walks, admire the beautiful scenery, and get groceries. We like our flat and it's starting to feel like home. I will say that sometimes I still feel overwhelmed with the constant 'newness' of it all. Besides Andy, I don't get to see very many familiar faces or see very many people who speak English, so sometimes, all I want to do is stay at home (which I get to do a lot!) and take walks with Carsten because I just want a familiar and non-awkward sitiuation. I think this feeling of newness is tempered somewhat for Andy since he has the same coworkers and everyone speaks English at ETH. Other than the occasional feeling of 'newness', both of us are enjoying Egg and Zurich.

Now that Carsten has adjusted to the time-zone, which took about a week, he seems blissfully oblivious to all going-ons that don't involve sleeping, playing, and getting fed. He really enjoys walks, both in the stroller and the baby bjorn, so I try to make sure we get out of the house at least once a day in the afternoon. Fortunately, the weather has been absolutely beautiful, with most of the weather so far in the 40s and 50s and even when it's colder, it only gets to just below freezing. This means that we can go outside, unlike in the Midwest where sometimes temperatures are so cold that a couple of minutes of exposure really isnt' good for infants. Carsten has now spent a week in his new kinderbed, and we still do find him in interesting positions (arm/legs out of the crib bars). Last night he woke up at 10 pm (went to bed at 8) and was upset because he had rolled onto his tummy and had one arm stuck up to his shoulder in the bars. It's interesting that he rolled onto his tummy in his sleep because a) this is the second time that I'm aware that he's rolled in this direction and b) he hasn't rolled in any direction at all this last week. I know that he's strong enough to roll, he just really doens't seem interested in it, which to be honest, is fine with me. A few more days of a non-mobile child is still a welcome thought :).

At church, for whatever reason, people keep asking me what my baby girl's name is. This is not something that I would be a problem because I think I dress him sufficiently like a boy. However, this last Sunday I dressed him as boyishly as possible, and no one asked me if he was a girl, so that was nice :). Here's a picture!

Thanks to my Grandma Hoogeveen for this cute boyish outfit!

I will leave you with one last thought: After I feed Carsten, if you walk with him or bounce or do anything except sit, you can hear (seriously!) the milk sloshing around in his tummy. So, does this mean he's constantly getting sloshed? :)

One month in Switzerland!

It's hard to believe that it has already been a month since we arrived in Switzerland. I posted a short (compared to a month) video on facebook. You might want to check it out.




(edit: I had to change the facebook permissions to make this video visible here. I'll leave the video up for anyone to see for a few days in case someone doesn't have a facebook account but then I will take it back down if I remember to do so)

Carsten is 5 months old today!

Who can believe that 5 months ago we got to find out what Carsten looked like and then we'd get to start our amazing journey as parents. :) I think today will be a day filled with remembrance for the last 5 months with him.

For example, I woke up this morning thinking about how fast he's going through his clothes. He started out in newborn size, which lasted about 3 weeks. Then 0-3 months size lasted until 2 months, and the 3-6 month size lasted until 4 months. He's now in his 6-9 month size, and I think he'll be out of that in another month. I know people always say they grown up fast, but really I think part of it is that he's growing like a weed... :)

Here's some photos that I've been going through as I walk down memory lane today...

Carsten's first day at home. It's hard to believe that we did our best to wake him up every 2-3 hours so he could eat...now we try everything just to keep him sleeping... :)

Carsten at 1 month! We thought he was big then, but oh my, how he's grown and changed!

Now at 5 months, he's our happy kid who loves tummy time and can now grab toys with easy whether his on his front, back, or side. We've seen him roll, but not with great frequency, so I'm sure this will change soon!

Carsten is already my little helper and helps me with laundry. However, it's not in the way you would usually expect. He helps me dirty the clean laundry by spitting up, so now he gets to hug a burp cloth when I'm doing laundry.

However, I do have to remember that even though he's growing up so fast, he's still our little baby and that I do get to carry him around and cuddle him for a little while longer... :)

We love our little Carsten and every day, yes, even the relatively bad days, we are so thankful that we get to be his parents.

The Alps!

We had wonderful weather this last weekend! It was typically >45 F and sunny! This meant that all the snow (approximately 2 inches) is gone and that we have had amazing views of the Alps. The best view that we've found in Egg is by the reformed church, which sits on a hill in the middle of town. We can also see the Alps from our street (not our apartment though :( ).

Reformed Church in Egg

Carsten and I up by the church (Alps in the background!).

Carsten and the Alps!

The Alps. Beautiful.

Andy, Carsten, and the Alps

The Alps from our street.

Zurich!

Lake Zurich and the Alps in the distance

All in all, Switzerland is very beautiful, at least, when it's not cloudy :).

Test post

Test post from Andy. Something real and interesting will go here later.

Wednesday Trip to Zurich

I was invited to a Moms and Tots group at IPC (church) that meets on Wednesday mornings, so I decided to go and try it. Andy kindly waited for me so we could take the train in together in the morning and then walked to the church with me (what a guy!). It was fun to be with him on the train and see what his morning commute is like.

The Moms and Tots group was a lot of fun; there were 5 moms including myself and we talked about how to incorporate Christianity into our children's lives. I really enjoyed the group, and I enjoyed speaking English (not that I speak anything else...)! The group got done at 11 am, so I confidently got on a tram that would take me to Andy's building at ETH so Carsten and I could eat lunch with Andy. I was pleased with my tram skills because I totally made it without any help! However, I have learned that having a stroller is a bit of a pain when taking the trains/trams. Some of the trams you actually have to lift the entire stroller up, and since Carsten is a bit heavy, this is getting to be a difficult task. Andy and I took a short walk before lunch since Carsten fell asleep in the stroller right as we were leaving his work building, and then we ate panini sandwiches, which were quite tasty! Andy graciously kept the stroller and took it back home after work so I could just take Carsten in the baby bjorn. This arrangement was a whole lot easy to maneuver on the transit system, so I think I'll try to avoid taking the stroller when I'm traveling by myself.

Ok, so remember the part when I was so proud of myself for mastering the transit system? Don't worry, it was short lived. As I left Andy's building, we went through the trains I would have to get on. The number 9 down to Belleview, then a short walk to Stadelhoffen where I take the S18. The number 9 is on the same street Andy's office building is on, so I went out and got that train after just a couple of minutes, and I'm thinking: 'This is great! And I'm so getting good at this!'. There's about 5 or so stops before I get off this train and the one nice thing about these Zurich trains is that they have computers saying how long the train is going to take to get to a particular stop. So, with 2 minutes left to get to Belleview, the train veers off to the left taking a different street. They said something in German, but as I don't speak German, I had no idea what it was. I panicked, and got off about 6 blocks off the correct street that the number 9 is supposed to take. I called Andy at this point and told him of my utter failure with the train, and he assured me that I was walking back to the correct street. So, I walked back and then continued walking to Belleview, which was about a mile. For the record, we found out later that the 9 had to be diverted because the tracks were closed, so if I had understood the German announcement, I would have known to stay on the train and would not have had to walk. So, this at least, was not totally my fault.

As I came to Stadelhoffen (the stop where I get the train home), there was an S18 waiting, so I held on tight to Carsten and ran across the square to get on the train. Once I got on the train I found someone who spoke English and asked if this was the correct train to get to Egg. They assured me that it was. I was so relieved to be on the correct train! So I fed Carsten and he fell asleep, which I was super excited about because that meant he was sleeping through the brake noises that had upset him so much on Sunday. Well, we got to Forch, which is about 4 stops before Egg, and the train stopped. I noticed that there was absolutely no one on the train, and asked the driver (who spoke English!) if this train went to Egg. He informed me that this was the last stop and I had to get on the train on track 3 in 15 min to get to Egg. This meant that I had gotten on the wrong train. There are two S18 trains during 'rush hour', one of which goes all the way down the line (goes through Egg!) and one of which stops at Forch. So, I had gotten on the wrong train. Perhaps I should have known not to trust the person who assured me that it was the right train when they got off 2 stops after the train left Stadelhoffen. Anyway, I hustled off the train (I didn't want to go back to Zurich!), and in the process woke my sleeping child since I had to dress him back up in his winter clothes and put him in the baby bjorn. Then we got to go wait 15 min in the cold, and then our correct train finally came, for which, I was grateful! Carsten was great, and even though I did wake him up from his nap, he was very cheerful and tolerant of waiting in the cold with me - what a great kid!

One of the moms at the Moms and Tots group invited me to a Bible study on Thursday mornings at the church. Needless to say after my experience getting home, I elected not to go...

Church

Andy, Carsten, and I had a wonderful weekend. We finally made it to church, which was a blessing. We went to the International Protestant Church (IPC) in Zurich where we met quite a few people with American English and Midwestern accents to boot! We met someone who grew up in Ames, IA (where my Dad went to college), someone from South Dakota, and someone from Oklahoma. I also was able to meet a few moms (with even younger babies than us!), and they invited me to a Moms and Tots group that meets on Wednesday morning (it's complete with babysitters!). It was so nice to connect with people again, and I think I finally started realizing how isolated we are out here. I've noticed that when I'm out I try to say and I pay attention to people, but for the most part I don't even listen to what people are saying because I have absolutely no idea... :). The church service was long, but fairly traditional, which is what we like and is good because there aren't a lot of English-speaking church options to choose from.

We had Carsten's first train ride on they way to church, which was very close to a disaster. Church is at 11:30 am, so we had to leave our train station at 10:30 am. We tried putting him down for a nap at 9:30 am, which did not happen, so by the time we made it to our train he had been up for 2.5 hours, which is on the long side for him. He absolutely did NOT like the brake noises (compressed air whooshing noises when the brakes released, which are really quite loud), and since there were about 15 stops that occurred about every 2 minutes, he had no chance to fall asleep on the train. Poor guy... Anyway, long story short, after this ride I think we were both thinking that I was never going to leave Egg again. However, our train ride back (even though he was still tired and hadn't had many naps because of church) was terrific. He loved looking out of the windows, and even though the brake noises still startled him, he wasn't upset by them. Hooray! Looks like I can leave Egg by train after all, I just need to make sure he's not on the verge of a melt-down before we go :).

Last week we had a few rough nights with Carsten. We have been putting him to bed asleep, but that no longer is working because he'll wake up MAD after about 30 minutes of being set down. So we spent 2-2.5 hours per night trying to get him back to sleep. We decided on Friday night that we'd like to be done with that, so we've decided that it's ok for him to cry. Friday night he cried 45 minutes straight, and we felt like horrible parents, but Saturday and Sunday nights he didn't cry at all! I think the trick with him is trying to make sure he's awake when we set him down, that way he knows where he is and that the expectation is for him to sleep. Last night (Monday night) he didn't do as well, but he only cried for little while. Needless to say, Andy and I are enjoying having some time to ourselves after he goes to bed (about 8 pm most nights).

Carsten has also decided that laying on his back is not the most fun place to be as he'd rather be sitting up (he still needs supervision & some help to do this), hanging out with me, on a walk (he gets excited when he sees the baby bjorn), and even tummy time is preferable to being on his back. He'll lay on his back and play sometimes, but it's usually the best after he wakes up in the morning, and he gets progressively less tolerant as the day goes on. This is a little stressful for me because it means there are a lot less times that I can go and do other things (like dishes and writing papers). He also takes very short naps (mostly 30 min naps), so it's hard to get things accomplished at these times as well. Here's some photos of him at tummy time:

He's a thinker!

He's become quite adept at eating his burp-cloths now. 

So bright-eyed!

Our smiley boy. This picture absolutely melts my heart :).

 And here are some other goofy photos: :)

This is what happens when Daddy dresses Carsten :).

This photo was Andy's idea - this is Carsten's hair after bathtime :).