more paris pictures

first pic - moulin rouge even though ive never seen the movie, 2nd - view from notre dame towers, 3rd me and max on the second floor of the eiffel tower with my camera so you can barely see the view, 4th pic is the louvre again, 5th is notre dame

Paris!!

(1st pic eiffel tower at night, next during the day, next is us loving the fall that doesnt exist in madrid, and finally me and max in front of the louvre) so max finally made it out to visit a few days before his birthday and i was lucky enough that he stayed for 2 weeks!! within those 2 weeks we enjoyed celebrating his birthday and i took him out on the town and to the madrid casino and to Paris!!! we left for Paris this last friday morn or should i say thurs night, our flight left at 5:30 am thanks to ryanair - the low cost airline - so needless to say we were all exhausted being that we were at the airport at 3:30ish. so we tried to sleep on the oh so comfortable ryanair, with the baby kicking max's seat the entire way...i slept but he didn't. we finally made it there and had the rest of the afternoon to explore after we dropped off our stuff at the hostel, which was nice i thought. and we headed to grab food, we found this quaint little italian place (even though we all wanted french food, this was the only place that looked good around were our hostel was -in the ghetto). the people of the restaurant were really welcoming and so excited to have us there. it was a tiny little place and we just ordered the menu of the day, little did we know (couldn't understand what we were getting with the french/italian language barrier, too bad they didn't speak spanish) we got a salad to start and then a pizza that was delicious and then pasta from this HUGE pan and then dessert that the lady made special for us. after this very filling and absolutely amazing lunch we headed to a cathedral which was up on a hill a little ways away...we needed the walk! this cathedral was cool, but nothing too exciting. from there we headed to the catacombs which was really neat except for me freaking out in small spaces!!! saw it for a while took some pictures of the dead body skeletons which were cool and then booked it out of there. after this we walked to the louvre which we planned to go friday night cause we got in free from 6-10 so we went in there and i enjoyed it for about 1 1/2 hours and then i was done with that...not too much of a museum person but i was impressed with the time that me and max made it. the next day we got up early and went to the palace of versailles and spent a lot of the day there and had lunch at this tex-mex place right by it which had amazing margharitas!!! so good except i was a little nervous cause it came out blue but it was really good!!! and then we made it to notre dame walked around inside the church and then watched as mass began and made our way home to take showers and get ready for dinner but first with a stop at the french's version of a "chino" and picked up some alcohol. we pre-gamed in the hostel and had a lot of laughs there, we lost of the boys, and then we headed to dinner. we found this french place right in the heart of the restaurant zone so we headed in and me and max and kathleen got cheese fondue (i mean we were in france, it was a must) and it was very good!! after dinner we headed back, we were all exhausted and were planning on getting up early. the next day me and max headed to the aquarium while others did some more museums. the aquarium was pretty small and we were not real impressed but we had a good time! and from the aquarium we went to the towers of notre dame to meet up with everyone cause they were closed the day before. after this we grabbed lunch and then headed to do a boat tour on the Seine River for an hour, which was really nice and perfect cause the sun was setting and we got some really good pictures. then it dropped us off at the eiffel tower just as it was getting dark. we headed up to the top of the tower and of course i didnt last long with the whole heights problem! but we all took pictures in front of it as it sparkled and was blue! my friend took these pictures cause she had the fancy camera so ill try to post those when i get them. we had a good time! lots of things to see and do, it was very much of a whirlwind (what else is new in my family haha).

love you guys very much!

miss you all!!

SWITZERLAND!! with mom and dad!!

i arrived on thursday night to meet my parents in the airport in Zurich and from there we went to our hotel, grabbed a late bite to eat at this pub near the hotel and headed to bed, ready for the next day adventure to Interlaken. The next morning we got up early and headed to the train station, and within 2 hours we had made it to Interlaken and the whole way there we had gorgeous views of the countryside along the way even though it was raining! once we got there we had some lunch and did some shopping around town. we were in our room when all of a sudden we heard lots of noise, almost like bells and as i looked out the window we saw a heard of cows coming down the road being followed by a man completely dressed in the stereotypical swiss outfit!! it was so funny, unfortunately i missed the picture!! but for dinner we found this great place called the Chalet. the next day we headed to Lucern, unfortunately a 2 hour train ride but it was absolute gorgeous again the entire way there, this time we were on a panoramic train and we went to this town way up in the mountains where it was snow/raining! we made it to lucern to find it was a lot colder there than it had been in Interlaken but fortunately it wasn't raining there. we hopped on a ferry to get to Burgenstock, but once we made it to what we thought was burgenstock we found out we had to take a tram up to the top of the cliff/mountain to get to burgenstock! it was absolutely fantastic! the tram was really steep but we had so many gorgeous views and we actually ate lunch right on the cliff looking out onto lake lucern! it was breath taking! as we walked around the town a bit we kept hearing these bells, well learning earlier that it was the cows being moved we kept looking for them cause i wanted to get a picture but we couldn't find anything...finally we saw this one man leading one cow on a leash down the 1 lane road, well we watched as the car came down and wondered how this man was going to deal with the cow...dont worry there was a cow turn out! just like a car turnout would be for the slow cars, this was just a smaller version that couldn't fit a car...just a cow! only in switzerland!! we headed back that evening and grabbed dinner at the same restaurant and had fabulous cheese fondue!! the next morning we decided to trek to the Top of Europe! we took a bunch of little, old trains to get there! but it was absolutely worth everything! the view was spectacular, and luckily it had cleared up for us so it was a beautiful day! i cant even explain how amazing this place was! we even found an "igloo" up there, what they call the ice palace, was just a big igloo that you could walk through! it was sooo much fun! but unfortunately i had to leave the next morning so we headed back to zurich early and my parents are staying there one more night and then will head home. but we had such an amazing time!! switzerland was absolutely amazing! i recommend it to anyone and if anyone else goes, count me in!!! we were thinking we might move there if the US is going down the tubes! 

love you all!!!