YOU SPENT WHAT?...FOR THAT?...

Switzerland just may be one of the most expensive countries anywhere.  I mean…6 bucks for 10 eggs, 15 dollars/pound for chicken.  Beef?  Pork?  Forget about it!  These prices make NYC look like Kansas.  And it doesn't end with the food.  Everything costs 50-150% more than in the US.  Wow.  Nice to meet you, fiscal discipline.  Other expensive Swiss treats:  Garbage bags.  Yep, not kidding!  The Swiss require you to put red stickers on your garbage bags before discarding them into the dumpster.  Each sticker costs 3 dollars, and the garbage bags are pretty small…about the size of a large bathroom garbage can.  Wow.  Just the cost of diapers alone (now not only paying double the cost for them here vs home, but now also paying to throw them away in the trash) is going to put a dent in the monthly bottom line!  I tell you what, one way to ensure that a family recycles every last piece of anything recyclable is to charge for garbage.  Effective method!  (More on recycling later).  I've even tried pulling the sneaky American trick...trying to dump a dirty diaper here or there in a dumpster when we are out and about-but to no avail!  All dumpsters are padlocked!  It is virtually impossible to find an open public garbage can.  They really make you pay to throw your stuff away, there is just no getting around it.  Vignettes.  Yep, you need a vignette to ride your bike, and a vignette to drive on the highways.  We found out the hard way that you apparently need to pay to drive on the highways in Austria as well…but that is a story for another time!  And, Parking.  Every last parking lot in Switzerland has a meter!  We learned that lesson on our very first trip to IKEA.  As we went to exit the parking lot with a nice line of cars behind us we realized that we forgot to pay for parking!  Apparently the Swiss don't take kindly to backing up to let uninformed Americans reverse their way back to validate their parking ticket!  Live and learn.  

MOTHER'S DAY

Mother's Day started with cuddles from all three boys in bed and the best french toast I've ever had, thanks to Chris.  As we were eating it, Isaac remarked, "how can we be eating Fwench toast in Switzewand?"  Good question, my little literalist.
After he cleaned up the dishes, Chris asked me what I wanted to do, so I replied, "take me to the mountains"!  And he did.  Chris drove the scenic route, and I couldn't help but ooohh and aaahhh over the spectacular views or stop myself from taking pictures out of the windshield.  We took a walk to a waterfall, and ate lunch at a restaurant nestled in the mountainside known for it's fine food (which Chris looked up).  We even enjoyed a beer with lunch.  We drove through the Klausen pass until we got stopped by a road block...too much snow and fallen rock at the top to go over the tippy top of the mountain, so we pulled over and ate some homemade chocolate chip cookies that I brought for dessert at the highest point that we could get to for the day.  There isn't a Mother's Day that I haven't enjoyed yet, but this one was especially wonderful.  Now that our family is complete, I had my first mother's day with all of my kids, and my first mother's day in the Swiss Alps.  We ended the day all huddled together on the couch, watching a movie on our laptop...starting and ending the day cuddled up with my boys with a trip to the mountains in between...what more could a mother want?!?