Travel Goals

Dan and I have set a goal to travel to a new place at least one time a month.  That is really easy right now, as everywhere I go is a new place, but will get more challenging as our time here continues.  Note that I said, at least.  I would go somewhere every weekend if I could, but that may be a little much for our budget.  Especially with me not working right now).

October was pretty easy…moving here was my new place.  But, we did also head to Brussels on day and I went with my neighbor to an incredible zoo that is just around the corner.

Pairi Daiza

According to their website, Paira Daiza means enclosed garden in ancient Persian, or the oldest name for paradise.  I would have to say this place comes pretty close.  It is truly breathtaking.  What?  A zoo breathtaking?  This is unlike any zoo you will see in the US.  I would classify this place more as gardens with animals, than your typical zoo. 

Pairi Daiza started its life as an abbey, founded in 1148.  The abbey was dissolved in 1797 and it was sold to the Counts of Val de Bealieu who owned it until its current owners purchased it in 1993.  The zoo started as a bird garden and there is still an incredible collection of unique birds (Mark and Steven, this place has you written all over it). 

Our neighbors have season passes, so Ava and I tagged along with them for the day.  The season just ended for the year, but in March Dan and I plan to get season passes for our family.  It costs 24 euro to visit for the day, or 47 Euro for the entire season.  They have a great playground, too.  Here are some pictures from our day. 

The park surrounds this beautiful lake, filled with unique birds.

This incredible building, the home of the Counts, now is home to jellyfish, starfish, and other sea critters.  Yup, it is an aquarium.  We didn’t make it in there on this visit.

The following two pictures show one of the public bathrooms.  This was definitely a unique bathroom.  The pictures make it look dirty, but it wasn’t.  It was actually quite beautiful (for a bathroom).  It was a little cold though, so not sure I would use them:)

I had this picture on my Facebook page.  As we were leaving we saw this elephant taking a stroll through the park.

Notice the tower in the distance.  This was part of the original Abbey.  Today, it holds hundreds of bats flying freely, and yes it is an exhibit you can enter. 

My favorite animal.  This place had the coolest giraffe exhibit.  You can actually climb up to the decks shown in the picture and pet the giraffes.  There were a lot of exhibits that allow visitors to interact with the animals. (Lauren, you would LOVE this).

 

Ava and Adelyn had a great day.  I am sure there will be a few more posts about this place in the future.

 

November

Back to my New Place a Month goal.  For November we headed to Germany.

We went to Ramsteim AFB to get some shopping done at the PX.  We have been having a hard time finding a few things we needed for the house and wanted to get a crack at some Christmas shopping for Ava.  This is a much larger base than where we are currently, so there was a bigger selection. 

We spent our evenings in Kaiserslautern.  I was really impressed with this city.  It was beautiful and there was a great selection of restaurants. One night we ate at Spinnradl, which has fantastic traditional German food. 

.We had Indian food the next night.  It was a quick trip, but it gave us a nice taste of Germany.  We plan to get more of a taste next month.  We are going to the famous Christmas market in Nuremberg.  I plan to take a ton of pictures there and I will share. 

That’s not it for November, this weekend we are going to France to check out some crazy Le Crueset sale.  Once a year they have an incredible sale where everything is close to 75% off.  Between fighting people off with cast iron pans I will try to remember to take some pictures. 

Brussels

This weekend Dan and I decided to take a drive to Brussels.  We didn’t really have any plans for our day.  It is so close  (a little under an hour), so we just figured we would have lunch and check out the Grand Place and walk around a bit. 

We arrived around lunch time and we were both starving, almost hangry.  We stumbled upon Rue des Brouchers (butcher’s street).  We wanted somewhere we could sit, order a beer, and enjoy a good burger and what better place for that than butcher’s street?  During the middle ages this street was used as a meat market, hence the name. 

 

We liked the look of the Six Nation’s Pub (a “rugby pub”), so we decided to give it a try.  I am so glad we came here.  Not only were the burgers awesome, but the service was phenomenal and everyone spoke English (it was an English pub after all).  The owner was British and we met him and his wife and new baby.  We spent a good deal of time talking baby talk, as is what happens when traveling with a baby. 

With full and happy bellies, we headed for the Grand Place or the central square of Brussels.  The Grand Place started as an open-air market in the 11th century and continued to be a market until 1959.  The Grand Place is pretty remarkable and it was actually voted as the most beautiful square in Europe in 2010. 

Maison du Roi (The king’s house), although no king ever lived here. The Dutch refer to this as Broodhuis, or bread house for the market that used to exist here.

 

Guildhalls- After the French obliterated the original merchant guilds’ buildings, the guilds rallied and rebuilt the ones that stand here today. Now they are all pretty much restaurants and cafes. There is quite a bit of bling on these buildings.

The Brussels City Hall was built between 1401and 1455. It stands 315 feet high.

 

As you would expect in Belgium, the skies opened up and it began to rain and hale.  In perfect timing, we spotted this familiar figure.

We had read about this museum, the MOOF (the Museum of Original Figures) and we figured it would be a great way to get out of the rain.  And, that is pretty much all this museum was good for (that is unless you are a huge fan of Tin Tin and Belgian comics).  We were pretty disappointed in the Smurf exhibit, which is pretty much the only reason we were interested in this museum.

 

At least we got to take our picture with some pretty cool guys.

“Wow Batman, you look pretty annoyed.  Do you not like your picture taken?”

I am not sure who this is supposed to be, but Ava was mesmerized.

The MOOF served its purpose, we stayed dry and got out just as the rain was ended.  We finished our afternoon with a little shopping where we scored some of this.  I died and went to chocolate heaven.

 

By the way, the chocolates made it all the way to Monday.

Dan added to his beer collection by buying Leff and Troll beer glasses and I was psyched to find one of my favorite stores.

 

Even though we didn’t do much, it was a great way to spend an afternoon.  We are so excited to be so close to so many great cities.  The best outings are the ones that your don’t plan for and you just go where the wind takes you.

Getting Settled In (Part 3)

This is it, the last post of house pictures (click here for part 1 or part 2).  In this post we will take a look at the upstairs.  I didn’t take any “before” shots, so this is just how it looks now. 

The Stairs

The stairs here are pretty scary, but what was really scary was the railing at the top of the stairs.  Dan fixed this by screwing in some plastic material he found.  It is much safer now and I think it looks pretty cool, too. 

Notice the window next to the stairs.  That is actually French doors to nowhere.    The movers had to use that door to bring all of our furniture upstairs.  They pulled a ramp right up to the door. 

Gym

Nothing special here, but those of you who know me well know how I need a good workout space.  This room works really well.  There is plenty of room for me to workout and for my elliptical.  I love the window in here; I get a ton of light, but still have privacy.

Shower Room

That’s right…notice how I did not say bathroom.  That is because in Belgium it is very rare to find a house in which the toilet is in the same room as the shower or bathtub.  So, we have a huge room with a shower, tub and sink.  Then, as you can see from the picture, across the hall you will find the toilet in a room all by itself. 

Here’s the tub.  It is a decent size.  I love how it has a sprayer; it is perfect for Ava’s baths.  I HATE the red tiles BTW.  In Belgium most houses don’t have bathroom fans, so you have to open the window (which is a crazy contraption in itself) when taking a shower or the room will start to smell.

Master Bedroom

This room is HUGE; it is the entire width of the house.  It was so big that we broke it up into 3 separate areas: a sitting room, the bedroom, and a “closet”. 

Here is the sitting area.  There is a great view of the farm from those windows, so this is a great place to sit and read.  Of course I haven’t actually done that, because who actually has time to sit in a sitting area and read anyway? 

Then you have the bedroom.  Notice the “wall” behind the tall dresser.  The Army issued us a wardrobe for each family member and an additional one for the house.  We used the wardrobes to separate our bedroom from the “closet” area. 

And here is our “closet”.  The wardrobes we were given did not provide even close to the amount of clothes storage that we needed, so we bought a few wardrobe racks and shoe racks and used those in addition to our wardrobes.  I LOVE this closet. 

  

Ava’s Bedroom

Ava’s bedroom needed a little TLC.  It had the most horrific light fixture and it was super dark.  We replaced the light fixture with this super fabulous light from IKEA.

Since it is so hard to hang things on these walls, wall decals were a major lifesaver.  I actually ordered one more to hang above her crib, but it hasn’t arrived yet.  I also painted a cheap unfinished 3 legged table we had green.  Finally we hung some curtains and called it a day.  I am pretty happy with how her room came out.

 

 

I think Ava likes her room, too. 

 

Guest Bedroom

Finally, here is room that you will stay in when you come to visit (that’s right, I am talking to you).  The bed is super comfy, you are right across the hall from the bathrooms, and you have a great view of the farm.  We can’t wait to have you:)

I plan to use this blog to document our travels and experiences while living overseas.  I would love it if you would follow us by email. To do this, enter your email address where it says, “Follow By Email” (scroll to the top of this page).  Then, you will get an email when I update the blog. 

Getting Settled in Part Deux

In the last post (part 1) I left off showing the after photos of Ava’s playroom and the entry way.  Here are the rest of the before and afters for downstairs. 

Kitchen Before

Remember, we had no counter space and hardly any storage options.  We took a trip to IKEA, bought an island and a microwave cart for storage and counter space.  We also utilized our oddly placed dishwasher to increase counter space.  We also hung some blinds and put some herbs in the windows. 

After

Living Room Before

I am not at all a fan of the stove in this room.  It would be awesome if we didn’t have a 10 month old who is ALL over the place.  But, it is also takes up a TON of space because it sticks out so far from the wall.  We didn’t really do much in this room except hang a few things on the wall and buy some plants. 

After

 

Anyone have suggestions on how I can baby proof the stove?  I don’t even want Ava touching it.  Help!  Please.

The Bathroom

This is not a before or after picture as we did nothing with this room but throw a rug on the floor.  But, I do have an interesting fact: Any house you go in in Belgium will have a bathroom right next to the front door and this is because it is custom for strangers to knock on doors to use the bathroom.  It is next to the door so the person doesn’t have to go all the way into your house.  Interesting…not so sure I am going to let a stranger use my bathroom.  Also, check out the super duper tiny sink.  I am pretty sure this is the smallest sink I have ever seen in a house and it only has cold water; pretty awesome.  Another oddity, no mirror above the sink.  Perhaps Belgians aren’t as vain as us Americans?

Check out part 3 of this post for upstairs pictures.  Also, leave some comments.  I would love to hear what you all think plus some tips for baby proofing this house.