24.1 - Trainspottin'

I had a Märklin railroad track as a kid, and during their last visit in Switzerland, my parents brought the set with them. This Saturday the kids saw the set and started nagging for me to put it together. First I was kind of resistant (they're still a bit young for Märklin, I think), but then they were able to bring over the flame to me as well.
As a consequence I went with Anton to a Märklin shop close to Aarau to get a service kit for the locomotive. These trips never end well... this time I got stuck with a couple of goods wagons, a tunnel, and some extra tracks. You can see the extra tracks as the darker ones in the picture.

Especially Anton seems to enjoy the railway track - the train is running almost from morning until evening ... he even would like to let it run overnight, but there goes a clear limit.
By the way, this railroad intrigues the neighbour's cats who walk back and forth outside the window as the train runs by :-)

18.1 - Skiing in Stoos

This Sunday the whole family went up into the mountains to start the skiiing season. The weather was horrible (the picture was taken only after the snowfall eased down quite substantially).

Anne took her new skis out for the first time. Consequence: She walked around carrying the skis, but didn't want to up with a lift. Ergo: Frustration in the "red zone".

Anton wore skis for the first time in his life. The morning was only hardship, but in the afternoon he started to get more and more interested and took own small initiatives to ski down small slopes. Finally I took him to the skilifts and skied down with Anton between my skis several times. He was having a ball!!!

Amanda and I were, of course, enjoying ourselves regardless of weather.

X-Mas Stuff

Here's a picture of the kids of the Finnish School of Aargau presenting a Cristmas Play in the yearly Zürich SVFF (Schweizerische Verein der Freunde Finnlands) Christmas Party, which this time was held in Suhr.

Can you find Anton and Amanda in the picture?

Here's a picture of the Finnish School of Aargau Christmas Party. The X-Man was kind enough to pay the kids a visit with a bag full of presents

Here's a picture from Christmas eve where the X-Man visited us at Fammo and Faffa. The X-Man had a fever of 39 degrees, which was a pretty hard strain thinking of how many kids he still had to visit before Christmas was over...

Here you see a tired, but happy young man with his bear family driving their new Volvo V70

Here you see an equally tired, but happy young woman posing before the Christmas tree with her new bear "Tigge".

Here during Christmas day at Anne's parents you see everyone watching the kids opening their presents

The biggest toy over there was the railroad track from Brio. This track is actually something that seems to grow every Christmas. This year the X-Man brought one new locomotive and a tunnel

November - Visit of Family Gröndahl in Fislisbach

In November Anne's sister's family came for a 1-week visit to us. The players are: Sami (dad), Niina (mom), and Akseli (son).

Here they are with Anne and our kids at a local restaurant on Heitersberg (the same place where I sat as Elvis in a picture form October)

Here the dudes are posing together with the kids at Mythen.
In the background to the right of Amanda you can see the Fronalpstock (the mountain I climbed in August) and behind me Stoos (ski picture with Amanda above)

Sami was all for starting the ski-season, but this November we didn't have enough show. This didn't stom him from trying, though :-)

Here's a sporty picture of Anne from the same trip to Mythen

And here's a more artistic picture of me.

Please note the same mountain as in the picture above. There's actually a cottage on the top of this mountain.

The ramp I'm sitting on is used by paragliders as a starting platform.

This here is a cool thing:

Anne and I rented for Sami's 30th birthday a Smart for them to use for one day. (Check out the tears of joy of Niina - that was thanks enough for the present ;-)

The next day they drove to Luzern, over the alps to Interlaken, stopped in Thun and Bern, and drove back.

11.11 - Räbeliechti

In the village we live there's a yearly tradition:
In autumn, when the evenings are dark and the snow has yet to come, the younger kids organise a procession, where each kid carries a self-carved weird vedgetable with a candle inside.

Here you see the one Amanda had. She's holding the candle as a carrying stick.

Anton is carrying his Räbe (=the weird vedgetable I mentioned above) on a couple of strings. A small candle has been placed inside this weird sculpture.