Ten Reasons I Love my Life Today

1. I am me.
2. I am Mormon, and ever proud of it.
3. I have amazing friends.
4. My friend and I wrote a song for my amazing sister.
5. The little guy and I are getting along so well, and he gives me kisses <3
6. I live with an awesome family.
7. The mother doesn't get mad when I break half the condiments in the fridge, because I am plain old clumsy.
8. I love being outside.
9. Rain never makes me sad.
10. I am in Germany!!!

Am tollsten Schwimmbad in der Welt!

My dear Elkse took me to go swimming. I expected your ordinary swim hall with a pool and maybe a hot tub. That is not what I found. It was basically an indoor waterpark and spa. But it wasn't entirely indoor... It was sick!

There was a pirate ship,

 a warm outdoor salt water swimming pool,

 water slides,

crash landings, jumping platforms, and lots of other cool stuff.

 but I think the most fun we had was with my underwater camera.

 I went in the sauna for the first time. Saunas are hot, like really hot.

I don't know what I would do here without this girl. It would just not be the same.

That was pretty sick!

Liebe,

Karynne

the Netherlands

Shortly after returning from Austria I went to the Netherlands with my amazing Au Pair friend Elske to visit her family. It's such a cute country. I communicated with a mixture of three languages: English, German, and Dutch. I can't speak Dutch though. Some conversations included all three in the same sentence. It was pretty sick.

I sort of couldn't get enough of this house!

 Most of the houses there have a fancy kind of garden in their front yard or surrounding the whole house.

 It has a straw roof!

 This is a house boat chillin in the water. There were also some that looked like floating trailers, but I don't have pictures of those.

 Another house boat. They have the coolest sail boats in the Netherlands! They legitimately look like pirate ships!

 This is a war museum. We got there too early to see it though.

 I don't even know what this is, but it's some kind of court yard in this building we discovered by accident.

 Yes, we went to McDonald's...It's a lot more expensive here, and there are very few menu items.

 My Happy Meal box. Interesting. I think we named him Earl, and he was the mascot of  the day. He's also a ladies' man.

 A BEACH! This is by the sea. It's the largest body of water I've seen in three months. We all enjoyed it so much!

"We are surrounded by clouds, but the sun is shining on us." -Elske (rough translation)

Sounds like a song. It was so cool! There were enormous storm clouds surrounding us on all sides, but directly above the sky was blue, and the sun was shining brilliantly.

 

This is the most adorable traffic light I've ever seen. They all have the rounded shield behind them, but the black and white stripes are just so cute.

 The Netherlands are flatter than a pancake with the exception of the dykes that keep the country from drowning when it rains. The whole country's below sea leve.

Canal. Bare feet. Guitar. Sunshine. Perfect day. I think this is why my dad calls me crunchy.

The right one is an American Flag! The other is the flag of the Netherlands. Yes I leaned out the widow on the Autobahn just to take this.

Other cool/interesting things about the Netherlands:

Clothing swap! I got some pretty cool stuff from Elske and her friends.

Elske's family is the sweetest ever!

They're obsessed with chips!

I can understand a good amount of Dutch, because a lot of words are the same or similar to German.

There are deer fenced in like cows and pretty much no wild animals.

Sinterklaas is like Santa Clause, but painted black (like cinders), and they tell their children that the rest of the children in the world are being lied to. Santa is not real, and Sinterklaas is.

There was a kangaroo on one of the farms.

 When I got home, I had two lovely ladies  and one handsome young man style my hair.

My Mormon Girls. Some are missing, and they're all totally cool!

I hope all is well back home.

Liebe,

Karynne

Serfaus

I know snowboarding in the Alps is pretty amzing, but I still found myself wishing I was hiking. I didn't complain though. We stayed at a cozy little hotel owned by the sweetest Austrian family.

 Some days were so perfect I thought I must have been dreaming. I kept having those "Oh my gosh I'm in the Austrian Alps!" moments, and at first the family thought it was weird, but they got used to my random moments of uncontrolled smiling. Okay, I think I smiled for the whole week, but there were moments of extra smileyness.

 Then there was the inevitable hotel silliness that comes when you share a room with two girlies.

 There were a couple of days when the fog and clouds were so thick we couldn't tell up from down, and it was a little bit scarry, but the threat of falling off the side of a mountain can be quite thrilling.

 This is the motto/ catchphrase of the three ski resorts. It means "Because we enjoy it."

 I enjoyed it.

 This is a bad picture of traditional Austrian architecture. It is totally normal to paint on the buildings. The big painting on the left side is the family crest of the people who own the hotel. I think that's pretty darn cool!

This was such a cool vacation! On the last day I stayed out until the lifts closed (I wanted to do this every day, but the kids got too tired, and sometimes cruddy trails-as are common at the end of a busy day- are best enjoyed with others), and followed the trail groomer down the mountain for the smoothest ride of the week.

I previously wondered if Austrians spoke a different dialect of German. I asked an Austrian (when I was in the U.S.) and she said no. That was a big fat lie. They have accents that sound like an Irish person speaking German, and when they speak their German, it is like listening to a Swiss person speak German. It's nearly unrecognizable. I don't know if that's true for all regions of Austria, but Tirol definitely has it's own unique version of German.

You might think after such a busy week I would be chillin at home for the second week of school vacation, but no. I will be traveling to Holland with my dearest Au Pair friend (she's from there). I like to keep it fresh.

I send all my best back home!

Liebe,

Karynne