Fall Break Adventures

So this last week was fall Break for me and it started off with us driving down to Innsbruck, Austria on Friday.  We actually stayed in a little tiny place outside of Innsbruck called Mutters.

The first night we ate at this cute little Italian place and they gave President a bib to go with his pasta because of his white shirt.

 The next morning at breakfast we found TINY little Rittersport chocolates at our places.  They were so cute!

 After breakfast we decided we would ride this Seilbahn up the mountain and then walk back down because it was such a gorgeous day.

 At the top we hiked around a little bit first and found these really cool tree houses along the way.  You can see there was already snow on the ground up there!

 Then we came to this GORGEOUS view at the top.

 There were these funny little chairs there and my Mom was enjoying soaking up the sun very much.

 On our way back down we saw some sheep and there were really new lambs that were so cute!!!

 This is Sister Kohler soaking up the sun while we wait for President to take a phone call.

 Here you can see the Bahn we took.

We even found some mushrooms on the way.  

President enjoying the view out the hotel window.

 That night we went to a musical fireside that the missionaries participated in to celebrate the 50th anniversary of their building and it was really fun.

The next morning we went back to the church for sacrament meeting and then we changed and went to walk around the grounds of Schloss Ambross.  So gorgeous.

 There were these funny peacocks on the wall.

 After that we went back to the hotel and decided to go for a walk and find a picnic spot.  We started off by going to see this cute, tiny chapel by our hotel.

 On that same little road it was interesting to compare the very old houses (back) and the new, modern ones all clumped together.

 Continuing on our walk we saw some cows and chickens.  When the chickens saw us they all came running over because they thought I had food.  Then this old lady came who actually did have food for them.  (Hint: Remember the cows)

 We walked by the sign welcoming people to Mutters.

Remember the cows?  Well we eventually found a table outside an empty cafe to eat at and all of a sudden a farmer walks by with his cows.  It was pretty funny so my Mom tried to get some pictures but didn't really.  Then we heard a bell and President said, "Get your camera ready, here comes another one."  And it was a good thing he said that because then she captured these great pictures of the cow coming around the corning and sticking his head in my Dad's lap.  Then he consumed the banana peels and tried to eat all the other food before the farmer came and rescued us.  It was a bit alarming, but my Mom and I could not stop laughing.

 Walking back to the hotel this was the beautiful view.

 On Monday we went back to Schloss Ambross because it was the National Day of Austria so all the museums were free.  Here's some cool armor.

 And here are some really old and scary sharks.

 There was this gruesome picture and the caption explained that this was a man who got gored during a jousting tournament, but because the injury did not hurt his brain, he lived...that seems nice, doesn't it?

 Then we went to the Hofkirche and this was the beautiful grounds.

 When we came back from Austria we had transfers, so Wednesday we picked up the goldens and Thursday we went to the Bahnhof to see all the transferring missionaries.  Here is a last picture with Sister Abram who has been in our ward before she got transferred.

 That night the leaving (dying) missionaries came in and the next morning we took them to the airport and Sister Page was the only sister going home.  So here was a last picture of us together.

 For mutual last week we carved pumpkins and I didn't know what to carve so...I carved a car.

 On Saturday we went to the International Ward trunk-or-treat and Halloween party and that was fun.

 So Tanner got to his mission and this is him with his President.  We are waiting to hear from him tomorrow.  Keep him in your prayers!

Life is Busy, Life is Good

So a lot has happened since my last post, but I'll try to sum it up.  I personally think these first few pictures are awesome.  For geography we had to do a field study and go collect data so we went to a river, the Maisinger, in Starnberg where the school is.  So we were in groups and I was conveniently nominated to be the person to walk around in these awesome waders for four hour.  I think they looked pretty great.

 I ended up falling over in the river...

...So I just collected samples from there.

 So in art class we have been working on portraiture, so of course for our final we had to do a self portrait.  We were supposed to do something that captured "identity" so I was taking all these normal pictures and then just took this one for fun, but ended up drawing it because I just thought it was pretty great.  I think it turned out pretty well, and it was definitely the most exciting one in the class.

 So a few weeks ago was Oktoberfest here in München and we were all busy, but finally on the last Friday the three of us went.  It was pretty crazy with lots of people because it was the last weekend, but we had a good time.  This is the main entrance.

 And we rode this

And survived

 My Mom and I also rode the swings (President opted not to).  This was the one ride we rode last year with Tanner.

 We just got food and rode rides and walked around and it was a good time.

Last week we went down to Switzerland to hike.  We tried to do this in August, (see earlier post) but the weather was bad.  So this time we opted for a different hike anyway, but the weather was still bad.  There were two members from Switzerland that lead us on our hike and it was cool to get to know them.

We stayed in the same little hotel which is cozy and creepy at the same time...

 With awesome furniture.

 Once of the nights while we were in our room we heard some singing and instruments outside so we went to check it out.  It was all these hunters gathered together with five deer they had laid out.  There was champagne and singing and we watched them load the deer into their trunks.  It was kind of weird...

Then that night when we were eating dinner in the little restaurant, a group of the people who were there came in and ate and turned on the juke box to Elvis and just sang and sang and started playing spoons and stuff.  It was pretty great.

So on the morning of the hike we had to drive a little ways and we passed this house on the way there.  It's an ERIKA HOUSE!!!  I was so excited I made my Dad turn around so I could go take a picture.

 The view out the window was foggy, but gorgeous with all the fall leaves.

 I was reading my scriptures in the car as we were driving through this GORGEOUS part of Switzerland, (even though it's all gorgeous) and this verse just jumped out at me.  I feel so blessed to be here and experience all the things we do.

 Our hike was very long and cold, but very beautiful

 Towards the end we stopped by this famous little church carved in the mountain called "Das Wildkirchli."  In Swiss German this means little wild church.

 We hiked for about four hours and then rode the Seilbahn (cable car) down.  By the end we were pretty tired, but it was really fun.

This last Tuesday I went with the Sneddons and their cousin (in our ward) to the Imagine Dragons concert here in Munich.  It was SO FUN.  (Left to Right: Me, Rachel, Josh, Caleb, Kai)

 Here we are afterwards, pretty tired, but we had an awesome time.  (I got home at about one in the morning and the next morning had to go take the PSAT which probably wasn't smart, but it was so worth it!)

 This weekend my parents had to go to stake conferences in Austria, but I opted to stay for a stake activity.  So I stayed with the Sneddons Friday and Saturday night.  They were so awesome to let me stay there and it felt so good to be with a family again and made me think about Tanner and Tosha and all the fun times we had growing up together. 

I decided I should adopt Josh as my brother.

 On Saturday we had our stake activity.  We went to an indoor pool close to the church and then came back and had a fireside from Elder Laimer of the area seventy here.  We talked about family history work and he reminded us of the Temple Challenge from Elder Neil L. Andersen.  It was really good and I was glad I could go.

(In English this says: Prepare as many names for the temple as baptisms you perform in the temple and help someone else do the same.)

 We also got a new wristband at the firseide, so now I have this one and the one from fsy last year, and hopefully I will get another one from fsy this year.

 Whew!  that was a lot.  So much is happening, I'm just touching on the big stuff.  But if anyone is wondering how Tanner is doing in the MTC, he is doing well.  Russian is hard, but he's a hard worker and is as happy as ever!

(This is him with someone Tosha knew)

In the words of Tanner, "Life is good!"

Life Keeps Going

My last post was titled "14 Months" and yesterday was our fifteen month mark.  It's crazy how time flies when you're havin' fun, or just being busy.

So obviously a lot has happened since then, but I'll only touch on the basics.  A little while ago I went on a grade retreat and we went canoeing down a river and then slept in tents and went geocaching the next morning.  So that was pretty exciting.  Sadly I don't have any pictures, but it was fun none the less.  Just very cold.

This is from a few weeks ago.  We went to a stake conference in Stuttgart and when we were in the hotel that night Sister Kohler wanted to color in my new coloring book, so I just had to capture that moment.

 The next day at the stake conference we ran into our good friend Marius from fsy again so that was fun!

 I've been super busy with school and I just thought this was a fun picture because we are doing portaitism in art right now and this is what we had to do.  We taped charcoal to a stick and held a mirror in order to draw our eyes on the the wall.  It was pretty crazy...

 ...but I think mine turned out alright.

 A little while ago my Mom and I just took a walk to a beautiful cemetery near our house and we couldn't help taking pictures with the beautiful sunset behind us.

 Last Sunday my choir sang in Marienplatz for a Unicef fundraiser.  It was really cool and we sang right in front of the Rathaus.  We sang lots of group songs and I sang my solo from last year.

 Right now in Munich it's Octoberfest so of course in school we had and Octoberfest assembly and we got to wear our Trachten so that was pretty fun.  I haven't gone yet this year, but I'm excited to!

 This last week my parents had to leave for a zone conference and a senior conference in Switzerland so the Sisters from our ward came so stay with me for the first part of the week and I stayed with a friend the last part.  The Sisters and I had so much fun together here.

So that's about it for now.  I'm also involved in our school drama production, Annie Oakley so I have rehearsals for that three times a week after school, and choir once a week, so that combined with all my homework keeps me on my toes, but as Tanner would say, "Life is good!"

(And don't worry, Tanner is doing great!)