Nathan’s first day of Kindergarten!!!

We all took Nathan to school, and he was greeted by lots of new friends and two wonderful teachers.  His class is approx 15 kids from all over the world.  What an experience this will be for him!

And he had the coolest first day of Kindergarten EVER!  Last week we got an email from the school telling us that on Tuesday, the Kindergarten, 1^st and 2^nd grades would be going on a field trip to hike up to the first gondola stop on Mt. Pilatus (the closest of the Alps, just on the other side of the lake), have a picnic lunch, and then take the gondola back down…and would Nathan like to start school a day earlier than planned so he could join the field trip!  So his first day of Kindergarten was hiking in the Alps – WOW!!!  He had a great time and all the parents who were chaperoning commented on how well he did on the hike and how quickly he integrated into the group.

He's in the middle with the blue backpack, moving right along with the group to get on the bus for the field trip (and those are the cool little school buses!)

Dropping Nathan off was a little rough, I can’t believe my big boy is in Kindergarten!  I didn’t actually cry, but I was awfully close J

Taking Nathan to school was my first time driving in Switzerland, and it went well, but I definitely have some adjusting to do!  The lights are different, but easy to get used to, but there are yellow cross walks at other points in the road, and pedestrians just go, regardless of any cars coming, because they have the right of way.  Must look out for those crosswalks and not hit any walkers or bikers!!!  The speed limits are also very strict (they give you a 5km/hr grace, but no more), but are only posted if they are an exception to the “Generale” limits – 50 in towns, 100 in country, etc.  So you have to know…and keep an eye out for signs indicating an exception, and then for the end of the exception.  It reminds me of a game of Milles Bournes – Limit…End of Limit!

After dropping Nathan off, we took Dave and dropped him off at his office, went to the hotel to turn in the keys and officially check out, and then went to the Löwencentre to have some lunch and do a bigger grocery shopping.  Alex wasn't so excited about the lunch options and ended up having a fruit cup and a donut.  Oh well, he’ll adjust to not being able to get chicken nuggets everywhere we go!

We picked Nathan up from school, and he was very tired but full of stories from his hike – he loved it!  I ended up being a little late to pick him up, the traffic through Luzern was worse at 3:00 than it had been at 8:15am, and then the parking at school was terrible.  And I had to wait for a spot in the school lot (rather than parking on the street) because Matthew was asleep in the car and I wanted to be able to leave him there sleeping.  But all was well, and Nathan was fine, but glad to see us.

After school we had a VERY important errand to run – the N’espresso store – we NEEDED a coffee maker!!!  It had a been a VERY rough morning with no coffee after a few long days!  We headed into town on our way back from school, and went through a bakery to get each of the boys a snack before going to N’espresso.  After getting what they wanted, I asked the woman what would be a good loaf of bread to have with spaghetti – there were SO many choices – and was told “we don’t eat bread with pasta”.  Um…ok…but I’d like to have some bread with my spaghetti.  I was definitely getting to the end of my rope not being able to communicate well…and having cultural differences on top of it.  So I picked out a loaf and we left.  Across the street, at the N’espresso store, I took one look at the dozens of different machines and knew I was going to have to wait another day to get a coffee maker.  The choices were WAY too overwhelming for how tired I was!  So I got some information and we headed home.  I was toast.

We enjoyed a first home-cooked meal in our new place, spaghetti WITH garlic bread J and got everyone to bed as early as we could.