Wine trip to Burgundy, France

You come up this road and the entrance to La Combotte is on the right hand side of this photo. It's just so pretty in the small quaint towns.

The entrance to La Combotte

Some of the Vineyards owned by the parents of the owners of La Combotte. They have a distillery up the road.

I had no expectations going into a road trip to France. I was excited to get out of town and to hangout in France. It is probably my favorite country to visit currently. I knew very little about this region except that it had good wine. Well my expectations were pleasantly exceeded on this trip. We had the best time at our B&B La Combotte, and spending time in Beaune and Dijon. So let me start from the beginning.

You head in through this door to the dining hall for breakfast

Henri and I hanging out on the bed in our room

Me and Henri in the Vineyards at La Combotte

Adam and Henri by the Vineyards at La Combotte

We took off on a thursday morning. It only took 3.5 hours to get to the B&B so we had most of the afternoon to walk around Beaune and grab dinner. We walked around Beaune for the whole afternoon, grabbed a light dinner in town, and got Henri back to our room to attempt to keep him on a schedule. It worked well. He was out like a light at his normal bed time and we had a little time to relax ourselves and plan out our next day.

French Onion Soup

Escargot Bourgogne

Beef Bourgogne

Friday we were in Beaune all day. We started the day at breakfast at La Combotte. Denis made the best french toast for us that morning. Breakfast was leisurely and so relaxing. Henri enjoyed the high chair and Clochette (one of the dogs) enjoyed any food that he might drop for her.

The dining room

The best french toast ever

We walked around part of the town until our lunch at Boulevard 21. They were so nice and accommodating to us since it was a fairly nice place and we had a small child there. The food was outstanding.

Boulevard 21

Eggs Meurette

Escargot with ravioli

Chicken in cheese sauce and potatoes

Beef Bourgogne

After lunch we walked around town more and stopped in at pastry shops for dessert later that evening. We had a wine tasting that afternoon at Marche au vin. The tasting started in the cellar where there were stacks of wine bottles dating back to the 30's and 40's.

Ahhh pastry shops

The Wine cellar to start the tasting at Marche au Vin

an old building in downtown Beaune

After the tasting we finished our tour around town and went for a drive to the country. We were told of a great place to take pictures and see a lot of the countryside. We did finally find it and got some great family photo's there.

After a long day of food and walking around Henri was ready to get down and move. We got him fed and bathed and were hoping to get him to bed but no such luck. I think because he had been cooped up all day he just had to move. He was rolling around, standing and falling, and just non stop moving on our bed between Adam and I. It was actually very funny to see him just move until all the pent up energy was out. Then he went from laughing and  moving to crying and ready for bed in about a second. Luckily we can still just nurse and put him to bed.

I can't get enough of his cute chubby cheeks!!

Weekend away to Zermatt and Gruyere

Adam and I still have lots of places we want to visit within Switzerland and outside. One thing we desperately wanted to see before we leave Europe is the Matterhorn. We risked it and went down for the weekend. There was a forecast of cloudy Saturday and Sunday so we decided to head down on Friday and hope to catch a glimpse of it.

So the drive down was quite unusual. The GPS took us off of the high way and onto probably one of the scariest drives we've been on over here. We thought the Amalfi coast was going to be stressful. This was a very narrow two lane road that switchbacked up an enormous mountain. There were hardly any towns or rest stops as we were heading up, which was very unfortunate for me because I had to go to the bathroom. Thank you to my post pregnancy bladder! Finally at the very top there was a rest stop. We got out walked around, realized there was a glacier you could hike at, and used the rest room. It was beautiful at the top. The glacier was so cool to see.

We started heading back down and that's where the worse trouble started...Car sickness. I was in the back seat with Henri and it was awful on a switch back road. I pulled it together thankfully, however the beamer car that kept passing us was pulled over multiple times. I believe his lady passenger couldn't handle it either.

You can see the road going down...it was rough!

We get to Tasch, Zermatt doesn't allow cars, park and take the train into Zermatt. We are walking around town looking for our hotel and look up, and there is the Matterhorn in all of its glory. It was huge and very cool to see. We found our apartment and went upstairs to the group room to take more pictures of it. We decide just to walk around town that night and get an early dinner, so we could get to bed early and go hiking the next day. The town was so cute. Lots of little pastry shops, cute stores, and tons of restaurants. It is such a great town to relax in and stroll around.

The next day we took a gondola up to Blauhard. We hiked around to a lake and then over to a restaurant. Henri was all smiles hiking around and hanging out at the restaurant. He really does love nature and water. We were able to sit outside so we just had mountains in and all around us. It was a great setting for a long leisurely lunch. Unfortunately the rest of the hike said 3 hours but in terms of our hiking it would most likely be 5 and we weren't prepared for that with henri. So we hiked back to the gondola and took it down. We again took in an early dinner, nothing special. Then walked around town till it was henri's bed time.

Sunday we enjoyed a little more time in town and left after lunch. We decided to take a different route home so we could stop in Gruyere. Adam was dying to get some cheese I guess =) It is a very cute town up on the hill. We toured the castle and walked around the small town. Afterwards, we got dinner at the cheese shop then hopped in the car to head home. We hit the worst rain storm as we headed home. My sweet baby was asleep in the back of the car and I'm doing everything not to freak out as we hydroplane a few times. I'm talking torrential rain. We made it safe and sound. I had to say quite a few prayers to calm myself down.

Gruyere

Looking out of the Castle in Gruyere

Overall, Zermatt was awesome. I would love to go back again and hangout in the small town.

8 months and growing so fast!

My sweet boy is now 8 months old. He has changed so much in the last month! He is crawling, non stop. I leave him in the living room and walk into the kitchen and he is there in no time. It is also a great blessing because now he wears himself out for nap time. Not that nap time happens so often these days. At least the last couple of days he has slept for 20 minutes during the day. He's also had some trouble sleeping at night but it all changed when his 5th tooth broke through. Since then we have had some great sleep.

There are 2 things that I love right now. When I hold him and say" can momma have a kiss" and he leans in and gives me a kiss. And when Adam gets home from work he crawls to the door and puts his arms up. I love seeing him miss his daddy during the day.

Stats:
Weight: 19lbs
Height: 27.5in
teeth: 5..waiting in 6 to come out
crawling and sitting up on his own. Loves to play with our stacking cups and knock over our towers. Will try all foods at this point. We give him bites of our lunches and dinner. He loves fruits and veggies. He also ate 2 slices of pork loin the other day and wanted more.

7 Months!

I'm Late, I'm Sorry!!!!

Time has flown and Henri is now 7 months old. He rolls over like a champ, laughs and chatters a lot, and really really wants to crawl. for now, he can't and thats great for me. He hasn't slept well in the last few months. I blame teething, and our extensive travel with Adam's parents in town. He also has a huge mommy complex, which I love. I really should get more of hiss mommy melt downs on video for proof that he once loved me, when he is 16 and acts like he doesn't.

Stats:
weight:18.5lbs
height: 27in
teeth: 4 still

loving reading books and going on coffee dates with our friend Missy. He loves being outside and by water, just like his daddy!