A place for family and friends to keep up with the Carlson's!

The Carlson Family

The Carlson Family
Luxembourg

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Sites of Luxembourg





We were busy this weekend learning more about the country that we are calling home for 2 years. We went on an english speaking guided walking tour of Luxembourg city on Saturday through the American Women's Club. The first three pictures show some of the sites. You can see the remains of the wall of the old fortress in the first picture. Luxembourg was actually a fortress in ancient times and the city was within the confines of these huge walls. This wall dates back to the 14th century. The second picture displays an ancient abbey with its orignal gardens and vineyards, and finally the third picture is of "old town" or more properly called the "Grund".


On Sunday, we drove about 30km outside of Luxembourg city to see the Berg castle which is home to the royal family of Luxembourg. The current royal family includes Grand Duke Henri, Grand Duchess Maria Theresa and their 5 children. This castle was built around 1400 and stands 210 feet high and has 200 rooms. This castle has served as the residence of the Grand Ducal family since 1911. No visitors are allowed inside the castle. The last picture is of Berg castle. This was as close as we could get to see it. We were told to visit it in the winter time when all the leaves are down to get a better view.

Friday, January 18, 2008

Lauren's First Haircut



Lauren had her very first haircut last week. We found an english speaking lady who cuts hair out of her home named Tekla. She is icelandic but actually lived in Wisconsin for 10 years. Lauren was pretty cooperative through the whole ordeal.


Yesterday Lauren got another haircut from her sister Ericka while mom wasn't looking. Ericka has been using kid scissors to learn how to cut things out. While mom was cleaning the mess up and throwing stuff away in the kitchen...Ericka decided to try out her scissors on her sister's hair! Thankfully it was just one spot up front, and as you can see from this close up shot it's not too terrible!! We're sure this won't be the first time that Lauren will serve as Ericka's guinea pig for something.

Pictures of the Girls




Here are some more pictures of the girls as requested by many of you as we have not posted anything new since Christmas. We haven't really done anything too exciting since Christmas as the weather has been cold and rainy. Not cold by Minnesota standards...but cold and windy for here!!


Ericka really enjoys pushing Lauren around on her little car that "santa" brought for her. Lauren is not tall enough yet to reach the floor to push herself around, however she doesn't seem to mind when everyone else does the work for her!!!