Twins in Spain!

Calcotada!!! Our poor friends were picked up at the airport at noon on Saturday February 16th after having flown all night and carried off directly to Milmanda Castle for a traditional Catalan calcotada and 30th birthday party for our friend Sarah Andrews (who coincidentally went to UNC and was in Chapel Hill as an undergraduate while I was there in graduate school!) I met her Christmas carolling in our town, small world! Anyway, they cook these onions over an open fire pit, and then you peel off the black part and dip them in this amazing sauce and eat them as Becky is doing here. It was a great cultural experience!
We lost Luke at the Castle numerous times only to find him on the tractors (New Holland tractors, by the way).
Twins and Mike "illegally" eating the dessert bread before we were supposed to. I figured we could claim ignorance and jetlag.
A shot at the castle with the nice view in the background. The entire visit they were trying to make me look shorter than them. :)
Day #2: We walked into the beach from our house, and then spend some time walking around Sitges. Here's a shot in front of our favorite church. Late in the afternoon we stopped at Cafe Mont Roig for some yummy warm chocolate drinks and lunch.

Day #3: We left on a 2-day tour of the Costa Brava. Unfortunately we did not have the best weather, but we still had a great time! This was our first stop at Tossa de Mar, we had lunch outside at a little cafe by the sea.
Here is a great shot of Luke with his favorite hat, and the beautiful old town area in the background. It had great winding roads and many nooks and crannies to peak in. We actually spent quite a bit of time walking around here.
I went to Messiah College with Becky and Patience, here is Becky with her husband Mike.

Here is Patience with her husband Steve.
And even one of us!

Here's an attempt at a family photo, I guess we can't expect everyone to be smiling nicely. :)
The kids loved exploring this area along the sea.
Here is Patience and the view down a side street of quaint homes.
And Becky hanging out in the wall.
The view of Tossa de Mar as we were continuing on our route. The next portion of the drive was very scenic, but we had cloudy/drizzly weather. We made another stop later on in search of ice cream, which we never found. We ended that night in a cute little town called Llafranch, but we got there after dark and left in the morning so I didn't really get any great shots there. Our hotel was right along the sea, and we could hear the waves all night long, it was a great find.

Day #4: We then continued on to La Bisbal d'Emporda and followed the instructions in the guide book to find the castle in this town. What we didn't know was that this medieval castle had been renovated into a gorgeous hotel and restaurant. We spent quite a while walking around the castle grounds and even peeked into some rooms. It was so beautiful, and Brian and I are hoping to stay there when we go on a trip for our 10th anniversary.
Our next stop was the medieval town of Girona. Here is a picture of the famous cathedral of Girona. We had a very nice time walking around the old cobblestone streets and exploring.
We found a great little local restaurant to have the "menu del dia", which is a 3 course meal with a couple choices for each course, at a fixed price. The kids enjoyed their spaghetti. :)
And Steve enjoyed his crayfish!! Yuck!
Here is a view of the river which separates the old town Girona from the newer part of town.

Day #5: We drove out over the hills from our town to the Penedes region, and toured the Codorniu winery which is famous for their cava (which is like champagne, but apparently you can't call anything champagne that doesn't come from France, so they call it cava). Part of the tour included a train ride through the caves where millions of bottles of cava are aging. The boys loved that!
Anna Codorniu was one of the early heiresses of the winery.
Jackson and his blankie.
We also toured the Torres Winery this day, and this is a picture of one of the vineyards by the winery. Both of the tours were very well done and we enjoyed learning all about the wine-making and cava-making. That night the twins dragged me down the street to the gym for a "body pump" class. Well, it didn't really compare to what THEY teach in their hard-core gym, but it gave me a pretty good work-out. :) This day was also Mike's birthday so we had a fun birthday dinner for him afterward.

Day #6: Barcelona! We decided to do a one-day tour of the city and just hit the highlights of what we thought would interest them. We rode into Barcelona by train, and did the rest of the tour by metro and walking. It was a great way to see the city, but we walked a ton. Luckily Brian and the kids stayed home this day. Here is a shot on our way up to Montjuic in front of the National Museum of Art.
From there we walked up to the Olympic Ring, and saw the stadium and went through the Olympic Museum. We then continued on to the cable car at Miramar Gardens that goes out over the sea to Barceloneta. Here is a shot waiting for the cable car.
We got off the cable car at Barceloneta and they all wanted to at least touch the Mediterranean Sea.
We then walked toward the El Born district, and saw the Santa Maria del Mar cathedral...
and found the restaurant Sagardi that had been recommended to us for tapas. We REALLY enjoyed this stop. You go in, help yourself to whatever you want to eat, sit outside or anywhere, and then pay when you're finished based on the number of toothpicks on your plate. We loved it! The food was excellent.

We then continued on to Barri Gotic and passed this cool street by the cathedral with a bridge that connects the cathedral to some of the government buildings in Barri Gothic.
We then walked along La Rambla for a bit, and came to La Boqueria market. I hadn't been here before, and we all enjoyed the very colorful displays.
At precisely 5pm we went to Petrixol street and found the highly recommended shop for xocolate suizo amb xurros...yum yum!! This street seems very dark and dreary until this time, and then comes alive and is so cute!
After our snack we went through the cathedral, and headed back home. I hadn't been inside the cathedral before, and it was very beautiful.
Here's Patience reading a book to Jackson. Our kids really got attached to the twins and Mike (aka Birthday Boy) and Steve (aka Stinky Stink). I'm not sure where the Stinky Stink came from, but he's still a nightly topic of conversation at the dinner table!! Even when we look at our pictures from their time here, the kids say "Stinky Stink took that one, Stinky Stink did this, Stinky Stink did that." It's hysterical! We had such a fun time with them here!! Once again Brian was the supreme chef and made us great dishes of paella, steak, homemade potato chips, and all other sorts of creations. We all had a very fun week!!

God bless you all and have a great week. We'll talk to you again soon!
Besitos de espana,

Tonya

The Walter's Invade Europe!

Hola amigos y familia!
We just had four fun-filled and crazy days with our neighbors Todd, Kathleen, Zachary, Reese and Nadia from Landisville. We had such a blast traipsing around Barcelona with six kids ages 8 and younger. :) The Catalans are so friendly and family-oriented that we got plenty of smiles, laughs, and help as we were out and about. Everyone loved the kids! They arrived at 6:30am on Friday morning and after a big pancake breakfast we walked from our house in to the beach to enjoy some sunshine. The kids had SO much FUN playing in the sand and before long were completely soaked.



We had the most amazing weather while they were here. In the sunshine it easily felt like 70 degrees. We had beautiful sunny days, and just loved being outside. Here's Luke, Reese and Zachary building a fort. After we let them rest a bit we headed into Barcelona by train to go to the aquarium. Here are the kids being eaten by a shark at the entrance to the aquarium. They really enjoyed seeing the beautiful fish and especially the shark tunnel. The aquarium is at the port right along the water, so you can enjoy the outside surroundings just as much as what you see inside.
On the way back to the metro we had to stop for our daily ice cream cone. :) We ended up getting home and finally sitting down for dinner around 10pm...welcome to the Spanish lifestyle!
On Saturday we had Caroline's 4th birthday party at the beach in Sitges, and it was SO special for her to have Nadia, Zachary and Reese here to celebrate with her!! I let her decide who else to invite, and she invited Joan (with Josep & Teresa), Miss Annette, her Sunday School teacher Miss Lydia, and our landlords Mr. Fermin & Miss Celia. Our landlords weren't able to come, but everyone else was there. We ended up with another beautiful day and a great time at the beach!! Everyone seemed to really enjoy it. Miss Annette made Caroline a beautiful chocolate cake, and we provided tapas and cheetos for Joan. :)
Caroline was full of smiles and hugs for everyone. Here she is giving Miss Kathleen a big squeezer.

I'm not sure she liked all of the attention when everyone sang to her, but she sure loved the chocolate cake!!

Brian spent HOURS making her a beautiful pinata of Thomas the Tank Engine. The kids then filled it till it was bursting with candy. Unfortunately 6 of the 7 kids at the party were staying at our house so most of it ended up back home!!
Jackson with chocolate on his face...a recurring theme!!!
She received the nicest selection of gifts, and just loved everything. Here she is opening a wooden Maggie Leigh doll from Nadia, who is busily eating candy beside her. :)
Here Caroline is giving Miss Teresa a nice big hug for her gift. Teresa was almost 9 months pregnant and had a c-section scheduled for the following weekend, but ended up having her baby the next day!!! She had a boy and they named him Miquel, we're anxious to meet him.

Miss Annette gave Caroline a mermaid Barbie doll, which did not leave her hand the rest of the day, or the whole night, or the following day in Barcelona. :)
By the end of the party the kids ended up...guess where...in the water. Here's a cute shot of Joan, Zachary and Luke.
Jackson and Joan playing with diggers in the sand. I don't think Jackson moved from this spot during the entire party, except maybe to get more candy!
On to Day 3! We went to the International Church of Barcelona in the morning, and then took the metro to La Sagrada Familia to show them this amazing cathedral. From there we started the double-decker bus tour of the northern part of the city. Here's a great shot of Kathleen & Nadia.
Luke & Reese having fun on the bus.

This part of the tour took us near Parc Guell, Tibidabo, Les Pedralbes, and most importantly, the FC Barcelona stadium at Camp Nou.
Todd & Zachary enjoying the ride, and listening to our personal tour guide.
I guess I took a lot of bus pictures that day!
We got off the bus at Placa Catalunya, and walked through the beautiful Barri Gothic district in search of "xocolate suisso amb churros", or something like that. :) Our Catalan neighbor in Landisville, Maria, gave us a treasure map of where to find some, and I'm not sure that we went to the right place but we sure enjoyed what we ate!! Here are some shots of the kids at Placa del Pi.

Day #4: We took the train from Sitges to Estacio Sants and picked up the double-decker bus to finish the southern tour of the city, along the sea. We first got off at Montjuic at the National Museum of Art to get a group picture with the city in the background. There were some reporters there shooting interviews with people because of a big conference that was in town, and guess who got on the camera!! The Walter kids!! It was pretty cute. They were trying to get people from all different nations and languages to say "Hello from Barcelona", so they gave them a good old American accent.
One of our many picnic lunches, this one at the park at Anella Olympic, the Olympic Ring.
Brian & Zachary trying to be human statues and make a little cash. :)
After touring around the Olympic stadium and surrounding area, we went through the Olympic museum where I did a slam dunk on Brian. :)
Our next stop was a cable car ride out over the port, with amazing views. Here Kathleen and the kids are watching the red cable car come to pick us up.

The views of the city and the Mediterranean from this cable car are just amazing.
Me & Caroline.
Miss Nadia enjoying the cable car ride. I think this was right before she fell asleep. :)
Back to the bus! We then finished the ride by Port Olympic, the zoo, and another ride through the beautiful old town area. We stayed on the bus until the train station and then rode the train back to Sitges. Once again we had a late dinner and then they had to pack up to head to Munich the following morning.
This is pretty much the reaction we got anytime we tried to take a picture of these two! Luke was really interested in the fact that Miss Kathleen had a baby in her belly, and throughout the day he would walk beside her for a while and hold her hand. It was very sweet. After they left I asked him about this and he said that he wanted to make sure she didn't tip over!!! :)

Another funny thing about their visit was that we all kept confusing Brian and Todd for each other, and Caroline & Nadia for each other! It was really funny how often it happened! We just had such a nice time with them, and when Luke woke up the day they left he just cried and cried. We were so sad to see them leave!! They'll be back for a quick sleep-over this Saturday night before heading back to the US, so they'll have one more fun night in the tents Brian set up for them. Sorry for such a long entry, but you end up with lots of pictures and stories when you take 4 adults and 6 kids around Barcelona!

Lots of love to you all, and have a Happy Valentine's Day! :)

Besitos y abrazos,

Tonya