Calders, Olerdola & Tibidabo

Hola y mucho amor to all our friends & family! This week we were thrilled to be able to visit with Maria (Maite) and Henry (Enric) from Barcelona-Landisville! They now live in our neighborhood in Landisville, but are from Barcelona, and are one of the reasons that we chose Barcelona and specifically Sitges in which to live. They have a house in Calders, a beautiful spot in the mountains outside of Barcelona. They invited us over on Tuesday for a nice lunch and fun afternoon of swimming. They were in town to celebrate Maria's birthday. This picture is of Maria and the kids having lunch.
Here is a shot of the side of their beautiful house.
Henry was doing the airplane trick to help Jackson eat and it worked perfectly!!
Here is a view of the Montserrat mountains from their house.
Henry & Luke playing in the pool.

Me & the birthday girl! When I said "girls picture", Caroline ran away and Jackson came running. :)
Maria, Henry, the kids, and Maria's madre muy guapa! She was so sweet!! They took such good care of us and we had a wonderful visit with them!! The following day Maria came to Sitges for a couple of hours, but we were so busy shopping and going out for a nice lunch that I forgot to take any pictures!
On Thursday the kids and I checked out the Romanesque church and castle ruins of Olerdola, only 15 minutes from our house. It's a place we always passed going other places, and I was curious to check it out. Luke was fascinated by the history of it, wondering what all was there during Bible times.
Here the kids are hiking up the old steps to the church of Sant Miquel d'Olerdola.
They thought it was fun to talk in through the openings of the door and hear the echo from inside.

Pretty view of the church with the Montserrat mountains in the far distance. Now we are on the other side of them from Henry & Maria's house!
At the top of the hike were ruins of the castle and an old Roman watchtower. They saw a pit and wondered if it was where Daniel was put with the lions. :)
Luke on the watchtower keeping watch for bad guys.
I got the self-timer working for a group photo. Luke was our tour guide with the map in hand. Caroline was wearing a toilet paper roll (nice).
Another photo of the view from the top of Olerdola.

Then on Friday we went to Tibidabo with Josep, Teresa, Joan & Miquel! We had been there last fall with them, and the kids definitely remembered how fun it was. Luke, Jackson, Caroline & Joan riding the train.
There were a couple nice kids rides without lines that they could keep riding on over and over and over. :)
Cute shot in the tea cup, before Luke started going around too fast and Jackson started screaming. Joan isn't sure what to think!
View of Barcelona from Tibidabo, high on the mountain behind the city. It's just beautiful.
Jackson being a big boy on the carousel.

Luke being a silly boy on the carousel.
Caroline ready to ride.
View of roller coasters, the city of Barcelona, and the Mediterranean sea.
Jackson being cute.
Airplane ride that of course we had to go on for Dad.

Luke on a ride that is sort of like the ferris wheel, we could see each other from our cars.
I was with Jackson & Caroline, and they weren't sure what to think at first! It went up really high and was sort of on the edge of the mountain.
Across the way you can almost see Luke & Teresa waving from their car.
Beautiful cathedral right at the entrance to Tibidabo.
Josep trying to eat a cookie, and Miquel trying to eat a cookie. :) You can't eat or drink anything while holding him because he is all over it!

This was the third week of Brian's trip, and it was nice to have so much activity. He is now due home tomorrow morning and will be home for two weeks. Yeah!! The kids have been counting down.

Have a great week and we'll talk to you again soon!
Con mucho amor,

Tonya

Summer...

Hola!! We hope you are enjoying the summer! We sure are. Most of our days are spent either swimming in the pool or playing at the beach, and believe it or not I don't have pictures from EITHER of these activities on this post. Next time. The biggest news from the pool is that Caroline has made INCREDIBLE progress in the last couple of weeks. She is swimming freely in the deep end, all around, all by herself! Brian is determined to teach Jackson to swim the next time he comes home.
Before he left on this trip the kids were thrilled to be able to take him to the zoo one Sunday after church. Here the kids are watching some monkeys play.
We met up there with our friends Josep, Teresa, Joan & Miquel, who also have a family pass for the year.
We were jealous of the sea lions going for a swim, it was pretty hot that day!
The following Sunday I had the crazy idea that the kids and I would drive into the mountains somewhere for a picnic lunch and a hike, and escape the heat for a bit. In my one tour book I found Santa Fe del Montseny in a beautiful mountain range just 40 miles from Barcelona. I thought "great, it'll only take us <1hr to get there, perfect!" So we went to church and then headed for the Sierra del Montseny mountain range. The drive was just gorgeous, but I forgot to take into account that the roads winding up a mountain are just that...winding!
We finally made it to our destination and had a nice lunch in a lovely shaded picnic area. We were at a height of 3,610 feet, and it was much cooler!
Caroline was very hungry by the time we got there!
There were some beautiful old buildings at the "village", although it wasn't much of a village!
This was actually converted into a hotel, and there were lots of great hikes leading out from this area.

We chose a nice, kid-friendly hike. Luke is always a couple steps ahead.
Caroline with her walking stick. I love this shot with the mountains in the background.
The highlight of the hike...a stream!
They loved figuring out how to maneuver back and forth across the rocks, it was great.
Yes, Jackson is only wearing a shirt. As I was getting our lunch ready, he peed through his underwear and shorts. Couldn't stop playing long enough to go to the bathroom! I didn't have anything else along, so this is what he wore. Everyone who passed us cracked up. :)

Once in a while they really get into drawing pictures or painting. This happened to be Barca day I guess!
Another day we went to the grocery store, and as we were checking out the cashier pulled out 3 spiderman costumes for the kids! Score! They loved them.
One day by the pool they were having a surfboard lunch and some of the neighbor kids brought things by to sell that they had made. :) It was so cute!
Holding up their 30 cent purchases!

On Friday afternoon we went to a birthday party for Luke's friend Dylan at the Terramar Park near the sea.
The party was over about 8pm, and it was so lovely out we just couldn't resist going to the paseo to play for a bit. :) There are some nice grassy areas overlooking the beach, so we chose one and hung out for a little. Here's Jackson hanging out!
And here they are jumping. There is a video included below of them rolling in the grass and running during this visit to the paseo.
Tonight Dylan's parents invited us to come to see Dylan drumming in a parade in the little village of Olivella out in the hills. It was only about 10-15 minutes from our house, but felt like it was in the middle of nowhere! My pictures don't do the village justice, it was so quaint with beautiful old stone buildings.
An old building with a flag advertising the festivities tonight.

Brian's trip has been extended into another 3-week trip, so we've got one more week until he's home. Luckily we have some fun things going on this week, so the time will pass quickly. We have friends coming to swim, we're planning to go to Tibidabo (the amusement park), our Catalan friend Maria from Landisville is visiting, and we are going to the beach with other people visiting from Belgium. The summer here has been just beautiful so far. It's hot, and we don't have air conditioning in the house or car, but we manage and just make the best of it! :)

Wishing you all a wonderful week!

Love,

Tonya