January 2012

January was a crafty month for us: I worked on several sewing projects, and Zak carved a set of salad spoons for his mom and a butter knife for us. We also visited the Olympic Museum in Lausanne, and celebrated Zak's birthday.

Noel at Printemps

In the Christmas ornament section of the department store Printemps.

Falafel at Chez Hanna

Our falafel wraps at Chez Hanna in the Marais were superb.

Louis XIV

A statue of Louis XIV in the courtyard of the Musée Carnavalet.

Locks of love

A view from the passerelle Léopold-Sédar-Senghor, a pedestrian bridge over the Seine. This is a common sight in Europe: padlocks etched with couples' names attached to bridges. The Musée d'Orsay stands in the background.

Carousel

The carousel near the Hôtel de Ville.

Blue and orange

Just up the street from Chez Janou. The blue and orange reminded me of my next quilt project.

Lunch at Chez Janou

We had a great meal at Chez Janou on my birthday.

Architecture!

Our Parisian apartment was just a couple blocks from the Promenade Plantée, an elevated former train track that has been turned into a landscaped walkway. Here: a local police station as seen from the walkway.

Street sign

Just around the corner from the Centre Pompidou.

Arc de Triomphe

La Marseillaise, one of the sculptures on the face of the Arc de Triomphe.

Paris, at last

The ferris wheel in the Place de la Concorde at sunset.

Lady Liberty

Colmar is the birthplace of Frédéric Bartholdi, the sculptor who designed the Statue of Liberty. The city has its own replica in a roundabout that was next to our car rental company.

French dogs

Dogs seem to be a special class of citizen around our part of Europe. They go everywhere with their owners...on trains, in restaurants, to festivals. This terrier and his owner were watching a folk dance performance in Beblenheim.

Colmar train station art (part two)

Part two: after their rescue, they become models for the painter.

Colmar train station art

The Colmar train station had two large windows covered with art by French artist, Jean Le Gac.

In this image, a painter bravely jumps from a train to rescue twins from danger.

Storks

There is a large stork population in Alsace. I think most had already flown south for the winter, but there was still a nesting pair on the roof of the church in Bergheim.

Strasbourg cathedral

The bustling Christmas market in front of Strasbourg's cathedral, which Zak thinks looks like a one-eared dog.

Saint-Hippolyte concert

The second Advent concert we attended was performed in the village of Saint-Hippolyte. This is the ceiling of the church where the concert was held. On the recording: le quatuor des soeurs Umbdenstock (the Umbdenstock sisters' quartet).

Bergheim Advent concert

We attended two Christmas concerts while in Alsace. The first was in Bergheim, the village where we stayed.
The town's children performed in the former synagogue.

Colmar Christmas

We stayed in Colmar only long enough to visit the tourist office and pick up our rental car. Most of the buildings in the old town were already decorated for Christmas like this: with large dioramas attached to the facade.

Basel buffet

We took the train to Colmar, France, last Saturday, changing trains in Basel, where there is a noticeable difference between the French and Swiss train terminals. This former buffet is on the French platform.

Morat church

The ramparts and the decorative roof of the German church in Morat.

Swiss bride

 

In Morat on a very cold day.

Myself I shall adore

These sculpted landscape figures in Montreux brought to mind an aria from Semele, the opera we saw earlier this month: "Myself I shall adore, / if I persist in gazing. / No object sure before / was ever half so pleasing."

Montreux Ramseyer

Plentitude (1985)

An André Ramseyer sculpture on the waterfront in Montreux to add to the survey from early July.

St. Imier sculpture

A sculpture of St. Imier himself, founder of the town.

St. Imier clock

One of the clock towers in St. Imier. This type of single-hand clock is common around our part of Switzerland. 

The text under the clock face says, "Be careful because you don't know what hour our Lord is coming."

Tête de Moine

Tête de Moine (monk's head) is a local cheese made in the nearby Jura mountains. 

We visited a cheese factory that makes it in St. Imier.

Cow art

Kinetic cow sculpture in the Migros grocery store in the city center of Bern.