In preparing for our upcoming trip to Paris (which is actually happening, because my passport came today!) we’re learning that getting around with a stroller will probably not be trivial.  Several of the major sights don’t permit strollers (while, interestingly, others require them for little ones) and they also neither provide an officially sanctioned place to leave them temporarily, nor do they allow you to just leave them around (probably not a good idea, anyway, given how common theft seems to be at the big tourist places).  The Metro, which we’ve heard is the “best in Europe” — so theoretically superior to Vienna’s U-bahns (although that’s hard for me to imagine) is small and difficult to maneuver with a stroller and, unbelievably, most stations are not accessible by elevator.  Many don’t even have escalators, so we’d be left to carry the stroller up and down the stairs.  (Doesn’t sound like fun.)

I don’t want to judge Paris unfairly before we go, but we aren’t used to any of this.  Vienna is so stroller friendly, we’ve been spoiled.

In our entire time here, there have only been a handful of places that have been challenging to access with the stroller (other than a few private residences, I can actually only think of one — our favorite pizza place).  Everywhere in Vienna is wheelchair accessible, which means everywhere is stroller accessible.  All of the palaces (including the grounds), cathedrals, trains . . . plus nearly all shops and restaurants.  There are a few places without convenient stroller “parking”, so you end up having to stash the stroller around the corner or out of the way, but it hasn’t ever really been an issue.  Not once.

And the few places where it’s a bit of a challenge (on the non-street-level trains and strassenbhans, for example) there’s an easy solution — someone will ALWAYS help you get on or off.  (In the case of the trains, the conductor will actually get out of the train to help you if there isn’t anyone else around to do it.)

Planning ahead to Paris, we’re working on some creative strategies to get around (because we’d been counting on the Metro).  We’ll walk a lot of places (which still lets us use the stroller) and we’ll use the Moby and/or the Ergo where walking isn’t practical.  But I’m realizing how much we’ve taken Vienna, and the pleasant stroller situations, for granted.  It’s truly lovely how easy it is to get around here with a stroller.  We take ours everywhere, without a worry or thought.  I am so grateful to have that luxury — and I’m not too worried about Paris.  It’s only a week — we’ll be fine.  But I do suspect there will be a lot of impromptu nap times spent with our little ones sleeping in our laps while we hang out in cafes.

Each day as a mom has its challenges.  Today’s challenge:  attempting to convince my two boys to take their naps while we had guys working on our roof (hammering, stomping, running carts of cement up a ladder from the courtyard, “enjoying” their loud music being blasted from just above our skylight).  Mommy was a bit frazzled by this evening.

But every day has wonderful moments, too.  Like this evening, just before bath, when Dan went into our room to check on Benjamin where he was watching cartoons on Dan’s phone.  He found him curled up, under the blankets in our bed, and he requested company.  First Dan joined him, followed by Liam and I.

Even with the inevitable elbows to the face, hair pulling and general wriggling around, it was the absolute best part of my day.  It isn’t possible for the magic of 10 minutes spent cuddling with my kids to be overshadowed by anything.  It is amazing and absolutely perfect.  I love being a mom.

When Benjamin was born, he didn’t have much in the way of hair, just a tiny layer of fuzz on his head.  Throughout his first year, we anxiously waited for his hair to grow in, which it did, but slowly.  (For some reason, even with just peach fuzz hair, people always assumed he was a girl.  Even when he was wearing blue or brown or gray.)  By his first birthday, he had a respectable, boyish hairdo, but I was so happy to see his hair finally growing that I delayed cutting it until he was nearly 18 months old.

Liam has not had this problem.  Liam was born with hair — moderately thick, dark hair.  I have no idea what happened to all that hair — I guess it either fell out or magically transformed, but somewhere along the way he grew a head full of golden curls.  And again, here I am, with an 18 month old who has never had a hair cut, but for different reasons.  (And most people also assume he’s a girl, but they attribute it to his long hair — from what I’ve seen it seems particularly long by Austrian standards.)

before

I’ve needed to cut Liam’s hair for a while.  It gets in his eyes, for one thing.  But one nice thing about curly hair is that it doesn’t look as long as it is.  When his hair is wet, in the bath, it’s quite long, but as soon as he gets out and it dries, it coils up into springy curls and ends up about half the length.  There is also a practical consideration:  Liam is an enthusiastic eater.  His hair does not escape the side effects of his energetic eating, and that can get really gross.  However, that’s also prevented me, in large part, from cutting his hair sooner.  I wanted to preserve a lock of hair from his first cut, but I didn’t want to keep one coated (however lightly) it whatever he’d recently eaten.  And, since neither just before bed or 6:00 in the morning has never seemed like an attractive time to cut his hair, it just hasn’t gotten done.

Plus, I’ve been terrified of cutting his hair.  With Benjamin, his hair was all different lengths already, and I was just keeping it out of his eyes.  With Liam, I’m intimidated by the curls.  It, too, is all different lengths, but I just don’t know anything about cutting curly hair.  I’ve been afraid to try.  And, to be honest, I know absolutely nothing about any of this anyway, seeing as I’ve never had any training AND I’ve only had my own hair cut about a dozen times ever.  (My poor kids.  I know at least one thing they’ll be discussing with their therapist when they’re older.)

But, it had to be done, so today, Liam got his first hair cut, courtesy of me.

after

It’s really not too bad.  It turns out that cutting curly hair is kind of easy (comparatively).  Exactly because it’s curly, no one is going to be able to see how horribly unevenly I cut it, and curly hair is different all the time — his hair can go from tight curls to loose waves throughout the day, so however it looks one minute, it’ll look different soon.  I really do think it turned out ok.  There is one piece (in the front, of course) that I definitely cut too short.  And there are a few pieces that I didn’t realize were long enough to reach his eyes (nothing like cutting your baby’s hair and finding that he still has hair in his eyes) which I neglected to trim.  And at some point, I’m going to have to work on the back, before it turns into a mullet (a definite concern).

But, as with Benjamin, we both survived the first haircut.  I can see a little more of his face, he has a little less hair in his eyes, and neither one of us got wounded.  I still think most people are going to be surprised to hear he’s a boy, but for now, I’ll count it as a win.

I had a fantastic day today, hiking in the rainy woods of Vienna with my family.

When I think of Vienna as a beautiful place (which I do, often) I mostly think of the gorgeous architecture, or the perfectly manicured palace gardens.  But, Vienna also has a lot of wooded areas, set aside for recreational use with trails and such, but pretty much preserved in their natural, lush, green state — right within the city limits.

We’ve done a little hiking/walking/exploring in the forested areas of the city before, but we’d never really devoted the better part of a day to it.  Today, we did.  We went up to the western part of Vienna, up where the significant hills begin, and investigated some trails we’d seen once before when we rode past on a bus.  We found ourselves on part of the Wanderweg that goes around the whole city of Vienna (although we only covered a small part of that today).

We weren’t really sure what to expect, so we left the stroller, and Bailey, at home.  It turns out that the trails are wide and smooth enough that we could easily have managed the stroller, and Benjamin could have even brought his bike (now we know for next time).

It rained the entire time we were hiking.  It didn’t dampen our spirits and we had a great time.  (A lesson I learned from my dad, growing up, was that it is possible to enjoy the outdoors in any weather, as long as you’re dressed for it.)  We tromped up the hills, slogged through the mud, climbed on tree stumps, splashed in puddles, ate lunch in the rain and even came upon another American, originally from Maine, who was delighted to see our boys in L. L. Bean raincoats.  The woods are full of fresh, new, vibrantly green leafy growth;  in fact, the forest felt very much like one from home at this time of year.  Chasing the boys through the woods and preventing major catastrophe wasn’t relaxing, but it was fantastic.

Benjamin was our trail guide — we let him make the decisions at all of the intersections.  He made different decisions than I would have (I have some paths I’d like to go back and explore in the future) but it was fun to have him be in charge.  It was also fun for both boys to be able to run freely for a few hours — for city dwellers without a yard, it doesn’t happen all that often.

I think we covered about 2 miles of hilly terrain.  Liam walked nearly the entire way, and Benjamin walked (and ran) the whole time.  Then, of course, Liam slept the whole way home, and Benjamin took a long nap after we got home.  We were all glad to get out of our soggy clothes and get all warm and snuggled up.  Our boys were worn out.  So were we.

It was a fun, rainy, hiking Sunday in Vienna.  We got soaked.  We are tired.  We had a great time.

Yesterday afternoon, it started to rain.  Usually, when it rains in Vienna, it just rains a little — a drizzle, not a downpour.  But yesterday was a deluge.  The sound of the rain was incredibly loud on the roof and the windows.  The boys were napping when it started, and it was loud enough that I was worried it would wake them.

After nap time, it evolved into an actual storm, with thunder, lightning and even more rain.  We just don’t get that very often here — we’ve really only had them a handful of times since we’ve been here.  I miss it a little, because a big thunderstorm is almost as good as snow for making you feel all cozy and snuggly (assuming you’re lucky to be home when it happens, and not out in it).

Benjamin did not agree.  As further evidence of the rarity of such storms here, he was completely freaked out.  The first crash of thunder made him gasp and sent him flying across the living room from the futon to the safety of the big chair I was sitting in with Liam.  We all cuddled up together, and after a few minutes, he relaxed.  At home, thunderstorms are a near daily occurrence in the spring and summer, and, before we came here, he was completely accustomed to them.  Now, the sound of thunder is truly foreign to him — I’m not sure he remembers it at all.  I’m certain we’ll all get reacquainted with daily storms when we’re home this summer — something to look forward to!

We’re going home to the US for a visit this summer.  We’re making a stop in Florida to visit with my in-laws and then we’re going to Maryland to see my side of the family.  We’re also taking a family trip to the beach in Delaware.  There will be many opportunities for swimming — Dan’s parents have a pool in their backyard and a condo on the beach, and then, of course, we’ll also be at the beach in Delaware.

I love to swim.  Dan loves to swim.  The kids don’t know how yet.  This stresses me out –a lot.  All of our upcoming water exposure will be a great opportunity to work on teaching the boys to swim, but, of course, it also worries me.  Having two bold, adventurous, exuberant boys (one of whom is also fearless) near water, when they don’t actually know how to handle it, freaks me out.  It literally gives me nightmares.

I know the best protection against the things that I fear is 1) to watch the children 100% of the time whenever they’re near the water 2) to make sure they appreciate (as much as is possible) how seriously they should take themselves around water and 3) to teach them how to swim and float.  We are working on all of these things.

Don’t worry, though — my boys are ready to take on that third part themselves.

The other night in the bathtub, as the water was draining out, Benjamin turned to Liam and said, “Liam!  Let’s practice on our swimming!” and they both flipped over and laid down on their tummies in the tub, side by side, and started kicking and splashing.

I know that this isn’t *actually* functional swim practice, and I’m not lulled into any sense of complacency by it, but it is super cute.  I’ve been explaining to Benjamin that he has to learn how to swim, and that we’re going to be working on it this summer.  He is very diligently working towards that end.  He even practices holding his breath (although he won’t put his face in the water yet — we’ll get there).

We’ll definitely get some swimming practice in this summer (and if we’re really lucky, we’ll get some before that, too).  But my boys are on it.  They’re “practicing on their swimming”. They are so cute.