Billy

Brandon and I have started riding a horse that lives on a farm which is about a 15 min walk from our house.Brandon brushing Billy down before tacking him up.Brandon on BillyFor our first ride we walked over to our house so Alicia could also meet Billy. After the ride, we let Billy go in the field to play with his other friends (there are about 20 horses and poney on this farm).
There are a ton of animals on this farm: a peacock.

chickens,

and rabbits are just a few of them. There are also cows, 11 cats and a dog (a least those are the ones I saw after our first visit).

The garden

Hervé loves to work about the garden making it look exactly the way he wants. One of the first things he wanted to do was put in a garden so we could grow our own vegetables.He thought the best place would be close to the kitchen so that we wouldn't need to go very far to pick herbes, fruits or vegetables.
So, he started out taking off all the grass little by little.

Sometimes he would have little helpers that would come and give a hand.

Some help more than others.

Some are just interested in playing in the wheel barrel.

After several weeks of pulling out all the grass, it was finally done. Jean-Louis came yesterday to turn the dirt over with his machine.

Picking up the rocks that the machine made come to the surface.

Now it's all ready for planting.

As the men worked on the garden, Alicia showed Granmaman what she could do on the trampoline.

To finish off the day, Hervé thought he should mow the lawn so that everything looked just perfect.

A couple more pictures of around the house.

Hervé didn't much like the way the front of the house looked like either.

So he changed the look there too.

To the back of the house, all the trees are in flower.

Don't know what this one is, but the bright red is rather nice.

Easter

Alicia Easter morning trying to figure out how to take the paper off of the chocolate rabit.
Maybe if I sit on it, it will come off.

We were invited to the Sandoz's for Easter dinner. Here is the kids table. Hervé's cousins and their kids were also there. (10 kids in total!)
Brandon and Tidji playing inthe sand pit.

Alicia trying out Mahé's tricycle.

After lunch, there was an egg hunt outside. First the kids had to find the 30 eggs that were hidden.
As usual, the Swiss tradition it to hunt for real hard boiled decorated eggs (still seems funny to me since we live in a chocolate country).

Then the kids wanted to hide the eggs so that the adults could find them. Even Hervé's Grandmother thought she would have a go at it.

Alicia slept on Mommy's lap through both hunts.

Making & decorating chocolate rabbits

The local shopping center was showing the kids how to make and decorate chocolate rabbits this week.

First you pour the chocolate in.

Then you hit it on the side so all the chocolate fills all the holes.
Then you hit it on the head (just in case it is still alive I guess).

While the chocolate was getting hard in a fridge the kids could decorate pre-made chocolate rabbits.

Here are the ones Brandon did. To the left the one he made. In the middle the one he made for Alicia. To the right the one he made for himself.

Eating it at home was just as much fun.Alicia was so excited to have her very own personalized rabbit.

If you enlarge this picture you'll see that Alicia really enjoyed her rabbit!