Schloss Lenzburg, take three!

Racing to the train: everyone's
 eager today

This morning I woke up to the sound of Ella teaching Alex how to play Hot Cross Buns on the glockenspiel.  He was a pretty eager student: he worships his sister so.  Truly, he just wanted to mess around with the instrument.  But no: Ella is a firm task mistress.  "Alex!" she exclaimed, when he started straying from her instruction, "I had to learn how to play at least three songs before I allowed myself to start composing!" Music requires discipline!

The kids and I only have two days left to show our friend around Zürich, so today we decided to take them to what we've decided is our most favorite place in the area, Schloss Lenzburg.  I've already written about it twice, so by now you know that there are many reasons for loving this place. But my kids had an extra reason today: Ella and Alex decided that the little wooden playhouse village just beneath the castle would be a really excellent place to play Smurfs.

Incredibly, today was the first time that I've ever had to purchase a train ticket.  We got our all-inclusive year-long passes almost immediately after we moved here, and Dennis has always taken care of getting our out-of-country tickets on his way to or from work.  I have to say, the SBB runs a very slick operation at the Zürich Hauptbahnhof.  Everyone who works at the ticket office and the Reisebüro (the free tourist office, for vacation planning) speaks at least passable English and, of course, many other languages besides.  There are many, many different versions of tickets that you can get (day passes for an individual or multiple zones of Zürich; all-inclusive passes for all of Zürich; passes that let you pay half-fare for any ticket--the last of these, I understand, is the most economical, but also the most complicated.), and it seems worth the few minutes to ask an agent for the best option.  Today, for our friends, the best option turned out to be a combination ticket for transportation and entrance to the castle.

Brie, reading to a whole passel of children

Brie did a lovely job entertaining the kids on the way to the castle. I kind of want to keep her here for ever and ever.  But it was my turn to entertain, once we got to the castle.  The kids took off in three directions, wiggling their Smurfy little butts in my direction, just begging to be chased.

And so they were.

Smurfette taunts me from the top of her house

Meanwhile, our friends eventually went ahead up to the castle, and I finally convinced the kids to follow. I'd had the time and foresight to pack a picnic, and so we ate our bread and cheese and apples and grapes and chocolate in the castle courtyard. I have a great fondness for this sort of meal: for our first date, a double with some friends of ours, Dennis and his friend packed a similar picnic for us lucky girls, and we ate it in the abandoned top floor of our college dorm.  Adam and Brooke, they're married with three kids, now, too.

But I digress.  We took our friends into the museum after lunch, and the kids visited all their exhibits before leading me up to the Children's play room on the top floor.

And that's where we stayed, for hours.  Alex and Joey almost the entire afternoon in the second floor, playing with a toy castle and a pile of Papo figurines.  They joined the cluster of other boys there and made up stories with their dollies for well over an hour.  Alex did a wonderful job of looking after his brother and keeping him amused. And I got such a kick out of seeing Joey give voices to the dolls: he does an especially good dragon roar. See?

Meanwhile, Ella found a kindred spirit, a little boy, about her age.  The two of them ran around the museum while his mother and I surreptitiously snapped pictures.  They spent most of their time playing with the toy suction-cup cross bow, my femme fatale giving the boy tips on how to shoot more accurately.  He was suitably impressed at her consistent aim. "Woah! Mami!  Sie ist so toll!"

When it was time for Ella's new friend to go home, Kael made his move and lured Ella into a castle tower, where he absolutely refused to let anyone enter, to Ella's great amusement.

Kael, guarding the princess 

Alex, patiently walking Joey through a giant board game

Unfortunately, the castle closes in the fall, and I don't know that we'll get a chance to return before that happens. So I was all to happy to let the kids stay and play as long as they wanted to today, and before we left we got a few souvenirs for the kids.  Knight and dragon dollies for Alex and Joey.

And, for Ella...well. My friends promised Dennis a shotgun when Ella was born, so that he could put The Fear into any potential boyfriends. So far, the shotgun has been non-forthcoming.  But after watching Ella today, I've decided that she can probably take care of herself.  So Ella...today she got her first crossbow.

Ella got tired of retrieving her darts, so she attached one
with a string to her bow, for rapid retrieval and loading.
I love my young engineer.