Brussels, Belgium: Adventure Day

Another day of everyone awake by 6am. Oh well, it’s better than when L woke us all up by 2:30am. The nice thing about vacation is we all just take our time getting up. Reading books in bed, snuggling under covers, maybe watching a travel show. I love vacation mornings like this!

Ty is our amazing trip organizer. I did help research places to go in city, however he’s the one that makes that happen. He downloads each city in maps.me (this is an amazing app, that doesn’t use data!) then he marks each location we want to visit and then he becomes our navigator extraordinaire. I’m usually in charge of snacks, layers of clothes, and child well-being. We make a good team! 🙂

This morning we headed out, extremely bundled up because we knew we weren’t really going to be inside today. We had all the layers on (I was wearing 7 layers on my top!) but it made for a comfortable day.

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Near the Grand Palace we came across two guys juggling in the crosswalk for money. L loved this idea! He decided he wanted to come up with an act to make some money. So he found himself a stick and started doing some moves with it. Then he convinced R to sing with him. So she was singing Oh Tannenbaum in German while he was tossing this stick around. 🙂 It was wonderful. However, we were the only people to give him money. He decided it was due to the fact he only had a stick. He was determined to get something more useful when we went back to the apartment. Love this kids entrepreneurial spirit!

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We walked through a few beautiful churches, the Notre-Dame du Sablon.

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Then we walked to the Notre-Dame de la Chapelle. I don’t have any pictures from there, but they had this wonderful exhibit/find and seek activity for kids. It was just a brochure I grabbed at the front, Bruegel, The Great Escape. Ten characters from the famous Flemish painter, Pieter Bruegel the Elder escaped from his paintings and were scattered around the chapel. They had a sheet of the characters to be located. Then a copy of the painting they escaped from an a description of the artwork. It was such a fun way to explore the church, looking for details. Also, a wonderful way to learn more about Bruegels paintings and to explain to the kids, the characters and why they look like they do. It’s always wonderful when we come across gems like this unexpectedly.

From here we walked to the world famous, Peeing Boy statue. 🙂 Ty scoffed at me for wanting to see it, but to me it’s like the Mona Lisa. It will be smaller and less impressive than expected, but you still have to go see it. Funny, how these random things become famous!

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This was also the first time we hit the tourist district! So many people here. The statue is also surrounded by waffle shops, and tourist trinkets. Therefore we had to partake in both!! These waffles are incredible, taste and cost! But we went all out with fruit, sauce, and fresh cream.

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I’ve been talking about finding a new scarf this trip. So my kids decided they needed these scarves. They’re hilarious but so soft. But hey when in Europe why not! L seems to think his is like a stuffed animal, he kept mentioning how he was going to sleep with his. Which he did!

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R has been posing in photos since she was little. It continues to crack me up! Meanwhile L’s ‘smile’ face, totally scrunches up his eyes. I LOVE them!

The kids of course got hot, when we did a playground stop, so look who ended up with the scarves. 😉

After binging on super sugary waffles, it make perfect sense to go to the local Chocolate Museum. Why not?! The displays were a bit lacking, and could use some maintenance. However, the demonstration on how they create their famous pralines, was very entertaining, and delicious!

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We walked around the Grand Place a bit, while making our way home.

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Making several playground stops along the way of course. Big cities have them so often, you just never know when you’ll discover them. Our kiddos even got to play with a few locals. R felt stuck on the teeter-toter because she didn’t know how to tell them to stop. 🙂

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We had walked about 8 miles by this point, it was a long day so we were all moving a bit slow. Ready to be home.

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The apartment however, smelled like grey water, and was freezing. We snuggled under blankets, while Ty messaged the host. I think he figured out the grey water smell, but the heat still hasn’t kicked on. We at least found a space heater for the kids room.

Some warm baths/shower then we struggled to get out of the house for dinner. We had been in the restaurant for about 2 minutes before L’s eyes started to close. I took him back to the apartment while R and Ty went in search of a quicker dinner. Burgers and fries again, but it tasted good. We were all happily snug in bed by 9pm. Let’s blame it on jet lag, the extensive walking, and the lack of good sleep for the past week.