Jared's Birthday & Swiss National Day Celebration

Jared's birthday was Saturday, July 30th so I started the day with cooking up a big birthday breakfast then we headed to a nearby town that has an English Bookstore.It was a tiny little bookstore but Jared found a book he had been wanting to read so despite its size it did have a decent selection. They also said they could order any book we wanted if the book we were looking for wasn't in the store already. It was nice to have an English-speaking place to go to...especially a bookstore because back home in the U.S. Jared and I loved to go on dates to the bookstore where we would roam around searching for new reads then talk about our finds with each other. May sound boring and nerdy to some but it was one of our favourite things to do. I had missed that. Afterward we did a little birthday shopping and got Jared two nice new pairs of shoes for only $30CHF each!! That's a steal even for U.S. standards but for the Swiss it was nearly unfathomable! Everything here is typically double (sometimes more than that) of U.S. prices so finding deals like this is cause for excitement. LOL! He really wanted a pair of sport shoes so he can start working out at the University gym and his current pair of everyday shoes were getting shabby so he found the perfect shoes for both needs.

After walking around town we came back to our place and I made the largest plate of chicken nachos ever. That was his birthday dinner request and I think you can tell from the pictures just how much he enjoyed his birthday dinner! :) And that right there is why I love to cook so much....I love making him happy with food! :)

The Swiss were kind enough to have a national holiday the same weekend of Jared's birthday which meant fireworks and an extended weekend so we enjoyed those bonuses as well. Our neighbors were setting off some great fireworks on Jared's birthday that we were able to enjoy from our balcony so that was a treat too!

Here is a quick video I took from our balcony of those fireworks.

August 1st was Swiss National Day here in Switzerland (it's the equivalent to America's Independence Day) so Jared and I celebrated like the Swiss by going to the town of Ouchy (which is about 15 minutes from where we live) and went down by the lake to watch the fireworks display. We had absolutely no idea where exactly they would be setting off the fireworks so we searched around for a good spot to sit that would have a good view. We arrived well before the fireworks began...there were tons of people there but still plenty of open seats along the lake. I noticed a guy with professional camera gear all set up who was sitting on a large rock that jets out from the shore and figured that with all that gear...he was probably in a good spot for watching the fireworks. So we sat right behind him. We were literally ON the lake...couldn't get any closer unless we were actually in the water. Which some people did rent paddle boats or had their own sailboats and yachts to watch the display from the water. I actually tried reserving a dinner cruise that night for Jared's birthday so that we would be that much closer to the action but they were all booked up by the time I learned about the option. Maybe next year...we had the next best thing with our seats though. The fireworks were set off right in front of where we were sitting. It was so memorable! I'd never seen fireworks set off that close to a lake before. I loved how they sparkled in the night sky and how the bright lights reflected on the water. They had some very unique fireworks that I had never see before too. Some that hung effortlessly for several moments and sparkled like a crystal chandalier. Square-shaped ones, smiley-faced ones, rainbow ones, some so big the nearly took up the entire sky...so much variety. It was magical.

Here are a few photos and a short video of the fireworks that night. I didn't bring my professional camera because I knew we would be on the lake and I'm super paranoid about anything happening to it. So all these were taken with my iPhone camera.

Hope you all had a fantastic weekend also and enjoy the upcoming weekend too! Cheers!