Belqiue-Day 1: A New Place to Start

So after Paris we went off into the unknown, Belgium. Ha ha! I know, so scary Lynsey! And it really....wasn't. Of course! Belgium was GREAT!!! Who doesn't love chocolate and waffles?? Honestly the food was amazing-I think that is where we gained our travel weight ;)
Our first full day we went walking around and checked out the sights. We walked by a Godiva Chocolatier who was making the yummy goodies.....

and then we went into this great church! We saw some wonderful stained glass in Paris (need I remind you of Notre Dame??) but this place had some BEAUTIFUL stained glass. It was another one dedicated to Mary (she was the beeze-knees everywhere) and that was reflected in the glass.

See there she is....

Here is what the church looked like from the lovely little park across the street.

Now apparently Belgium is known for its parks and public spaces. While we were visiting this park, some random lady was touching the flowers and the park patrol guy blew his whistle and yelled at her. That is some serious enforcement for just a neighborhood park. But rightfully so-even with the overcast sky and occasional rain drop, these parks were lovely. We really enjoyed seeing and smelling the flowers! And of course goofing off is a necessity....

Next we visited the Music Museum. I didn't post any pics because I couldn't decide which one did it justice. Let's just say that it was a pretty awesome little museum and worth the entrance fee and if you have kids it's a great place to take them! The audio guide didn't have any verbal information on it, just the sounds of the different instruments. It was pretty neat. There were some very interesting sounding instruments, and some that sounded like cats mating and dying at the same time. Not pleasant I assure you.

Anyhew, the architecture in Brussels is apparently something to stop and take a look at. I agree. Not just in Brussels but since that's the city we're starting out in, we'll stay on focus here. Parts of the city (sadly none that we saw) are known for their art nouveau style which is pretty but again we didn't get to see much. I don't know what the majority of what we saw is called, but we liked it!

This bit was from the Grand Place and it was mom's favorite row of buildings.

Grand Place was a pretty neat area-it's the big market square area. We spent a good amount of time wandering through here-we found the best ice cream around here! Yummm...

So in case you didn't know it, a national monument/icon of Belgium is the Manneken Pis which means "little pissing boy." Yup, a little boy peeing is a national symbol. Great. This thing has outfits (even given to him by kings and dignitaries!) and people were always swarming it to take pics and they gave away free beer next to it. Craziness I tell you! And the thing is only about 2 feet tall if that. It's right by Grand Place and the yummy chocolatiers that we liked so we took a photo of it of course.


And we were told no trip to Belgium was complete without getting a waffle so of course we took care of that the first night! And the second. And pretty much every night we could. They were so stinking tasty!

When we started to discuss going to Belgium dad and Matt were pretty excited at trying all the beers! They make and drink a lot of beer. Since I am not a huge beer fan I stayed with wine but the other 3 tried and loved a lot of different types. Whenever dad was needing a break he'd say "it's time to grab a beer." Don't they look so happy?