25th Anniversary trip...just one year late!

You know my hubby, Bill, travels almost every week for his job. And I travel a bit. Normally I fly to an event, teach, and then fly straight home...but this time I decided to take hubby along and stay an extra week after the event was over.

(You know we have never taken a trip together. ALONE. With NO kids! Okay-we did take 3 or 4 days once when Bill had a seminar in Georgia. But he was in class all day long. So it doesn't count. Right?

 We were always just too busy just trying to take care of our seven kids, and all their activities, to really take time to get away together.)

Last year was our 25th anniversary so it was a GREAT excuse to plan a second honeymoon. (And Bill was really excited about THAT idea! Ha.) So we bit the bullet and booked an extra week with time in Belgium, Italy, and France. We packed a lot into the week, but it was so worth it!! (We also had AMAZING help at home. THANKS to our sweet girls for everything you did. It was a relief to come home and see the house still standing and ALL the boys accounted for!)

We wish we hadn't waited so long to take off though!

Here are a few pics from our visits to Belgium-St. Lauriens, Brugge and Gent. (Some are out of order because blogger decided to mess up my carefully laid-out plans!) I took SO MANY pics that I need to break them up into a few posts. Italy and France to follow sometime in the near future.

An appetizer in St-Lauriens. Consisted of bacon, cheese and shrimp. oh my!

my steak and pepper sauce. another oh my!

bill's lamb and some kind of amazing cheese. we like cheese! (We are from WI after all.)

dessert. love their art forms.

Now we are in Brugge! shadows in the window.

We went with the Downeys to Brugge. FUN couple!

Brugge is called the Venice of Northern Europe

in a candy shop

this is after donna started behaving! haha.

I got my girls scarves at this store!

specifically-got britt that red scarf!

the canals in Brugge were beautiful

we ate fries at this side-walk cafe. YUM! With mayo!

and we bought delicious pastries to take back to our hotel!

funny-one arch. haha.

bill and his dinner at St-Lauriens. I forgot to take a shot of my Flander Stew. :(

And Gent:

we headed off to Gent for a few hours of sightseeing!

public bathrooms for men. lol. I know someone who used it!

the details on the architecture is STUNNING!

inside a cathedral. these cathedrals are ALL huge. and stunning.

a cutie-pie racing through the square.

another side-walk cafe.

Gent had fabulous shopping. We got our boys carving knives, Billy a cool t-shirt, and loads of chocolates!

me and my knight in shining armor...even if he is a bit bent over.