A birthday weekend.

Last weekend we took a little family get-a-way for Michael's 2nd birthday! We stayed in Vienna overnight and enjoyed the beautiful Vienna Zoo, Mass at the cathedral, and checking out Vienna's amusement park. Michael was very excited to take the bus to the city (Fienna, he calls it) and enjoyed all the extra love and attention. Two girls from ITI joined us on taking the early bus from Trumau and we stopped for some coffee after arriving at the Vienna bus station.

 Michael always like chatting with the girls!

 These monkeys grabbed our attention as soon as we entered the zoo - they seriously sounded like opera singers and were quite entertaining.

 

Michael especially enjoyed the giraffes and kept pointing out,"Mama giraffe, Papa giraffe, Baby giraffe." The baby was sure cute!

 

 The penguins were also a highlight.

 Dominic is starting to get used to the stroller more now.

 Michael loved the little play areas that were scattered throughout the zoo.

 The boys finally fell asleep for their afternoon nap around 2pm. So we stopped to soak up the delicious sunlight on the steps of the Kaiser Pavilion.

Lights out for our two monkeys!

 

 

We exited the zoo at one point to hop over to the Schonbrunn Palace gardens and the Gloriette. This structure was first built in 1775 as the last of the garden buildings, and was used as a breakfast and company party room for emperor Franz Joseph I.  It was destroyed in WW II and then rebuilt in 1947.

 The upper gardens provide such a great view of Vienna!

 Not many 2 year-olds get to spend their birthday on the grounds of a Hapsburg palace...

 We tried a group photo...

 

The next day, Sunday, we attended Mass at the cathedral and then strolled the city a bit, letting Michael stop to inspect whatever his little heart desired. Horse-drawn carriages are a big favorite of his.

 Helping to push the stroller - not so easy on cobblestones!

 "Papa do it."

 There are always more churches that we haven't seen; here is Schottonkirche.

 

I wanted to take Michael to the St. Michael's church to say a special prayer to his patron saint. This church is located next to the Hofburg Palace and houses the tombs of many of Vienna's royalty.

 Beautiful sculptures over the altar depict the battle of the angels.

 

The 300 year-old organ was being renovated and we were able to hear a bit of the pipes!

 After lunch we headed over to Vienna's Prater - a large public park area which provides playgrounds, sports areas, and the Wurstelprater Amusement Park. It is a nice setup as admission to the park is free, and each ride is individually owned by small businesses or companies, so you pay per ride. It was so fun to see Michael enjoying himself and giggling a lot!

 He and I went on a little Arctic ride, which was cute, but mostly in the dark, so halfway through Michael started asking where Papa was and got upset thinking we had left him behind.

 Highlight for the birthday boy - this little car ride. We thought he might be afraid to go alone, but after watching other children do it, he jumped right in and asked for his seat belt! I think he could have ridden this all day.

 

We had planned to get home in the late afternoon and make dinner and cake, but alas, we are still learning the in's and out's of public transportation, especially the weekend schedules! There was no bus going to Trumau at the time we thought, so we had to wait 1.5 hrs for the next bus. Thankfully, Vienna's cafes supply delicious cakes and goodies, so we picked something up on the way. 

 Earlier in the week, I had been showing Michael pictures from his 1st birthday, and he remembered that he had a party hat then and wanted to wear one again. I quickly made him this crown.

 Michael had been saying, "Happy birthday to meeee!" for most of the day - I don't know where he got that, but it sure was cute.

Such a goofball. We love you so much, little man!