Traveling companions

Look! It's so big!

We would like to introduce you to our traveling companions. Before we left on the trip, Bjorn’s friend Brett gave him a green army man that Bjorn named Robert. Emma’s friend Nikki gave her a small glass turtle. The idea was to take pictures of the toys and send them by email. If their friends couldn’t come with us, at least they could send a representative.

Bjorn also decided to bring his lego friend, Johnny Thunder. Just before we left Minnesota, our 5 year old nephew, Zach, gave us a small rubber ducky. He told us that we could call him Sharky or Fred. We decided on Fred. Then, when we got to Norway, Grandma Ruth gave the Dahla Horse to Emma for her birthday.

We took pictures at every major monument and all of us had great fun posing them in different environments. There are several pictures on the blog already. Here are a few that didn’t make it.

Snake!

Robert in roatan

Our friends hanging out at the fjorn hytte

Robot at the Eiffel Tower

Nikki's turtle

Alas, we discovered in Salzburg that Fred was no longer traveling with us. There are many theories about what happened to him. Some think he discovered his true love and ran off with her. Perhaps he liked Prague and decided to join the circus there. At any rate we were now Fredless and all of us were very sad. The search began for a new Fred. We visited every toy store we could find. No Fred.

Finally, at the Bon Marche in Paris we discovered a gigantic Fred. He was way too large to fit in any of our bags but we soon found a mesh bag filled with all sorts of Freds of various sizes. It was a package deal. They would not sell us just one Fred. It was the whole Fred family or nothing at all. We chose the whole Fred Family. Now we have about 8 little freds, one medium sized Fred, and one big Fred. But the Fred story isn’t over. We discovered Egyptian Fred at the British Museum all dressed up as a sphinx. Of course we invited him to join us on our journey.

A little fred with Egyptian Fred

Bjorn found a few lego mini figures at a store in Paris and Robot and Ninja joined us as well.

All of our little traveling companions have been wonderful entertainment for Emma and Bjorn as well as making for some interesting pictures. They provide a strong connection with friends and family at home.
Look for them in our blog posts.