Between our US and Sweden trips, we had a few days to wash clothes and repack in Belgium, and to our surprise, it snowed!  Despite the stories I’ve been told that it never snows in Brussels, we got a few inches.  Thanks to public transportation, Thomas and I ventured around town.

Thomas and Dallas in the snowy park

We headed downtown for the Brussels Christmas Market.  Many cities in Europe hold handcraft markets throughout December – Brussels’ seemed to focus on knit hats, jewelry, and food items.  We enjoyed the food, trying boudin blanc (white sausage), waffles, frites with mayonnaise, croustillions (doughnut holes), apple cider, hot chocolate, and Christmas beer.  Our favorite part was along Brussels’ Chinatown, where there were Himalayan throat singers and yurts selling traditional Tibetian crafts.

Dallas has traditional Belgian frites - with mayonnaise, in a paper cone, with a fork

We also decided to head to our local Sunday market at Weiner Place.  Many of the booths were closed, but we found a few that were using the snow to  keep their produce chilled.  We grabbed some lunch at a nearby pizza place, and then went for a walk through a couple nearby parks.  It was fun to see all the people out enjoying the snow – we even saw some trying out cross-country skis and snowshoes.

Snowy Produce for sale

I just have to share this photo because this is the most popular Christmas decoration outside Brussels apartments.  They’re little Santa dolls that are set up to look like they’re crawling in the windows.  In Belgium, children leave their shoes out on December 5th for Sinterklaas, and his assistant Zwarte Piet (Black Pete), to fill with candy.  The kids leave carrots for Sinterklaas’ horse, and Zwarte Piet climbs down the chimney (hence the black face) to leave the gifts, or if they’ve been bad, leave them sticks, or kidnap them and take them to Spain.

Brussels' main apartment Christmas decoration

Anyway, if you’d like to see more of our photos, they’re on PicasaWeb:

• Brussels Snow Photos (20 photos)

Related posts:

1. Snow Day
2. Driving around Brussels
3. The Tour de France in Brussels
4. Expat Groups in Brussels