One might think of the Sound of Music and all the green spaces when thinking of Austria. Vienna, though, is a city of two million people. Most apartment buildings are fiver to seven stories high, which means that the city is quite spread out. There are laws, though, about having a certain number of green spaces (parks, playgrounds, even trees!) per area. 

Although there are some homes on the outskirts of town, many people live in apartment buildings. Many of the older apartment buildings do not have balconies, whereas many of the newer ones do. 

This is our balcony that connects to our indoor living area. There is a door that we can open to go out on it, which can also be tipped to be a window (pretty cool). You can see that our apartment building is on a street with other apartment buildings nearby, parking, and public transportation is within walking distance (bus, streetcar & subway stations). 

When we walk out onto our balcony, this is the view that greets us from the third floor. The apartment building across the street went up six years ago, and even though I miss the view that the building took, the colors remind me of a rainbow. Interestingly, one of my sons made the hanging mobile (top of photo) which says, “God keeps His promises”, which goes right along with the colorful building across the street. :)  

The first photo shows how our balcony looks now, but since we were in the States for six months this year, we weren’t able to grow plants like we usually would. So this photo shows how our balcony looked last summer. :)

I do not have a green thumb! My husband is the gardener in our family, and my boys enjoy taking turns to water the plants.

Our street has room for two-way car traffic and two-way bike lanes, as well as parking, which is first come, first serve.

Our space may look quiet, but it is on a road that cars like to take as a shortcut from the main road. There is a parking garage for a grocery store on the street level (it is a huge bonus to have a grocery store in our building...something that I definitely take for granted!), as well as the garbage room for the apartment complex. When the trucks come to collect the garbage, it is is VERY loud, and it stinks!

It’s been important while raising our boys that they have places outdoors where they can run around and be boys. When they were little, we could only go to parks that had fences, as one of my boys would run everywhere. As they grew older, I could take them to parks that had more space and now, I can have them go out on their own to play for specific amounts of time (although they still enjoy it when a parent goes with them). Now that my guys are getting into their teen years, some of the outdoor activities they enjoy are soccer, American football, baseball, frisbee, and bike-riding. People often meet up at parks to have their kids play together.

I love how there are safe pathways for both those walking and bike-riding. The city of Vienna continues to add more bike lanes around the city.

I’m thankful that the area we live in has a lot of parks and areas that encourage one to get outside. We have several play areas near us that I took my kids to when they were small. Now, they just like to take a ball out to throw or kick around, so we go to a local nature area that is open. We go walking or bike-riding on nature trails that are nearby. One way that I’ve gotten my kids to go on walks when they haven’t wanted to is to go Geocaching! The app and an account are free and it gets the whole family involved!