Is That Art?

Lucky for us, this was the closest thing we saw to modern art in the Louvre, so we didn't need to rack our brains on deep questions like: what is art? There's no doubt that the architecture of the historic buildings (the museum opened in 1793) is definitely art with amazing details and beautiful paintings on the ceilings. We weren't impressed, however, with the maps on the walls because we found ourselves lost multiple times. Eventually, we'd seen enough and it was time to venture outside for a ride on the ferris wheel to see another grand view of the city.

Sleeping Beauty...

Although the girls enjoyed the audio tour explaining many of the pieces in the Louvre (with merely 1,000 of the 35,000 pieces with explanations of which we did just a fraction), Ashlynn was done after a few hours. Here she is taking a nap in a room full of 24 large Rubens; good thing he's dead or he'd be greatly insulted. Luckily, after a stop for lunch on the 2nd floor with a lovely view of the Pyramid, she had enough energy to finish seeing Napoleon III's apartment from the 19th Century and the Medieval Louvre from 1190 in the basement.

Masterpieces...

I'd like to say that it's my new interest in art since my exposure to all those Dutch Masters that fed my desire to visit the Louvre. Sadly, the real reason is much cornier than that-- I've wanted to go since reading "The Da Vinci Code". On our last visit to Paris, we did all the silly photos with the Pyramid and the Inverted Pyramid without actually entering the world's most famous art museum. Now it was time to see the big stuff--The Mona Lisa. We were thrilled that there weren't any lines at the ticket window and only one group of Japanese tourists at the painting itself. I was not disappointed. It is truly a masterpiece. I definitely like the theory that it's a self-portrait of Da Vinci. Jimmy agrees, but has an additional theory that the one on display is a fake and that the real one is locked up in some vault deep in the recesses of the museum reinforcing that it's often the intrigue behind a piece of art that makes it a masterpiece. Veronica thought it was "funny that there were two guards just standing next to it" and liked the background of the painting. Ashlynn thought it was funny that it's "just a picture of a girl; it's tiny, but pretty". As you might have noticed, this photo isn't of the Mona Lisa but of the Venus de Milo with our two masterpieces.

One More...

Sorry, but just had to include one more photo from the Champs Elysees. We enjoyed walking around so much with all those lights, that we decided to skip finding a cafe and got sandwiches to eat on the go. Thankfully, there was a great boulangerie still open. It might have been off-season in Paris, but you sure couldn't tell by the huge crowds on the streets at 10pm.

That Famous Tower...

Of course, no trip to Paris is complete without at least taking some photos of the Eiffel Tower. Built in 1889, it's the tallest structure in Paris at 1,070 feet and one of the most recognized symbols in the world. While 6.5 million people visit it each year, we opted not to visit it this trip. We simply enjoyed seeing it at night with lots of twinkling lights.

A View from the Top...

Looks like our stair climbing for the day wasn't over. When we realized that the Arc de Triomphe (commissioned by Napolean Bonaparte in 1806, he died before it was finished in 1836) was still open, we knew we had to see the view from the top. Another 282 steps later, you're seeing what we saw from this 165 foot high monument. What a fantastic view of possibly the world's most famous street. It still amazes me to see all that traffic and find out that the avenue was built in 1670, over 200 years before cars were invented.

City of Lights...

Although the kids were in denial that they were tired despite walking out our door at 6:15am that morning, we were able to coerce them into taking a family nap late in the afternoon. With a 2nd wind, we were able to hit the streets again. It was quite magical when we exited the Metro and saw our first view of the Champs Elysees lit up for Christmas as shown in this photo. Paris definitely earns its name of City of Lights at this time of year.

Definitely Worth the Climb...

The day after school let out for the holidays, we hopped a train (ok, it was actually 3 trains, but who's counting?) to Paris for the weekend. I have to admit I wasn't impressed with Paris during my first visit back in 1998. Luckily I was willing to give the city another chance, which paid off with a great visit in 2005 with the Agrios family and now a fantastic weekend on our own. This time we went to Montmarte to tour Sacre Coeur, the Basilica of the Sacred Heart built in 1914 on Paris' highest point. Of course, we couldn't resist going as high as possible, so we climbed the 284 stairs to the top of the dome where we got a great view of the city. Afterwards, we wandered the streets in search of the Moulin Rouge in honor of the movie of the same name that we love so much. Somehow we hadn't realized it would be surrounded by theaters specializing in lap dances, so we didn't hang out long.

One Scary Zwarte Piet...

Sinterklaas was nice enough to pay a visit to Jimmy's company holiday party, but strangely Jimmy had disappeared. Perhaps this Zwarte Piet scared him away? I wouldn't be surprised if he gave several of the kids nightmares. Apparently the controversy of the Piets has grown over the last few years, which is detailed on a separate page on Wikipedia. Historically, the Piets were Moorish slaves, hence their dark skin. Now, they have dark skin because of the soot from chimneys. In Amsterdam, policitally-correct rainbow-colored Piets visited instead. To check out David Sedaris' irreverent look at this holiday, click here.

Those Zwarte Piets Always Make Us Laugh...

After their arrival, Sinterklaas and his 250 Zwarte Piets (Black Peters), paraded through the streets of Den Haag. This photo was taken just before the parade started and you can see that the Piets use a variety of methods to get around. The best part is that they pass out pepernotens (small ginger cookies) and oranges. They also have a mischevious side, and if you've been a bad child, rumor has it that a Piet will scoop you up, stuff you in his bag and take you away to Spain. What a pleasant holiday story for the kiddies--too bad more kids don't believe it.

Sinterklaas Arrives...

On November 18th, while Veronica was off at a birthday party, we took Ashlynn down to the Scheveningen Harbor to see Sinterklaas arrive on his ship from Spain. (Sint was born in Turkey in 280, but now lives in a palace in Madrid. While Wikipedia claims that he's the basis of the North American Santa Claus, we all know he's really Santa's cousin.) It was quite a sight to see the ship pull in with Zwarte Piets dancing and hanging from every surface. Sint was in town for 3 weeks visiting children around the country. Apparently our girls must have been good this year, because a Zwarte Piet snuck into our house the last night before returning to Spain, and filled the girls' wooden shoes with candy and gave them each a small Delft pottery box.

Prettige Feestdagen!

As we get ready to head to France for two weeks, I leave you with what is possibly my final entry until the New Year. There's a rumor that we might have an Internet connection, but I won't believe it until I see it. So just in case:

Happy Hanukkah!
Merry Christmas!
Happy New Year!



Don't forget to make the following New Year's Resolution:

I need to get my butt to Holland!

P.S. If you're planning on mailing a Xmas card but haven't gotten around to it, save stamps and trees and drop me an email with some photos instead.

A Royal Family...

As Class Mum, I get to choose first which activities to help with. First, I went with the class to the old prison and saw lots of ancient torture devices. Now it was Tudor Day and I couldn't resist the idea of renting a costume for the first time and getting to be royal with Veronica; the entertainment value of the visit to the costume warehouse was well worth the price of the rentals. Sadly, it was raining that morning so we didn't get to wear our costumes on the train. I may have felt like a queen, but my duties for the day were hardly royal. I was in charge of soap making, although we cheated by starting with soap flakes instead of lye and lard, and helped with banquet preparation and clean up. Veronica volunteered to be a servant for the banquet. Since she was overdressed, she was made the noblewoman in charge of the servants, which she thoroughly enjoyed.

Tudor Day...

One of the cool things they do at the girl's school is have the British company "History Off the Page" visit each year group once a year. In November, they visited Veronica's year for Tudor Day. As you can see, most of the kids in her class rented costumes ranging from servants to Queen "Burn those Heretics" Mary to King "Off with her Head" Henry VIII. In the morning the kids did a variety of activities from the 1500's such as soap, medicine and ink making, candle dipping, stitching, archeology digging (Veronica's favorite), and visiting the barber surgeon. In the afternoon, there was a grand banquet with the kids as jesters, dancers, tumblers, singers and actors. What a fun way to study history.

Lost in Translation...

If you can't say the word "lost," are you? You might be surprised to learn that it is actually possible to get lost at the beach. Of course, beyond the obvious that you know that you're at the beach and what direction you're traveling, you might not actually know where you are. Case in point--we took the train about an hour south of Valencia to what we thought was a beach resort area. When we didn't see any resorts, we started walking north. By the time we stopped for lunch all we could find open was a Chinese restaurant. Then we kept walking, beachcombing along the way. Although we knew we were paralleling the train tracks, we didn't know how to cut across the fields to get to a station. Eventually we made it to another town in time to see the sunset. At this point we went into a grocery store and attempted to ask for help. Luckily there was a nice couple who spoke English and helped us find a bus to a station about 3 miles away. Amazingly, after we returned and geeky Jimmy plotted our GPS path on Google Earth, we discovered we'd walked 8 miles barefoot along the edge of the Mediterranean. More amazing was that our adventure girls never complained once.

Valuable Lessons Learned in Spain...

* I should have paid more attention to Senor Flores in middle school Spanish class. While I was shocked how many basic words came back to me (una mas cervaza, por favor), it would have been nice to have been able to converse in Spanish.

* It's OK to have chocolate for dinner when in a country famous for its chocolate. What's better than dark chocolate fondue with fruit along with hot dark chocolate milk so thick you have to eat it with a spoon?

* When you happen upon a smoke-free restaurant, you're so thrilled that you don't really care about the food. Granted, the tapas restaurant that we found was very affordable and tasty, but didn't serve tapas as we expected. Basically they were all mini sandwiches, including the dessert shown which was a chocolate bar served on a warm baguette.

A Glimpse of the Future?

Valencia has quite a mix of architectural styles, but most of what we saw was fairly conservative. When we caught our first glimpse of the City of Arts and Sciences, we were quite shocked by the contrast. Five buildings have been built since 1996 on a dry river bed in a very futuristic style. This photo shows the performing arts center. L'Oceanografic, an open-air oceanographic park, was amazing with much of the aquarium actually underground. There was the best observation tunnel that we've ever walked through; it was quite eerie when the sharks went overhead. There was also a great dolphin show featuring 11 dolphins performing at once, although the music playing from "Oklahoma" and other Broadway plays seemed a strange choice.

A Shopper's Delight...

When we travel, we often find ourselves drawn to the local markets and Valencia was no exception. The street markets were mostly jewelry, scarves, knick-knacks and paella pans (when you visit, we'll use our new massive pan that Jimmy somehow crammed in his backpack). The Mercado Central, one of the largest markets in Europe, was in a huge modernist building. Jimmy loved the smells, while I wasn't crazy about the aroma from the huge variety of meats. I especially felt guilty walking past the fish stalls knowing that we were going to an aquarium later in the day. Since most of the foods were raw, we were stuck eating warm pastries heaped with chocolate for breakfast for several days. Luckily, some sacrifices are worth it.

Cutting School Again!

As much as we value education, sometimes it's hard to resist cutting school to go on holiday. In early November we pulled the girls out for 3 days to tag along on a business trip to Valencia, Spain. If you're not familiar with Valencia, don't feel bad because we weren't either. It may be Spain's 3rd largest city (population 900,000), but it doesn't draw tourists like Barcelona or Madrid. It's famous for the Valencia orange (also grown in Valencias in California and Florida) and paella (the original recipe is made with rice, chicken, rabbit and saffron). We enjoyed exploring the many alley ways (some dating back to Roman times), the museums, the America's Cup exhibits for the upcoming races, and the botanical gardens.

An American Halloween in Holland...

I've really grown to love Halloween over the last few years and was bummed to find out that the Dutch don't really celebrate it. They celebrate Sint Maarten's Day on November 11th (when we were in Spain), which is similar with the singing of songs in exchange for treats, but without the cool costumes. We attempted to do a Halloween Hash, but didn't get enough interest. The girls were happy to be able to go trick or treating on November 4th in the American enclave of Wassenaar. Somehow it just didn't have the great atmosphere that I'm used to. We contributed money towards candy and got a list of houses that would be participating. It was extremely crowded because there was lots of kids but not many houses. Nothing like the great times we've had in Cary, but the kids still had fun. Luckily it doesn't take much to amuse them. It's probably hard to tell, but Veronica was Jasmine from Aladdin and Ashlynn was a cowgirl complete with her own horse.

50 Cents Goes a Long Way...

...It might only buy a small cup of nectar at Avifauna, a local bird park, but it's money well spent because of how many birds flock to you. While the park isn't nearly as spectacular as the monkey park, it was a fun way to spend the end of our half term break with our friends Sally, David and Andrew. The kids really loved the massive playground with the high corkscrew slides and the flying bird show, but feeding these parakeets was definitely the high point.

Yeah! Veronica Got Her "A"

Veronica missed the official test for her first swimming diploma when we were in Spain (sorry, still waiting for those photos from the lab), but the instructor was nice enough to give her a private test. The exam starts with her dressed in shorts and tests for a variety of survival skills (treading water, floating and underwater swimming) as well as stroke skills (breaststroke, inverted breaststroke, crawl and backstroke--her strongest stroke). This photo shows her after diving in and swimming underwater for 3 meters. She was quite excited when she was presented with a diploma and a stuffed hippo (must be some warped Dutch humor that an animal known for killing swimmers is chosen as a mascot for a pool, but at least he's cute).

Survival Swimming...

Yes, you are actually seeing Veronica intentionally jumping into a pool with her clothes on. Swim lessons here are very different than what we were used to in NC. In fact, they are quite intense as they primarily focus on survival training. Luckily we were able to squeeze into some lessons taught in English back in April. Veronica was the oldest in the class and could already dive, but had to learn breaststroke and inverted breaststroke in order to move up to a more advanced class. In preparation for her first test, she was switched in September to a twice weekly Dutch class with mostly 6-year-olds, and Ashlynn moved along into beginner Dutch lessons. While Ashlynn's swimming hasn't improved greatly, at least she can now ride her bike the 15 minutes to the pool (although she still can't start herself or stop without jumping off, which is obviously not so safe--too bad we can't put her in Survival Biking lessons).

First Family Portrait...

When we first got a glimpse of this calf, we knew that he was fairly young. As we got closer, we realized that we were watching him take his first steps. He was still wet from his big journey. We were so distracted by watching the labor nurse eating the afterbirth, that we missed our turn on our hike in the Ardennes (we spent the final night of our holiday in the northern mountains of Luxembourg). Luckily we had a topo map and were able to find our way back.

A Roman Ruins Daytrip...

It was just an hour by train to Trier, Germany which had several interesting Roman ruins to see. While we'd seen Roman baths and amphitheatres in Italy, this was our first chance to explore the tunnels below. Also thought it was interesting that there were vomitoriums at the amphitheatre. I thought it meant that there were troughs placed around because people would get sick watching the slaves being fed to lions, but actually it was the type of exits built as passages under the seats since people "spewed out" after the carnage was over.

Reflections on our 1st Year - Part 2

(Apparently Blogger isn't fond of my long lists of highs and lows, so I've split them up)

Highs:

* Travel
*Chateau with friends at Easter
* Fulfilling Veronica's dream to see the Colosseum, eating the best ice cream in the world
* Pompeii
* Vasa Museum in Sweden with Ariana & Max
* Caves in Luxembourg
* Indoor skiing in Maastricht
* Getting lost on the beach in Valencia, Spain
* Buckingham Palace, London Eye, Marks & Spencer picnics in London
* Mudrucking along the Thames in London and the beach in Ischia, Italy
* Making new friends, especially Hannah, Ma'ayan, David and Andrew
* School including learning, going on field trips and science investigations
* Getting cute British accents
* Living on the river--canoeing into Leiden, diving off the dock, watching the boats go by
* Lowering our carbon footprint--1 year without a car!
* Morning chaos getting on trains and trams
* New foods--yogurt drinks, pannekoeken, poffertjes, uitsmijters, oliebollen (oil balls), Old Amsterdam cheese, Sultana crackers, loempia
* Fantastic museums
* 6 weeks of PAID vacation
* Grandpa & Grandma's visit was solid quality time--we were sad when they left (although Ashlynn didn't miss Grandpa's "blah, blah, blah" radio programs on the computer)
* Leiden market
* Ice skating on outdoor rinks
* Riding bikes
* Starting the Dutch Treat Family Hash
* Non-dubbed US TV & uncut movies with few commercials
* Living outside the US bubble (other than TV & consumerism afforded by having an APO box)
* Windmills
* Flowers--biking through the tulip fields
* 7th Heaven Festival and silent headphone dancing
* Throwing messages in a bottle off the ferry to England
* Brielle and Leiden Liberation Festivals
* Queen's Birthday and Prinsjesdag
* Grandpa reading to Ashlynn's class
* Adjusting to our new lifesytle
* Starting a blog

Reflections on our 1st Year in Holland...

It's hard to believe, but today marks our 1-year anniversary since our big move to Holland. I'm sure it sounds corny, but we decided to recreate our first night with drinks at the Boulevard Hotel (where we lived for 5 weeks last year) and then dinner at the Italian restaurant in Scheveningen where we ate on our first night. We put the pressure on the girls by asking them to think of the highs and lows of our past year (rather than the highs and lows of the day like we usually do at dinner). The list is long, but here goes:

Lows:

* Missing our friends--call us! visit us! write us!
* Missing Adams Elementary
* Missing our house, especially our new screened in porch and firepit
* Missing the creek behind our house
* Missing the crickets and frogs singing in our yard
* Stinky scooters passing by while biking
* Our horrible washer/dryer combo (after almost 5 months of no dryer, we finally got a new horrible combo unit)
* Can't have a pet in our rental house
* Rain, wet, damp, windy rain

Experiencing Technical Difficulties...

Sorry to all who have checked my blog in the past week and have found nothing new. For some bizarre reason, I've been unable to post anything from my home computers. Definitely suspect it has to do with my carrier after trying multiple machines with different browsers, but the language barrier makes it hard to figure out what to do.

I'm at a friend's right now, but forgot to send myself the photos I wanted to upload, so you'll have to make due with this apology. Thanks for your patience! Hope to be up and running soon.

Valuable Lessons Learned in Luxembourg - Part 2

* If only we had saved all those wine bottles from the Chateau, we too could have zip-tied our own cool piece of art. This particular one filled up an entire room in the new Luxembourg Modern Art Museum. The architecture of the museum was definitely as interesting as the art and often a lot easier to understand. Designed by I.M. Pei, who designed the infamous Louvre Pyramids, it includes an incredible amount of glass and has walkways over 13th century ruins.

* Not all train stations are created equally. We're quite spoiled in Holland because many of the stations have mini-marts and sandwich shops, but in Luxembourg we had several changes of trains in abandoned stations in the middle of nowhere. At least the scenery was pretty.

Valuable Lessons Learned in Luxembourg - Part 1..

* Carry a flashlight in your travel backpack so when your husband decides to go down dark windy paths through the canyon shown, you can really be brave instead of just pretending to be. (We're standing in the Bock Casemates, a series of defense tunnels built in 963 that housed thousands of soldiers under a castle until it was demolished in 1867. The 17K of remaining tunnels were used as air raid shelters during the world wars.)

* It would be a lot cheaper if we'd just give in and eat fast food. In our effort to eat real food on holiday, we eat a lot of Italian since we rarely can find any other food that the girls will eat or we can afford. Luckily, several of our Italian meals in Luxembourg were even better than we had in Rome.

Mommy, Why are We Staying in a Hospital?

After we checking into the Luxembourg City Youth Hostel (the red and white building on the left), Ashlynn asked if hospitals all over the world let people rent rooms. Unlike Jimmy, I never experienced hostel life in college. Luckily these days you only have to be young at heart to take advantage of very affordable accomodations (about $50/night for a family room in Europe is truly a steal). In addition to a fantastic location, clean rooms and breakfast, you get to:
* Make and strip your own bed
* Take military-style showers with 30-seconds of water at a time
* Shower in the dark when the timer light turns off
* Fight with your kids over who gets the top bunk
* Moon folks across the way from the WC with no curtains

Luxembourg City -- An Unexpected Jewel...

The train ride to Luxembourg was beautiful as we passed through the mountains awash in the colors of fall. We really didn't know what to expect when we arrived in Luxembourg City, the capital of this small nation of just 500,000 people. We were pleasantly surprised at what a pretty city it was perched on a hill surrounded by 13th century ruins. We enjoyed exploring several museums, especially the Museum of History and Art which has the largest and most spectacular 3rd century Roman mosiac floor we've ever seen. The weather was great, so we spent a lot of time walking along the river shown here.

What Cool Caves...

Our fall break began with 2 nights in Maastricht, Holland's oldest and most southern town. It wasn't as quaint as I'd hoped, but was impressed with the local museums -- art, natural history, and architecture. The high point (literally and figuratively) of our visit was a tour of the St. Pietersberg Caves. We took a short boat ride outside of the city, then hiked up a hill to the mouth of the man-made cave shown here. The cave dates back to Roman times for excavations of marl, a building stone. At one time there were over 20,000 passages for 220 kilometers; today there are still 17K accessible. During World War II, it was used as a bomb shelter. Our 1-hour tour was entirely in Dutch so didn't learn much of the history, but was amazed to see works of art on many surfaces (unfortunately, the digital camera's still in the shop, so no photos from the inside). We were especially thankful the old man who led the tour remembered his way back out since there weren't any Exit signs or fancy lighting like in the US.

Country Roads, Take Me Home...

In our 10 years in North Carolina, we never managed to make it to the Blue Ridge Mountains in the fall for the changing of the leaves. During our recent October half term break, we were excited to get to the mountains in time to see the fall colors. Can you guess where we went?

Look for the answer next week when we return from our long weekend away as we tag along for another business trip.

Each and Every Day You Will See a Cow...

I still remember when I heard DJs Jeff & Jer say that about cows on the radio in San Diego. I was pulling out of my driveway in a very urban area and I thought they were crazy. That is until I turned my head and saw a wooden cow planter on my neighbor's porch. Ever since, I have seen a cow almost every day. Of course, my odds of seeing a live cow increased greatly since moving to Holland since there are 1.2 million of them here. When we first arrived, the cows were in the winter barns, but since spring we see them regularly on our school commute and on bike rides. It's especially lovely since there's few fences with the irrigation canals acting as barriers. Keep your eyes open and see how many cows you see this week.

For the Love of Beer...

Gotta love a restaurant called The Big Beer (that is if you ignore the fact that "beer" is actually Dutch for "bear"). There's no doubt that the Dutch love beer:

* In 2005 the average Dutch drank 78 liters (165 pints) compared to 21 liters (85 glasses) of wine according to CBS (Central Bureau of Statistics)
* Heineken, headquartered in Amsterdam, is the 4th largest brewer in the world with 170 brands including Amstel
* Holland is the 3rd largest exporter of beer (after Mexico and Germany), exporting 60% of it's 2.5 million liters of beer produced
* Beer's obviously a priority since it's often cheaper than soda in both restaurants and grocery stores (a case of Heineken sells for just $10)
* Mini 5 liters kegs are sold at the grocery store for under $15 to use with a home BeerTender cold tap or for one-time use

When will you be joining us for a cold one?

A Carnival View of Leiden...

It was a shock to see the quick transform- ation of our quaint town into a carnival site. All the main roads of the centrum were closed and filled with rides, games and food. Jimmy and the girls especially enjoyed the view from the ferris wheel.

Celebrating Freedom...

222 years before America's Founding Father's were celebrating liberation from England, Leiden was celebrating liberation from Spain on October 3, 1574. The city had been besieged by the Spaniards for many years. The Prince of Orange finally decided to cut the dikes to flood out the Spaniards: "Better a drowned land than a lost land." Wikipedia doesn't mention how many Dutch drowned, but the strategy worked and the Spaniards fled. Since 1575 a celebration of Thanksgiving has been held on every October 3rd with a memorial service, market, parade and carnival.

Here you see that we liberated the kids from school and were on our way to our favorite canal restaurant for a good view of the parade.

The Big Bad Grandpa...

Ashlynn was very excited when she found out that I'd signed up her grandparents to be guest readers in her 1st grade class. Grandma was very professional in her reading of a story of how a princess invented pizza. Grandpa, on the other hand, was a total ham while reading "The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs." He quickly took on the persona of Alexander T Wolf in this 1st person narrative--"You can call me Al. In fact you can call me anything, just don't call me late for dinner." By the end of the story he'd worked the kids up into a frenzy and Mrs. Cross was quite cross. She had to threaten to cancel all future guest readers to calm the kids back down. Dad was excited that he'd be remembered as the grandpa who nearly started a riot.

One Groovy Grandma...

We were very excited when Grandma arrived after visiting family in England, although she seemed to have brought the rain. We saved much of the cultural sightseeing for when she joined us--the Anne Frank House (a very powerful experience), the Mauritshuis (an amazing art museum in Den Haag that specializes in Dutch masters), the Van Gogh Museum (Ashlynn enjoyed playing tour guide since she studied the artist at school) and a candlelight tour of a 17th century castle in a neighboring town. We also saved Veronica's 9th birthday party so she could help us celebrate with our friends. She was a good sport about everything we put her through. We were especially impressed when she climbed into the girls bunk beds to read to them (design note: we didn't pick out the lovely drapes and the Kerry - Edwards sticker was already on the used bunk beds).

Democrats & Republicans Coming Together in Peace...

I was a bit nervous about entertaining such politically diverse dads, who'd only met once at our wedding 13 years ago, but I was worried for nothing. We enjoyed touring the Peace Palace (apologies for the lousy photo). This magnificient building is filled with amazing artwork from the many member nations and houses the International Court of Justice, which settles border and financial disputes between nations. After this inspirational tour you'd think we would have solved all the world's problems over lunch, but sadly we only unilaterally agreed that it should be illegal to marry your own grandmother.

Slumming it in Holland...

A week after my dad arrived, Jimmy's dad came out for a long weekend. We dragged the two of them to the Leiden market, our favorite Saturday hangout; the girls convinced Buddy into paddling into the centrum while Grandpa was relieved to ride in a city bus. In fact, we dragged both of them on many trains, trams and buses. For guys accustomed to the finer things in life, they never complained about slumming it with us in 2nd class. In this photo Veronica's showing Buddy how to tram surf.

Mother Nature Shows Off...

Just had to include this photo since it was one of the most spectacular sunsets I'd ever seen. Amazingly, it was from our front yard in late September. Not sure what the atmospheric conditions were to create such a show, but would love for it to happen again. While we do occasionally see sunsets and sunrises (sadly we wake up around here before the sun comes up about half the year), this was definitely a rare one.

Dutch Specialities...

We ate out a lot when my dad visited. While the girls were at school, he and I explored nearby towns in search for the best lunch. The runner up was an Uitsmijter (sunny side up eggs and cheese on toast) at a cafe in Haarlem. The winner was a Tuna Carpaccio sandwich at a Leiden canalside cafe. We skipped the Filet American which is raw hamburg.

We didn't eat out often for dinner because most restaurants offer multiple courses served over several hours and are quite expensive. The philosophy is that once you have a table, it's yours for the night. However, we did go out for some traditional meals-- Pannekoeken (Dutch pancakes which are similar to crepes), Rijstafel (Indonesian rice table) and the shown Mosselen (mussels steamed with wine and veggies). Eet smakelijk!

The World's Oldest Profession...

No tour of Amsterdam is complete without a walk through the infamous Red Light District dating back to the 1300's. Yes, the rumors are true, women legally sit in windows plying their trade while tourists walk by gawking. Strangely, there are even boat cruises advertised as "romantic" that specialize in the area. Not surprisingly, the area is quite sleazy with sex shows, shops and coffeehouses.

My, That's Funny Smelling Coffee...

If you're looking for a good cup of coffee, you'll want to avoid Amsterdam's coffeeshops and stick with a koffie house or cafe. As you walk through the streets of Amsterdam, it's hard to avoid the smell of marijuana pouring forth from the many coffeehouses where it's allowed (although still technically illegal) to buy and toke. As old hippies, my dad and I couldn't resist posing in front of Amsterdam's first coffeeshop, The Bulldog. Of course, we just liked the paintings.

Sharing Dutch Culture with Dad...

I must admit I was a bit nervous about hosting my dad for 10 days before my stepmom joined him for another 10 days. He's used to a lot of space and a 1st class lifestyle, but he adapted to our 2nd class existence brilliantly and we had a great time sharing father and daughter moments all over the Randstad. Here you see us at the Heineken Experience which is basically a giant ad for Heineken, but was lots of fun. Click here to check out the silly video we made.

Hanging at Schiphol...

It's an easy commute from our house on the train to Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport. Schiphol means "ship hole." Its original name was Schiphel meaning "ship hell," because many ships mysteriously got lost in the lake that existed until 1850 under its reclaimed land. Unfortunately, we haven't found those great flight tracker websites here like in the US, so we've spent many hours there this summer waiting for late flights. Luckily, there's a nice shopping center before security. There's also a giant observation deck that's smart enough to have a bar, but strangely no view of take-offs or landings. In this photo, we're meeting my father for his recent visit. The hamster is the mascot of the largest grocery store chain in Holland; personally I think anything close to a rodent doesn't make a good mascot, but it made for cute masks and a good laugh.

A View of the Royals...

Before moving here, I didn't even realize that The Netherlands had a Queen. I still don't know much about the Royal Family, but was excited about my first chance to see them even if it was from afar. On Prinsjesdag (Day of the Princes) the 3rd Tuesday of each September, Queen Beatrix, Prince Willem-Alexander (next in line to the throne) and his wife Princess Maxima ride in a golden carriage through the streets of Den Haag. They travel from the working palace to the parliament so the Queen can deliver the opening speech for the new parliamentary year. I kept the girls out of school so they could join me for lunch at a friend's apartment on a prime viewing corner. She was told there was a marine sharpshooter posted on the 5th floor balcony, but when we got permission to go up there we discovered instead of an uzi, he was armed with a very nice Nikon.

And On the Right We Have Some Crazy Americans...

Yes, it's true. Our house is actually on a tour boat route. We feel so famous. It's quite funny to look out our dining room windows and see a big old tour boat going by. This particular one specializes in dinner parties. The smaller flat roofed tour boats that Holland is known for stick to the canals in the center of Leiden. This photo also shows our favorite spot to hang out--our dock. It's a great place for snacks, after-dinner drinks, feeding the ducks and watching the sunset.

Wacky Summer Weather...

There's a saying here in Holland: If you don't like the weather, wait 5 minutes cuz it'll change (ok, they don't really say "cuz", but you get the gist). After a beautiful spring, our first summer here was filled with weather extremes. July 2006 was the hottest July on record. Luckily we were in Sweden during the week filled with days over 90°. While that's a normal summer temperature in NC, it's scorching in a country without air conditioning. We were relieved the temperatures dropped when we returned, but not so thrilled about the 3+ weeks of constant rain (especially tricky with a broken dryer). August 2006 was the wettest August on record with over 7 inches of rain (keep in mind that's without the help of a tropical storm). This photo was taken from our yard of the only rainbow we've seen here so far. Things finally dried out in September and it went on to be the hottest September on record, which meant gorgeous days around 72°. It's now October and it's swinging back to wet. I'm stubbornly refusing to take out my winter clothes in hopes of one last bit of good weather, but have learned my lesson about leaving the house without an umbrella.

Valuable Lessons Learned - Part 5

* Don't forget to bring snacks along if you ever do a race without an entry fee. Imagine our surprise when we finished a recent 5K that we were offered water and radishes at the end. Guessing the mastermind that had the brainstorm 0f giving runners 1-calorie radishes has never run in his life. Of course, you get what you pay for.

* Unless you enjoy waiting needlessly for hours at an airport or train station, it's best not to try surprising travellers who don't carry a cell phone. Somehow Jimmy managed to sneak out another door from customs at the airport and we managed to duck into a cab at a British train station thus leaving the other to wait.