Creative Kids...

The girls were thrilled to have two whole days to hang out with Zoe and Patrick. After a lot of random imagination games and some board games, Sophie focused their attention on learning lines for her version of Cinderella. All the kids did a great job, but Patrick was especially funny as the Godmother. It was hard to say good-bye as we have no idea when we’ll see each other again. With dreams of visiting them in Australia and hiking together in New Zealand, we’re confident that our paths will cross again someday.

Back to Brussels...

As our Aussie friends were soon to move back Down Under, we went back down to Brussels to spend a final weekend with them there. We stopped for dinner before heading to their house and came across some snow, which was an unusual sight since it was a clear fall night. Turned out that a fast food commercial was being filmed and the snow was actually soap bubbles. It was funny watching the main actor take a bite of a burger, then spit it out over and over.
The next morning, Jane took us to an open house at the Cantillon Brewery, founded in 1900. It specializes in brewing organic lambics utilizing methods from days long gone by. We took a morning tour, so we missed seeing the beer piped into this copper tray in the attic where the yeasts in the air will naturally ferment the brew. Although I normally like Kriek, a fruity lambic, I wasn’t fond of this one, but did enjoy learning about the process.

Another Halloween in Wassenaar...

The girls really wanted to get back from Cologne in time to go trick or treating in Wassenaar with friends, so we caught a morning train back. Veronica actually sewed both her Roman and Ashlynn’s medieval costumes. Jimmy’s was just a simple conversion of a toga from his 40th b’day party. Unfortunately, I had a fever, so I was stuck home alone. Veronica went to a sleepover at Ma’ayan’s and went out begging for candy with some classmates. Jimmy and Ashlynn went to a party at Jim and Nina’s. Ashlynn enjoyed helping pass out candy to the sugar-hungry masses after gathering a lot of treats herself.

Happy Holidays!

You probably already know that I gave up sending out Christmas cards a few years back, partly to help the environment, partly to save money and partly because I’m too lazy to hand write notes to everyone anymore. Besides, you’re already reading the longest holiday letter anyone could possibly write. So, this year, I asked the girls to design a card I could post here and on Facebook and here’s what they came up with.

Wishing You Peace, Love and Happiness in 2010!

A Busy Day in Cologne...

While we didn’t manage to actually smell any cologne in Cologne (where in fact eau de Cologne originated), we did visit the famous Chocolate Museum. We loved seeing chocolate being made in the factory section and couldn’t resist buying some freshly-made truffles before settling down for lunch complete with fantastic hot chocolate. We also enjoyed visiting the Olympic Museum and the cathedral, which was one of the only buildings left standing in the city center after World War II. We ended the evening at the Claudius Therme, a spa with a huge pool fed from a thermal mineral spring.

Puts REI to Shame...

When I saw that the Cologne tourist guide mentioned an outdoor adventure store in the Attractions section, we figured it was worth checking out. Boy was it right! Globetrotter was totally amazing! Four stories packed with adventure wear and gear. In addition, there was an aquarium with jellyfish, a pool for testing kayaks and taking scuba classes, a climbing wall within a bridge to an adjacent store, and a full-service restaurant (where we ate dinner). When Jimmy said he was going to test out the Goretex testing machine, Ashlynn quickly volunteered to join him. Unlike her daddy, she was smart enough to put on rainproof trousers and boots in addition to the coat. She managed to stay dry underneath the waterproofs in the storm cabinet, but silly Jimmy’s jeans and hiking boots got soaked.

Our Little Daredevils...

We were all really impressed with Phantasialand. The park was beautiful and the rides were of a high quality. We loved the ice skating show so much that we went to see it twice; hard to go wrong with this family when the music’s from West Side Story. The girls were thrilled to have an entire day with Jimmy so they could go on the daredevil rides that I was too chicken to ride. Ashlynn was greatly disappointed when she found out she was too short to go on the Tabocan shown above, which you couldn’t have paid me to ride. I did go on three of the rollercoasters, but skipped the Mambo, which did multiple twists; even Jimmy said he was dizzy after he got off. It’s interesting to see everyone’s tolerance; Ashlynn was too scared to go in the haunted house, but didn’t hesitate to go on the freefalling elevator, which Veronica and I skipped.

Off to Another Amusement Park...

As our October break approached, we still hadn’t figured out where to go. Since Jimmy couldn’t get away for the entire week, we knew we couldn’t venture too far. Since we’d visited amusement parks in the last two Octobers without him, we decided this was the year to finally visit one with him. I chose Phantasialand just outside of Cologne, Germany, which we could reach by train in under four hours. Us girls went down in the early morning to spend a half day in the park after checking into the hotel. The girls were surprised that we were staying in the fancy Asian-themed hotel adjacent to the park; Ashlynn was thrilled that it was an even date so she could chose the top bunk. Jimmy arrived that evening in time to join us for a nice Asian buffet dinner.

The Art of Fashion?

The exhibition that we visited was called The Art of Fashion. Similar to the last fashion exhibition we saw, this one was full of completely insane designs that no one would or could actually wear. For instance, where would you put your head if you wore this concoction of sequined purses stitched together? All-in-all, we had a great laugh and a lot of fun. Our favorite item wasn’t actually part of the exhibition, but rather the coat rack in the entranceway of the Museum van Boijmans Beuningen. We were fascinated by the series of strings, pulleys and locks so that lifted coats up near the ceiling. If we had space, I’m sure Jimmy would love building something similar.

Sights in Rotterdam...

I’m always on the lookout for places to visit in Holland and often try dragging friends along with me. I was successful in getting Sally, Darlene and Terri to come along to Rotterdam to see an exhibition at a museum. Terri then dragged along her friend Habe, who was visiting from London. We started out the day at the Rotterdam Central Market, where we bought a variety of cheap veggies and snacks. As we were heading to lunch, we came across this unusual statue of a gnome. You can use your imagination to figure out what he’s carrying.

Dutch 101 - It’s All Mixed Up

Since we’ve moved here, we’ve had to adjust to using the metric system and military time for train and school schedules. In addition, there’s also some fundamental differences to learn how the Dutch communicate:

* Telling time: 1:15 is quarter after 1:00, but everything after 1:15 is told in relation to the next hour, so 1:16 is 14 till half before 2:00 and 1:34 is 4 after half before 2:00 (confused yet?)
* Counting: 1-20 is the same concept, but for all numbers above 21 the order is switched. So 95 would be said: 5 and 90.
* Negatives: There’s no equivalent of “Don’t.” So instead of saying “I don’t speak Dutch,” it’s “I speak none Dutch.”
* Letter sounds: Their “E” = our “A”, “I” = “E”, “V” = “F”, and “W” = “V.” It is a very guttural language with “G” sounding like gargling.

Lucky for me, the majority of Dutch speak great English. Of course, this has also hindered my efforts to learn the language and after four years, my Dutch still stinks.

A Happy Third Wheel...

Jimmy and I hoped we could sneak away with Darlene and Mike before they moved back to the US. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find a good weekend for someone to look after the girls, so I ended up leaving Jimmy behind for a weekend in Lille, France. We left on Saturday morning and headed to some outlet stores, which were nothing special, then into this city near the Belgium border. We had a fantastic seafood dinner (I had ray, which was delicious), then crawled into bed to watch a movie. On Sunday we did a lot of walking around. Unfortunately, the shops and fort were all closed, but we still managed to have an enjoyable day.

Our New “Pets”

Early in October, we dogsat for Darlene’s dog Lance. When out for a final walk one night at 10pm, Lance started barking like a madman. Turns out there was a hedgehog on the lawn. Jimmy and the girls sprung quickly into action planning a hedgehog feeding station. They scrounged some scrap lumber from a neighbor’s construction project and built a large box. Here’s our first visitor playing dead. The girls named him Hedgy.
Hedgehogs are spiky, but basically harmless. A few weeks later, the girls realized that a 2nd hedgehog had paid us a visit for a free peanut butter sandwich. They then marked their backs with some fabric paint, so they could tell them apart. The mad scientist in Jimmy then took over and soon our feeding station had its very own motion sensor and webcam with infrared lights (probably the only one of its kind in Holland). By the end of November, we were up to five hedgehogs paying us visits. Check them out on the girls’ blog.

Our Frisbee Girls...

As a 4th grader, Ashlynn wouldn’t have normally been invited to play in the Dutch Jr. National Ultimate Frisbee Championships, but her coach made an exception for her since he knows how dedicated she is and her big sister was playing. We were very proud of her as the youngest player that she stuck through an entire day of her team getting creamed in on-and-off rain. Here you can see that she had the thrill of scoring!
Veronica normally plays with the Gray Lions, who came in 2nd, but was bumped down at the last minute to the blue team, who came in 4th. When the two teams met in the semi-finals, the Gray Lions stomped on them, but at least Veronica scored. As the team captain for the day, she learned a lot about strategy. Despite what a long day it was, I was surprised how much fun it was to watch (although I am relieved that there’s only a few tournaments a year).

An American Dream in Leiden...

Every year Leiden celebrates its liberation from Spain on October 3, 1574. This year October 3rd happened to be on a Saturday, so Jimmy was available to come along to their big parade. The weather was questionable, so the girls wimped out and we cycled there without them. We managed to find a great place to stand on a narrow street near the end of the parade route. One local family was thrilled to have Americans to buy beer for and explain things to, although many of the groups were easy for us to figure out since the theme happened to be America.

Let’s Go Fly a Kite...

After missing this for the last three years, I made sure that we wouldn’t miss the International Kite Festival in Scheveningen by arranging a Dutch Family Hash at the beach. It was a beautiful day, which was perfect for a hash and for kite flying. We didn’t actually fly any kites ourselves, but we enjoyed seeing the colorful variety of kites from 20 countries.

Going Dutch...

Soon after the newcomer’s guide came out in February, Terri and I were recruited to be co-editors for the magazine of the American Women’s Club for the club year from September through June. By some miracle, we were able to recruit Meg, a philosophy professor for the State of Tennessee who teaches via video from The Hague, to be our layout manager. Somehow we managed to pull together our first issue while Terri was in France and I was in America. It was exciting when the three of us were finally in the same place at the same time and could celebrate our first issue. By now, we’re finishing up the January issue. Five down, five to go!