Learning to Sail...

Veronica looked forward all year to the week-long Year 9 trip to Poole, England. They left early on a Sunday morning in early July to make the long drive, which included their bus being loaded onto the Eurotunnel train. She was especially excited that she and five of her friends got to stay in an unsupervised holiday caravan while most of the students were in a hostel with the teachers. As part of the British national curriculum, the primary focus of the trip was to learn how to sail on four of the days. Here you see Veronica and her friend Emilie on a 2-passenger sailboat. They also sailed on 5-passenger boats with an instructor. One day they went kayaking and she got a turn at driving a power boat.In the evenings, there were a variety of activities including: watching a movie, visiting a water slide park, going bowling and going fishing. Poor Veronica was excited that she caught nine mackerels until she realized that they were going to be eaten, at which time she broke down crying. Despite that, she had a great week!

A Very Special Night...

It was an action-packed evening for the kids with lots of dancing. Within Veronica’s set of friends, only one of the girls has a boyfriend, so they danced as a big group. I was shocked that they included Ashlynn, who had a blast being with the big kids. In addition to Jimmy taking squish pics and me taking candids, there was a giant group shot taken out on the lawn which even us helpers were in.

At the end of the evening it was officially time to say “Bye Bye, Blue!” Each kid grabbed a blue helium balloon with a note tied on that they’d written earlier in the night. When Madame Chantal asked the local government for permission for the balloon release, they were initially horrified because they thought she meant hot-air balloons. Anyways, it was quite a sight to see those 125 blue balloons take flight while knowing that all these kids will soon be taking flight as high schoolers.

Bye Bye Blue 2011...

As the Year 9 kids switch from blue jumpers (sweatshirts) in middle school to black jumpers in high school, Madame Chantal (Veronica’s favorite French teacher) hosts Bye Bye Blue. The girls all looked so grown up.

Here’s one of the photos that Jimmy took of the girls in Veronica’s class (plus Ashlynn, of course!) There’s too many good photos to show here, so click here if you want to see the video of the rest.

Look Who’s Growing Up...

After helping set up, it was time for Veronica to get dressed for the big dance. What a major transformation as she put on her first truly grown up dress along with her first pair of heels (which she quickly ditched while dancing). It was apropos that Jim was around to see her wear the necklace that Susan gave her for her 12th birthday. I’m still trying to figure out how such goofy looking parents have such a beautiful daughter.

Setting Up for Squish Pics...

Immediately after returning from a business trip to Turkey, Jimmy headed to Rotterdam to pick up the lights that he rented for his photo shoot at the big Year 8 dance. Luckily Terri had loaned us her SUV, which came in very handy carrying all the gear that he needed. It took several hours to set everything up. Raising the backdrop up to the 2nd story of the atrium was tricky, but he was able to recruit several helpers.

Luckily Jimmy’s dad arrived just in time to help. The original plan was for him to take Ashlynn home when the event started, but surprisingly Veronica decided that Ashlynn could stay to help; no doubt that Ashlynn’s lucky to have such an understanding big sister. Jim was a great sport about being put to work and really seemed to enjoy himself.

Final Year 5/6 Summer Fair...

After attending the Year 5/6 (4th/5th grade) Summer Fair for the past five years, it was hard to believe that this would be the last as Ashlynn prepared to finish primary school. Under Masha’s artistic direction, Ashlynn, Sara and Sarah helped her make this wonderful tennis ball toss as part of their obstacle course for the younger students. I’m clearly biased, but theirs was the coolest booth.

Their booth also featured colored hairspray, which was a big hit. Ashlynn’s hair had orange and blue stripes. While she was busy working her booth and doing a dance presentation under her PE coach’s expert direction, I was busy working the snack bar. It was a fun day for all the kids and helped to raise € 2,500 for a variety of charities (the portion for Ashlynn’s class went to the World Society for the Protection of Animals.)

One Big Piece of Cloth...

When Jimmy found out that I’d been asked to help take photos at the Year 9 (8th grade) end-of-year celebration and dance (which the school hosts for the middle schoolers instead of a graduation ceremony), he quickly volunteered to help as well. He quickly dreamed of doing squish pics, much like we did way back in 1996 in Kathy & Phil’s living room the night before we left San Diego. He figured out where to rent the right equipment, but needed to buy a giant piece of muslin to use as a backdrop. Once he found the cloth, he realized it was too big to prep as a backdrop, so he took it to the cafeteria at work where he could stretch it out. As you can see, it’s one big piece of cloth. Will be interesting to see how he transforms the school atrium into a photo studio.

Fun at the Leiden Boat Parade...

Somehow we let five years go past before getting out to see another Leiden boat parade. Pretty silly of us considering how much we enjoyed it. I wasn’t very optimistic that there would be any seats left at the dive Italian cafe that James had discovered, but we lucked out and got the last table at the water’s edge along the main canal. Definitely great front-row seats to this fun two-hour parade.

Celebrating Ashlynn’s 11th Birthday...

Ashlynn had a very exciting birthday as she left that day on a 4-night trip to the Ardennes in the Belgium mountains for a school trip. We finally celebrated her birthday with a party on June 18th at our house. We had our usual family BBQ and pool party followed by a slumber party. In addition to these five girls, we also had three big girls as Veronica had two friends spend the night. Jimmy and I went to bed at midnight, but these crazy girls were up until 4 a.m.

Let’s Hit the Pool!

After weeks of working on the pool, Jimmy had it clean enough for Ashlynn’s party on June 18. Ashlynn had actually asked to postpone her party so the pool could be ready. Unfortunately, it rained earlier in the day. We pushed back the start time and even had a bit of sun late in the afternoon. We were actually lucky because our last guest made it home just minutes before the skies opened up.

Baking Lessons...

Veronica’s good friend Adelina is really into baking and is especially talented at cake decorating. When she heard that Ashlynn was having a birthday party, she volunteered to sleep over the night before so she could give Ashlynn a cake baking and decorating lesson. She brought all her tools, including black and white fondant to make an orca (Ashlynn’s favorite animal) which sat atop blue icing on a chocolate cake. Adelina was a patient and good teacher, so hopefully Ashlynn learned a lot. Best of all, the cakes were delicious.

Auditioning for Juggling Jobs?

Jimmy starting teaching Veronica how to juggle when she was 11-years-old. She really started getting the hang of it when we were in Greece in October. Now that she’s got the basics down, he figured it was time to teach her how to steal. And what better setting to learn this new skill than at Disney? Here they are at the small stage at Disney Village, which we walked through to get from our hotel to the parks.  

Many eyes were upon Veronica as she stood on Main Street while waiting for the parade to begin. She also practiced with Jimmy while waiting in line for rides. Our final ride of the trip was the Disney Railroad with over an hour wait. She provided a lot of entertainment for her fan club of six little French kids.

Eating at Disney...

We began each day with the breakfast buffet at the hotel, which was included in our package. The fruit salad was surprisingly fresh and yummy, but the scrambled eggs were the worst we’d ever had. We’re not sure what they injected into the eggs, but they were too fluffy and flavorless to be regular eggs. A few days we had sandwiches for either lunch or dinner, but we splurged on good meals more than we’d expected. We had one lunch and one dinner at the Blue Lagoon, the restaurant within the Pirates of the Caribbean ride; the girls had a blast trying to get folks in the boats to wave back. Ashlynn loved the tortellinis with the Mickey Mouse shaped plate. She was disgusted that I ate parrotfish after seeing them while diving in Bonaire, but it was delicious, as was the seafood and mango salad. Lunch came with dessert, but as dinner was a la carte, we shared a creme brulee, which was set aflame as you see above. We also ate at Agrabah Cafe twice, which was a fantastic Mediterranean buffet featuring a huge assortment of vegetarian dishes.

Disney-Style Entertainment...

 When we went to Disneyworld in 2005, we got into pin trading (you buy pins you don’t want and trade them with Disney employees to get pins you do want). So, we grabbed our old lanyards, bought a bunch of Minnie Mouse pins and traded pins for several days. My favorite is the Mickey peace symbol; Ashlynn’s is Stitch.

While both parks had a parade (it was funny hearing some of the characters speaking French), we were surprised that neither had a proper show with singing and dancing. Luckily there were a few other shows to entertain us. The Studio’s stunt show featuring cars and motorcycles was so fantastic that we went back to watch it a second time. We also watched an amazing movie twice that magically put actor Martin Short into actual footage of movies throughout the decades.

Favorite Rides...

We suspect that it was all those wild rides in the baby jogger that turned Ashlynn into such a fan of roller coasters. We really looked forward to taking her on the Rock ‘n’ Roller Roller Coaster and she loved it. We enjoyed it, but didn’t think it was quite as good as Florida’s version since it was in darkness rather than filled with neon signs. She also loved Space Mountain (this one went upside down). I preferred Big Thunder Mountain, which was extra exciting as it was on an island accessed by a tunnel under the lake. The ride that surprised me the most was the Tower of Terror. I expected to hate it, but loved it; the set-up to the ride was great with just enough creepiness but not too big of drops.

Fun Times at Disney...

To be honest, after everything I read about Disneyland Paris, I had fairly low expectations. Much to my pleasure, we had a great time. Yes, there are only two parks (Disneyland and Walt Disney Studios) and they are much smaller than their US counterparts, but then they were very easy to get around. The crowds were pretty manageable the first two days and we were able to plow through Disneyland on Tuesday and the Studios on Wednesday. Unfortunately, I hadn’t realized that Thursday was a holiday when I booked the trip and the crowds for the last three days were insane. Strangely, we heard more Dutch than French so clearly a lot of Dutch schools were on holiday.

Just had to include this photo as this really cracked me and Veronica up. We set off in front of Ashlynn and Jimmy on the Autopia and saw them along the route a few times. Then we lost them, which is strange since the cars are on a track and there are no turnoffs. We thought maybe Ashlynn was just a really slow driver, but turns out that the car broke down and it took six cars behind them to push them into the station.

Disney at Night...

At least Disneyland was open later on Thursday and Friday when it was overflowing with crowds. There’s no fireworks or Main Street Electric Parade because the park closes at 10pm (we were happy guests can get in line for rides until 10pm) and it doesn’t get dark until almost 11pm.