Gold Award Ceremony...

We were quite thrilled that not only would Veronica be receiving her International Gold Award at a special ceremony at the Press Club in The Hague on May 21, but that she and Michelle would be introducing Veronica’s Nepal video to a packed audience.

Due to the large number of BSN students receiving their Gold Awards, special arrangements were made to bring Prince Edward, Queen Elizabeth’s youngest son, to present the awards.

BSN Gold Award Recipients

Project Nepal Gold Recipients

Last Day of High School...

Veronica’s last IB exam was on May 19. Here she is just before leaving for the BSN for the last time surrounded by the many colorful posters she made as study aids.

Two months later we found out that she’d earned straight A’s with an impressive 40 points in the IB Diploma Program. Shortly thereafter she received a confirmed offer from the University of East Anglia, where she was also offered a scholarship resulting in a 50% discount in tuition. So proud!

Another Award-Winning Photo...

Veronica entered a photo contest by Motorola for backdrops for their cellphones. This photo depicting the color orange made it through the first round and earned her a prize of $125.

Ashlynn’s First Cover...

Ashlynn might not be old enough to drive a car, but that didn’t stop the Japanese from having her pose with a Porsche. Don’t let the name scare you: Goo World is a monthly car magazine. Since Ashlynn went to the shoot with another model, she thought that only one of them would be chosen to grace the cover; as the other girl has a more commercial look, Ashlynn assumed the Russian model would be chosen. I was disappointed when I found the November issue featuring the other girl, but looked up the December issue anyways, which hit the stands in Japan today. Imagine my surprise when I found my beautiful daughter on the cover!

Cycling the Bulb Fields...

As Veronica realized that she would be spending less and less time in Holland starting later in the year, she made a point to visit some of places she’d missed so far. In early May she finally had a chance to cycle the bulb fields. Of course, Jimmy and I went along with her.

Not only did we get a late start in the season, but we also got a late start in the day, so we took our bikes on the train to Sassenheim.

There weren’t a lot of fields that hadn’t already been deadheaded, but there were just enough to get some great photos.

Veronica wasn’t exactly dressed for cycling, but she was dressed for starring in some nice photos.

Walk Like an Egyptian...

Hash weekends usually have a dress-up theme for the party on Saturday night. I cheated and wore my Roman outfit despite the Egyptian theme and bought Jimmy some accessories to wear with a black dress he’s worn in the past as a witch costume.

We loved Abbie’s homemade crocodile mask...

...and Inga’s amazing cat Goddess, Bastet.

There was some paper accessories to use for selfies; here we are with Nick and Ola.

Jimmy got up early to cook eggs for 90 people. He was quite a hero after the slop that apparently was served the morning before. We ran another lovely wooded trail and climbed to the top of a pyramid (whomever would have guessed that the Netherlands had a pyramid!) The Pyramid of Austerlitz was built by Napoleon’s soldiers in 1804. We’re sorry that Veronica had to fend for herself during exams, but we had a great weekend!

Dutch Nash Hash...

We’d planned to skip this year’s Dutch Nash Hash because it fell on the weekend during Veronica’s IB Exams, so we didn’t register. At the last minute, the organizer convinced us that we should be there and we agreed. We skipped the Friday night pub crawl and caught a ride to the same forested area outside of Utrecht where Ashlynn went to model camp last year. We got there just in time to run trail, which was great. We were happy to see Dave, who had moved to Hong Kong a few months earlier.

After the circle, we competed to see which team could make the best toilet paper costume. We thought ours was pretty good, but we didn’t win.