Nog een keer!

I'm going to London again for the weekend. I'll be going by myself so it should be interesting, it'll be my first "real" trip alone. I'm excited though. The weather is supposed to be rainy the whole time but that's ok, I plan on visiting a lot of the museums and stuff so that's all indoors. Besides, I've lived in Holland for almost seven months so I'm used to a little rain, lol. I'll try and take a bunch of pictures and I'll post them when I get back. Have a great weekend everyone!

Day at the Zoo

This week the boys are on holiday from school. I'm enjoying it because it means I get to spend the whole day with them instead of just a couple hours in the afternoon. It also means that we get to go out and do fun stuff. Monday I took the boys to see the Spongebob movie. Spongebob is definitely not my favorite cartoon character but it was fun just going out to the movies with the boys. Today I took all three of the kids to the zoo. We had a good time. It was a bit cold so we spent a lot of the time inside but it was still nice.



Me and the kids



"kijk, een gekke penguin!" *wink* (sorry, that's for Lana and Joel, if you want to know just ask me)

Au Pairs

Kathrin, Anna Maria and I out for an evening in Den Haag.

Good friends = Good times

A bike story

That is my wonderful bike. It's a typical city bike, known as an "Oma fiets" (Grandma bike) and it's gotten me just about everywhere in heat, cold, rain and wind. I love it. Unfortunately, yesterday it had a flat tire and since I was already running late I decided to take Ineke's bike and that's where my story begins... I was peddling along at a decent pace, trying to make it to Centraal Station on time so I didn't miss my train, when I saw that I was coming up to an intersection. The light was flashing green which indicates that it's going to turn red in a matter of seconds, so naturally I speed up in order to make the light. However, while I was still a ways back it turned completely red and I knew I wasn't going to make it. I "slammed on my brakes" and remembered at that moment that I was riding Ineke's bike and hers doesn't have the brakes in the pedals like mine, it has hand brakes. Well, it only took me a split second of peddling backwards to realize my mistake but I was still approaching a busy intersection at a rather brisk pace and was no closer to stopping. I quickly corrected my mistake and pulled my hand brake as hard as I could. Now, correct me if I'm wrong but on most bikes with hand brakes the brake for the front tire is on the left, and the brake for the back tire is on the right, isn't it? Well, unfortunately it's opposite on Ineke's bike and since her front brake works very well, the front of the bike stopped dead, the back of the bike flew up in the air and I sailed over the handle bars and landed on the ground! I wish I had a video tape of it because it had to have been incredibly funny to see. Luckily, I managed to kind of keep my feet and ended up without a scratch on me. The three or four people waiting at the intersection all asked me if I was ok and I was not only ok but I could not stop laughing. I still managed to make it to Centraal Station in time for my train so all is good. I just wanted to share that story with you all so you can have a little chuckle at my expense. Have a great day everyone!

A Dutch Wedding

Today I went to a Dutch wedding. It was for Leendert and Mariëtte; Leendert is a friend I met a few weeks ago at the Bible study I attend. It was very nice. It was surprisingly different than an American wedding but I suppose that's to be expected since it's a different country. The major difference was they were technically already married because Dutch law requires you to be married in the City Hall before you're allowed to get married in a church. They had done that last Tuesday so, this was basically a church service where they resaid their wedding vows. The rest of the service was singing and even a sermon. It was of course entirely in Dutch and so I ended up serving as a quasi-translator for the other girls there from the Bible study who didn't understand a word. I more just gave them a general idea of what was going on since it's a bit difficult to listen and translate at the same time. It was neat that I could do it though *smile*
A little bit of Dutch trivia: Most Dutch people wear their rings on their left hand when they're engaged and then move it to their right hand when they get married, interesting hé?



This is de Kruiskerk in Dordrecht where the wedding was held.



The bride and groom singing together after they said their vows.

Congratulations Leendert and Mariëtte!

how is it possible...

...that every time I do laundry I end up with an odd number of white socks? Every single time! You would think at the very least I'd come out even every other time. It just doesn't seem logical to me because I never wear just ONE sock! Yet somehow, when it's all said and done I'm one white sock short....strange hé?

smiling

Have you ever been so happy about something you couldn't stop smiling? And then every time you thought about why you were smiling you smiled even bigger. And by the end of the day your cheeks kinda hurt from smiling so much but thinking about why they hurt makes you smile all the more...lol Today was just a great day! *happy sigh*

Lekker!

This morning I made Americans pancakes and I even found real maple syrup to put on them. They were so yummy!



The whole family really liked them a lot. Morten even said that he thinks they're " the yummiest pancakes in the world!" Thank you Dad for the recipe :)

hugs

I was in such a bummer mood last night. I'm not really sure why, I think I was a little homesick or something...all I knew is I just wanted a hug. I'm a big hugger and so living way over here with no one to hug (they do kisses over here, very "cool" and European but not the same) can be hard for me sometimes. Anyway, I pretty much slept it off and woke up in a much better mood. I still really wanted a hug but I was ok without it. I worked at the office all day today, which I enjoyed. Then when I got home, I walked in the door, took off my coat and set my stuff down and stuff. Then Caroline saw I was home and from across the room yelled "Abigail!!!" and ran over to greet me. She then wanted me to pick her up and hold her and we snuggled and danced to the music that was on for a good five minutes (which is impressive for any two year old *giggle*). God is so good isn't He? He knew just what I needed. I love that little girl so much, she really made my day.

Judo

It was Timo's first day of Judo and so Ineke and I got to stay and watch. Morten has been going for a couple weeks now but Robbert was the one that took him. It was so cute! There was probably 20 little kids or so, mostly little boys but a couple girls too. At the start of the class, when the Teacher took role the kids had to answer to their name with "Ja, Meester"(master) it was adorable. Anyway, both of them really enjoyed it so this is something they'll both be doing every monday now.



Timo listening to the instructions



The Meester explaining a game to the kids



Morten and Timo practicing a move

Look what I found...

...in Rotterdam!



Isn't that a great combination? An Easy Internet Cafe and a Subway together! Unfortunately this Subway doesn't sell Mountain Dew...oh well, I'll still be eating there quite often *smile*

Nice relaxing day

I had a very pleasant day today. I didn't do much other than sleep and finish this book:



It was a really well written book actually. It was a bit hard to read at first but once I got used to the style it was very good. I highly recommend it *smile*

My first time...

....putting Caroline's hair in a french braid *smile*

I love my job!

Look at the wonderful kids I get to take care of!



Morten, 5



Timo, 4



Caroline, 2

They're all great and I love them so much! *smile*

Mama Mia!

I went to see this today with Ineke and some of her friends. It was a lot of fun. It was in Dutch so I was a bit concerned about understanding it before I went but I ended up having no problems. Yea!



A picture of our group at the Asian restaurant we ate at before the show.