All great things come in small packages, they say. It’s true for our kids, and also for amusement parks. Too big and they overwhelm you, too exciting and after half an hour you’ve wet your pants and want to go home, too far away and you wish you ever went there in the first place without giving the kids something to play with in the car…
Well, apart from the last problem, our outing to Madurodam, Holland in miniature, was great. Oh, and the weather, of course. Not good… We had a bit of a drizzle in the morning, but it was still doable, and actually nice, because it wasn’t too busy. But after lunch, pfff, the heavens opened and we finished off the tour and ran to the car, to go to Almere and deliver Gerbrich’s birthday present.
Here are some pictures of the day! Taken on our video cam, as our photo cam had packed in (we are now the proud owners of a new Sony Cyber-shot, which was ridiculously cheap, really, should have done it weeks ago…).
Hannah in front of Utrecht city centre, with the Domtoren behind
Amy and the Westertoren in Amsterdam
The kiddies in front of the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam
The Dam and the royal palace in Amsterdam. Look at the tiny cars and figures! Cool!
The puppet show at lunch time
A huge hit with Hannah (SHE’S BEHIIIIIND YOUUUUUU!)
And then you’re soooo glad that the both of you are at home when something happens, even though it was only a minor crisis…
Last night, after dinner, Hannah decided to go and watch some telly. She lay down on the sofa, turned round and boom, rolled of the sofa straight into the table with her face. As she started screaming really loud and quickly, Steve and I jumped up to see what had happened. All we could see was blood, lots of blood. Scared shitless, no other way to say it… Steve took her on his lap, pressed a cloth against her face and I desperately started looking for the number of the emergency room at the hospital (not the emergency number for the ambulance, but to request an admission to the ER, they are a bit weird about that here…). When I finally found it, it took a while before I was connected through, and I saw Steve sitting with Hannah, white as a sheet (both of them), Sam not knowing what was going on, but on the verge of crying himself… And when I finally got someone on the phone and Steve dared lift the cloth, we could see there was quite a deep cut, from the corner of her lip out. We got the all-clear to jump in the car and come over straight away, so Steve took Hannah on his lap in the car, I bundled Sam in the back in his seat and then we drove off. Pfff… Hannah was seen to straight away and luckily a bit of glue did the trick. It looked worse than it was, but still… as a parent you’re just terrified that a pretty little girl like Hannah would end up with a horrible scar, just from rolling off the sofa… The first thing she said when she got back out was: ‘But I do want to go to school tomorrow.’ The sweetheart… With a Panadol and some extra cuddles she took it easy on the sofa (watching hospital reality shows, nothing seems to phase that kid!), and then slept like a log. This morning she was fine; sore, but fine. And she even managed to give us a smile for the camera… (maybe it helped that she got an invitation to the birthday party of her new ‘boyfriend’…)
Remember this place? It’s our allotment… We were either busy or the weather was plain crap (and then it’s too muddy to even get past the strawberries…) and have only been able to pick the occasional box of beans and parsnips or courgette – but it needed attention. URGENT ATTENTION!
It was time to start planning for next year, and after some brainstorming we decided the theme for next year will be fruit. Fruit to eat and fruit to make wine (a friend of us does that, and we’re more than happy to oblige with the odd bag of berries and stuff…).
Today, Amy went over and planted loads of fruit: brambles and yellow raspberries (gifted by Tijm, one of Amy’s knitting friends who also has an allotment there), blueberries and red gooseberries, anemones and phloxes (these last ones are autumn flowering plants, cool for some colour later in the year), and crocus bulbs (for some Spring surprises).
The middle part of the garden was cleared of Malva (a real pest in our garden, however pretty it looks with its purple flowers), the soil was quickly turned over (as if we care for weeds this late in the year ) and then the plants went in. Tadaa:
The new patch, from front to back: phlox, anemone, gooseberry, blueberry, brambles, yellow raspberries
Did I say I can take pictures, no… Just trust me. It’s just quite a long stretch, and it’s hard to take good pictures. Here’s a closeup of the yellow raspberries, ’cause I had never heard of them. Strange little things…
Yellow raspberries on the plant
And to show you how BIG they are... small!
And some more snaps:
Proper winter fare: curly cale, with parsnips behind and some Chinese cabbage hiding
After 5 million courgettes, this plant is still not finished... It's getting a last chance!
Even the lettuce is still trying hard. A few more days of sunshine and then we can enjoy some crispy leaves
The raspberries we already had will be replanted further up in the allotment next time, strawberries are hiding behind. They are sprouting like mad, but did we have any strawberries this year? NO! None! Unbelievable...
Samuel is celebrating his 2nd birthday on Wednesday, but yesterday and today we’ve been doing plenty of partying. Yesterday, Amy’s ‘posse’ came round in the morning (in total 8 mommies and 10 kids, with two daddies seeing the mayhem and running away veeeery fast…) and our neighbours came round in the afternoon. It was a great day, we all enjoyed our cake and chat and watching the kids making a mess of their self-decorated little chocolate buns and then attacking the crisps and train set that Sam got (he got loads of other pressies too, but we’ll focus on the T’s here…). Yes, he’s big into trains! Thanks to D&K (you know who you are) , we were able to get some serious Thomas the Train stash. And Sam loves it. Loves it. And so does Hannah. This was them this morning…
Samuel, Hannah & Thomas and friends
Hannah is a deft hand at running the trains
Of course we had to add some ‘fun things’. We asked Hannah to get her Barbie box out and we rummaged around the attic for some trees and things. And then this happened: yes, that is Snowwhite lying in a field next to a Duplo sheep… and on the other side of the fence a rhino and horse are grazing side by side. This is only the tip of the iceberg. We have enough rails to make Thomas and his friend go all the way around the living room and back into the kitchen. We even have a Thomas (of the 3 in total, haha) that can be charged up and that goes off all by itself. Sam was amazed…
James goes to the Alps
And then it was time for the cake!
Sam's cake
Which went down well!
This Cookie Monster likes strawberry cheescake too!
And now it’s time to recuperate and get ready for Wednesday! It’s going to be a ’small’ affair, as Sam’s away at daycare, but he will be bringing Nemo tangerines with him to hand out to his friends and group teachers there and after Hannah’s swimming lesson we’re picking him up to go to the Pancake Boat to celebrate his Bday in style! Video of the candle blowing and other antics will be up on Youtube in due course. Please be patient… It’s not every day that your son turns 2…
We were either busy or the weather was plain crap (and then it’s too muddy to even get past the strawberries…) and have only been able to pick the occasional box of beans and parsnips or courgette – but it needed attention. URGENT ATTENTION!
