Our Anniversary

Last minute we called our AWESOME friends, asked them to watch our older kids (kept the cute little man pictured below), rented a car (since ours was already headed across the ocean) and drove out to the Netherlands to see the tulip festival in Keukenhof.  

We got to stay in this cute bed and breakfast on the border of Holland and Germany (pictured above) and got to spend the weekend of our anniversary together sightseeing.  It was fabulous!!

This little guy was the perfect addition to our afternoon in Keukenhof wandering around the beautiful tulips!  I mean, come on, who wouldn't love that face?!

St. Nicholas Day - Take Two!

George our elf with the 'shoes' for St. Nicholas Day.  

While in Holland I decided to get a huge pair of shoes to celebrate St. Nicholas Day.  Hopefully our kids like the idea of these huge shoes being filled with candy!  This year the kids got Friend Books.  The two little kids got 'Meine Kindergarten-Freunde', while the older kids got 'Freund Buch'.  The kids take these books to school and pass them around to their friends.  Their friends fill out their 'information', such as favorite color, favorite animal, favorite thing to do or eat, draw a picture, maybe put their picture inside and then return it to the owner.  It's basically a year book but you pass it around all year long.  It's a good way to be able to remember their friends out here in Germany when we move back to the U.S.  That night the kids had a piano recital and St. Nicholas showed up with Milka chocolate bars for all the kids!  I LOVE St. Nicholas day... and German chocolate.  I love the way the Germans celebrate Santa Claus on this day and then turn their attention to the real reason for Christmas - celebrating the Christ Child!  Merry Christmas!

The Netherlands

We extended our trip since an army thing got rescheduled at the last minute.  We were able to head up to Amsterdam and experience a little bit more of Europe.  I know, I know, Amsterdam is known for a lot of things ... the red light district ... legalized pot ...  but we didn't go for those.  We tried our best to shield our children from these particular areas but at the end of the day making our way back to the train station we weren't very successful. 

The Flower Market -- Bloemenmarkt

Tulip bulbs were seriously CHEAP!  We could gave bought a huge bag for 5 Euro.  If I didn't kill everything I probably would have done it too.  Even my kids thought of getting their school teacher some tulips before buying them for me.  I seriously kill everything!

The 'I Am' Sign

All our kids

'P' (an upside-down 'd') for Paige ... what is that other girl doing?  Crazy upside-down girl!

an 'E' for Emi & Evan

An an 'A' for Anika ... she found this balloon there and wouldn't let it go.  We even had to 'coat' check it at the Van Gogh Museum.  She is too funny!

My favorite picture of the canals, all the bikes, and the homes!  I love it!

house #166 - the skinniest house in Amsterdam

The Anne Frank Home!  Such a neat experience, and very educational for my children!   

More Pictures HERE

Tourist Trap in the Netherlands (a.k.a. Zaanse Schans)

We did it, we went to Zaanse Schans.  I actually really liked it here but I think Miles wasn't too impressed.  It all started when they stopped us at the entrance and took our picture like we were entering Disneyland or something.  From there it was all down-hill.  Too funny! 

Along the Zaan River in Zaandijk they have re-created a 17 c. town to preserved Dutch culture.   In the 1960's homes were transplanted here to preserve their traditions.  

Included in this town are cheesemaking (De Catharina Hoeve Cheese Farm Kassmakerij) and wood shoe-carving (Klompenmakerij)

Each one of these windmills are working specialties.  I seriously had no idea!  It was so neat to learn something new here.  One windmill is a sawmill (De Gekroonde Poelenburg), another one grinds dyes (De Kat), and another one crushes oil (The Seeker, De Zoeker)