Papa’s birthday
I spent my birthday with friends on the beach in Terschelling. It was sunny and the water was warm enough to swim. The wind was strong enough to fly kites and all the kites we bought in Long Beach made it up into the air.
Zella loves cycling here and cycled from my aunt’s house to the beach at Midsland aan Zee which is about 3km one-way. and back. I hadn’t expected her to be able to do it, so I had the back up plan of locking her bike and taking her in the bicycle carrier the rest of the way, but she did great and never even got out of breath.
The day wasn’t without adventure either. Zella locked herself in the toilet and I had to climb in through the little window to get her back out. Miles and Maya got lost in the dunes (but we tracked them down fairly quickly). With little kids around the fun never ends 
In the evening (after the kids had gone to bed), I enjoyed the gifts so thoughtfully given to by my kids (chocolates made with local berries and herbs and a liquor called “Jutters Bitter” also made with herbs found on the island.) Someone must know my weaknesses really well 
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Not an auspicious start
Our trip to Seattle was quite interesting. It started out with Miles falling on some steps and cutting his chin. For a moment, we feared he needed stiches, which would have been difficult since we had to leave for the airport in less than an hour. But a band aid fixed him right up. A good friend of ours had borrowed her boyfriend’s parents’ van to drive us down to O’Hare. After ten minutes of driving, the van started to stall on the highway. We just made it to a Wallgreen’s parking lot, where the car completely . Fortunately, we found a van (driven by a seventies reject and his girlfriend) that took is down to O’Hare in time to catch our flight.
The fun was not over yet though. When we got to the house we rented, the code to open the front door didn’t work. We drove around to find a unsecured network so I could look up the phone number of the owner. When Mandy arrived, we called the owner and got into the house to find it the beds unmade and the sheets piled up on the drier. To top it all off, we set of both the fire alarm and the house alarm the next morning. The owner felt bad and offered to refund us three nights .
Since then fortunately, everything has gone far better. We have hiked up to the Franklin Falls and had a great meal at the Issaquah Rogue Brew House. Yesterday we played at Greenlake, visited the Seattle Aquarium and had a drink on the pier. Today we’ll check out the Space Needle and the EMP. Seattle is wonderful city and we are having a blast. Now if our kids would sleep past 6 am …
Ice cream in Wisconsin
Being in Wausau for the summer meant that we got serious about investigating ice cream options in Wausau and its surroundings. We have tried on location:
Briq’s Soft Serve
Culver’s
Stone Cold Creamery
The Windmill Ice Cream Shoppe in Tomahawk (OUR FAVORITE)
Cedar Creek (in the Milwaukee zoo)
We have also learned to ask for the kiddy portion (including for ourselves) since our kids can not finish a single serving, let alone a double.
Take out we tried:
Ben & Jerry’s
Edie’s
Benny’s
Cop’s (a legendary Milwaukee institution about which I had heard a lot and now finally got to try) OUR FAVORITE
Sarcasm explained by a five year old
Yesterday, I was walking Miles and Zella to school and it was horrible weather, windy and wet. Miles said “Het is leuk weer vandaag. (It is nice weather today.)” and Zella replied “Nee, het is helemaal geen mooi weer vandaag.” (No it is not nice weather today, it is horrible.) So then he explained sarcasm to Zella. “Soms als het slecht weer is dan zeg je dat het mooi weer is. Het is een grapje” (Sometimes when it is bad weather, you say that it is nice weather. It is a joke.) I think it is great that Miles understands sarcasm, however, I do fear it also says something about our parenting style…
Zella can ride a bike
We went to the playground in the park around the corner of our house and bumped into a former class mate of Miles. He had his new bike with him and was practicing riding it. Miles, who is a head taller than he, asked if he could ride the bike. So Miles rode around on it for a while. Then Zella asked if she could also ride the bike. I said that it lacked training wheels, but she wanted to do it anyway. I put her on the bike gave a her push and off she went. I was surprised since she could only just reach the pedals and had never riden without training wheels yet. She has been riding a “like a bike” which lacks pedals and which has given her a good sense of balance.
I guess never underestimate what a little sibling rivalry can do
Arno can walk!
Arno can walk, he is still a little intimidated by this discovery and often still prefers to crawl as a faster and more reliable mode of transport, but we caught him on film walking and falling. Miles and Zella love this little clip. It makes them laugh every time, even when they have just seen it ten times in a row.
First day of School
First day of School, originally uploaded by Lewis Dijkstra.
After two months off, school started again on September 1st. They were excited to see their friends again and, of course, dressed up for the occassion. The summer holidays have been fun; two weeks on an island off the Dutch coast, two weeks with Granny and Pake in France and a week of circus school to finish it off.
Zella turns three
Zellabday_08 08 30_0016, originally uploaded by Lewis Dijkstra.
Zella had a polka dot birthday party. Her friends Nina and Ada came over, both decked out in polka dots. They played in the yard and ate icecream cake. The flavors were raspberry and chocolate. Raspberry because it is pink and chocolate because it is chocolate
Arno’s first Birthday
Hi everybody,
I am one! I have kept this crown on just long enough for my dad to take a picture. Then I got to open my cool presents! Toys for in the bath. I like to take baths with my brother and sister. Colorful blocks which turn into animals with the help of my siblings and I turn them into random piles of blocks again. We have so much fun. My mom made chocolate cake, which is nice, but I am still too little for chocolate cake, that is not nice. I also got a fun toy to put different shape blocks in. I haven’t figured all them out, but I am working on it.
Go away dark cloud
Miles really wanted to ride his bike. I told him he could if it didn’t start to rain and I pointed to the dark cloud in the sky. So he grabs a towel and tries to fan the cloud away. When he noticed that the cloud was still approaching he also started to blow with all his might and fanning harder hoping that this may turn the tide.
I love the way a child’s mind works.
