The Son, on the Floor
The Son, in the High Chair
Look Ma, No Patch! (I ate it...)
Snow I
href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_yieYYkkvggU/R7J6HUETpPI/AAAAAAAAATo/kTMuZQbvbt8/s1600-h/Overhang3.jpg">
Snow II
February 12, 2008
Son and Snow
We've taken lots of pictures of our son, mostly because he's cute. We also take many pictures of the snow, because there is a lot of it. Or, at least, there was. Now we have a regular little creek running behind our house from the melt off. Dirk has been faithfully pulling buckets and buckets of water out of our window wells to keep the basement from flooding. 'Sides that, nothing too new.
The Son, on the Floor
The Son, in the High Chair
Look Ma, No Patch! (I ate it...)
Snow I
href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_yieYYkkvggU/R7J6HUETpPI/AAAAAAAAATo/kTMuZQbvbt8/s1600-h/Overhang3.jpg">
Snow II
The Son, on the Floor
The Son, in the High Chair
Look Ma, No Patch! (I ate it...)
Snow I
href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_yieYYkkvggU/R7J6HUETpPI/AAAAAAAAATo/kTMuZQbvbt8/s1600-h/Overhang3.jpg">
Snow II
February 02, 2008
Continuing on our trip of Europe...London
The last leg of our trip was in London.
A highlight of that time was attending the church service at Westminster Abbey. Unfortunately, the choir was on summer break, but the organist was superb. I can't imagine attending church every Sunday in a place that beautiful.
We went to the London museum, which was nice and free. It was not, however, air conditioned. At the risk of sounding a wimp, I will say, the stuffiness and heat there put a damper on my enjoyment of the museum. Even so, there was lots to enjoy. Particularly fascinating was the Assyrian collection which included the two huge statues that sat at the entrance of the Babylonian gates. The following picture is of a very historical stone, but if you look behind it, just to the right, you can see one of these statues.
The museum collection also included several Egyptian pieces. My computer wussed out on me, or maybe I wussed out on it, but either way, the time/production rate of making these pictures rotate correctly was not to my satisfaction. So, if you want to see these right side up, click on them and you can rotate it yourself.
I was unaware that several Parthenon and Greek pieces of art had been removed to England and housed in the London museum. But they were. Here is a statue, I think, of the Three Muses. Ever since I was little I thought how interesting it would be to see what their faces had looked like.
This is the House of Parliament, which we drove by in a bus very quickly.
We ate at the Sherlock Holmes Pub. I had some good old Shepherd's pie, which was quite enjoyable. It was fun to look around here.
This is the London Tower, which I expected to be more, well, like a tower. It is actually more of a fortress than anything, and has loads of armor, guns, and the like. It even has a torture chamber. No Geneva convention back then, I guess.
This is the front of St. Paul's, I think. Somehow, we never went in. Not sure why.
This is a statue of a boy holding a goose that traditionally marked the 'cockney accent' section of town. Don't know why, but that's what they told us on the tour.
This is a memorial for the great fire in London.
This is the front of Herrod's, where you have to be filthy rich to buy anything.
We never went on the London eye, but even though we never saw all of London from it, we did see it all over London. You'll see this in the second movie of the Fantastic Four.
I honestly can't say what this is. I guess it was a nice strong piece of architecture that took my fancy and inspired me to take a picture.
This is the front of a building with the 'black friar' statue in front. He looks very jolly.
Dirk and I were out walking between bus rides and got caught in some rain. So we head for the nearest and most interesting tourist site---the aquarium. I'd never actually been in an aquarium before, and I had a lot of fun. The jellyfish pics turned out the best, so I have one here.
Here is the Big Ben.
And here is the infamous London Bridge.
A highlight of that time was attending the church service at Westminster Abbey. Unfortunately, the choir was on summer break, but the organist was superb. I can't imagine attending church every Sunday in a place that beautiful.
We went to the London museum, which was nice and free. It was not, however, air conditioned. At the risk of sounding a wimp, I will say, the stuffiness and heat there put a damper on my enjoyment of the museum. Even so, there was lots to enjoy. Particularly fascinating was the Assyrian collection which included the two huge statues that sat at the entrance of the Babylonian gates. The following picture is of a very historical stone, but if you look behind it, just to the right, you can see one of these statues.
The museum collection also included several Egyptian pieces. My computer wussed out on me, or maybe I wussed out on it, but either way, the time/production rate of making these pictures rotate correctly was not to my satisfaction. So, if you want to see these right side up, click on them and you can rotate it yourself.
I was unaware that several Parthenon and Greek pieces of art had been removed to England and housed in the London museum. But they were. Here is a statue, I think, of the Three Muses. Ever since I was little I thought how interesting it would be to see what their faces had looked like.
This is the House of Parliament, which we drove by in a bus very quickly.
We ate at the Sherlock Holmes Pub. I had some good old Shepherd's pie, which was quite enjoyable. It was fun to look around here.
This is the London Tower, which I expected to be more, well, like a tower. It is actually more of a fortress than anything, and has loads of armor, guns, and the like. It even has a torture chamber. No Geneva convention back then, I guess.
This is the front of St. Paul's, I think. Somehow, we never went in. Not sure why.
This is a statue of a boy holding a goose that traditionally marked the 'cockney accent' section of town. Don't know why, but that's what they told us on the tour.
This is a memorial for the great fire in London.
This is the front of Herrod's, where you have to be filthy rich to buy anything.
We never went on the London eye, but even though we never saw all of London from it, we did see it all over London. You'll see this in the second movie of the Fantastic Four.
I honestly can't say what this is. I guess it was a nice strong piece of architecture that took my fancy and inspired me to take a picture.
This is the front of a building with the 'black friar' statue in front. He looks very jolly.
Dirk and I were out walking between bus rides and got caught in some rain. So we head for the nearest and most interesting tourist site---the aquarium. I'd never actually been in an aquarium before, and I had a lot of fun. The jellyfish pics turned out the best, so I have one here.
Here is the Big Ben.
And here is the infamous London Bridge.
Continuing on our trip of Europe...Rome
Our next stop was Rome. It was big, busy, and had so much to see. We walked everywhere, miles and miles, except the day we went to the Vatican when we took a Taxi and when we took the Tour Rome bus. We had a lot of fun in Rome, even if we were clueless tourists. We did find one really good restaurant that wasn't too touristy while we were there. I had some excellent ravioli. Since I was pregnant Dirk made an attempt at the whole pitcher of house wine, which was really quite good, by himself. He didn't even come close to finishing it, but it only cost a few Euros anyhow. We also got to meet up with Rudi and Anne while in Rome. Their cruise ship stopped at a dock about an hour's train ride from Rome while we were there. Here are some pictures.
We spent a very long time in line waiting to go into the Vatican. It was worth it though. The next several pictures were taken inside the Vatican
This is the Hall of Maps
This is a very large basin that is really cool and probably has a reason for being at the Vatican besides its coolness, but I don't know what
This is the stairwell we walked down on our way out of the Vatican. It's newish, I believe, and very swirly.
This is, as it appears, a painting on a wall.
This is the dome of the Vatican, which was kinda hard to see from where we were outside, so I took this while in the Vatican.
This is a tomb of a pope in the basement. All the popes are buried in the basement of the Vatican
This is ceiling art. After a while of walking through the Vatican, it's art overload on the brain. We walked through at a fairly moderate pace, which mostly just included glancing at things around us, not studying them or even finding out what they were all the time.
This is a painting I saw that looked interesting historically.
This a picture of the Vatican gardens, which were impeccable. They had these fabulous trees that were so, so tall and only had leaves at the very top. They were beautiful.
Here's the painting School of Athens. I didn't know before seeing it that it is painted on a wall.
This a more recent monument not far from our bed and breakfast.
This is by the Roman ruins. Rome is such an old city that there are literally layers and layers of it, one built right on top of the next. So the old ruins from Roman Empire days is several feet lower than modern Rome. This part is fenced off and really looks like a whole bunch of stone pillars and blocks and such knocked over and in general disarray.
Dirk and Me in Front of St. Peter's Basilica
This is Another View of St. Peter's
This is the interior of the basilica. The famous Pieta statue of Mary holding the crucified body of Christ is inside too, but I only got a very bad picture of that since it's encased in glass now.
All this gold, etc. is the thought to mark where St. Peter was buried; hence it's the St. Peter's basilica.
This is a closer-up of the exterior of St. Peter's that shows all the statues that are on the roof. They are all the popes of the Catholic church, as big or bigger than life, if I recall correctly.
Molly sitting by the Trevi Fountain
This is a pic of Dirk by a sculpture inside the Vatican, in a garden/outdoor area.
Here's Rudi and Anne on their honeymoon, in Rome!
The Colosseum
Here is a not often seen view inside the Colosseum, where you walk in. The pillars are huge, some of them broken and laying on their sides.
This is one of several people we saw who dress up and stand in a public place so that people will give them money. They are fascinating to look at, but I never could figure out why people would give them money. It's not like it takes a lot of talent to stand still all day. Although, I have to say, I sometimes felt sorry for them, dressed up head to toe like this guy during some of the hottest days in Rome.
We went to the Pantheon. It struck me as strange that although it's still called the 'Pantheon', it's an entirely Christian remodel inside, with pictures, etc. from the Catholics.
We spent a very long time in line waiting to go into the Vatican. It was worth it though. The next several pictures were taken inside the Vatican
This is the Hall of Maps
This is a very large basin that is really cool and probably has a reason for being at the Vatican besides its coolness, but I don't know what
This is the stairwell we walked down on our way out of the Vatican. It's newish, I believe, and very swirly.
This is, as it appears, a painting on a wall.
This is the dome of the Vatican, which was kinda hard to see from where we were outside, so I took this while in the Vatican.
This is a tomb of a pope in the basement. All the popes are buried in the basement of the Vatican
This is ceiling art. After a while of walking through the Vatican, it's art overload on the brain. We walked through at a fairly moderate pace, which mostly just included glancing at things around us, not studying them or even finding out what they were all the time.
This is a painting I saw that looked interesting historically.
This a picture of the Vatican gardens, which were impeccable. They had these fabulous trees that were so, so tall and only had leaves at the very top. They were beautiful.
Here's the painting School of Athens. I didn't know before seeing it that it is painted on a wall.
This a more recent monument not far from our bed and breakfast.
This is by the Roman ruins. Rome is such an old city that there are literally layers and layers of it, one built right on top of the next. So the old ruins from Roman Empire days is several feet lower than modern Rome. This part is fenced off and really looks like a whole bunch of stone pillars and blocks and such knocked over and in general disarray.
Dirk and Me in Front of St. Peter's Basilica
This is Another View of St. Peter's
This is the interior of the basilica. The famous Pieta statue of Mary holding the crucified body of Christ is inside too, but I only got a very bad picture of that since it's encased in glass now.
All this gold, etc. is the thought to mark where St. Peter was buried; hence it's the St. Peter's basilica.
This is a closer-up of the exterior of St. Peter's that shows all the statues that are on the roof. They are all the popes of the Catholic church, as big or bigger than life, if I recall correctly.
Molly sitting by the Trevi Fountain
This is a pic of Dirk by a sculpture inside the Vatican, in a garden/outdoor area.
Here's Rudi and Anne on their honeymoon, in Rome!
The Colosseum
Here is a not often seen view inside the Colosseum, where you walk in. The pillars are huge, some of them broken and laying on their sides.
This is one of several people we saw who dress up and stand in a public place so that people will give them money. They are fascinating to look at, but I never could figure out why people would give them money. It's not like it takes a lot of talent to stand still all day. Although, I have to say, I sometimes felt sorry for them, dressed up head to toe like this guy during some of the hottest days in Rome.
We went to the Pantheon. It struck me as strange that although it's still called the 'Pantheon', it's an entirely Christian remodel inside, with pictures, etc. from the Catholics.
Continuing on our trip of Europe...Holland
Unfortunately, I never got a chance to finish posting about our trip through Europe two summers ago---babies have a way of taking your time! If you look at the first post on our blog, it has a summary of our time in Holland, but I'm adding to that now. Here we go....
We started out in Holland, and I'd like to add some of the Dutch photos to the post mentioned above. We began in Bolsward, Anne's home town.
Jop and Hanna: Our Hosts in Bolsward
Siska and Molly Exploring Bolsward
Rudi and Anne at Anne's Home in Bolsward
Anne's Nieces and Nephew
Cool Pete
Dirk and Rudi at Rudi's Wedding---sorry, this one is sideways!
Rudi, Anne and Their 'Get-Away' Car
Reception at the Doule Restaurant
Now we move to our day in Amsterdam with Siska, and our friends Mike and Carrie.
This is the Reich's Museum (probably didn't spell this right), which showcased several famous Dutch painters, including Rembrandt, Durer and Vermeer.
This pic turned out a little fuzzy, but it's fun because it gives you an idea what it looks like in real life instead of in an art book.
After Holland, we flew to Italy and took a train to Florence. The train was more or less a local one, and stopped at every station on the way to pick up and drop off. In Bologna we stopped for a long time, announcements were made in Italian over the loudspeaker, and not knowing what was going on, we tried asking the man next to us what was wrong. He didn't speak English, Dutch or Spanish so we waited. People were poring off the train, walking around the station. Looked like we were stuck for a while. Dirk finally found someone who spoke English and apparently there was a small riot going on in Florence over a rigged game in the World Cup, and the people were keeping any trains from coming or going at the Florence station. So we waited. And waited. The another announcement came over the loudspeaker, again in Italian. Everybody began running, away from the train, and so I picked up our bags and started running with them. Dirk caught up and told me that a train was leaving Bologna right now for Florence, but on the other end of the station. We barely made it on the train. So many people were stuck in Bologna trying to get on this train that people were almost piled on each other out in the hallways. We arrived at Florence eventually, at about midnight. Our hostel had closed. Fortunately, a kind soul had posted a sign for us to call a cell phone number of someone with a key. We were very happy to see our beds.
We stayed a few days in Florence, and I have to say, it was beautiful. It was definitely tourist season, but it was so much smaller than Rome and so much more sane. Our hostel room was very nice and we had a beautiful and CLEAN bathroom. Thank goodness!
We walked all through Florence and we found a little bake shop to have breakfast in. It was lovely, and the most memorable breakfast on our trip.
The duomo, or big church, of Florence was very unique in that the outside stonework was white and green. Yes, green. I've never seen anything like it, but it was gorgeous!
Florence had some very picturesque bridges. I believe this is a pic of the bridge over the Arno river.
There was a plaza in Florence that was circled by several famous sculptures. The David, Rape of the Sabine Women, Jason killing Medusa, and one of Poseidon, to mention a few. Here's Dirk with David in the background. This really gives you no idea of the scale of this statue---it's absolutely huge! But for the sake of getting all of David in the pic with Dirk, I put David far in the background.
We started out in Holland, and I'd like to add some of the Dutch photos to the post mentioned above. We began in Bolsward, Anne's home town.
Jop and Hanna: Our Hosts in Bolsward
Siska and Molly Exploring Bolsward
Rudi and Anne at Anne's Home in Bolsward
Anne's Nieces and Nephew
Cool Pete
Dirk and Rudi at Rudi's Wedding---sorry, this one is sideways!
Rudi, Anne and Their 'Get-Away' Car
Reception at the Doule Restaurant
Now we move to our day in Amsterdam with Siska, and our friends Mike and Carrie.
This is the Reich's Museum (probably didn't spell this right), which showcased several famous Dutch painters, including Rembrandt, Durer and Vermeer.
This pic turned out a little fuzzy, but it's fun because it gives you an idea what it looks like in real life instead of in an art book.
After Holland, we flew to Italy and took a train to Florence. The train was more or less a local one, and stopped at every station on the way to pick up and drop off. In Bologna we stopped for a long time, announcements were made in Italian over the loudspeaker, and not knowing what was going on, we tried asking the man next to us what was wrong. He didn't speak English, Dutch or Spanish so we waited. People were poring off the train, walking around the station. Looked like we were stuck for a while. Dirk finally found someone who spoke English and apparently there was a small riot going on in Florence over a rigged game in the World Cup, and the people were keeping any trains from coming or going at the Florence station. So we waited. And waited. The another announcement came over the loudspeaker, again in Italian. Everybody began running, away from the train, and so I picked up our bags and started running with them. Dirk caught up and told me that a train was leaving Bologna right now for Florence, but on the other end of the station. We barely made it on the train. So many people were stuck in Bologna trying to get on this train that people were almost piled on each other out in the hallways. We arrived at Florence eventually, at about midnight. Our hostel had closed. Fortunately, a kind soul had posted a sign for us to call a cell phone number of someone with a key. We were very happy to see our beds.
We stayed a few days in Florence, and I have to say, it was beautiful. It was definitely tourist season, but it was so much smaller than Rome and so much more sane. Our hostel room was very nice and we had a beautiful and CLEAN bathroom. Thank goodness!
We walked all through Florence and we found a little bake shop to have breakfast in. It was lovely, and the most memorable breakfast on our trip.
The duomo, or big church, of Florence was very unique in that the outside stonework was white and green. Yes, green. I've never seen anything like it, but it was gorgeous!
Florence had some very picturesque bridges. I believe this is a pic of the bridge over the Arno river.
There was a plaza in Florence that was circled by several famous sculptures. The David, Rape of the Sabine Women, Jason killing Medusa, and one of Poseidon, to mention a few. Here's Dirk with David in the background. This really gives you no idea of the scale of this statue---it's absolutely huge! But for the sake of getting all of David in the pic with Dirk, I put David far in the background.
February 01, 2008
Happy new year...a little late!
Sorry it's been so long since I posted. This holiday season was loads of fun, but very busy. Maybe this'll give you an idea: Arie's pediatrician called last week to ask if we'd switched to a different doctor, or something... It'd been quite a while since we'd been in. Oh no, I assured him. We'd just been so busy that we hadn't had time to come in. Well, needless to say, we made an appointment right then; his one year check-up appointment three months late! Better late than never.
Things slowed down for us about the middle of January.
Dirk has been staying super busy working in the shop and doing odd jobs around the farm while studying in all his spare time. He's been diligent, to say the least, getting up at 5 every morning to study!
Arie sees Dirk read a lot, actually pretty much all the time he's inside, and so our little man has taken a like to sitting on the couch with his book. He 'reads' it for us, very, very loud so we can all hear.
Arie added water therapy to his weekly to-do list recently, and he LOVES it! He also had his first big accident last week (a slip in the icy parking lot) and a lovely shiner was the result. We haven't actually gotten a picture of it yet though. I thought we did, but Arie was wearing his patch over the eye.
We've been working on crawling and sitting with Arie during physical therapy, and right before Christmas he learned to prop-sit, where he uses his hands to hold himself up. Hurray!
We let Penny in the house the other day so she'd be out of the way for the diesel delivery man. She and Arie had a blast.
Here's some more of Arie sitting:
I joined church choir this month, and it's been a nice outing without the baby once a week. What a treat! And here's a completely unrelated picture from Christmas. I bough a few amaryllis around Thanksgiving and they bloomed in time for Christmas.
And, by the way, it's dumped snow here for about a week, and I think we have at least three feet outside. I have never seen snow like this. It's amazing!
Here's our front yard.
Looking out of our living room window...there's about a foot of overhanging snow at the top of the window.
Things slowed down for us about the middle of January.
Dirk has been staying super busy working in the shop and doing odd jobs around the farm while studying in all his spare time. He's been diligent, to say the least, getting up at 5 every morning to study!
Arie sees Dirk read a lot, actually pretty much all the time he's inside, and so our little man has taken a like to sitting on the couch with his book. He 'reads' it for us, very, very loud so we can all hear.
Arie added water therapy to his weekly to-do list recently, and he LOVES it! He also had his first big accident last week (a slip in the icy parking lot) and a lovely shiner was the result. We haven't actually gotten a picture of it yet though. I thought we did, but Arie was wearing his patch over the eye.
We've been working on crawling and sitting with Arie during physical therapy, and right before Christmas he learned to prop-sit, where he uses his hands to hold himself up. Hurray!
We let Penny in the house the other day so she'd be out of the way for the diesel delivery man. She and Arie had a blast.
Here's some more of Arie sitting:
I joined church choir this month, and it's been a nice outing without the baby once a week. What a treat! And here's a completely unrelated picture from Christmas. I bough a few amaryllis around Thanksgiving and they bloomed in time for Christmas.
And, by the way, it's dumped snow here for about a week, and I think we have at least three feet outside. I have never seen snow like this. It's amazing!
Here's our front yard.
Looking out of our living room window...there's about a foot of overhanging snow at the top of the window.
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