General Things

Laundry, Kaemon style

Cupcakes, my style (quick and dirty) for playgroup's second birthday

One for my husband

Nelson is officially eating with the pot. (Translation from dutch- means he's eating grown up food)!

Gerco & Charlotte 4 eva!

I love weddings, yes I do. It's usually the manic happiness making it a shining point in life. Everywhere you turn manic smiles, everyone happy happy joy joy! The bride and groom were radiant and resplendent.

Beautiful Old Mansion in the forest, decorated in Art Deco style and a intruiging Shell-Horn-Mahogany Decor theme (Pau shells, with buffalo horn on massive dressoirs= lavish)

Brings the romance out in all...

I made a token cake (with three boys in the house, when do I ever get a chance to make flowers???????)

the food: the main course, cornish hen with tarragon sauce was...well, cornish hen with tarragon sauce and broccoli and mashed potato. But the entree, tatare of salmon with asparagus, was a delectable coarse chop of fresh salmon, dill that was tart and fragrant, making me want to use words such as delightful, delish and om-nom-nom-nom it's gone!

A lovely sunny day, nice catching up with friends and hanging out in luxury for a day.

Open invitation

Our littlest is turning one! Betting on good weather, we're organising a picnic in the park. We're reluctant to send out personal invitations as many live far away and may feel under pressure to turn up to a 3 hour dig; therefore we're posting an open invitation to all: you are welcome!

Please let us know if you can come!

Koninginnedag 2009

We had a beautiful day with Renee and Martijn and lounged in this cool Belgian beer cafe with a gorgeous secluded garden perfect for gambolling kids. It was a close to relaxed as one gets with 2 kids and 4 adults!

Only in the car on the way home did the silence fall as we listened to the radio news bulletins. In the morning, many houses had hoisted flags and the royal wimple in honour of Koninginnedag. Seeing the flags lowered to half mast by the end of the day was a sad, but in a way uplifting sight of community solidarity.

Nelson GET TO WORK!!

The glassy look in their eyes is not due to drugs but the TV. Well, that's the drug of a nation.

We biked to the beach for the first time yesterday! 20 mins by car, 20 min by bike! Joy!

The entrance to the playground framed by blossoms



Of all the attractions of the playgound, Kaemon enjoys the snacks the most.

Flower Power

The small country lanes were crowded with bike-traffic-jams; it was an orgy of photo-taking, as if we'd never seen flowers before. This is our neighbourhood- the famous bloembollen/tulip fields- and it made us go a little ga-ga, hence the bumper photo extravaganza.

Tulips:

...as above...

...as above, above...

That's our transport. Nelson eating tulips, lucky they weren't poppies.

These days we never leave the house with nappies, milk, bubbles, snacks. To do so would be gravely regrettable. Lunch al fresco.

Along with the kids, we brought the KKK: Kick-a$$ Karrot Kake. LUcious cream cheese frosting and deliciously spiced cake with walnuts. Food tastes better in the outdoors, but modestly speaking, this truly was num-num.

...and more tulips

Running through a field of flowers, the classic-money-shot

Long Weekend!

The recent long weekend was the opportunity to catch up on the lost holiday moments: (clockwise from top left) so we did some crafty egg decorating, ate (more) good food (sushi, lamb and lentils, green tea cake with red bean cream filling) and finally, after I walked into a closed door this morning at 5am to stifle a Crying Nelson and Screaming Kaemon I was in need for feeling-sorry-for-myself food so 2 kg of roast pork with crackling did the trick nicely (if you see my black eye, it really was a walk-into-a-door). Unfortunately, kaemon also has discovered crackling. Previously I cut it off, reasoning that it was just too hard for his little teeth, and instead of wasting it, I'd have to eat it. He stole some from my plate and polished the rest off. As I said, pity.
Kaemon loves hats, posing naturally with Nelson, hand-modelling easter eggs, and the ladies with Cars.


Love love love living near the beach: we (I) threw a salad and quiche together for a afternoon/dinner at the strand. Instant holiday feeling, just add water!
FEED ME!

SPring has sprung...

The around the border between March and April lies somewhere the transition from winter to spring. Transitions are such that they are periods, and you emerge different and changed. This year, we had sick kids, a planned week of relaxing with/without kids, sick kids- so no planned week of relaxing and now, vacation over, we're glad to be back at work to relax and recover a little.... I DO feel different and changed, last week I felt about 30, this week about 65! Photos Below: (clockwise) Douwe being the taxi man, dutch-style; Kaemon in repose, pale and weak in sickness- now he's recovered and catching up on the obtusiveness and contrariness of a typical 2-year old double-time; Watching cars on Ipod, covered in clingwrap to protect from suprise emissions; Renee did her monthly stint relieving my horse-duty; it's Douwe's birthday and we've got cheap party hats! (economic recession)
A new season is inspiring the kitchen and my belly...num.green asparagus (although it came from Bolivia, it still seems a sign of the European spring...) with bacon-wrapped salmon in a dill-caper dressing. The spaghetti was like a sexy nun: plainly dressed but a divine accompaniment in truffle oil and garlic. Tooooo good! The leftover asparagus was hidden in a eggy terrine with ham and tomato in filo. Haricot verts, the princess of the beans also arrived to dance around on my plate with some finger-lickin grilled herby sausages, baked thyme potatoes, crispy bacon and a saucy vinaigrette. On the right are douwe's two birthday cakes. Sick kids= no fancy cake, sorry love.



Our two naughty boys *proud parents* kiss kiss

Hylke's 65th

Cake- modelled on the ANRO asia, a container ship on which Hylke sailed on long ago... I like the water flurry in the wake of the boat the best!

Food-I've never made such neat and tidy nigiri sushi before!

Late edit: Yes there were people at the party, not just food!

What we've been eating

With the winter dragging on, it was time for comfort food. There was mushroom soup with cauliflower and chicken (take packet mushroom soup and cook with cauliflower and chicken, voila...), I discovered beans, connected with my inner-dutch-wife and made Brabantse sausage rolls (good food for sick kids) and...sausage pizza (take 1/2 can of pizza, lay on pizza, top with mozarella and bake. eat.)

Who on earth decided that Twinkle Twinkle, ABCDEFG..., Baa baa black sheep should all have the same tune? Anyway, kaemon does his mixing and performs his own arrangement of it in the footsteps of Mozart who wrote 12 variations on the theme. The gassy noise in the background is backing percussion by Nelson (vocal talent). I realise the folly of mentioning Mozart and Kaemon in one sentence, Mozart wrote the variations at 25, and kaemon is only 2.

Nelson Obsession with Putting Things in his Mouth

Holiday week...

Not so much a holiday rather than the week my day care lady took a holiday and I faced a week home with the Kids. My initial trepidation gave way to relief when it seemed really not so bad as I expected...we filled the week with a visit to the kids farm

Shopping malls of varying sorts (still too cold to wander out for hours)

Battling colds (no one was spared, and this week seemed to be the peak of the mucal congestion) and nelson cut TWO teeth!

Fingerpainting (again, initial trepidation but it was really not as bad as I thought). Still, on my first day back at 'work' I slept the first 2.5 hours away recovering.

And experimental kitchenry
Kaemon discovered the deliciousness of Scallops(St Jacobsschelpen) and while I'm happy he's shaping up to be a foodie, in reality it means I have to share the crispy skin, the juicy chicken leg, the prawns, in general, less for the rest of us...

In short, it was an intense week (intenser than the regular intensity) but filled with more sweetness and joy of the everyday variety.

It's been a month of colds being passed around (sneezing in each other's faces in our small living/dining/kitchen room on a cold wet grey winter day does not help). Sometime I wonder why people bothered to colonise the cold climates...why oh why?!? Anyway to continue, colds, lack of sleep, wet weather, bleak skies...yay. I'm carefully rationing my optimistic and positive thoughts. We got a visit from some Lovely Friends

I've been carefully testing Kaemon for excellence in various areas, harness the talent early and they can potentially make us millions!!! I did a blindfolded test and fed him various foods to see if he could identify them (hey,it's raining, it's boring, the old man is snoring) and he got prawn, pea, noodle, daikon/radish, cucumber! Then we put Nelson any other suggestions to pass the rainy days away?

erm........the very last post about Kaemon's Birthday (Week). This is really the end, until next year!

Nelson tries very hard to escape his diet of boiled vegetables and fish. He wants to EAT CAKE!!