Delft, Netherlands- First of hopefully many visits!

The kids had a day off from school so we headed North to the Netherlands.  Our goal was a cool visit somewhere but one without tons of walking for hop-along Kelly.

We went to the pottery factory in Delft.  It had a cool movie to start the tour, and a museum of old pottery and then you go in the actual factory.  You see people painting and all the pieces waiting to be worked on.

Here is one of the master painters at work...Greg looks like he is talking on his phone, but he's actually listening to the audio tour.

I loved the tulip vases, they sell them in the store at the end...for a mere 15,000 Euro I could have bought one..

One popular kids character is Miffy (see photo below).  We really got a kick out of seeing Miffy's ready to be made in the factory.

Miffy's being made.

Everyone liked trying on the giant wooden shoes painted in the same style as the pottery...

We did see windmills on the drive too..in case you were wondering!

At some points the windmills were on both sides of the road.

The town of Delft was really quaint.  It had little canals everywhere, a university, bikes, a town square and a market.  I loved trying some of the foods, here was a pastry/bread stand.

They also had lots of fish for sale...here was a herring on a roll...we tried a piece of the fried fish and it was amazing!

We bought Charlie a bag of Speculoos cookies- it looks like Cookie Crisp cereal.  Specloos is everywhere here and its delicious.  Here's what Wikipedia says about it.

SpeculaasSpeculaas or speculoos is a type of spiced shortcrust biscuit, traditionally baked for consumption on or just before St Nicholas' day in the Netherlands, Belgium, and around Christmas in Germany

Main ingredients: Flour, sugar, butter, pepper, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, cardamom, nutmeg

Charlie rating= A+++++++

We even buy the spread, pictured below in our local supermarket!

If you order a coffee in a restaurant it usually comes with one of the little cookies on the side.

We left Delft mid afternoon and headed on to the Hague which was another half an hour up the road.  I will post on that shortly, Kelly and Katie took a million pictures there (gotta keep up your Instagram feeds if you are a teenager) so I'll use those!

A new Burger King and Car Free Day in Brussels

As we have been driving to school we pass a shopping area where they have been building a new Burger King.  Charlie always asks to stop and we tell him it isn't open yet.

One day when I passed by they were doing a grand opening...we went on our way home from school.

Excellent entertainment...they went with a Cowboy/Wild West theme...because nothing says America like a mechanical bull,

Fake covered wagon (with what looks like Native American jug/ baskets sitting on it??? I have to give Katie all the credit for pointing that out! 

Dancing cowboys and cowgirls (who probably were exotic dancers by night) We realized that we never took a picture, we were simply too busy enjoying the spectacle.

We are happy to have a Burger King close for a taste of home when we need it!

Brussels also did a cool thing where for one Sunday they declare it a car free day.  Everyone is supposed to ride a bike, scooter, or public transportation which is free for the whole day.  We headed out with Charlie's bike and scooter, met up with another family and headed to the area of town where they had a bike circus.

Our first spectacle when we came off the metro was people tightrope/slackline walking between tall buildings-crazy!

Our next adventure was a slow bike race for Charlie- the goal of a slow bike race is to be the last one to cross the finish line.  Happy to report that Charlie won his race and got a few prizes...here he is pulling to the back of the competition.

The kid on the left was already out as he had put his foot down, once you touch the ground you are out.

 We saw some professional bike riders do a trick show, Charlie and his friend LOVED it.

 Charlie got to try some ramps, note the fancy chocolate shop in the background!  Leonidas is a big one around Brussels.

Katie gets into the action and rides Charlie's bike for a bit.  On the same street there were two kids playing chess in the middle of the street-just because they could for one day!

 One sporting goods store had a demo area where you could try out equipment, Charlie tried a skateboard.

 Charlie and his neighborhood buddies!

We live near a beautiful fountain that is in the center of a VERY busy rotary, so generally the fountain is something you look at but never go close to.  However for car free day we were able to go out in the middle of the rotary and check out the fountain.  Here is my neighbor and I and the kids.  She is another Illinois girl who has been living in Brussels for many years...so she became my tour guide for the day!

We look forward to another car free day of exploring next year and know Kelly will enjoy it then because she won't be stuck on crutches!

8 is Great!

Just like that Charlie turned 8!  We celebrated his actual birthday a day two days early and spent Saturday doing what he wanted.  This meant two trips to the skatepark to ride his new trick scooter and having pizza and ice cream.  (more photos of the trick scooter to come)

His real birthday was on a Monday, he wanted to bring in rice krispie treats for his class (my personal shopping victory was finding American marshmallows in the supermarket-this was a major score-I have only found them on an endcap in one random store).

Last Saturday we invited his entire class for his party and a few neighborhood kids.  We chose a theme near and dear to Charlie's heart...a dog party.  With no dog of our own we borrowed one to be our guest of honor.  Here is Charlie and Olivia

Dogbone cake, chocolate with chocolate icing...everyone helped, Katie and her friend baked, Kelly and I frosted, and Charlie did the M&M's and Oreos.

 Everyone adopted their own dog before they went home...

Here are all the dogs waiting to be adopted.

 The pinata...

I had counted on Kelly to be the photographer...but she hurt herself coming home from soccer practice...she spent the party in her room with a hurt foot... the next day we learned she broke a bone in her foot.  It's been a real bummer, she was so excited for her first soccer game on the school team and instead she spent it on crutches.  So I am back to being a taxi and counting down the days until Kelly can get back to walking and playing sports again!

Back to School

After the longest summer break on record (April-Aug) the Hughes kids are back in school.  First the girls,

Then the following day, all 3!

 No one is missing the school uniforms...yet!

Waiting for the bus, lucky for us the bus stop is down the block and we have a bench!

 Just a scene from daily life-here are Charlie and Katie trying out our new electric lawnmower...takes about 10 minutes to do the lawn!

One day to pass the time and meet some neighbors Katie & Charlie did a stand...we had no lemonade but we did have Tang drink mix...so Katie made the French sign...they had a few customers and we did meet a few nice people who were kind enough to stop!  Charlie would still be out there if we didn't make him quit!

Everyone is settling in nicely to school, making friends and trying some things, the girls made the school soccer team and are looking forward to some travel to away games...Paris, Germany, The Hague-not too shabby!