In the right timezone for once!

Living in Europe is great but being many hours apart from everyone in the US has its challenges.  For once we were in the right timezone to host a Royal Wedding viewing party.  My friend had also been in London right before and picked us up some great decorations.

My friend said the stuff was everywhere in London, in supermarkets, street corners...

The ladies watching the fun, Greg & Charlie skipped out for boy activities.

Our well dressed crew!  

We made our own version of the Lemon & Elderflower cake that Harry & Megan were serving...

Kelly & her friends...

A good but short time was had by many of us, as our Saturday activities did not stop for the big day, we rushed off to Charlie's first baseball game he was so excited as he has serious baseball fever.

We wish Harry & Megan well and are happy that we got to celebrate their big day with friends!

The King's Greenhouses and Rites of Passage

I tortured Charlie with yet another garden, he complained, "we already went to see the tulips!"

For three weeks every spring they allow the public to tour the Royal Greenhouses which are in Brussels very near to the Atomium.  The greenhouses were built over a period of 30 years starting in 1873.  They are a series of cool old glass and iron buildings and you follow a set path through the buildings and grounds.  They don't let you walk on the grass at all, they had security guards ensuring that the grass stayed untouched for the king!

 A view from outside...

 A picture of a picture, but these are the Royal Children of Belgium, Charlie liked the dog.

 This part reminded me of the botanical gardens in Washington, DC.

 Sister bonding at our picnic.

 We went with some friends...

A cool building on the grounds, it had an open spiral staircase up the back that would have been fun to climb but the whole thing is fenced off..no climbing for us!

We had a few big family events over the past few weeks, first Kelly & Katie made their confirmation together. 

Barb is also Katie's godmother, so it was pretty special to have them here for this day on a different continent!  They live about an hour and a half from us in the Netherlands.

(James was at a soccer tournament-so all but one Hughes/Barata pictured)

Kelly & her sponsor, Nevenka, who is her friend Steffi's Mom.  We spent Easter with this lovely family!

Charlie was not to be outdone by his sisters, so a week later he made his first Communion.  The church did a cool thing and had the entire class wear white robes, so I was happy to not have to buy a white suit for him to wear once!

He thought the hood was very fun!

Not sure what his sisters are doing to him in this picture!

I have the biggest smile on my face because Charlie's request for an after communion celebration was a trip to Burger King!  Many of our friends and family can remember coming for Katie's communion day & party afterward.  I remember it being a great party but a trip to Burger King was much less work for me!  I told some of the other communion families here about Charlie's request and they were quite jealous that I got off so easily!

Spring Gardens- 2 Spectacular Visits

One weekday a few friends and I went to Hallebos forest about 30 minutes from Brussels it is also known as the Blue Forest.  The forest turns blue when the bluebells or wild hyacinth flowers bloom under the tall trees.  Here was what we found...

 Very beautiful, and we were lucky to be there when it wasn't totally packed full of people!

Only after we left did a friend tell me that the creator of the Smurfs was from the town of Halle which is right next door...I finally understood (after all these years) why the smurfs were blue!!  (the flowers are a blue/purple and the tall trees certainly look like the old cartoons)

May 1, is the May Day holiday here (kind of like American Labor Day) we all had the day off. We drove to the Netherlands to visit the famous Kuekenhof Gardens where the tulips grow.  I was worried about how bad the crowds and traffic would be, especially on a public holiday, but the weather was cold which kept many people away.  Fortunately, the tulips were in full bloom and it was spectacular to see! 

 All around they had beautiful outdoor garden displays...

 Thought my parents would get a kick out of where these flower bulbs were from!

 A display of all the styles of wooden shoes...

 You could climb up into the windmill which was turning, see all the gears and look out at the bulb fields.

 They had indoor greenhouses too, this one was full of orchids, I thought these were pretty amazing!

 You could buy fresh strawberries and cream...we packed a picnic but these strawberries looked so pretty!

 So many varieties of tulips...these were getting ready to bloom but we liked the name!

 These looked like rocket ships!

 Rows of gorgeous flowers...as far as your eye can see!

 Lots of cool spaces for Charlie to explore, so he wasn't miserable!

 We had some friends come along for the day...

 This cool display was in the cut flower house...

 A bulb field right outside the entrance in full bloom!

We got a kick out of the McDonalds outside the gate, even that was on a beautiful canal!

Now we know why Kuekenhof is called the gardens of Europe and we are lucky to have seen it in full bloom!

Beautiful Budapest

Budapest is actually two cities that are split by the Danube river, the Buda side is hilly and has the castle and a famous old bath house called the Gellert Baths.  Pest is on the other side of the river and it is where we stayed and spent most of our time.

Driving across the bridge when we arrived was neat because you can look down the river both ways and see cool bridges and buildings, a little like crossing one of the bridges into Washington, DC and seeing all the monuments and landmarks!

One of the many amazing bridges.

We checked into our hotel and wandered around, we found a Spring Market...which was like a Christmas Market but with beautiful weather.  Here was the freshly cooked salmon that we had for dinner!

Kelly and Katie tried the tiny sausages!

This is Chimney cake...round bread turned over the fire. they pop it off and sprinkle it with cinnamon & sugar (or a few other toppings). It was delicious!

A cool swing at the night market..this was before the fighting began over who got to have the swing!

We found a cool statue on our walk to Parliament...he was near the American Embassy.

Charlie attempting to be Spiderman!

Olympic park and playground...Hungary has many Olympic medalists and they all had their names on a monument in the park.

The golden staircase at the Parliament building.  We went to see the crown & scepter that were once stored in Fort Knox for safekeeping.

These are cigar holders where members of Parliament could leave their cigars in the halls while they went back into the chamber to vote!

Times have changed somewhat...they are no longer allowed to smoke in the building...outside is another story..Katie really hates all the smoke you walk through everywhere!

The red communist start that used to be on top of Parliament...now its just in a display on the tour.

We did an escape room that was pretty creepy...it was in a smelly basement and the theme was an operating room..Charlie really wanted to leave before our hour was up...happily we made it out!

The guidebook said to get the best view, don't take the Ferris Wheel but instead climb to the bell tower of the St. Stephen's Basilica..the book was right, we got a wonderful view from the top and looked down on the Budapest Eye!  Inside there is a relic of St. Stephen's hand..If you drop in a Euro coin it will light the relic up for 5 minutes.  There was a group of  Hungarian Elementary school kids standing around hoping a tourist would come with a coin...luckily Kelly had one in her bag and we loved watching their reaction to seeing the hand-very fun!  I don't have a photo but it was neat to see their reaction!

Something I had no really thought much about is that most cathedrals have an inner dome that is painted/decorated, then they have a second dome over top to protect it.  Here is a view of the inner dome/outer dome of St. Stephen's Basilica.

We walked across the river to the Gellert Baths and lucky for Katie her friend from Brussels happened to be in Budapest the same time as us..so she got to spend the day with us.  The big bath house is behind the kids in this picture.

The bathhouse was gorgeous old place..I didn't take many pictures because I locked up my stuff, but here was a ceiling dome in the entrance.

Another shot inside the bathhouse. Water was great, warm, there were about 12 pools, sadly the outdoor wave pool was not on for the season yet!

Crossing back, all soaked & ready for dinner! The kids liked this bath house much better...much younger hipper crowd, mostly tourists!

Hungarian flag blowing in the wind!

We took a night boat tour...here is the castle on the Buda side at night.

Katie & Astrid with the Parliament in the back.

The Parliament Building lit up at night was incredible..this photo doesn't do it justice!

Sadly our time in Budapest came to an end and we headed back for school to start back up!  We were all charmed by Budapest and hope that maybe we can return again one day!