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!