Highlights of my trip to CA

I went on a little CA (shopping) trip because I had a ticket that was about to expire.

I left on Oct 3rd.

Here are some highlights of what I did on this trip:

- It was great to see Jan and Estela again, and of course their kids Julian and Camille. I stayed over on the first night of my arrival and we ended up talking till 2am. The next morning we went to see Camille's soccer game - too cute to see her play.

- For the next 4 nights I stayed over at April's house. I was happy to help out a bit in the household (doing laundry - changing drapes - cooking soup and dinner) since she has been through a hard time. It was nice to chat at night and keep her company.

- Let's not forget the shopping, shopping, shopping,....

- I visited the Monticello school to hear the unfortunate news that Trinh's husband David has just been diagnosed with colon cancer. I really hope it's not too wide spread and treatable.

Sometimes I wonder why so often bad things happen to good people...

- I was able to catch up with Becky over Starbucks coffee - we mostly talked about a certain operation I had done (hmm... someone else is interested??) haha...

- It was so great to get together with my old Cisco crew - we had lunch together, lots of talk and ended up going for pearl tea and even coffee. I miss them, it was always a lot of laughter when we were together (and tears but that was mostly because of the managers :)

- On my last night I stayed over again at Jan and Estela's house, again talking till 2am (ouch - it was a working day for them the next day). We all got up at 5:30am (everyone except Camille) and they waved me out ... snif snif....


And then I had to fly back:

- First of all, with two heavy pieces of luggage and one rolling hand luggage, it was really hard to get all of that to the train and to the check-in counter (no carts in sight).

- Then I spend two hours at the check-in counter because it turned out that they charged me too little for my trip (I payed 250 Euro to change the ticket dates, you would think that was enough). I was arguing that you can't change the ticket price on my halfway my trip - that isn't fair. About one minute before boarding time they let me go, so I had to run through the security checkpoints (cutting in line before everyone - giving me mean looks) and barely made it in time to my gate. It's now 9am and I didn't have breakfast.

- Instead of flying to Philadelphia we made a stop at Phoenix where I was supposed to change my ticket (I still didn't have the correct ticket to fly to Brussels). When they took care of that I had to run back to the plane (still didn't eat).

- When we landed in Philadelphia, I asked another passenger what time it was, it was 7:40pm, while my next plane was boarding at 7:45pm. Again I had to run like crazy to make it to that plane. And again I hadn't eaten - I was starving !!

- I must admit: I refuse to buy food in the plane since I really hate the taste of cold soggy bread. Even when extremely hungry, I can't eat that.

- I was pleasantly surprised on the plane to Brussels: I had 3 seats all for myself. I was gonna get some sleep here !!! A girl asked if she could sit on one of those seats, but thinking back to my tough day so far I just said "no - I want to catch some sleep". Awful huh - but she found another seat where there was lots of space.

- I have never enjoyed a pasta more then I did when they served me dinner :)

- I fell asleep after dinner and woke up when they were serving breakfast. PERFECT!

So these were the highlights of my trip....

Our family portrait (from Elias' view)

Elias' teacher keeps a blog where she posts pictures of the kids when doing projects in the class. It's great to see them doing all those things - very high tech as well (for Belgium).

I was checking out the day they were making family portraits and found this picture of Elias:

He was the only child that drew a family member with a sad face (Mendel). I guess I'll have to find out what that was about, but still, it's a bit funny.

Mendel turns 5

Mendel's birthday(s)

As is becoming the tradition, we had multiple birthday parties to celebrate the fact that Mendel turned 5.

Of course we had to have a little something special on the day itself, even though it was a regular Monday and the day before we left for our vacation.
Alyssa and Caitlin came over..........


Then on the 23th of August, we had a family party with the aunts, uncles and grandparents. The weather wasn't cooperating so we spent most of the party inside. On times like this, it's good to have a small family.

But her REAL party, with all her friends, was on the 30th of August. She had a joined birthday party with Louise who turned 4 (daughter of our friends and a very good friend of Mendel). We rented a pink bouncing castle, decorated with pink/white balloons, made a face painting booth, had a "wand-making" activity, of course the regular swing and trampoline and two hostess moms dressed up as princesses.... did I mention it's a princess party"...?


We were so lucky with the weather! It was the warmest day of the week, lots of sun, and it stayed warm till late in the evening (hence the BBQ that followed).

One month of summer has passed

It's the end of July, which means we are halfway the summer vacation.

The month started off really crappy - it was cold, it was raining. It scared our CA friends from ever moving back to Belgium I think.

But the last two weeks have made up for those bad ones.
The sun has come out with a vengeance. It's been really warm, and the nice thing about Belgium-summer-warmth is that it stays warm till 11pm.

Ok, the nights are hot too, but I'll gladly handle that little discomfort.

Almost every night we are either having a BBQ with friends, going to local festivals/events or just plainly sitting outside and drinking a glass of wine (overlooking our dirty backyard :-)

Which is another point I want to mention: we have seen the first draft of our backyard plan and we love it. We'll get the final plan on August 4, but Wim has to wait for a bit before digging the first hole (we leave on vacation on the 5th...).
--- I'll scan the plan and post it here as well ---

Mendel is riding on her bike again. We had a few weeks where she refused to bike because her old bike died on her and she was convinced that her new bike (a nice pink one with a basket) was bigger and hence not fall-proof. But after gentle persuasion, followed by bribes and not so gentle threats, she is now again riding her bike and loves it.

A year has gone by (in Belgium)

It's true, we're in Belgium for about a year now,
and so much has happened....

- Kids went to a new school. It was a bit rough at first, but they have adjusted really well.
- Wim started working for a new company. Same as with the kids - a bit rough at first, especially when he has to commute all the way to Merelbeke. But recently he has been able to work from home about 3 days a week which is working out perfectly.
- I started a new job as well. Very different from Cisco/Siemens, but I enjoy my time there (limited as it is).
- We have gotten to know most of our neighbors in the street, very much so in the last few months when the weather got better and we love it here.
- We have made several new friends, some really great friends, some school friends, but all in all it makes adjusting to a new life so much easier.

I remember when I just arrived in Belgium, the weather was gloomy, I felt alone, and I was so afraid that we had made the wrong decision about moving back to Belgium.

I am happy to say that we both feel we made the right decision, and even though we do miss California and our friends there, our future is here...

Progress on the backyard

is none ....

On the contrary, we have decided to start all over again, with a new garden designer.

We will meet the new guy this Sunday - I have high expectations of him, I really hope he doesn't disappoint us.

As a result, we will tear up the original design and fill up the big hole in the backyard that was meant for the pond.

Sounds like I'm winning the bet as well (where I was betting we won't have grass/lawn before summer)....

Mendel can ride her bike

She hasn't been very interested in riding a bike by herself, but when she asked whether we could ride the bike to the soccer field instead of taking the car, I told her she should be able to ride without her training wheels before we could do so.

She responded that she can almost do it, and I followed her into the garage, out into the street, and ran behind her while holding onto her for just a bit.... and she was right - she could do it.

We tried for a few more rounds and yep - she got the feel for it and is now officially "riding her bike".