Promotion + Birthday + Father's day= Matt week

The second week of June was quite the week for Matt.  He was promoted to Major on Monday, had a birthday on Thursday and Father's day on Sunday.  In between all that we took a trip to Italy.  I will blog about Italy later, for now we will focus on what we call "Matt week".

Getting ready for the ceremony to start.  We are very excited for Matt, and feel very proud and blessed that he has succeeded so well in his career of choice.  He really does love his job!

 Matt's boss is wonderful.  Here Col. Mendelsen is giving a short blurb about Matt.

The Matt blurb.

 Having his promotion orders read

 There were a lot of pins, patches and tags to change out.

I think he actually had 5, the perfect number for each of the kids to do one.

It was a mad jumble of kids!

Jack got to help put the new rank on Matt's berett

 being sworn in.

 He got me and the girls each a bouquet of flowers.  The girls loved that...I think they take after their mama.  The boys each got an army coin.  We have since lost one...

 So proud!

 I was insane and decided to have his promotion party right after the Ceremony.  Most people wait a few days, weeks or even months before they throw their party.  We were just getting so busy with the move coming up, I decided it was now or never.  So we went for it.  It was pretty stressful, and I don't think I will ever have a promotion party right after a ceremony again...but luckily I have some pretty awesome friends who helped me pull it off!

 I couldn't have done it without them!

 Then it was on to Matt's big birthday!

He turned 40 this year, over the hill, ha ha!

I actually put 40 candles on his cake...

He is going to get me so bad when I turn 40!

 Amazingly he blew out every single candle!  I am not kidding, every one!  We even have it recorded for Posterity on video tape.

 Can you see that plume of smoke after he blew out his candles?!!!

We also had a wonderful time for Father's day, hiking through the Cinque Terre region of Italy and relaxing on a beach.  I think he had a pretty good Matt week, it will be hard to top next year!

Tang soo do

For the past year or so Anya has been participating in a martial arts program called Tang Soo Do.  She has really enjoyed it.  Recently she had the opportunity to compete in the International Tang Soo Do European Championship.

 Receiving last minute instructions and tips from Master Oden

 Her Master, Master Oden, received his 5th degree in Black belt that day.

 Competing with her group in the creativity event.

They took Third Place!

 Then she went on to compete in forms and sparing within her Gup

 She did very well in both and got very good scores.  Although she didn't place, we feel like it was a great experience for her and she had lots of fun!

Here she is with the group trophy for third place.

Congratulations Anya and a very successful first competition!

We are so proud of you!

Duinrill!

I think our favorite part about the Netherlands is where we stayed!  We got this excellent tip from a few good friends of ours to stay at Duinrill.  We got a 3 bedroom bungalow, which included day passes to the amusement park and water park for all the days we would be there.  The kids loved it!  We would wake up early, and walk into the park, ride a few rides and enjoy some fun family times.  Then we would grab lunch and go site see whatever was on the agenda for that day.  It was a great weekend!

 The boys had to ride the boats!  Too bad Jack got paired with mom...I didn't last too long before motion sickness started to settle in!

 One of Cora's favorite rides.  

 The boys also love a good train!

 Matt and Anya have really gotten into Rotebahning.  

It is pretty popular all over Europe, but especially in Germany.  They were very pleased to see a track at Duinrill.  It is like a huge slide/roller coaster/bob sled, that goes all up through a hill or mountain   And you slide down it in these little cart/slide things with only a hand brake for control.  They love it!  Anya thinks I go too slow...so I don't usually ride.

 The last day Anya and Matt got up the courage to go on this crazy ride.  It is called "the Falcon", and it goes straight up, and comes back straight down.  Ahhh!  Add in a few loopty loops and you get a crazy ride.

going up...

 Made it to the top...

 but you must come back down!

I loved the pancakes there.  They are very popular and you can find pancake house restaurants all over.  I was expecting more of a crepe, but was pleasantly surprised when I got something completely new and unique.

This was the cheese and apple one, so very delicious!

The Hague and Tulips...

Our last day in The Netherlands we drove out to The Hague and looked around, then drove along the coast thru the tulip fields.

Matt was most interested in seeing this building...The Palace of Peace

Our trip through the Tulip fields was interesting.  I had imagined in my head seeing rows and rows of various colored petal bliss.  I actually "borrowed" the above picture from a friend...it depicts perfectly what I had hoped I would see...

 but, alas, we were a few days too late...

most of the tulip petals had fallen and lay in between the rows waiting for the wind to carry them off.

 Here is a small field with a few tulips still holding onto their petals.

 We found this lonely strip of yellows...

 and far off in the distance we found a patch of reds.

Not the tulip sight we had hoped for, but after all  we were going at the end of May.  So our hopes weren't that high.  It was still fun trying to spot tulips, the whole family got into it and Matt tried not to groan too much at the million U-turns I made him take!

In the end, we called it an early night and went back to our lodging to eat dinner and hang out at the water park.

The kids were very happy!

Zaanse Schans

The next day was our windmill day!  I really wanted the kids to see the engineering of windmills and all the different things they are used for.  Not only are they used for power, but they are used to grind flower, spices, press oils, saw wood...you name it.

The Netherlands is the windmill capital of Europe.  Where we went that day, north of Amsterdam, there used to be 1000 windmills in maybe a 50km circumference   Now there are only 30, but they have been preserved and are still in use today.  A great place to learn all about windmills is Zaanse Schans!

 Passing a windmill on our way to the museum's

 Our first stop was at the wooden shoe factory.

It was fun to find out that these were not every day wear shoes.  They were fancy shoes worn to church on Sunday's or to festivals.

 Jack found his pair of wooden shoes right off.

That kid can sniff out anything sports related from a mile off!

 The paths were lined with crushed sea shells.  I think the girls had more fun finding sea shells then anything else.  Cora even found a zebra striped one!

 We toured two windmills.  

the first (pictured above) was a spice mill.  They were grinding cinnamon that day, it smelled heavenly!

Look at those roller stones!

The second mill we toured was an oil mill.  They were pressing peanut oil that day.

It was a fascinating process to watch!

 After a busy day of touring windmills, we needed a snack.

What better snack then a syrup waffle.

He would filet the waffel in half (look above, you see how thin that waffle is on his board...he filleted that in half!) Then a thick layer of warm caramel sauce is smeared in between the layers.

Heavenly!

We should have bought more!

Amsterdam, Netherlands

One of the last places we wanted to visit while still living in Europe was the Netherlands.  Of course we could name a ton of other places, but we are out of time and this was close and at the top of our list. We had a great, long weekend there.  We actually stayed in a really fun place.  

We got a 3 bedroom bungalow, and with that came free entrance to the adjoining amusement park and water park.  So we would spend the mornings at the amusement park, afternoons touring around the coast of the Netherlands, and evenings in the waterpark since it was indoors and open until 10pm!

 We had to go to the Van Gogh museum since he is from the Netherlands!

 We were excited, because unlike the Picasso museum in Spain, the girls actually recognized some of the pieces they saw by Van Gogh from their art classes.

It was a fun museum to go through, and not too long...which we like with twin boys!

 Next we walked along the canals towards the Anne Frank House.

 Outside the Anne Frank house.

Pictures were not allowed inside.

We had shown the girls a movie about Anne Frank, so they were really interested in going here.  It made it seem that much more real to them, I think.  They really enjoyed it.  Hannah's favorite part was seeing the "real"diary.  They whole tour she liked, but she kept saying "ok, mom, but do we get to see the actual diary?"  We did!  We saw the diary she starts out with from her 13th birthday, and then it moves on to loose pages of paper, book leaflets, and any scraps she can find to write on.

It was fascinating!

 We ended our time in Amsterdam, with a walk through town along some of the major canals.  We stopped at the delft store and I found a pretty little vase, and we ended at the flower market.  Which I don't have pictures of!

 We passed a street organ.  We had seen these in a museum  so it was fun to see an actual one in use.  We all agreed that the owner cheated though....instead of hand cranking the crank, it was hooked up to a belt and generator.  No tip from us...kidding!

It 's a fun town to visit, but very liberal!