P.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TRAVIS - 13 TODAY!!

Travis (Revisited)

A few more photos from Travis' time here, now that all the photos are in the computer. 

The guys spent a lot of time on the trampoline (until it broke),

We made a trip to a small but full-of-variety candy store,

Travis and Cameron rode with Kevin on one of his runs,

And we had a fun day playing at the beach and riding funky bikes.

Trampoline Drama

While the boys' cousin Travis was here for spring break, our trampoline sustained an injury. (It was less related to Travis being here and more related to all the times there are too many people on it at once.) The timing wasn't great since we had some sunny days the second week of their break and they complained more than once about not being able to jump. Surprisingly, the replacement parts were less than 5 euro and Kevin swapped out the bent pieces yesterday. I'm happy to report that the trampoline is back in service! It just has to last another 14 months of abuse!     

Cameron's a Teen

Though Cameron has been acting like a teenager for a while now - 'tude, cockiness, longer hair - he officially turned 13 last Sunday. Teen-moments aside, he's a great kid and has grown up a lot in the last year or two. He headed off this morning for a 3 day school trip which should be a lot of fun. Friday there is no school, Saturday 4 of his buddies come over for a night of pizza, movies and goofing off - and jumping on the rehibilitated trampoline. Life is good!

Mountain Dew

There are some things the boys miss from America - one is Mountain Dew. After nearly 2 years, we stumbled on a place that recently started carrying Mountain Dew. We bought out their 12 can supply while my nephew was here. The only other time we've seen Mountain Dew while in Europe was in Egypt - the can looks similar, but with the arabic text, the name slants the other direction.

Lode Redux

I'm adding some photos of our friend Lode - after using a picture of him in my porta-urinal entry I thought I should add some of the cooler shots we have of him. We've gotten together with Lode and his wife and daughter a few times and we think they're great people. They showed us around the Gentsefeest (where the urinal was) and it was a fun afternoon seeing all the music groups, entertainers and crowds. Another fun time with them was when they came over one afternoon for dinner about a year ago, and Lode treated us to some of his "circus tricks".  These included juggling while on a unicycle

 juggling with machetes (kinda rusty machetes), 

juggling hatchets, juggling with fire sticks, 

and the big finale - breathing fire!!

Needless to say we were all amazed, mesmerized and I was a little worried Cameron was going to want to try all!  We watched with our mouths hanging open - it was the coolest thing we've ever seen! 

Easter Egg Hunt

My friend and neighbor, Carla, arranged an egg hunt for our kids and the 3 young children of our other neighbor, Nele. Carla planned things and picked up lots of chocolate eggs (the size of real eggs) and she had some painted decorative eggs, too. I went over with Andrew and Cameron to find hiding spots for them Sunday morning. 

Then we all went over to Nele's house to tell her kids Jordan had heard something and he thought it was the paashaas (easter bunny). Nele's son, Tristan, thought he had heard something and his sister, Aglae, thought she heard "sniff sniff" (bunny sounds). So we all went in the empty yard between their houses and the kids started finding eggs. 

Nele's youngest, Guitan, is not quite 2 and he found a chocolate egg next to the fence of the chicken yard. He looked at the egg and looked at his mom and said "kippen" (chicken). He realized eggs come from chickens. (Smart guy.) He wanted to put the egg through the fence to give it back to the chicken! So Nele unwrapped the egg so he'd see it was chocolate and gave it back to him. We laughed about him wanting to give it to the chicken. Then Nele realized it wasn't in his hand and thought he must have eaten it very quickly - but no! He had put the chocolate egg through the fence and it was on the grass in the chicken yard! The chicken didn't seem to appreciate his gesture and wasn't interested in the egg. 

The other kids had fun "hunting" and in little time found all the eggs (with a little hinting from my guys). The yard has trees and garden things and eggs were in all the branches and bushes, nooks and crannies. 

Nele's daughter had a knit cap she was collecting the eggs in and the rest of the eggs were collected in a big bag. When the kids had found all the eggs, they put them all on a table and took turns choosing some to keep. It was very sweet. 

While the older kids did this, Guitan was interested in the fish swimming in the little pool in Carla's yard. He and Jan, Carla's husband, had a lovely discussion about the fishes. 

It was fun to see the smiles on the little ones!

Travis was here!!

We had a fun time last week with a visit from Cousin Travis (Cameron's age) from Seattle. He flew in early Friday morning the 3rd and after sleeping until 2 p.m. started his visit going to get the boys at school - it was the start of the 2-week spring break here! He settled into Cameron's room (Travis is on the left in the photo). That night he went and practiced with Cameron's basketball team. He thought the training was easier than his practices and he had fun. The coach speaks some English and 2 other boys besides Cameron speak English and translated things for him. Otherwise he just watched and followed what the guys were doing for drills. 

The boys had a sunny weekend to catch up with their cousin - jumping on the trampoline, hanging out, shooting hoops, biking, and generally goofing off. Cameron and Travis spent one night in a tent in the back yard, on the trampoline. They made it until about 7 am then came in the house. They figured they'd had about 4 hours of sleep. 

Then we had some rainy days.  We went to Technopolis (like OMSI) near Brussels, we watched some movies, the guys played some games (including on the computer). Andrew, Cameron and Travis met a friend of Andrew and Cameron's to play pool and go bowling one day. Andrew slept in Cameron's room with Cameron and Travis and 2 nights Cameron and Travis moved into Andrew's room. There was a lot of laughter! We introduced Travis to wursten, Beglian chocolate, chocolate breads for breakfast, stofvlees, frites, and more.

The sun came out again at the end of the week and Friday we headed to the North Sea for the day. It was a perfect beach day - sunshine, light wind, and not too crowded. The guys were in heaven, playing paddle games, jumping off a sand dune, a couple even made it into the (freezing) water. Then we rented "low-rider" bikes for some of the guys and a 4-seater for 3 of us and we rode along the waterfront. (We took our neighbor/friend Charlotte with us, too. She's coming to Oregon with us on our visit in July!)

Easter morning, Travis had a long day flying and was back home, unpacking and telling stories that night. We're glad it worked out to have him come visit, it was a fun treat for all of us and something he and our guys will never forget!

Greetings

I really like how the people around here make a point of greeting each person in a group when they arrive somewhere. I did that "back home" with hugs for friends or head nods for others. Here, usually everyone at least shakes hands, kisses the left cheek of friends or gives 3 kisses (left-right-left) when meeting the relatives of friends. (3 kisses is more formal and less familiar.) Older kids do this, too. I was reminded of the greetings yesterday when I took Cameron to his game warmup. His cousin Travis who's visiting this week was with him and as they walked to the entrance, 3 of Cameron's teammates held the door and waited for them. Cameron shook hands with each teammate, as usual, and they each extended a hand to Travis, too. The parents of the teammates on the boys' teams have been very kind and welcoming to us and greet Kevin and me mostly the same way they greet each other (even though we're new and not as well known). I'm still not always sure about who to shake hands with and who to kiss, but it works. The only time one of us has had trouble with it was the time Kevin went to shake the hand of the (short) mother of one of the boys' teammates. As he put his hand out, she leaned up to kiss his cheek and managed to accidentally grope her instead. - Can't say we're not friendly! 

From what I hear, it's 4-kisses in France; however I saw men on the same basketball team greet each other with 2-kisses, starting on the right. They were in the French-speaking part of Belgium, so maybe that's the difference. So many "protocols" - it's part of the fun of being here and trying to learn the customs. 

Cameron's Roesty Spetter wedstrijd

Cameron is a finalist in an art competition connected with the Ieper Kattenstoet. I hadn't heard of this before, but it's a big celebration around cats with a cat parade in the city of Ieper (and has been for 42 years or more) and during this year's event, Cameron will participate in the 2nd stage of an art competition. It sounds like I'm not completely sure what exactly the competition is, aside from it being art related, because I'm pretty clueless about it all.  I did google it and found the following YouTube video of a past parade. www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKUJsRtLFls

Cameron was given a letter by the school Director (principal) from the Kattenstoet saying that Cameron's entry was one of 60 finalists from all over Flanders, and he was the only one at his school to be in the final. From what Cameron tells me, the kids designed/colored a drawing of a cat. He added a baseball cap to his (maybe originality was a plus?). For the 2nd phase of the competition, we take him to Ieper on the 26th (his birthday!!) where he will be given a plaster cat to paint/decorate like his drawing. He'll have 45 minutes to get it done. Then the 60 statues will be judged and awards will be given in different catagories. I have no idea what the catagories are, but I get the impression there is more than one. What little I know about all this I've gleaned from a first read through the congratulations letter Cameron brought home. Being that it's in dutch, I'll be asking my neighbor for help with translating it later so we know all the details. And if/when there is something more to tell about it, I'll post it. With pictures. Wish him luck!