Opa and Oma are Here

My parents arrived in the middle of June and stayed for just over a month, partly to be able to be included in the girls' special 8th Birthday party and their baptism. They are always very helpful with the children, and with household tasks, and so they were again this time. Normally, they go on a trip halfway their stay, but this time we were going to be gone ourselves for a conference trip to Washington DC, and for a week of Josh's family reunion and cousins' camp. The most special of opa and oma's stay is that they get to see our family, our beautiful 4 miracles, how much we love and enjoy eachother, how much fun and work time we have together, and just to simply be part of all that. It always feels a little depressing when they leave again, as a part of me departs with them back to Holland. The girls loved the many ijsjes (icecream cones), the 'sommetjes' (a game involving math), story time with opa, going with mama and oma to horseback riding and cooking class.

We played lots of games over the summer, with lots of swimming. The girks and boefje all love to play games on the Ipad, mini-boefje just loves to sit and play while we all do work in the yard or inside. Every Saturday Josh does yard work, and we all like to help in some way or fashion. It is fun and hopefully it teaches the kids about work and helping others. We do the same with washing cars: the kids have to help, but in return they get to pspray me all over, such that we end up having fun while doing 'work'. Ofcourse I also make them do many more things which I am not funny about, so I am not sure if the picture of work and fun is coming across as well as I'd like. Oh well :).






  My mom took all the pictures, as she is much better at this than I am I just copy her many colorful pictures!

Boefje got stung by a bee in his ear, poor Boefje, so sweet

Mini-Boefje- loves to smile at any time

Trying to find out what is going on

Wow, time for a haircut for Espen

Espen playing outside

While the other kids are 'working'

....hard :)

Teamwork!!!

Wat een dikke wangetjes!

Sofia looks excited, and Lilian ....???

Ready to go!

Oh good, Lilian is excited too

Here she goes

Loving it!

Beautiful Fia

Lilian loved it more than expected

Having a great time with opa Pizza!

Mijn lieve kaboutertje

Sofia learning more about horses

Playing one of their favorite games: uno

How sweet, can't get enough of his sweetness. Note the blue/brown eyes

Ipad and ice cream, what more does a household need?

Boefje is fine with just that

During their stay, we thus took the girls to their swimming class every day, Jasper to 'playball' camp one week, the girls to a horseback riding class (thanks to groupon), and to a cooking class (where they learned to fold napkins in a pretty way, and they cooked pancakes and crunchy french toast (dipped in eggs/milk, then frosted flakes) and other things. Thank you opa and oma, for the special time and for all the help and all the pictures!