Nice weather

Dear friends,

It´s been a while since we wrote on our blog so here we go!!!

The last couple of monthes have been quiet busy. Busy at work (which is a good thing) and busy at home. Our search for a good high school for Sanne have been really succesfull. Starting next August she is going to the "Gomarus College", a Christian High School in Groningen, about 12 km from our house. Just as Thijs and me, she will ride this every day on her bicycle!!! Although it is a very big step for her, she´s really looking forward.

Everybody (except Sam, who isn´t playing volleyball) had their last volleybal matches and training and the kids ended the season last weekend, with a trip to Ameland. This is one of the little islands north of the Netherlands. With the kids gone, we had a whole weekend for ourselves!! With temperatures above 20 degrees Celsius, we decided to book a Hotel for the three of us (yes, we also took Lara with us....) at the beach in Ijmuiden, about a two hour drive from our house.

We had a great time walking,

digging holes,

walking,

sleeping (under supervision of angels.....)

digging holes,

and eating and drinking.

We were blessed with awesome weather and really enjoyed ourselves. Monday afternoon, we drove to Holwerd where we had to pick up the kids. They had a great weekend too and were exhausted. Two out of three were sleeping in the car on the way back home. After Pizza with Oma (grandma) they all went to bed and slept untill 11.30 next day!!!!!

The kids only have four weeks left at school and then summer holiday!! We haven´t planned a trip yet, but one thing we are really looking forward to is the visit of Fonda (a former collegue

of Samantha). She is staying with us the last two weeks of July and we´re gonna show her the Netherlands. After that we might go for a short trip to Germany, we´ll see.

This is all the news from this side of the ocean for now. Maybe Sanne is going to write something about her new pet.........

A big hug and God bless you all. Stay in touch!!

Henk

update from Sam

Hello everybody,

It is time for me to write something. But most of all..... to send you some pictures.

Let me start with the birthdays we celebrated.

Sanne turned 12 years, Thursday the 5th of March (she is almost as tall as I am).

She is doing fine at school, has a lot of friends and likes to play volleyball. Next year she is going to junior high. My 'little' girl is not a little girl anymore........

Of course Henks mom (and my parents) came for some birthday cake (and because of the fact that my parents live in the middle part of Holland, they stayed for a couple of nights).

We went to a pancake restaurant on Friday and the next day........party time again!

Daan turned 9 the 7th of March. We invited a lot of friends and family. I think that’s one of the differences between Canada and Holland. Celebrating birthdays!

He invited 7 friends over for a birthday-party.

Sanne and Thijs organized the whole party (yeah!!!! Note; I really dislike organizing kids parties).

Daan on a racing track.....

We ended that day with...pancakes!

It is spring!!! OK, we still have a lot of rain over here but sometimes.......SUN.

That means that we all jump in our (little) car and go for a walk.

Last weekend we took Lara (she is such a sweet, beautiful, stubborn dog) for a long, long walk.

The weather was beautiful and we (Lara included) had a lot of fun.

I must say, I really enjoy being back in Holland. I like my job, love to spend time with friends and family, ..... This is home for me!
That doesn’t say that I’m not curious about you all. Sometimes I wish that Canada was just a couple of hours away from Holland. That we just could get together for a weekend, do some talking, some laughing, just spend some time together and then go back to our own place.

But..... it isn’t. And I’m not a writer (in English), or caller......

For now; a big kiss from me, to all of you.

Gods Bless! SAM

Finally some news

Dear Friends,

Finally some news from us. I know, we should be ashamed but we were so busy (yeah, yeah, excuses, excuses.....).

I hope that everbody had a great X-Mas, I know we had. Thanks for all the cards and messages you sent us.

Last week we went skiing in Austria. The kids did so well at school, we thought they deserved this trip so we booked a nice house in the mountains. Beside the five of us, my mother and my sister also went along. Of course we didn't fit into our small Corsa, so we rented a Van.

Saturday morning around 7.30 we left and after a 12 hour trip we arrived in Austria. It was beautiful, about half a meter snow in the village and way over a meter on the mountain!! On Tuesday it started snowing again and that added another half a meter to the big layer of snow.

You can imagine the kids (and we also of course) had a great time. To give you a small impression of our trip I will add some pictures and short videos.

It is amazing how fast a week can go if you have so much fun. But unfortunately everthing has to end, so this Saturday we drove back and arrived home safely around 9 o'clock in the evening.

We are so blessed by our God who protects us and helps us by everything we do. We see that in our work, as well as during trips like this and often don't even think of it!!

We hope and pray that our Father blesses all of you the same way as he did us.

Well this must be it for now. Big hug and hope to hear from you soon,

Henk

PS I hope that next time I can get Sam or one of the kids to write something. Keep your fingers crossed..........