Planet Eijpen

From party to snow fun in a week......

We started last week with our 12,5 anniversaryparty, after weeks of preparation most of it in the last week, it was finally there. We had talked about how cool it would be to have some of our foreign wedding guests to show up. But we decided that babies, moving, money and age were in the way of that happening. We had not counted on our friend Heather, who showed up in the midst of the final preparation. The party was really really great and Heathers presence made it even better. It is a good party custom over here not to show pictures of the actual party, but we do have two for you..

the cake

the living room and the tent outside...

After the party we enjoyed Heathers stay for a couple of days and then on came the snow. It was Wicky's first snow of her life.

as you can see she loved it! And still after four days, she tries to get out of the house any chance she gets.

Anouk and Thom spend the weekend with us and saturday we went to the airplane museum and we ran into Santa. He gave us  a tour through the museum with entertaining extras and a quiz.

it was even fun when all the kids got to climb into a smelly rescue helicopter and Santa closed the door.

The real Boeing 747 was the best part of the museum, according to the kids, who unlike us are not frequent flyers, they even got to try out business class. Where Thom hurried us to sit down, thinking we were really going to fly!

Sunday we enjoyed the snow, that kept us from ice skating, but we had great fun....

building the snow slide and.... using it

All that snow makes you tired and hungry..

 
 
  A great weekend, week and weekend, and next weekend, CHRISTMAS!!!
 
 
 
 
 

 

 
 

On this day 12,5 years ago....

In Holland we celebrate a few wedding anniversaries big time, 25, 40, 50, 60,65,70, but the first one is 12,5. Since we were married on june 5th 1997, our 12,5 anniversary is today.

We share this date with Sinterklaas, who celebrates his 587th birthday today, and brings all the good kids presents today. That is why we stick to a small family dinner tonight and will go all out next saturday with a big party.

After 12,5 years I love Richard even more. We have managed to deal with stuff  life has thrown at us and are still going strong. I am convinced that you found the right husband/wife if you can help each other cope with situations and get out of it better. We love our life that we share with Puppy and Wicky and our big family and our numerous friends.

Everybody knows that having kids of our own is a big dream for us, but we have been so blessed with all the kids that were shared with us over the years. We went to concerts, amusmentparks, school, recitals, games , vacations and celebrations with them. That has meant a great deal to both of us.

Thank you all for being part of these great 12,5 years and you are all invited to join us the next 12,5 years! 

p
 

Happy (early) anniversary and welcome home....

Richard is coming home today from his vacation to Australia, New Zealand and Fiji islands. And coming saturday is our 12,5 year wedding anniversary. As his gift I fixed up our attic and turned it into a real "man cave". Here are the pictures.......

Anouk and Thom decorate one of the doors, the result..

Our neighbor Hans helped with the electricty, Martine and my mom helped hauling trash off to the dump, Anouk helped with the interior decorating. Martine helped me carry heavy stuff like the tv. Three weeks of hard work and this is the result...

Thom filled the fridge.

the computer corner

 

the maffia globe/liquor chest

the sitting area

tv, fridge, Wicky

Now I am waiting for his call, that he is on the plane home and we can take off to the airport. I cannot wait.
  
 
 
 
 

 
 

Happy Birthday, Jamie!!

Our second oldest nephew is celebrating his 5th birthday today!No birthdaycake for us, since he lives in California, but we are thinking of the cake!

Dear Jamie, We wish you a very happy birthday and hope you had fun celebrating with all you friends!

Lots of love and kisses from Holland and Australia!

And a big lick from Puppy and Wicky!!
 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, COLLIER!!

5 years ago our 1st of 6 nephews was born! Very exciting and we have visited woth Collier many times since. He is funny and lovable. We still think of his face last time we left, he was so sad. But next visit we will get to see much more of each other, since he moved to Murray just last week. We are soo excited! We cannot be there for his birthday celebration, but our best and biggest birthday wishes go out to Murray, to Collier who turns a solid 5 today.

We love you grote vriend! Happy happy birthday!
 

What does Wicky do on sunday?

This sunday was a lazy one for us, but Wicky had a very busy day herself. She.....

slept funny and she.....

begged for a belly rub and she...........

tried to out stretch Puppy for a bone and she.........

watched the Bucs get killed by the Patriots.

Wicky is adjusting to the dutch life pretty well, but hearing those amercian sounds out of the computer sounded really good. She was glued to the computer is was funny.
 
 
 
 

Sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeepy..............

It was a busy and funfilled weekend for everyone...

and fun makes you sleepy..

 Have a great week everybody!

Cooking like a pro

Never too early to teach a boy how to cook. Thom is spending the weekend here, and he told us he wants to learn stuff. So on friday he learned how to put on his new shoes and to bake pancakes. Oma Ineke helped him..

The outfit may need some explanation, the apron of course was to try to keep his clothes clean, the hat was his idea. After he put the apron on we told him he looked like a real cook, but it would even better with a chefs hat, and you know he is only three!  He may have set the trend for the upcoming ski season.

And after baking the pancakes he turned from cook into eating  child and his clothes ended up in the washer after all.

Today his thing was to help us with Wicky and Puppy and to help cook the macaroni tonight. Or macanoni as he calls it. Here the pictures of the cooking process. Note to concerned adults, supervision is out of the view of the camera but close enough for safety!

Cutting the meat

stirring the macaroni, did you all know it grows in the water? We told Thom about a cook on tv who always drinks his juice (wine) in a wine glas while he cooks.

 

cheers!

The food that actually made it to table was delicious (he is 3!), but we lost some on the way from the kitchen to the living room (hey, it is saturday we eat in front of the tv!). Of course our two little vacuumcleaners made sure we did not waste any food.

Now Thom is sound asleep, totally convinced that this will be his second night in a row, without a diaper and without an accident. No bath before bed, because he didn't want to wash off his "fat cool" tattoos.  Drawn on his arm this morning by our soccer clubs artist, who comes in once in a while to give the boys at the club temp tattoos. Thom is so proud of his it is funny.

and no, this is not how a bird flies, crazy man! It flies with his wings spread out. Despite Thom's problem with that he really liked the bird.

The soccer player was his first one, and he liked it so much, he asked for another one.

Our friday and saturday with Thom, just one word "hilarious!"
 

   
 
 

 
 
 
 

Bye bye........

After a late night and an early morning (Anouk was swimming for her 2nd diploma the morning at 7.45 am and passed!) we drove Heather and Shannon back to the airport. Everybody had a good time the last week, but fun cannot last forever obviously. And we need to sleep sometimes too.

Wicky was looking for Heather and Shannon everywhere, every room. We think she now knows that they are gone and she is staying. Puppy is too. When we walked them tonight, Wicky followed Puppy around and Puppy waits for her. Just like they knew that Wicky needs to learn from Puppy.

 After we got home, we started the laundry and cleaned the house. Right now it looks like they were never here, execpt for our "Heather and Harriet 2009" little Heineken bottle on the bookshelve. It is really quiet too, I really miss the sound of the beermaster getting us the perfect beer, the laughter and just sounds of friends hanging out.

Thank you guys for a really fun weekend, and we have said it a couple of times already, thank you for bringing us Wicky. While I am typing she is snoring her little head off on the couch. She is a great dog.

And this is how we found the dogs earlier tonight...........

And now we are all going to bed... GOODNIGHT!
 

beermaster, golf pro, three countries and flintstones

We have done so much in the past few days it is unbelievable! The Heineken experience turned Shannon into the "beermaster" and I have to say he is good!

Wednesday we went to Vaals, the town in Holland where Belgium, Netherlands and Germany come together. It is a pole, and I managed to be in three countries at the same time!

 

Well my behind, all of it, was in Germany and one foot is in Belgium, while the other is in Holland!

We also drank a beer in three countries and visited the american war cemetary. Very impressive.

 

Today we started out at Ikea, never imagined that would be a tourist attraction. After that we went to the cheese and clogfarm and we had Shannon's farmersgolf clubs made...

 

Later we went to of the nicest castles in our area..

 

Shannon became a knight here today! And we had a good day.

Later we had dinner at Flintstones, and now we are moving on to the evening progam! 

Good Night everyone!
 
 
 
 

The Heineken Experience

Although we have been experiencing Heineken for a couple of kegs already, today we went to Amsterdam to the Heineken Experience, the Heineken Museum.

 

 

 

that smells good!

 

The horse named after mr Freddy Heineken himself

 

That is right!

 

a few ways to make a house decoration statement.......

 

......that you just might be an alcoholic.

 

personalized bottles

 The warm part of the Xtra cold bar, you were not allowed to take pictures in the cold part, just buy them. The cold bar was -5C/23F and you had to wear special clothing. Nice.

After dinner we continued the experience at home, where Shannon showed off his new talent of beer master!