11 Years and counting!

Bryan and I celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary this weekend. Yep, that's right, 11 years!! We wanted to go to Paris, but couldn't find an overnight babysitter, so we settled for a nice dinner with my bestest friend from high school and her husband who (finally!) got to come to Europe to visit. They just celebrated their 5th, so it was a nice little celebration. We also went to a Sinterklaas party (more on this in a future post once I have the pictures uploaded, you won't believe it!). So, while it wasn't a romantic weekend in Paris, it was a nice weekend to relax and remember 11 wonderful years of marriage. I love you, Honey!

Can we go see the other aminals?

We caught this clip while we were at the zoo in Spain. Just now getting around to posting it. Bryan's also put together an entire movie of us in Spain. Will try to get it on You Tube soon.

Enjoy!

Avery turns Two!

The first day of fall is the first day of school. I don't care if school starts on August 1st, fall must start on August 1st. The 1st day of a two-year old is the 1st day she gets mad, throws on herself on the floor and bangs her arms and legs on the floor while screaming. So, Avery turned two on November 15, 2009! Yea! Good times.

Back from Houston

I just got back from a whirlwind trip to Houston. Left NL Monday morning and was back Friday morning. Bryan had the girls to himself again for 3 nights. He's such a wonderful and rocktastic Daddy! I was able to get him a little help in the evenings, so he wasn't completely on his own, but it was still not easy. Kaeli was a tremendous help and a great big sister. Avery had a very runny nose all week and kept waking up in the middle of the night with a cough.

Most of the 2.5 days that I was in Houston was spent at work in meetings (great meetings that have made me increasingly indispensable). However, I did get to see a few friends. For those of you I didn't see, please don't take it personally, it was a true business trip with no time for fun. I did not fully understand how much I missed "home" until my plane began it's final descent into Houston. It got worse when I saw our friends and their kids. We've missed so much since we left in January. Sure, we've had some fantastic adventures, but what adventures have we missed by being half way around the world?!

Did I mention how wonderful and rocktastic my wonderful and rocktastic husband, "the wonderful and rocktastic" Bryan, really is? In short, he is wonderful and rocktastic. The long version is that he is really, really wonderful and rocktastic.

Obviously, my husband wrote the paragraph above. He really is wonderful, but I can't quite figure out what 'rocktastic' means, so I can't verify whether he is or is not rocktastic.

Well, I'm back in the Netherlands and it is cold and gloomy, but I'm here with my wonderful husband and fabulous little girls. We're getting ready for our next adventure, looking for warm places to visit! Let us know if you have any suggestions!!

Halloween Scrooge

I feel like such a scrooge when it comes to this year's Halloween. I know I have a good excuse (we were flying home from Spain), but we were home by 2pm, which is plenty of time to get dressed up and go trick-or-treating. Yes, they do celebrate Halloween over here. But, alas, we got home, unpacked a little, called all of the grandparents, ate dinner, then went to bed. I could have at least answered the door and given some candy to the lone trick-or-treaters that rang our doorbell, but considering they woke up Avery... I think Bryan did go apologize, but we then turned off all of our lights and shut the doors to those rooms with windows to the front of the house. Bah Humbug!!

Seriously, though, Nana (my mom) made the most adorable costume for Kaeli. The extent of her Halloween was the pictures you see below. She loved it and looked absolutely beautiful. Thanks, Nana!

Spain - yet another White Family Adventure

We went to Spain last week for our very first week-long European family vacation, just the four of us. We went to Malaga, Spain, on the southern coast of the Costa del Sol. The weather was absolutely perfect. Sunny and warm during the day, cool enough in the evening to keep the room cool (very good thing since we had no A/C). The pool was a little chilly, but the girls didn't seem to mind and Bryan sucked it up a few times to get in and swim with Kaeli. The water at the beach was freezing, but we were still able to build sand castles. As you can see in one of the pictures, Avery's not much of a beach lover. In fact, she hated having sand anywhere on her! It was actually quite funny, but very difficult to enjoy the beach when your daughter starts screaming any time she gets sand on her hands or feet, and let's not even talk about the time she got sand on her pacifier! Enjoy the pictures!

Bryan and the girls at the Madrid Airport

Kaeli at the beach

Kaeli reading to Avery and vice versa

Avery with sand on her feet. Bryan laughing.

The only picture we got of the four of us