June was a particularly eventful and busy month for our family. With two birthdays and Father's Day, we have no shortage of sugary treats to fuel us through the different events. Here are just a few of the highlights.
We decided to give gardening another shot this year. Gardening is definitely a term that is used loosely here; what we really mean to say is that we ventured to the garden store and picked out some strawberry plants and some basil to plant in containers on our balcony. For those who are familiar with last years embarrassing disaster with our attempt to grow radishes you will realize this is a big step for two adults that do not have any pigment of green in their thumbs at all. Atticus loved helping us pick out the plants at the garden centre and visiting the fish and rabbits while we were there too. Milayla slept.
The really sad part about this venture is that one particularly windy day our strawberry plants lost a good deal of their flowers (is that what they are called?) and the basil began wilting. The story does have a happy ending though; not only do we know to bring our plants in during stormy weather but our plants seem to have recovered with a little love and pruning - we have even enjoyed some delicious fresh strawberries (to our complete surprise and amazement).
Laura celebrated a birthday in June so her birthday present was not to cook and go out for dinner. We went to Den Haag and got to see a very neat sand sculpture. The birthday girl opted for dessert at home (there was no more room after we ate dinner...) of chocolate torte with strawberries and whip cream.
We celebrated Father's Day which you can read about here and Jason blessed Milayla at church that same Sunday which you can read about here. There were a lot of special events that fell on this Sunday including Father's Day, Milayla's Blessing, Milayla's one month birthday and Aunt Dayna's birthday (who welcomed a baby girl, named Lylah, the same day that Milayla was born!). It was definitely a celebrated day.
And of course, we celebrated Little Man's Birthday which you can read about here, here and here (wow, we wrote a lot about that!).
Milayla started sleeping longer during the night, which any parent will know is great cause for celebration and we celebrated by making sure that we fell asleep when she did - a good night's rest is a wonderful gift! We partly attribute the longer sleeping in the evenings to our Woombie (part of a very generous gift from Jason's coworkers), which Milayla seems to be incredibly content and comfortable hanging out in. They look a little strange (and we have had a good laugh about the faces Milayla makes when we zip it up), but it seems to do the trick.
Milayla is also making great strides in holding her head up and is very attentive to what is going on around her. We are fortunate that she is a pretty easy going baby who loves to cuddle.
Atticus is, well...Atticus. His development has just exploded in the last couple of months and it has been a lot of fun for all of us. He is learning new verbal and signing words constantly and has even picked up a surprising amount of Dutch words. When we go out he always tries to chat with the people we meet and is insistent on helping with errands in every possible way. He pulls the basket at the grocery store, gives purchases to the cashier and carries the bags out of the store. He really is a gentleman. We have begun preschool work sheets with him which he really enjoys and concentrates very intently on.
We've learned to check his pockets before putting him down for a nap. Recently, he hid a set of keys in his pocket before going down for afternoon nap. When he decided it was time to get up he pulled out the keys and began trying to unlock his crib. He was not successful, obviously, but he sure did put in a valiant effort. When Mommy came in and discovered what the clinking noise was, Atticus could not stop giggling hysterically - caught in the act!
Atticus has really taken to the idea of Hide-and-seek lately and he is surprisingly good at finding hiding spots, just not so great at staying quiet. He gets a serious fit of the giggles...
And his love for books has increased substantially. His latest favorite is 'The Giant Jam Sandwich', and will want it read 3-4 times in a row - Mommy has it memorized. He is so great with 'reading' books to Milayla as well, such a sweet sight to see.
Jason went for a job interview and we accepted a job offer this last week that will require us to move to Bremen, Germany. After lots of prayerful consideration we felt it was the right choice for our family. We will be moving in just over a months time; there is so much to do before then. It is sure to be quite the adventure. We better start reviewing and practicing our German.
As excited as we are about the new possibilities ahead, making the choice to leave The Netherlands was very difficult. Our time here has been incredible. We do still have one month left though, so we will save our sappy 'goodbyes' for then.
There you have it, just a few of the bits and pieces of our life.
Love and miss you all.
Love,
-The Clog Crew
(guess we will need to rename ourselves...any suggestions?)
Atticus is, well...Atticus. His development has just exploded in the last couple of months and it has been a lot of fun for all of us. He is learning new verbal and signing words constantly and has even picked up a surprising amount of Dutch words. When we go out he always tries to chat with the people we meet and is insistent on helping with errands in every possible way. He pulls the basket at the grocery store, gives purchases to the cashier and carries the bags out of the store. He really is a gentleman. We have begun preschool work sheets with him which he really enjoys and concentrates very intently on.
We've learned to check his pockets before putting him down for a nap. Recently, he hid a set of keys in his pocket before going down for afternoon nap. When he decided it was time to get up he pulled out the keys and began trying to unlock his crib. He was not successful, obviously, but he sure did put in a valiant effort. When Mommy came in and discovered what the clinking noise was, Atticus could not stop giggling hysterically - caught in the act!
Atticus has really taken to the idea of Hide-and-seek lately and he is surprisingly good at finding hiding spots, just not so great at staying quiet. He gets a serious fit of the giggles...
And his love for books has increased substantially. His latest favorite is 'The Giant Jam Sandwich', and will want it read 3-4 times in a row - Mommy has it memorized. He is so great with 'reading' books to Milayla as well, such a sweet sight to see.
Jason went for a job interview and we accepted a job offer this last week that will require us to move to Bremen, Germany. After lots of prayerful consideration we felt it was the right choice for our family. We will be moving in just over a months time; there is so much to do before then. It is sure to be quite the adventure. We better start reviewing and practicing our German.
As excited as we are about the new possibilities ahead, making the choice to leave The Netherlands was very difficult. Our time here has been incredible. We do still have one month left though, so we will save our sappy 'goodbyes' for then.
There you have it, just a few of the bits and pieces of our life.
Love and miss you all.
Love,
-The Clog Crew
(guess we will need to rename ourselves...any suggestions?)
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