Ruben took his birthday celebrations to discover Old times - real old times- 08-08-09

Ruben became obviously 9 years old this year and it is enough reason to gather the neighbours and family members to taste nice cake (bought from the local bakery), apple pie (home made, Aty & Co) and drinks and fun chatting and enjoying the nice summer weather in our garden. I decided to cook pratha with dhal curry to have my neighbours to try my cooking for the first time. I still saw them walking around alive the next day! Thank God! Ha! Ha! The party ended up we tasted all my coffee liquor stocks (left overs from Christmas last year) and the last guest left around 2200 hrs.


Ruben invited only 2 friends from his school and he wanted to visit the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden in Leiden. Of course we travelled via the train and it is a good moment to open up the present he received from his 2 friends.


We arrived after almost 45 minutes of train ride in Leiden. We took lunch which we brought with us and walked to the museum. Along the way we saw the Leiden city attractions like windmill overlooking the canal and the fountain. It was quite informative hours we walked through the Egytian permanent exhibition and learned how they mummified dead bodies and preservation techniques and traditions.

We passed by shortly the Romanian times......

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Took a break at Viking tents.

Obviously trying out the outfits of the Vikings and the boat.

When arrived at the last drop off it was time for dinner. The other family too wanted to eat at the beach on our famous Jeroen restaurant and stayed till the sunset before calling it a day.

Ruben - Hip Hop Freestyle @ Kunstfestijn Zandvoort 2009 - 2nd August

Ruben had couple of sleepless nights waiting for this day. Zandvoort organized a talent hunt for 2009 and participants could show the talents they have to win the yearly competition. During the break when the juries were choosing the best 3 talents of this year (after their perfomances), Studio118 dance teacher Conny has asked Ruben to perform a freestyle hip hop dance with Remy.

I have made a video of Remy and Ruben's performances and you may check it out at TheDance. The event have been reported in various media links as follows.

Zandvoort-photoalbum-72-79 (photos from # 72-79), Kunstfestijn-zandvoort-2009 (reported the event in Dutch) and ZandvoortFM (too) .

Ruben had two practice sessions with Remy and one with Conny before he performed for the show. He sees he could improve a lot and want to keep dancing to perfection. Kudos Ruben! We are proud of you.

Priya turned 11 this year - Her school and family parties

This year, Priya's birthday fell on the last weekend of school year before the start of the summer holidays. Hence, she invited her friends over for a party the week before. We were done with the preparations and were ready around 1400 hrs when the first group arrived.

Some of the parents stayed a while to talk about the weather and when they left the party began.

First it was Priya's turn to close her eyes so that her friends could hide their presents in and around the house. She found all the presents with their tips. Then, they started with decorating the piece of cake they had in front of them with, whipped cream, chocolate and colour sprinkles, m&ms, fruits and so on.

Then we divided the group into 2 and the first group went with me and marked along the way some signs for the second group to follow after 20 minutes. Well, my group decided to give them a hard time, where Jackie needed to call me twice for tips (of course, my team were amused that they did a good job). At the final point, we marked on the ground to look for us.

We found a best place to hide as you see in the picture below. Jackie's team did not succeed in finding the hiding group and I gave them a tip.

We had later some chips and drinks before started playing various games in the dunes. It was a sunny weather.

On the way back, they had so much fun that they were not looking 'normal' anymore. Ha! Ha!

Back at home we ate pan-cakes and french fries.

It was time to give away small gifts to the her friends. I had to hold all the cards with the names of the kids and each of them need to pull the cord through the house to a place where they would end up (the cord has different lengths). At the end Jackie hung the presents randomly.

They were delighted with their presents and played further till their parents arrived to pick some of them up and the rest we brought them home with the bicycles.

Her actual birthday was celebrated on the 4th. July, 2009 with family members and neighbours. We bought a whipped cream cake and Jackie made the "Jackie's Famous Chocolate Cake' again.

When the family members arrived, Jan conducted the orchestra to ensure the birthday songs were sung properly (after 30, 178 times singing these songs throughout his life time, he thought it was finally time to conduct the orchestra. Ha! Ha!).

It was a brilliant weather and we sat in the garden to have the snacks and bites with beverages (alcohol and non-alcohol).

In the meantime, Priya and Ruben took a break while consuming a nice ice-cream.

Mellow was fixated with the guinea pigs (which are having vacation at our garden, since the owners could not take them with them to their camping place in Hoenderloo, Apeldoorn).

I made 'nasi goreng' and roasted chicken for the dinner and after the party the final guests left with the 3 dogs and Jan & Aty to the eastern part of the country. Jan & Aty are having their holiday at Arjen & Astrid's house in Wijchen (they are in the UK on 4 weeks vacation).

Joke the neighbour, was watering the plants outside and of course Ruben challenged her to spray the water on him. He needed to cool down after a heavy party of his sister.