Lots of pictures!

Hello!!!

Here is another update from Bolsward, Friesland, Holland!!!

We are doing great and having so much fun with our family here!

We've had a wonderful Christmas.

For those who haven't heard or read it yet;

We are expecting another baby!!!

If all goes well, he or she will arrive the end of June!

We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!!!

Enjoy all the pictures!

This was the first time I met my nephew, Dirk!

Me and my sisters (one is missing)

Me, my sisters and Naomi, my younger sisters friend.

Tys in the straw

Me and my sister Anyke and our boys, by the nativity scene!

Tys eating ice cream!

Tys by the Christmas tree!

Rudi and me!

Tys in the studio!

Tys and Rudi in the studio

Me and Robert ten Brink (he's the presentator of "All you need is love")

Me and Rudi by the very famous "All you need is love" bus!

Tys in his suit, he borrowed that from his cousin, Dirk! Isn't it cute?

The signs we had on our car on the way to the studio! (they say; "We are on the way to All you need is love!")

The whole family with Robert ten Brink

Tys with Robert ten Brink

Another one of Tys by the Christmas tree

Sooooo cute!!!!!!

With my mom and dad in the studio

Another one of us... they had beautiful photo oppurtunities in the studio!

Here you can see all the poeple in the studio!

It was a lot of fun!

On the way to the studio!

On Christmas eve the church organized a "Christmas walk". It was very beautifulk with candles in little jars all along the way. I sang in a little choir, and the people that went on the walk stopped by us to hear us sing! It was very fun! (and cold too...)

Dirk and Tys!

High Five!!!

Tys in my mom's old carriage, going for a walk! See the signs on the windows?

We're in Holland!!

We arrived in Holland Thursday the 18th!
Three weeks ago a lady from Holland called us. She works for a reality TV show, it's called "All you need is love". She asked us if we were interested in coming to Holland for Christmas to surprise my whole family!

My sister had sent the show a letter in october asking if they could reunite us, because we miss each other so much! They told her that they have so many requests each year, so they couldn't do anything for her.
So it was a total surprise, and when the camera crew and Rudi, me and Tys arrived at my sisters house, they were so surprised!! It was amazing!

It is great to be back here in NL and to be with my family. It is going to be a great christmas season!

We'll keep you updated!

Tys in my moms kitchen!

Tys and all his boy-cousins in Holland

from left to right; Ruben Jan, Dirk, Mike, Tys and Jesse!

Dirk and Tys on Rudi's lap

Anyke is the sister who wrote the letter, she is Dirk's mom.




This is the very moment I walked into the livingroom, where the whole family was gathered together. They were shocked to see me ofcourse!

Christmas is coming up!

The view from our kitchen window!

Tys in his Ikea bath tub! He loves it!

At the aquarium in Monterey!

I know it has been a while! And I can't believe how fast the time is going! The last message on this blog was November first! But it feels like it was just a week ago! And today is already December 16th!
We have been busy, but not extremely.. just nice!
The end of November we went on a De Winkle trip to Monterey. It was so much fun! We all sat in the spa together and we went to the aquarium and saw the ocean in cannery row! It was beautiful! We had a blast all together. We celebrated Thanksgiving at Cory and Katie's house. With Dirk and Molly and Arie and Katie's and Molly's parents. It was a lot of fun and the food was outstanding!! Amazing!
Last week Thursday and Friday we were in Salt Lake City with Justin, Siska and Logan. There was a DFA-Young Cooperators conference. It was fun and we learned some things, but unfortunately Tys got sick. He was throwing up and not so very happy.. Poor guy... It only lasted for 24 hours, so that was good. And Saturday he was just the old, happy Tys again!
He is in the process of learning how to crawl! He has four teeth already, so I bought him his first toothbrush and yummy fruit flavored toothpaste! (save for babies ofcourse!)
This morning he woke up from his nap, so I went to go get him. And I was surprised to find him sitting up straight in his crib! Now it's really time to lower that mattress!
It seems he's learning something new every day!

Well, the winter finally came! There's a bunch of snow and it's about 20 degrees today! COLD! So, Rudi stays pretty busy with this kind of weather! Me and Tys just like to look at the snow through the window! :)

Some other exciting news is that Peter and Miriam are expecting another baby in June 2009!

I will try to update the blog more often! Hopefully even before Christmas! Keep checking in and don't hesitate to leave a comment!

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!!

finally more pictures of Tys!

Hi everybody!

Sorry it took me a while, but here are finally some more pictures of our adorable, sweet son!
He's doing very well! 7 months already, sometimes I just can't believe how fast it's going! It really is true what everybody says; "enjoy it, they grow up fast!!!"
He loves drinking out of a bottle now! Before he didn't like it very much. But since I'm not nursing him as much as I used to, I thought I better start feeding him the bottle, and now he loves it, so that's great. He also loves his fruit and even his veggies! And every once in a while I'll give him a cookie to chew on, he loves that too!
I have not weighed him for a while, but my guess is that he's around 20 pounds now.
He is still in his infant carrier, but we need to be looking at a bigger carseat now, the carrier is getting way too heavy!

Rudi and me are doing well, just the normal things. It's been very nice weather, it hasn't been too cold yet, we've been working outside in our T-shirts! Today it rained just a tiny bit, but enough to settle the dust!

Well, as you can see no pics of the dairy yet.... I haven't taken the time to bring the camera out there... The new freestallbarn is coming along, still not done yet though. The chopping is all done, now they're spreading compost, disking and planting the fields.

Here are some pictures of Tys!

Have a good week everybody!

5 sisters!

I have 5 sisters...

Margriet is the oldest, she is on the far right.
Then comes Aly, next to me on the left, kind of hidden.
Then Janneke, in the middle in the back.
Anyke, second one in on the right.
(Me on the left)
Then the youngest, Elbrich, al the way up front!

And that is my one and only brother, Jan Jacob!
And my mom on the left....



This is the whole family (without spouses and kids)

This was the night before we left to go back to Idaho, in January 2008....


Anyways, I just thought I'd tell you a little bit about my family!
And Tys actually reminds me a lot of my brother. And also my brother and his wife have a baby boy that Tys looks like!!

A new car!!!

We bought a new (used) car!!!
It's a 2004 Ford Expedition Eddie Bauer!
We had been looking for a new car for a while, since my jeep was getting pretty old, it was a 1996!
It's a very nice car. All kinds of extra stuff. DVD player and a back up camera, seat heaters and AC for the seats.. It's very nice and we're very happy with it!
Here are some pictures...

The new car and the old Jeep...

Putting the plates on...

As you can see, Tys is quite pleased with the new car and all the space he has now!!

That's the big news of this week...
It's getting supercold here. I think it was freezing last night and I just saw on the news that there was SNOW in Boise!!! Crazy!!
last week the temperatures were still in the 80's!

Tys weighed 18lbs, 10 oz. at his 6 month check up.
He's doing very well, still rolling over both ways. Other than that there's not much progress, he's almost sitting up by himself, we just need to practice a little more...


I hope you all have a great weekend!

Next time I will try to put some pictures of the dairy and The De Winkles new house on our blog!!

BYE!!!

World Dairy Expo!

HI!

On Wednesday we arrived home safely from our short trip to Madison, Wisconsin!
We had a great time. We left Sunday morning early. First we flew to Minneapolis. Then from there to Madison. The flight went great and Tys even got some sleep on the plane. He did really well!
We arrived in Madison at about 2 pm. We had to drive to Deforest where we stayed at the Holiday Inn. That was about 20 minutes driving. But since we were early we just took our time and took a scenic route. That was fun. We sat in the spa when we arrived, that was fun. Then our friends from Florida, Michael, Carrie and their daughter, Madison, arrived and the rest of the trip we hung out. It was a lot of fun to see them again. Madison had gotten so big! And sooo cute! Madison and Tys got along really well, Madison could not stop looking at him! Adorable...
Monday the buys had to judge all day. Carrie and me and the babies went shopping, which was a lot of fun. We met up with our husbands when they were done and went out to dinner.
Tuesday we hung out at World Dairy Expo all day. It was really fun.
Then, Wednesday we had to leave early to go home again. And again, Tys did really well on the plane. We were so glad. We were home nice and early.
Here are some nice pictures from our trip;