Guus Bosman

I picked Nora up at 4.00 pm at the bus stop. She was the last one of the bus so I asked the driver to call her -- she didn't realize this was her stop. She was happy and not overly tired.

Her best quote was:

"Papa, de juf zegt dat de eerste dag op school altijd de leukste is".
"Oh, en was het leuk?"
"Het was hartstikke leuk!"

When Leo woke up and came downstairs, he immediately hugged Nora. When Adrian woke up 30 minutes later, his first question was: "is Nora beneden?" (They might be worried she'll disappear again, like she did in the summer).

She has her first homework assignment, a collage that's due next Monday. She went to sleep at 7.45 pm.

A big milestone today -- Nora left for Taylor elementary today, where she will start first grade.

We all woke up early, except Nora, who was calm and happy.

Below is also a picture of Nora learning about the lockers -- this is from a tweet from the school.

We had a great time with Opa and Oma. It's Labor Day weekend and the end of the summer, and yesterday Jaap and Mieke returned to the Netherlands. We brought the boys to bed to make it easier on them, and Nora and I drove to the airport.

After a while I showed the guys pictures of the plane Opa and Oma took home. Adrian was disappointed there weren't more pictures.

We're now getting ready for everyone to go to their new schools. Nora will start at Taylor on Tuesday and Leo and Adrian will start a week later at AMH.

We went to Water, Wind and Waves, an exhibition about Dutch maritime art in the 17th century.

We were a little early and the boys had a lot of energy so I parked at the Federal Reserve and we went for a long walk along Constitution. It's 1.5 miles from there to the museum so they had a change to release their energy.

This morning we went to the Arlington County Fair, the kermis. Jaap and Mieke walked, I took the kids with the bakfiets. That was a lot of fun, the boys in particular liked crossing the highway on a bike bridge.

We spent most of our time at the playground, and the boys did two rides. Adrian didn't like the first ride ("ik wil dat jij bij mij was") but they both enjoyed the train ride with Opa. We brought sandwiches and water, which was smart since they 'were getting hungry' at 10.30 am, they said. We also met Ginny, who was working for the Arlington Library.

The boys love the attention they are getting.

Here are Jaap and Adrian reading a book.

We celebrated Jaap's birthday together, a nice milestone. In the morning there were gifts -- mostly of the literary persuasion. Later in the day Judy and Ginny joined us for coffee and home-made apple pie.

We went for dinner at the Silver Diner, much to everyone's delight -- it was a fun day.

Opa and Oma left for New York City yesterday. They took the train. They're planning to visit the Metropolitan, the 9/11 Memorial, Central Park and a few other things.

We've had a great first week together. The boys were a little bit shy, but quickly got used to my parents again, especially when Oma started reading a book.

My parents are here, it's wonderful to see them. Their plane landed at 4.00 pm, but customs took a while so we were home at 6.30 pm. Leo was very shy in the beginning, hiding behind Sasha, but Adrian was ready to start talking right away.

Mieke read a book, Kom uit die kraan!. They didn't remember it from last year and didn't quite get the story yet, but they quickly warmed up and dinner was fun with lots of talking.

We're cleaning out the basement and so we're selling our old baby gear. It makes us a little nostalgic, but it's also nice to clean up and get more space in the house.

The double stroller went to a family with two kids who are consolidating strollers. One of the high chairs went to a family who already had one of the model but wanted one at their aunt's as well. The "baby cage" went to a lady who'll use it for her small dog. The running stroller we sold to a lady who turned out to be a co-worker.

The car seats are more difficult to sell, though we just sold the oldest one (Nora's green one).