Guus Bosman

We are in Secaucus and there's a large amount of snow on the ground.

We went sleighing and Julian took Nora with him on the sled.

We had at least 8 inches of snow tonight. That's more than we've ever had in this house and shoveling was quite a workout.

It's a satisfying chore -- nice to see the before and after.

There's a large snowstorm on its way to us; it started snowing about an hour ago. There's a couple of inches of snow predicted and it will snow or sleet in the morning also, so it's likely that our offices will be closed.

The snowstorm caught North Carolina off-guard earlier today and the trip home for some of my old coworkers took many hours.

Nora is talking a lot now, and over the last few weeks we wrote down some of the more memorable exchanges. Some are in Bulgarian, some in Dutch, some in a mixture.

Нора: "Падна!"
Саша: "Какво падна?"
Нора: "Нищо няма падна!"

Nora: "Champion? Pakken?"
Guus: "Een champion? Die zijn op meissie."
Nora: "Daar is 'ie!"
Guus: "Oh... je bedoelt de lampion!"

Here she found a great translation for "aardige meneer" (nice guy):

Guus: "Nora, vertel jij eens even aan mama over die aardige meneer?"
Nora: "Чичко говорише Нора! Магазина!"

Nora is learning the pronouns. In Bulgarian one says "я" for "(to) her" and "го" for "(to) him". She is starting to understand how it works but sometimes she uses her own invention "йе".

Nora: Намери йе!

Nora: "Duplo mannetje [ge]stoten"
Nora: "Duplo mannetje huilt. Traantjes!"
Guus: "Dan moet je maar een kusje geven."

"Are you Mr. Bosman?", the police officer asked. He was smiling after he saw how startled I was to see him through the backdoor window on our veranda.
"Eh, yes?" -- I wasn't sure what to expect from a smiling police officer at 11.00 pm at night.
"Well, Mr. Bosman, the trunk of your car seems to be open and I just wanted to make sure it wasn't broken into".
"Ah, well... I know how that happened!"

Somebody has been playing again with those fun remote buttons on papa's car keys!

It's pretty warm today, 58 degrees Fahrenheit, and we went to the Frying Pan Farm this morning.

It was Nora's second visit.