Felix has now started at the Gastouder on a Monday and a Thursday (Anke), with a different Gastouder on Fridays (Ines). He’s doing really well there. They speak exclusively dutch to him and he has no problems understanding what is happening. He plays well with the other kids and is happy when being dropped off and picked up. Felix is a great little guy. He’s getting good at stringing words together now also. Rarely is there a situation where we are unable to understand what it is he is asking for.
This frees Eliane up for her next stage. I’ll write about this in my next and final blog. It also gave us the opportunity to go out for lunch together alone for the first time since moving. The restaurant / cafe is a 2 minute walk from our house and it’s really very nice (it looks like an airport tower because that’s what it used to be.)
We took our first family holiday trip at the start of the month up to Kijkduin on the outskirts of Den Haag (~140km). This trip was arranged as a holiday for all of Els side of the family to come together and stay in cabins for the week. Funnily enough we actually arranged it all before we even knew we’d move to NL, so it ended up being a far easier journey than we’d originally anticipated.
At 9hrs each way cycling, we decided that it perhaps made sense to leave the bakfiets and instead hire a car to make the journey. It was the first time I’ve been in a car since moving. In fact I can’t think of anytime in my entire life where I would have spent anywhere near as long a duration without using a car.
The Dutch school holidays didn’t actually start until two weeks after the day we were scheduled to leave, but because we’d booked based on UK holidays this meant that Reuben and Ariana got out of school for a week then went back for a week and then started their 2-week spring break. Getting kids out of school here is no joke either! There are forms that you have to fill in and get written approval. You can actually be declined and will absolutely be fined per child per day of absence, as well as have to appear at an education tribunal to explain yourself. A friend of ours said they pulled a sicky for one of their kids so as to leave three days earlier the end of school so as to secure better flights. An inspector went to the morning of the first day of absence, and upon receiving no answer at the door, left a message saying that if they didn’t respond within four hours they would be in contempt of education policies and would face the aforementioned consequences. Serious stuff.
The holiday was so great. Here are some highlights
- First time seeing people we knew since moving
- Timon, Dani and I signed up for a 5km parkrun on the first morning there
- Got some time with one of El’s Cousins, El’s Oma and one of El’s aunts
- Celebrated Ben and Marjans 40th Wedding anniversary
- Kids got to see their cousins and be silly with Aunts Uncles, Opa and Oma
- Lot’s of trips down to the beach
- Played a mini tournament of Padel with Timon, Joel, Ali, Dani and Ben (team mates with Ben – we won.. obviously)
- Had a really nice long evening walk along the beach with Eunice, Ben and Marjan – not a group which I’ve had much time in the company of
- Took an afternoon trip into Den Haag with El and the Kids
- It was Joel and Amy’s 1st wedding anniversary and it was lovely to get to spend a bit of time in the evening with them both
- We arranged an après-ski style , 4pm drinks most days, so that if all of us had been scattered about the place we could come back together and catch up on everyones day
- The ladies got a few opportunities to go out sans-children and have a drink
- Drank a lot of coffee
The day after we got back we went to a great Speeltuin [en:play park], Klimbim. The Dutch have this idea of play parks with a minimal entrance fee per person, typically €1. They proprietors do seem to get a lot of milage out of this token charge, because these speeltuinen in particular are absolutely brilliant.
On the Sunday I took Reuben and Ariana into Eindhoven to see the Mario movie. Not much of a plot but a mega mix of Mario memorabilia. Very enjoyable. We’ve had the soundtrack on regularly since.
The kids were back into a week of school before the spring break started, I was back to work and El had a hectic week of paperwork to sort out. It was toward the end of this same week that we received news that someone very close to us was fatally unwell, and it was not clear initially whether they would make a recovery. The situation progressed rapidly and by Sunday morning Eliane was back in the UK where sadly our loved one had passed away that same day.
On the Friday before this we were scheduled to be at the City Halls for 1600 to get our driving licences converted to European ones. It was very busy and we had the kids with us. It was 1650 before we finally got called up to be seen and within a minute the clerk pointed out to us that we had not yet gone online and completed the mandatory health and suitability questionnaire. The kids were becoming unsettled, the place was soon to close, the website was all in dutch and we had to do it on our phones, plus there was a payment required which was not easy to process for various reasons. At this point El started getting messages which indicated that our loved one was in a very serious state, and she FaceTime urgently. The stress of the situation was unreal. I was proud of both of us for how we handled it, but it was heavy.
Felix stayed characteristically happy throughout, Ariana spilled a full cup of hot Chocolate on herself (and it was rather hot), and Reuben kept both the other two suitably agitated.
I didn’t even get my licence in the end. El did. I have to go back in another 3 weeks. Can’t wait.
So for the last week I’ve had the kids and they’ve the second week of holidays this week. I let my work know that I’d be chopping and changing work hours throughout the day for working in the evenings, and I’d have a couple of days of leave also, and they’ve been impeccably accommodating.
I think that, notwithstanding the very sad news and the absence of my best friend (El), this week has been really really fantastic. I feel like my energy levels have been through the roof. I’ve achieved probably double what I thought I’d be able to achieve. I’ve been trying to understand what inspiration has come over me to enable this added capacity, and I think it has something to do with just knowing you are 100% going to be responsible for everything. El and I had talked about this same concept a number of times, where if you know the other person isn’t going to be there to help (like if I was away at a ceilidh) you just dig deep down to this well of tolerance and find that getting flustered is just a waste of time, because you will absolutely just have to get unflustered and do / fix / see to whatever it was that got you riled up in the first instance. The certainty that you will do the work seems to make it less laborious somehow.
A couple of highlights from the week
- Spending so much quality time with the kids, getting out with them, playing with them, doing crafts with them, joking with them, eating with them etc
- Being on the Bakfiets with the kids daily
- Finding another great speeltuin with the kids
- Watching Back to the Future, and playing Zelda with Reuben
- Going to a baking class with the kids
- Going into Eindhoven with the kids
- Koningsdag [en:Kings Day]
- Getting through a ton of work stuff
- Doing some long-put-off DIY and organisation
- Day trip to Den Bosch
As mentioned at the start, this is my penultimate blog
My intention with it was always to document the first period of arriving and setting up life in NL. I wanted a detailed record of it for myself, and I wanted a way to more efficiently and consistently keep friends and family who were enquiring up to date. Save for one or two things which I might mention in the last blog in a week or two, everything is done and we are really here now, and life as usual is in progress. I don’t want to start taking weeks between posting because nothing noteworthy has come up, especially as there is not notification for anyone as to whether something has been posted or not. If you want to keep up to date with our life here Instagram is probably the way forward… or just old fashioned text / email / call.
Lovely photos of your time together 😍
Thanks it’s been a really fun couple of weeks in many many ways. Looking forward to seeing you guys.
Thanks for the blog Joe. It really helps to keep up with your new life and understand what is going on. Wonderful pictures. Look forward to seeing you all next month. Love Dad.
The weather should be very nice
Love your blogs Joe I will be sorry when they stop. But they must take up a lot of your time. Love the photos xx
Great pics. of all of you. I shall miss your blog when you stop.
Love Angela
Thinking of you guys today as we had a wee farewell get together for Cam and Eilidh Best. It hardly seems anytime since we were at your leaving gathering! So good to see how you all have settled and managed your move to NL! You’re an amazing bunch! Bless you all xx Moira and Stewart xx