Saturday, December 8, 2012

UK Visit en Sinterklaas

Hi everyone,

Catching up to the present day, and as promised some exiting new things.

Let's catch up first. We had another trip to the UK a month ago, going to London and Wales. We visited Lorraine in London first, then went on to Wales to visit Louise's father.
While we were there it was Guy Fawkes day, a day when the British light fireworks to remember someone back in 1605 stopping a bunch of gunpowder going off. Strange habits, but never mind. The fireworks are set off as soon as it gets dark so we decided to see how Noah would like them. It sort of went like this:
Why am I out in the middle of the night? It dark here and boring!

Fireworks! 

I like fireworks! Big success all around. The neighbors helped a bit by sending up rockets.


And a good excuse for a bath to get all the smoke out of you hair as well.

So on to Wales to visit the grandfather. Not many pictures from that trip, we did some shopping and had only one remarkable incident. The car broke down one evening, while I (Thijs) was out on my own.  Luckily on my own,  because it took me almost three hours to get back to the house.  No idea what we would have done with Noah in the cold and dark for three hours.
On the plus side I broke down in front of a whiskey distillery, so I had plenty of time to sample their lovely products (and buy myself a nice bottle for christmas). Check it out here!   ..... (~Just happened to break down outside the only whiskey distillery in Wales .... yeah .... that's what I thought too!!! ~Louise)

Anyway, the next day the car had to be towed to a garage to get fixed so we had a excellent chance to gridlock most of Caerphilly. Never one to miss an opportunity we did immediately.

Louise didn't want to stay out too long, so she only got a picture of the tow truck pulling up, but whole town was quickly blocked. Anyway the car was fixed and we got home with just one day delay, so it all worked out in the end.

Now what you have all been waiting for. First a quick reminder of how Noah moved back in August/september:

And this is what he started doing in Wales, with little steps, and now more and more:


All this walking is very very tiring!
But, sleeping standing up just shows you how good he got a standing up by himself.

And a week later he had to show Opa and Oma how good he is at walking as well:



The last pictures are all from the sinterklaas party at school:

First Sinterklaas got welcomed in and Noah got to walk in with them.


 Then he has to check his big book to see if you have been Naughty or Nice. (Where do you think the copycat Santaklaus got it from? We know .)



Wait for a bit while the other kids get their turn.



And saying goodbye again. Zwarte Piet even got a hug!



And last but not least opening the presents! Noah is not into presents yet, but it is always nice to get a new toy to play with!


Well that was all for now, next update after Xmas, and maybe also new year.

Merry christmas,

Noah, Louise, Lilo and Thijs

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Long overdue update


Hi everyone,
 
A long long overdue update! Let's start with some ancient history: Noah's Birthday.

 



He had a great time at school, and at home, allthough we didn't take any pictures of the party. I guess we were too busy having a good time.
 
 
 
For all of you who haven't visisted for a while: The garden has changed a lot, we put in a play area for Noah next to the house. He has a swing, which he loves and a slide. The slide is a bit too advanced for him, he loves going down it, but has to carried up. We'll have to wait until he can climb up himself for that to be a regular event. Anyway, here you can see my parent helping to level the ground for his play area. I'll take some pictures for the next blog entry so you can see the difference. We moved quite a few big shrubs and lot's of earth!
 

We also had the backgarden repaved in a different pattern, here the old situation is shown off by our favourite model. Does make me long back to wamer days, these pictures.


More summertime fun, now in school.Noah actually managed to get some color on him this year, instead of his usual scottish-like white-blue skin colour.
 

A while ago, we tried a new way of having a weekend of. Instead of having nurses in our house, and the two of us leaving, we decided to that noah could go for a sleepover at a nurse (they kindly offered). This would leave us in our house free to do some thigns we needed to do, and without actually having to leave to a hotel. A penny saved.. is a penny spend by Louise on other stuff ;-).

Anyway, we have now had two of these weekends, and these are pictures from teh second weekend. We forgot to put the camera in the bags for the first weekend, so we got some lovely prints from that weekend. You can check them at our house.



Anyway, I don't think I have to tell you Noah really enjoyed himself!

On to the rest of the family. We are doing allright-ish, with lot's of downs and ups.  Still trying to come to terms with the reality that Noah will very very likely need some form of care and protected living for the rest of his live, something that we really wanted to avoid for him. As long as he is progressing we can cope, and there is a lot of progress.

Work is good, despited major cutbacks i'm still there, so that is an up. Not much else to say, because I'll say it all in the next post. Coming soon: Sinterklaas and Wales visit, with a very surprising video!

Thijs

Monday, July 9, 2012

High tea & School Festivities

Hi everyone,

Noah's school celebrated it's own birthday a while ago, so there were lots of extra activities. The theme of all the festivities was ' Circus' so there were (circus) animals. Well okay, it was just a pony, but we didn't really like the idea of a tiger anyway.




There was also a lot of acrobatics.Here Noah is learning how to go up the stairs, but down the slide is still very scary. He can go up the stairs, if he wants to, but going down the stairs is still very difficult.




Hiding under a parachute is always a lot of fun.



And then there is the oversized trapeze



Also some handstands on the floor.



And lots of balloons, nothing says party more then lots of balloons!


Except for cake..... He seems to like the whipped cream. Not strictly for eating, but still........


And on the last day of the week of festivities, all the childeren went to a special circus, by the cliniclowns. It is a fantastic event that we can really recommend to every one (all children and adults as well!). Find more information here: Boemtata.


They have the same handstands and stair climbing acts as Noah demonstrated earlier. he loved to see everything, the most spectacualr things were too fast to capture on camera and too engaging to remember the camera.

Aftyer the show there was a lot of opportunity to meet the stars, but the experience was so overwhelming that a nap was needed.



He did not even need the specially created fluffly sky room.

One last picture from this week. Noah is starting to walk better and better, and he can now walk with just a tea towel for support. The problem is that he doesn't really like to, and is getting smarter and more assertive. So now when he sees the tea towel he sits on the floor and refuses to get up. The school has manged to trick him with a variety of other objects, so hopefully that will be enough until he gets confident that he can walk this way.



Last in this update, some pictures of the High Tea course that we hosted. We tested all the recipes and my teaching skills on some friends first. Recipes and bookings are still available :-). Here our charming assistant Maarten is showing the freshly made scotch eggs.  


And here is Tom trying to show how hungry he is. Luckily, because there was a lot!


A close up with meat pies, sandwiches, bubbly, more sandwiches, black forest gateau, scones en some pims in the background.


And here I am for real, explaining the finer details of pastry making to my mum and aunt Annet. All went smooth, but we were too busy to make a lot of pictures, so you'll just have to believe us that the table looked even better then the first time (practice makes perffect after all)


Everything turned out reallly well, and it was a lot of fun to do for everyone.

Enjoy and hope to see you on saturday at Noah's (and mine) Birthday Party!

Thijs

Saturday, June 9, 2012

Wales visit


Hi everyone,

We have had a short holiday, visiting Louise's father in Wales. We didn't really go out and do anything touristy, but with a castle on the back of the house it is not difficult to shoot some pretty pictures:


It was stunning weather, so we all went for a walk around the castle.


Noah is walking much better now, so he walked by himself. 



Of course the trick is not to step on any ducks, swans, geese, seagulls or other assorted waterfowl.

The other local tourist trap is the park across the road. It is full of excellent play stuff for kids. As our model shows right here!

We even made some movies. Noah really liked the swings, and even seemed to get the hang of keeping moving by himself. 





Last but not least I wanted to post this, just so any of you coming to the birthday party don't get confused when Louise opens the door. A whole new look!  Just in time for her Babybeurs in Rotterdam where she represented her company "HandenVol" and "Babygebaren".



Enjoy and hope to see you soon,

Thijs

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Invitation / Uitnodiging

Hi everyone,

A quick invitation for Noah's birthday party (Also my birthday, but let's just keep the focus on the important people here).
The party will be on July 14, and you are all very welcome from 15.00.
We will provide you with food and drinks, so please let us know if you will be joining us, so we can plan the amounts of food to make. 

Hope to see you at the party!

Thijs

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Fabulous Esther

I know we've taken our sweet time posting pictures of our fabulous Noah. Luckily fabulous Esther came to the rescue last Sunday and took the most wonderful pictures of our family.  When I saw the montage I had tears in my eyes.  The photos really capture .... well everything that I love about our family.  I hope you enjoy seeing it too.



Check out more of Esthers work HERE

Enjoy!

Louise

Thursday, March 1, 2012

(Some what) more recent pictures - Updated!

Hi everyone,

A whole new bunch of pictures. And a bit about how we have been doing as well. So let's get the boring stuff out of the way. I'll start with myself and work up to more interesting bits.

I have been quite busy at work, trying to impress my bosses enough to get a promotion. This seems to be working, but the headoffice is at the same time trying to cut costs and effectively pay everyone less. Not sure if I will come out with more or less pay at the end of this, but it is not very motivating to get a promotion only to counter the effect of budget cuts. Oh well, I'll see what happens.
In the mean time I am preparing for the future, so I can do some off the books work in the weekends ;-). Here the first steps, I will be available for any bricklaying needs from the 1st of march ;-).





Louise has been ill quite a lot, a very persistent cold that does not want to go away. Not enough to be truly sick, but enough to feel quite bad nonetheless. On the more positive side, she has registered her Baby Signing Business and will give a presentation at Noah's kindergarten at the end of March. Let's hope she can generate some business as well.

Noah has been ill on and off for December, Januari and the beginning of Februari. We finally managed to convince the hospital that he needed a bigger canule, so he got that and has been better since. Even though he did get a cold (it is winter after all) he didn't get so ill and could continue going to school.
He is again improving and showing some signs that he may start to use sign language. A lot of ifs in that last sentence, but it looks really promising, although you have to look quite hard.
Aside from the signing, he is walking better, improving his fine motor skills, and eating better. All in very smal steps, but with all his contnued illness it is amazing that he is improving and not just standing still or even going backwards.  We're very proud of our big guy!

So on to a load of pictures:

First