Winter Update

Unfortunately, not much exciting news to report from Wassenaar.  Winter can't seem to make up its mind whether to stay or go.  All of our snow was gone last week and the temperatures got near 10 degrees C.  Then Tuesday morning I awoke to thunder and lightning.  When I looked out the window, it was snowing!  I don't think I had ever seen a thunder snow storm before.

The snow didn't stick for long, but the entire week has been a series of snow clouds rolling in and out.  Skies will be clear one minute and the next minute there will be huge, wet snowflakes filling the sky.  It happened again last night so I took some pictures this morning.

Note that the only tracks in the road this morning are from a bicycle.

Ducks swimming on the neighborhood pond.

After our morning walk.  

Graber loves the snow.  

Winter also means the winter dance at ASH.  Grant announced on Monday that he was going and he would require a suit.  Announcements such as this are not to be ignored, so Saturday at 3 we went suit shopping and by 7:30 he was at the dance in a new suit that actually fit very well for coming off the rack.   Luckily, he's a boy so shoes and accessories were not a problem.

The pre-dance picture.  Like most teenage boys, smiling for the camera is a struggle.  

More winter news comes to us from Kate in New Jersey.  It seems that she has managed to avoid the worst of the big snow storm in the northeast.  Her area only got 6 inches of snow.  She said that New Haven, CT had 31 inches.  Another good reason that she didn't go to Yale.

Would you let this girl perform surgery on you? 

Cleaning off the car on the morning after.

The only other news is that our Queen Beatrix has decided to retire.  She will abdicate on Queens Day, April 30, this year and pass the crown to her son and our neighbor, Prince Willem-Alexander.  Well, not really our neighbor but he does live in Wassenaar.  As a college student, Prince Willem had a party boy reputation, but while in his 30's he married an Argentinian woman, Maxima, who is credited with bringing style and reason to this generation of the royal family.

Prince Willem, Princess Maxima and their three daughters.  

Beatrix follows the Dutch tradition of abdicating rather than ruling until her death.  Her mother and grandmother did the same.  When Willem is inaugurated in April (not crowned) he will be the first King of Holland in over 100 years.  Maxima will become Queen.

Many of the streets (or wegs in Dutch) in our neighborhood are named after the royal family, this one being Queen Beatrix's mother.  We don't have a Beatrixweg, though.    

You will remember from earlier blog postings that April 30 is Queens Day -- a holiday started to honor Queen Juliana's birthday.  When Beatrix took over from her mother, she did not change the holiday to her own birthday because she was born in January and that's a rotten month in Holland for a holiday.  In 2014 the holiday will become King's Day and move to Prince Willem's birthday of April 27.  Unfortunately, for us that is a Sunday and in Holland when a holiday falls on a weekend, that's when you celebrate it.  None of this taking a Monday off because the holiday is on Sunday.  When this occurs it is aptly named a company holiday.  Not a good start to his crown if you ask me.

Once of the Queen's accomplishments is to have essentially the same hair style for her entire reign.