Summer Recap

This posting is a collection of semi-related items from the summer.  I figure that if I post this on the next to the last day of September it won't be too late.

As you may know, our good friends, Mark & Carol Sechler, moved to Haarlem this summer.  We are thrilled to have them only 40 minutes away.  During their transition to The Netherlands they had some issues with their temporary housing in Amsterdam --  issues primarily related to the fact that their housing bordered the red light district where the revelry made it nearly impossible to sleep.   Seems like their relocation company might have known that location was a bad idea.

So after a week of that nonsense they bailed out and moved in with us.  It was great.   We came home to a freshly mowed lawn and home cooking every night.  Graber got 2-3 walks a day.  We were hoping they'd never move.

But they had other ideas, so eventually they left for Haarlem.  On one of our visits there we toured the Great Church of St. Bravo.  Construction began in the 1300's and like most of these old churches it continued for the next 500 years.  And during that time there was a fire or two  And a tower collapsed.

The church exterior, compliments of an internet photo.  The sky is rarely that clear in Holland.  

The organ has over 5000 pipes with the longest being 10 meters.  Mozart played it in 1766.  

This report of the siege of Haarlem in 1573 states that the people were so hungry that "dogs and cats were called roast game".  

We also traveled to Muider Castle, or Muiderslot, on the other side of Amsterdam.  It was built in the 1200's by Count Floris V and was part of the Amsterdam defense system.

The American nobles have arrived in Holland. 

My family complains that I never put up bad pictures of me on the blog.  This should silence them.  

In August we traveled to the next door town of Katwijk to shop for a bicycle for Mark.  By luck we happened upon a flower parade.  Katwijk is a town of 5,000 or 10,000 people so this parade was amazing.  It had over 50 cars, floats and bands, all fully decorated in fresh flowers.  In August.  I'm not sure why they had this celebration; that part was not explained.  But everyone seemed to enjoy it.

We also toured an art museum in Haarlem.  No pictures were allowed so nothing to post here.    However, the parking garage had some nice artwork on the wall.   The picture below is telling people to remember where they parked their car.  

Enough about the Sechlers and on to more important things....like our dog and cats.  We sent Graber to the groomers for his summer haircut and boy did we get our money's worth.  When I picked him up I had a labrador.  He was so embarrassed.  The groomer said that he didn't mean to cut it that short.  However, he had picked up the shears from the previous grooming without realizing they were for short hair.  Once he started in, he couldn't put it back so he did the whole dog that length.

Our new labrador.  

His hair is finally growing out...three months later.  

I bought Graber a new bed so he didn't have to nap on the tile floor.  

But it ended up like every other bed we've bought him.  Ruined.  

In other animal news, Tai Tai passed away this summer.  She was over 12 years old, had lived on three continents and flew over 12,000 miles.   Not bad for a stray that someone found in a parking garage in Hong Kong.  Her favorite activity was sitting in things..suitcases, boxes, napkin baskets.  

After Goldie lost her sister, she was in mourning for about a month.  Instead of wailing, she meowed in my ear all night long because she didn't want to sleep alone.  It was a long month.  She seems to have recovered now and I am sleeping much better.  

Grant's first day of 11th grade.  With our new location he rides his bike to school every day.  

My cousin, Sue, and her husband, Phil, stopped in Amsterdam for a few days on their way home from southern Africa.  We had a delicious Indonesian Rijsttafel meal, which consists of lots of small courses served family style.  We're still smiling here because we're only on course number 6.  By the time we got to course 12 we were too full to smile.  

Mark Sechler and I celebrated our September birthdays together.  

Our lap dog.  He would sit like this for hours if I could stand it.  On the other hand, our cat refuses to be held.  

Happy Birthday Nancy & Joan

Our annual rendezvous in the United States had several highlights.....both of our Mothers celebrated birthdays, Kate got some time off after finishing her Step Two Medical School exam and Grant got a chance to go target shooting and blow up explosives.   We also bought Grant 15 mechanical pencils for school (Target is such a great store).  We'll see how far they get us through the school year.

Grant started the trip by spending a week with Don and Joan

I was one of 15,000 runners in the Bix 7.  The road was much wider than in Holland, so the race didn't seem nearly as crowded.  But there were a lot more hills. 

Long distance airplane flights usually present some interesting situations and this trip was no exception. The area where I checked in at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport was right beside the memorial area for the victims of the Malaysia Airlines flight that was shot down over the Ukraine.  I thought it was tastefully done, with thousands of flower bouquets.

As I waited in line at immigration in Chicago, the sniffer dog came through and zeroed in on the man in front of me.  At the agent's request he opened up his backpack and produced....a banana.  You're not supposed to bring fruit into the country.  So the agent gave the sniffer dog a treat.  Good boy! No contraband bananas allowed.

On the flight to Chicago, I sat on the aisle in a row of two with an 11-12 year old Dutch girl by the window.  About 3-4 hours into the flight, I was reading my book and could almost feel her eyes staring at me.  I turned my head and sure enough she was looking right at me.  I could tell she was shy, so I asked if she needed to get out.  Talk about a look of relief.

I've always liked this photo of Grant, so I made a copy while I was home.  He's smelling my Grandmother's iris at our farm when he was two years old (while eating a cookie).  

My brothers, Ellie and Margaret joined us on a tour of the John Deere Harvester Factory. 

We heard there was a refrigerator in the combine cab, but no one could find it.  Finally Margaret came through.  

Ellie baked a cake for my Mom's birthday and Margaret decorated it.  

We had a hot dog roast at the farm, complete with S'mores.  

Looks like Margaret should have worn sunglasses too 

Looks like I should have worn a hat.  

We visited the Buffalo Bill museum in Le Claire, Iowa.  Tom & I had gone there 40 years ago for YMCA camp.  Since then it's moved locations and been significantly improved.  

Kate in a place where she's been for the past 19 years ....school!

Examples of the river shells that were used to make buttons.  

I wonder why their irons are not happy?  We learned that in this case "sad" means solid.  

Yet another reason why Pella is a wonderful town.  

This is an example of the old homes that line the main streets of Le Clair overlooking the Mississippi River

We had lunch at the former home of a river pilot.  

Kate likes to hang out with the stars.  Actually this is what happens when you take a picture of yourself in a mirror with the flash on.   Or you could say this is what happens when you let Mark play with technology.  

My home town has erected a huge statue of an old-time cyclist.  I'll let the readers draw their own conclusions.  

Kate picking strawberries from Tom's garden.  

Kate eating strawberries from Tom's garden.  

This is about all the old apricot tree is good for anymore.  Not much apricot production the last few years.  

Kate and Tom picked green beans for lunch. 

Grant and I got the urge to build and launch some model rockets so we walked over to Hobby Lobby.  They had everything and we were enthused, so we started to pick out all the components for a two stage rocket that would go 2500 ft in the air.  Then we did a quick tally and this rocket was going to be upwards of $200.  So we put everything back and pursued a more modest approach with a simple kit that contained two rockets.

Kate & I built this rather plain, unpainted model rocket

Grant's rocket looked a little more professional.   Kate and I say that his kit was easier   

Building and launching the rockets is always fun.  Finding them after touchdown is the challenge.  You'd think they would be easy to spot in a sea of green.  But that's not the case at all.  Here Tom celebrates finding Grant's rocket in the nearby soybean field.  

On Grant's last launch it was easy to find the rocket, but impossible to get it down.  It hung up in the very top of one of the Ash trees lining the road.  Maybe a strong wind will blow it out someday.  

Nice to see Carol joining in my love of orange shirts.  

No trip to Moline is complete without a stop at Whitey's, the local ice cream parlor.  Kate and I had to squeeze it in at 10 pm the night before we left.  The late timing didn't stop me from getting a three scoop hot fudge sundae.  

After two days in Moline, Kate, Grant and I drove over to Des Moines to meet Lori.  Our primary goal was to help her family celebrate Joan's 85th birthday.  But we also made sure to have time for our traditional breakfast at Chick-fil-a, lunch at Tasty Taco's and Iowa smoked pork chops for dinner.

Friday, there was a girls' lunch, where Joan's daughters, daughter in law, sisters, granddaughters and great-grandaughters and nieces all met for lunch.  Of course I was not invited so there are no photo's of this event.  The next evening the entire crew of 20 people met for a great dinner.  Photos are below.