It's still snowing, more than 24 hours later. The paths we made in the morning are completely covered again.

It was snowing all night, and it will continue to snow today.

We bought a small shovel for Nora, she loves it.

Last year she tried to shovel with our big one but the snow gets very heavy. This is the perfect size.

Here she is, before dinner. Sasha asked: "shall we read a book or do you want to shovel?"

We let Leo and Adrian roam around and they made a beeline for the plants in the middle of the room. They love plants. Adrian in particular is always looking for opportunities to pick their leaves. Even when he's in my arms and we walk by a plant he'll stick out his hands in the hope to catch something.

When Nora was their age, she did the same thing. Now she is protecting the plants from her little brothers.

Nora said: "kijk eens wat een grote vogel!" and she was right -- there was a big raptor in our front yard. It was eating a smaller bird, and we watched it for a few minutes until it flew away.

Consensus is that this is probably a Cooper's Hawk, possibly a young one.

I thought it might be a good idea to teach Leo "no", or "nee" in Dutch. Sometimes when I'm feeding him, he spits out his food with great delight. Funny for him but not conducive to a expeditious feeding.

So I thought it would be good to tell him, in a stern voice "nee".

Well... now he thinks that "nee" is a joke, and actually starts making spitting sounds when I tell it to him, even if there's no food.

We let the guys crawl in the living room after dinner. They loved exploring.

Leo went straight for the bookshelf. Adrian isn't very fast yet but this motivated him to crawl further than usual.

"Dat betekent 'Africa'", Nora told me yesterday when we were discussing the continents. There's a puzzle at school that teaches her the continents and she's starting to learn their names, in English.

It's one of the first times that she knows a concept in English first -- and then learns it in Dutch or Bulgarian.
I know this will happen much more often in the future but it's a strange thought.

In any case, we'll be practicing those names in Dutch and Bulgarian for the next few weeks.

We took some photo's today.

This one, while not particularly sharp, is one of my favorites.