Nora and I went to the Dutch school in Bethesda today and we celebrated King's Day there.
The Ambassador of the Netherlands gave a short speech but otherwise this was all about the kids. There was a lot of food and fun games. New this year was a booth by the internal store from the Embassy, they sold Dutch goodies and snacks.
Like in previous years, we arrived early and checked out the books on sale. We have a nice collection at home but this is an ideal way to find new books for now and for later. I picked up a few great beginning reader books ("avi start"), several books to read before bed time and two or three books for when the kids are older, such as Paul Biegel's Sleutelkruid.
Nora did several of the activities. She remember the blikken gooien from last year and she was surprised that she had to stand "so far away" this year. I told her it's because she's 4 now! For the first time she did zakken lopen. She was a little too intimidated to try to jumping castle.
We came home with two full bags of books, some snacks and gifts for the Zane family (vlokken and stroopwafels).





I installed a bike seat for the boys yesterday and took Adrian out for a ride. 



Today Nora and I spent 45 minutes doing language exercises and it was fun for both of us. She enjoys writing letters and we did a variety of learning drills. 
Spring is now truly here. It was nice and warm this weekend and we set up our deck for the summer. On Saturday morning we bought flowers and potting mix and the next day Sasha and Nora planted them, while I assembled our new furniture. 
Last weekend we installed the children's gate in the door to the kitchen. 