WEEKEND REVIEW JAN 1, 2017

This has been a quite busy weekend. Before my son picked up his wife at the station, because she had to work between Christmas and New Year, while he had holidays, they came already in the morning. Of course Toby wanted to know what Father Christmas had left for him in Waterloo a little late !



He was very happy with his Pokemon school bag and also with a Pokemon alarm clock. That's the fashion for all kids now, wherever they live.

Then my DIL came too and we unpacked our Christmas gifts. Toby wanted to take a picture of us which he did.



Besides the fact that Mr. G. has only half a head it came out very well. He is wearing his Christmas gift a nice bathrobe. Toby is now 6.



Then he wanted to add his parents and took a picture of us four.



All this made hungry and Toby waited already for the Gnocchis.When I brought the bowl on the table my DIL laughed and said, we now would have to eat Gnocchis the whole week ! I had cooked 2.700 kg for 4 and a half people. Believe it or not, they ate the whole bowl and no question of eating during the whole week. We couldn't believe it ourselves but the fact was there, the bowl was empty. The Gnocchis were with Mozarella and fresh Basil and tomatoes.

After supper we played cards. I don't remember the name of the game but we had a lot of fun ! Toby won nearly all the time, although we didn't let him win. Mr. G who is a real player, made a face because he, who always wins, lost !



Before supper we had made a little walk through Waterloo and stopped for coffee and cake. It was a very pleasant day.

The next day it all started over again, preparations for the New Year Eve. Fortunately there was nothing special to prepare, I just made a rice salad with lots of vegetables, boiled eggs and ham, together with olive oil and balsamico vinegar.  Nicole brought a whole plate of little starters and Chantal had made a Tiramisu as dessert. I put everything on the table and everybody helped himself.



To pass the time until midnight we played a funny game, everybody had brought little gifts which we had put in a basket and then one person took one gift, showed it around and we had to find out what was in there !

Sometimes it was really difficult, and it took time, but we had fun and almost missed midnight !

Poor Charlie had less fun, he is so afraid of fireworks and gets hysterical. He starts to scratch on the floor as if he wants to disappear under the ground, shakes like a leaf in the wind and tries to hide.
We comforted him as much as we could, and were happy when the fireworks stopped and the poor things calmed down !



The next day Toby and parents stopped for a short while before they returned to Amsterdam.
Here he is building a tower with his mum  !