New Year's Eve

NYE was a relaxed evening spent with my parents and Frederik, Marlies & kids. We didn't take too many pictures but just wanted to share this one of the 'oliebollen' Marlies made. Yum!

Floortje loved them!

Okay then, and some pictures of our dinner : )

King crab legs from Austria

Don't think so!

Butterflies

Yesterday we took a trip to Houston to visit the Museum of Natural Science and our theme of the day was butterflies.

First we saw the movie 'Flight of the Butterflies' on the giant 3D screen.

What an amazing story! A short summary about the movie:

It’s a natural history epic. It’s a compelling detective story. It’s a scientific adventure at its best. It took Dr. Fred Urquhart almost 40 years to discover the monarch butterflies’ secret hideaway and prove the most incredible migration on Earth. Following the year-long annual migration cycle of the butterflies, the award-winning production team filmed hundreds of millions of monarchs in their remote overwintering sanctuaries in Mexico in 2011 and again in 2012 and also along their migratory routes from Canada, across the U.S. and into Mexico. The technology of IMAX® immerses you in the astounding migration experience as two generations of the butterflies migrate north and then a Super Generation miraculously finds its way from Canada to a few isolated mountaintops in Mexico – to a place it has never been!

After the movie we visited the butterfly garden and saw some real specimens

Yes, I realize the above is not a butterfly :)

Christmas soup

If you are using your transformer for the Christmas tree lights then you just take the soup to the Christmas tree!

Christmas food

Just some random food images from the last few days, yum!

Two more geocaches

We are really getting into it.  Even starting to solve puzzles and wandering into snake territory to find them :)

Merry Christmas

Christmas lights in Houston

 The River Oaks area in Houston is famous for its christmas lights during the holiday season.  So after a dinner in Houston we drove around this area.  We were not the only ones!  There were loads of cars and people about, one intersection even needed two police officers to direct traffic! 

The houses in this area are huge and very expensive and their christmas lights matched. WOW!  Some houses went all out, including a Santa at the gate handing out candy cane and posing for photos.  The pictures do not do it justice but just to give you an impression.

Watch Dog

Last Friday opa was a watch dog at school.  The Watch dog program is described in short below:

WATCH D.O.G.S. (Dads of Great Students) - Is the father involvement initiative of the National Center for Fathering that organizes fathers and father figures in order to provide positive male role models for the students and to enhance school security. Today, more than 2,610 active programs in 42 states participate in the WATCH D.O.G.S. Program.

Who are WatchDOGS? Fathers, grandfathers, step-fathers, uncles, and other father figures who volunteer to serve at least one day a year in a variety of school activities as assigned by the school principal or other administrator.

The girls were so excited to have opa there on the last day of school before the Christmas break and opa had a great day seeing how things were done at school here. Oh, by the way, it was pajama day at school so the girls didn't forget to get dressed.... :)

Live Nativity

Two weekends ago we visited one of the (many) churches here in Katy to see a live nativity story.

It was called 'Journey to Bethlehem' and was a live, interactive walk from Nazareth to Bethlehem. There were 150 actors and live animals involved.  It was dark with torches all along the route, quite magical.

On the way we saw people preparing for the journey, came across the romans wanting to know our family name and destination of the journey.  We met the three kings who were setting off on their travels with gifts for the new born king.  We saw the shepherds and their sheep just at the time when the angels appeared and told them that Jesus was born in nearby Bethlehem.  We were counted by the Romans and paid our taxes before walking through Bethlehem.  After this we tried to find a place in the local hotel but it was full and that is when we came across the stable and saw Maria, Joseph and baby Jesus.

It was very impressive and a nice way to get into the christmas spirit.

Soccer