New eyes

A few weeks ago, Pieter had eye surgery. Actually, he had an eye lift. Or an eye lid lift. Or whatever it's called. Most important is that his eye lids are not pushing down on his eyelashes anymore and his sight has improved considerably. For about two weeks, he did look as if he'd been in a fight though. Final picture of the result will follow, but I think you can already see the difference.
Before surgery

After surgery, same day

Two days later

New bike

After much talking about it, Pieter finally took the next step and bought himself a race bike! He now goes for a ride several times a week, for now 15-20 k each time. Maybe he'll even join a tour group. His timing is both bad and good. Bad in the sense that the road cycling season is almost over, good in the sense that it'll be his birthday soon and at least now we now what to give him :-)
Good to go

Jeugd Wandel 3-Daagse

Emma and Janne again joined the 3-Day Youth Walking Event. All three days went fine; with temperatures around 20°C and clouded skies, the conditions were great for walking.
All dressed up, ready to go. This year, the theme was Italy, due to a visiting marching band from that country.

The team

On the go

Mom also joined on day three

Proudly presenting their medals and flowers

Madurodam

This is the last week of summer vacation, so today we made one last trip, to Madurodam, the smallest city in the Netherlands.

In Madurodam one can see well-known buildings and scenes in The Netherlands replicated on a scale 1:25. The Parliament buildings of The Hague, the canal houses of Amsterdam (including red light district), the Alkmaar cheese market and little trees and gardens, all replicated in minute detail. Windmills turn, ships sail and modern trains are tracersing the city on the world's largest miniature railway.

Madurodam was officially opened on 2 July 1952. The park was established for two reasons: as a war monument in honor of George Maduro and as a charity foundation in support of the Dutch Student Sanatorium in Laren. Now, Madurodam is a big (be it small) tourist attraction in the Netherlands.

I visited the park once when I was already in college and I remember being a bit disappointed, because it's really such a small park. (Window on China in Taiwan for example is a much bigger park). But, as Emma and Janne are still little and as I just finished reading 'Pinkeltje in Madurodam' to them a few weeks ago, I hoped they would be more impressed. And they were! The highlight of the day was the moment at which they discovered that the store (window), in which Pinkeltje hid in the book, was actually there ... with Pinkeltje in it! Great fun with small things on a little over three soccer fields :-)
Looking in on the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam

The UFO shaped structure is the Evoluon, where Pieter and I both worked and where we met

I spy with my little eye, something that is blue and red ... can you find Pinkeltje? (click on picture for larger version)