Happy five-and-a-halfth birthday Ella!

April 3, 2009
Ella has been eagerly awaiting her 5 -1/2th birthday so she can be like her classmates (some of whom are now already 6). We marked the occasion with a cake, of course. She is wearing her Easter bonnet here. Now that Ella is 5 1/2, she has only 6 more months to go before she gets the bunny she has been bugging and begging us for. We don't really feel she is quite mature enough but after promising for almost 3 years, what can we do... Also big news: one of Ella's bottom teeth is a little loose so she may lose her first tooth in a few weeks' time.

March

This month marked a couple of memorable occasions. For one, Ella has started attending Dutch School. We go Saturday mornings for 3 1/4 hours while Jim and Felix go to Trader Joe's. Juf Iris and Juf Janneke are fun and the classes are a mixture of learning words, drawing and crafting, and singing songs. Ella has been reminding me that we must speak Dutch together more, so that she will become better and better, so I've really been trying to do that, although with my 7th grade (Dutch) education along with not having been speaking it on a regular basis, it's going to get more difficult. I am hopeful that with the new friends we are both making, we will both become more fluent. We are looking forward to and preparing for the Koninginnedagfeest (Queen Beatrix's Birthday Celebration) at the end of April - the case of poffertjesmix that I ordered has already arrived.

Felix is coming home from preschool with new things all the time, singing songs like Skip To My Lou and Row Row Row your Boat ("barely, barely barely, barely"). Here he is with Miss Maria and Kara:



Next, we celebrated Byron's 10th Birthday. He and Toots got some tuna for cats to eat, we sang Happy Birthday and Byron got a new collar. The white bits glow in the dark.






Here is Ella helping me make one of her favorite dishes, Spanakopita.