house renovations

Dear all, those duties seem to peak these days.
we do the bathroom floor, install the toilet and do some cleaning as well.
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Our city is in a friendly relationship with the small city of Wageningen of The Netherlands. Some of you might remember my recollection and photos of my memories of my time in Holland. I was there in 2006 and in 2008 and now. Every second year a bunch of people travel there and every other year, the Dutch return.
During the 4 days of the visit, people from various ngos visit the other ngos of the other country, gathering experiences, listening to lectures, but basically, strengthening the ties between the two nations.
During both of my visits I was hosted by a friendly middle-aged couple and now our family is to host the husband of the same couple. He's a policeman, and is going to visit the local police station here, but his bread and breakfast is our duty.
He is to arrive Thursday and the toilet is not ready yet.
Hm... I'm off to help my husband out in the renovations...
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tunnel ----

this is what we've been doing - I'll be back with some writing soon.

summer has gone

School has started.
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My daughter is in the third grade, my son is in the seventh. He now starts in a yet another school. After our attempts to get him into a church-based school failed (reason: we, as a family do not attend services of any church. See? it's not your stand, but your reputation that counts. too bad for pagans like us, heh.) So I opted to remove him from his class, that did him no good at all. His classmates were underachieving and/or undergifted and/or disabled and/or of bad background. The level of education, for various purposed was extremely low and my son adopted himself to that low level. Which means he did not develope quite well.

This new school is an average state school, but his class is having extra singing lessons. I don't think *that* could be that bad.... There are 17 pupils in his class, and only 4 of them are boys. A much smoother atmosphere I guess. No more agressive behaviour from overaged mates I trust.

We'll just see.

My son has two more years in elementary education and at the age of 14 he'll be directed to a secondary school. Perhaps we'll head for the one state secondary school I wanted to avoid in my thoughs about his future this spring. But times are changing - and so are my thoughts. I want him a peaceful and strong community where he can boost up his abilities to his maximum.

Here they are, after the opening ceremony, still wearing their nice clothes.

Some photos of our summer menu:

the first one is a picture of an evening meal. bread slices are covered in egg and then are fried in oil. as a side dish, slices of eggplant are sauteéd and a ligth vegetable salad is there to balance off the juicy fat of the other two components of the meal.

this one here's a lunch. roasted chicken with sauteéd potatoes. and guess what, some salad. I love summer salads - they are so easy to make, so delicious... with a pinch of fresh hot pepper, there's a tint of spicyness to them just to tease the mouth.

this one's a cake, with apricots on top.

oh, what, another salad, yes.

summer offered lots of fruits and yes, we did take care of them - so that we don't have to worry about having a taste of summer in the winter :)

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and yes, the fourth anniversary of blogging has peacefully gone. I would like to express my thanks for all your heartfelt comments and good wishes I recieved during these four years. There were times when a simple 'I hear you - no matter how far away you practically are' meant half the world to me....

there were times I hope when my simple words were able to contribute to someone's faith in the ultimate good will and turn of events.

Even if my English sometimes has some hiccups - I'm sorry for that.

I learned a lot from you. and I do not confine to the language at all.

I will keep on blogging and continue to use the potential of this surface to connect people and keep those precious friendships and/or relationships I have been given over the past four years.

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with a view to another four years - God bless you all,

your crazy and indefinite tree...