A lesson learnt..

Darling cherubs of sunshine and delight they may be, but sometimes I’m reminded that kids can be quite ‘orrible (other people’s that is, of course ;). On Friday I went to collect Amie from Kindergarten and one of the workers said something to me in German about Amie’s stomach, and I finally translated in my head that she was saying that one of the children had kicked Amie very hard in the stomach. Now, not to name names, but the kid’s name is Sophie (it’s not like she or her parents are going to be reading this) and she is what I’d term a ‘little brat’. Literally any time I’m there she’s having a tantrum about something and pushing her weight around.. she’s a lot bigger than Amie, and most of the other kids, and at a guess I'd say she's at least 5 years old. From day one I was worried about Amie having a run in with her, but I do also feel sorry for her as she seems to be in the Kindergarten 5 days a week full time, which must be quiet tough on her and she certainly doesn’t seem very happy about it.


Amie and Noah at the Kindermuseum

When I went into the room Amie was sitting on a chair, waterworks in full flow being comforted by one of the staff. She had calmed down a little but when she saw me, indignation and sorrow broke out anew and she sobbed her little heart out telling me that "A big babby kicked me in the tummy". It was hard to explain to Amie why this had happened, but she seemed to come to the conclusion herself that it was an accident and that Sophie didn’t mean any harm. When we were leaving I went up to the girl in question with Amie, and said to her in my best German that Amie was only little and that she wasn’t to hurt her again as it wasn’t very nice. Sophie gave me her sweetest smile and carried on eating her lunch, so we shall see. Amie hasn’t mentioned it since, and I’m hoping that she won’t be too worried going to Kindergarten tomorrow morning.


Amie's favorite chair by far :)

Sometimes I’m amazed at how grown up Amie seems, but then at times like Friday when I see her so upset (and those waterworks I mentioned weren’t just the ones running down her cheeks) I also realise how little she is and how much about the world she has to learn. Even if there are certain things I rather she never had to see, such as the fact that people sometimes can just act plain mean because they feel like it. And that life isn’t like a Disney cartoon, the bad person doesn’t always fall off a cliff never to bother you again. Sometimes you’ve got to just face them day in day out, and there’s not a thing you can do about it but hope that they decide to kick someone else today. Or maybe that's wrong, maybe I should be teaching her if someone picks on you, stand up for yourself? But I don't know, I'll just have to hope that the staff keep a close eye on things. I certainly don't want Amie turning into a bully or aggressive towards other kids... so we shall just have to see how things go.


"Relaxing" on a Sunday morning

Grandad pays a visit

Grandad O'Brien has been visiting this week, which has been very nice. Today, we went back to the kid's museum.

Stopping to have a look at a woodlouse

Back to Haarlem

Zoe and Vera a.k.a Zera







We had a lovely time on Saturday with Amie's party.. all our friends from there showed up to wish her a very Happy Birthday.....even those with no children, who didn't even know there was a 10 AM on a Saturday. It's just a pity that we seem to have done something with our camera that made all the pictures blurred, luckily Marianne has come to the rescue with some lovely shots of the day, it's just a pity that she's not in any of them! Amie really enjoyed herself, and got SO MANY presents.. it's lucky we came by car so we could bring them all back.


She didn't wait for us to cut the cake before trying to have some (and had fortunately blown out her candles before trying to take a bite out of it!


Tired after the party!


Amie and Walter

We arrived home on Monday, instead of Sunday as planned. Amie had a very bad fall just as we were packing up the car to leave on Sunday. She was leaning through a railing on the first floor of a house, when the railing broke and she fell 3 meters to the hall below. She was taken by ambulance to hospital, while totally strapped up in a neck brace and an inflatable wrap to prevent her moving, which made her very nervous! She was x-rayed and given an ultra sound scan to make sure she had no internal bleeding and had to stay overnight for observation.. but much to everyone's relief she escaped the whole episode with very minor scratches and is totally recovered (which is more than can be said for her parents! :) We have just come in from trying out her new bike, which she got from her nana and pa. I'll have a picture of her on it as soon as I find the charger for the camera!


Concentration


Gimme


Emma doing a better job at ironing than I do!

More updates and pictures during the week! (Thanks to Marianne for these lovely pictures


The lovely Milla enjoying some cake