We have a tradition in our family to go on a one-on-one trip in the year of our kids turning six.
Des got to go to Santiago, Chile with Curt two years ago.
This past weekend I took Evie to Amsterdam.
{after our overnight flight, waiting for the train from the airport to the city}
We got there pretty early on a Saturday morning, so the town was still sleepy and slowly starting to open for the day.
{lots of cheese stores all over}
{cute little rowhouse souvenirs...we got Evie a porcelain bell and Dutch shoes ornament for her memento}
We got some pastries and ate them sitting in Dam Square.
The city was still festive and decorated for Christmas.
We walked down and through the flower market.
{so many tulips and bulbs, with a wide variety including really unusual colors like black}
My favorite thing was to get a feel for the city's unique architecture, quirks and all.
By this time we were really cold, so Evie was a lot more amenable than normal to my suggestion of going to a museum.
So we went to the Rijksmusem.
I love museums, but when going with kids your expectations have to stay really low.
I was super pleased that we were able to pretty much go through the whole thing, even if it was kind of at hyper speed and I sort of longed to stop and study things some more.
There will come a season for that later in life.
{Evie had her hand in a hook to be a pirate}
The one thing Evie did stop and stay a while looking at was this really intricate doll house.
It was amazing.
{beautiful library within the museum}
{Ha, one of Evie's favorite parts of the museum, lego people set up out in the main foyer}
By this time Evie was super exhausted (overall my phone tells me we walked almost seven miles this day) so we stopped for some pizza and then slowly trekked up to check in to our hotel.
She was a trooper really.
We vegged at the hotel for a little bit, Evie watching the Disney channel dubbed over in Dutch.
Then we went out to find some food and come back to sleep.
As it turns out, my kids are the opposite of adventurous with food so we ended up getting her McDonalds.
But she didn't opt for the Netherlands version of a kids meal fruit side, tomatoes.
{we did get these super sweet dessert waffles though...so sweet they could not be finished in one sitting}
And then, even though it was early (6:00pm local time), we'd been up since 1:00am on our bodies and so we zonked out.
Or at least Evie slept and I tried to sleep. Jet lag is for real and can mess you up bad.
But the next morning we started the process of getting home.
Incredibly short time in Amsterdam, but I super love just getting a taste of a place.
{canal boats all tucked away on our way to the train station. Didn't get a picture of it, but close by was thousands upon thousands of bicycles parked too.}
We flew from Amsterdam to Detroit, went through customs, then turned around and flew to Atlanta.
Evie got a kick out of being in the state she was born, even if it was just the airport.
And then we were home.
As I had only slept for an intermittent few hours the whole trip, my own bed felt like heaven.
So thankful for chance that we get to travel and see new places though.
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