A classroom to ourselves?

Day 77: Spreken Engles?!?

Well this morning I woke up early and wrote my globalization paper....not my best work. Then fell back asleep until Brittany woke me up with a phone call. Ya I was as confused as you were by this. She thought I had left her behind and gone in to turn in my paper. Instead I had passed out and died, not really, still have a pulse. We sent our papers in electronically then made a big pot of coffee and had breakfast. It was then 11:35 and we had to leave by noon so I showered really fast, proving Brittany wrong. We surprising were really early for everything today. We got to the bus station earlier and I even had to put money on my card. Then got to the Children's farm with time to spare, even beat Marilyn. For the first hour of volunteering we hiked the trails and showed Tyler where everything was at. Then we came back and had a classroom to ourself. Which was hard because not a lot of people spoke english today. It is surprising that you can still communicate with hand gestures and have kids still semi behave. The only time I was frustrated that I didn't speak dutch was when they asked me questions I knew they wanted answers to and when a big group of unsupervised children came in that were not good kids. After we were done with volunteering for the day, clocking in 3.5 hours, we stopped by a fish stand and got kippling. OH MY GOODNESS is this stuff good. As Brittany described it, "fried air"! It didn't taste fishy at all and was just so so good. After this we headed home where we ran into Jaz and headed back to Hugo where we pinterested and relaxed for a bit before Jaz and I went out to take pictures for photography. Yep it is official.....I hate cubism, this is our assignment this week. I am not inspired by anything. The one picture I am taking is a cumulation of trees that I am going to somehow make into a big tree, we will see how that goes. The other picture is going to be a surprise, because I don't know what it is going to be. After we got back I attempted organizing my photos and looking up more inspiration, finding none. Then decided to make dinner, yep I made dinner all by myself! I made vicious shit! (It is a recipe from my mom, I don't know where the name comes from). But good news it was a success and I actually cooked cooked. Just adding stuff when it was needed. Granted we had to put salt and pepper on it in the end, but that was because there wasn't much room in the pan to mix everything without spilling. After dinner I finally got to talk to kit kat and then went into Brittany's room and got to talk to nan. In there we looked at photos and watched "So You Think You Can Dance" videos. Now I am blogging and am going to hit the hay.

The Peacock strutting his stuff! 

Baby goats! 

The lone tulip. 

We determined this was a blue heron. I loved the reflection. 

Tyler getting up to put the chick back after letting these girls hold the chick. 

Brittany showing a little one how to pet the chick. 

Met da baby!

Day 76: Sorry means Sorry! 


So last night I could not for the life of me fall asleep....Therefore I was up until 4 am watching "The Voice", yep now addicted! Dang you television for creating addicting television shows.....but anyway day 76 started this morning at 10:30 with brunch. It was really good and filling as we weren't going to eat again until after volunteering. Then we caught a bus out to the Children's farm and met the teachers for the day, Steph and Leon. All Brittany and I had to do was teach the kids how to hold the animals and make sure they didn't strangle them (the kids strangle the baby animals). I was surprised that I understood some of what Leon was telling the kids. Like the mom and baby cows both have black spots over their eyes and a white snout....and some stuff about chickens. The first group of kids was small so it was really easy. They were really well behaved and one kid kept talking to us in dutch so we said sorry, which only confused him more because sorry is sorry in dutch. He figured it out after his teacher told him we only spoke english that sorry is the same and it might have made his day as he wasn't too big a fan of holding the animals. The next group was a big group of really little kids, in other words, grabbing and holding the animals to death group. I felt so bad for our animals. The kids didn't understand soft touch as that wasn't something they had been exposed to yet and were really loud. Brittany ended up getting bitten by a bunny and a baby chick jumped from a kids lap in an attempt of escape and quite possibly has brain damage now, but we survived because the next group was english speaking! I got to explain to the kids how to actually hold the animals in English! It was like I was home again leading summer camp at the Nature Center. It was really fun! I was so glad that we could interact with the parents and the children. I think my favorite part was when the chicks fell asleep in the kids hands. I had them warm their hands up and make a nest and the chicks actually slept in their hands. It was so darling! We got the guinea pigs out and everything for them because they were so good! After this Brittany and I played with the baby goats and headed back home after three hours of volunteering. I took a glorious nap and then we made quesadillas and fiesta rice, as I call it. I was so full I couldn't move for awhile, definitely had a food baby! After dinner we decided to watch a movie, "Safe House", I was really wanting to see some Ryan Reynolds, man I love him so much! After this I went to bed.

Me practicing proper bunny holding techniques. 

Baby bunnies! So cute! 

Brittany helping a young girl hold a bunny. (This is before she got bit).

Me holding the good bunny getting ready to hand it over to a kid. These bunnies go to the hospital for therapy. They are so well behaved. 

So American....Tennis shoes and jeans....Oh and a t-shirt and messy bun!  

Me telling the kids how to sit all the way back and make a fence so the baby chick doesn't jump down. 

"Chicken" as the kids named him, asleep in my "nest"! 

Typical Monday

Day 75: Getting better at this cooking thing! 

Well today was another monday...Do I say that every monday, if so sorry?!? We had Netherlands were we watched a dutch movie called "Black book" which is about the resistance during WWII specifically one girls contribution and experience. After that a couple of us hung out until photography listening to music and talking about dinner plans. Then we had photography an played in photoshop. We get to learn lightroom soon and are going on a field trip next class! We also got our midterm grade in there and I am right below an A-. So hopefully that will pan out well over the next couple of weeks. As for after class Brittany took Jazmyn and I on the "long" route home and long it was. But because it was nice out it wasn't that bad. Then Brit and I made dinner. Spaghetti with a homemade sauce (spinach, tomato, mushrooms, onions, green peppers, a dash of cilantro and some garlic powder). It was to die for!

Our sauce in the pan! 

After dinner I caught up on my blogs and talked to Taylor, Shalimar, and my mom! Overall I would have to say it was a successful day!

What Time Change?!

Day 74: Photo shoot time! 

Well today was spent recreating photos for photography class after I woke up to a surprise....Daylight savings time. It kind of put a damper on my day because I woke up at 10:30 instead of 11:30. But I still got my photography assignment done and the best way to explain this is to upload the pictures:

Duh! Rosie the Riveter. 

My recreation. 

Mother earth 

me as mother earth. Summer did my makeup which took an hour to do and a lot of makeup remover to get off. 

Dr. Seuss, "The Sneetches" 

Katie and Kylie being "Sneetches" 

These were not the only pictures that were taken of me or that I took. I was a model for Brittany and for one of Jazmyn's photos. After this was done Brittany and I made baked potatoes with broccoli. Then we just kinda relaxed for the evening and I caught up on some blogs and talked to Taylor.

Finally Conquered Market!

Day 73: Charades! 

I spent the morning cleaning my room and getting organized again. It seems that every time I leave to go on a trip I always come home to a room of havoc and caos. After I got my room back in order I got ready to head to market with Brittany, Jazmyn and Freddy. Where we finally bought a bunch of stuff including a ton of fruit and veggies. We plan on going on wednesday to get fish. After that we went to get the rest our our groceries...and man did we have a ton.

All of our groceries. Guess we were really hungry when we were shopping. 

 After we got all our groceries put away I took a nap before we diced up all our fruit for dinner.

A picture of me...I don't know what I am doing. Brittany took this picture. 

Our Fruit Salad! 

Me really really excited for our fruit salad!!!! 

After dinner we went to the grocery store and got some mixers and had a drink while playing charades. We had some crazy ones. Like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles eating pizza after saving the day and riding a flying turtle through a rain forest and getting attacked by a snake. Then we went to bed because we are old people.

Really 7 hours on the train!?!?!

Day 72: Oh Brugge!
 
So we woke up semi early and headed to Brugge. Where I instantly fell in love with this quaint town. I didn't take too many pictures, but the best way to describe this is with pictures...so here goes.  

So cute! 

Teacup flowers (daffodils) in a secret garden. 

My feet in Brugge. 

Swans!!!!!! 

Michelangelo's Madonna.   

A cross that fell from the top of the church. 

A reflection of the tower in the market square. 

French fries and potatoes! 

Lady Justice! 

Me in front of a justice building. 

This church has the actual blood of Christ....

After Brugge we attempted to get home, but it ended up taking forever! There was a delay of an hour when trying to leave Brugge then on that train there was a medical emergency and we had to stop for 40 minutes which made us late for our next train which meant we had to wait for another hour....then we finally got home. We were starving so bought noodles at Julia's. It was really good. Then we reached Hugo and I was so happy. I didn't think that I would be so happy to be back at Hugo, but I was!

Finally got me some lace!

Day 71: Brussels 

Well today we started our day with a tour of the EU parliament! The best way to explain this is with pictures and a sneaky video I took!

After our tour we ended up walking past: Royal Palace, Palace of Nation and the Warande Park, One of the Government buildings and Cathedral of St. Michael. After this we were let loose on the city! We walked around ate 7 euros worth of cheeseburgers and fries then found a chi chi's and got amazing mexican food! YUM!!! We all really were craving it. From there we went looking for chocolate and lace. We ended up stumbling upon waffles towards the end of the night then hiked back to the B&B to hang out.

A random picture of a church I thought was cool. 

Me with all the flags. 

Me eavesdropping on a session of Parliament. 

Some of the group getting their picture of the unique sculpture. 

Such a pretty tree! 

I liked the framing in this picture.

me infront of some gov't building. 

The back of the Cathedral. 

I really liked this picture outside of the Cathedral. 

This is how amazing it was inside the Cathedral. 

The steps of St. Michael's Cathedral. 

7 Euro worth of cheeseburgers, fries, and a DIET COKE! 

A view of the whole city! 

My shoes in Belgium! I can't believe they have made it this far! 

It looked so pretty I had to take a picture of it! 

Me trying my Strawberry Daiquiri. So good!  

ENSENADA!!!! YUM!!!!!!!!!! 

Yes you all look like homeless people eating waffles! 

YUMMY!!! My belgium waffle!