April 13-(Im home in 23 days and 16 in 29!!!!lol) hey everyone! sorry I haven't writen much, I grow increasingly lazy as the days go bye and can't seem to find the time to write, not that I don't want to its just I have other things to do.  Well last weekend I got to go on a steam train!! It was one of the really old trainns and was really fun! It was Simone, Jelle and I on the train and we sat and made funny faces nearly the whole time it was fun. After we got off the train we went to this cool bakery museaum thats set up like a early to mid 1900's bakery.  It was really cool we got to go in and try some ice cream that was made old fashion style it was neat.  Next weekend we are going to Belgium to visit relitives of mine.

April  7- Sorry I haven't writen in a while things here have been going along nothing to to big happening. 

            Well Sunday Denise, Anita, Piet and I all went to the Batavia, a reconstruction of a 17^th century VOC ship.  It was cool its this huge galley ship that was reconstructed using only 3 measurements; the height, width and depth. It was really neat because we got to go on a tour through the ship and learn a bit about its history and how the boat shipwrecked because of mutiny.

            This week I have had a bit of a cold but other than that things are going well.  Tomorrow Denise and I along with a few girls from our class are going into Hoorn to go shopping!

Mar 29- Paris was AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I loved it.  It is such

an amazing city! it takes you like an hour to drive a kilometre because of all the traffic yet in the centre of the city you can still her the birds chirp and the dogs bark!!!! it is so cool.  The weather was great to like between 17 and 20 everyday. It was so nice.

        Well Friday by the time we got to the city and checked into the hotel it was like 4:30.  9the drive to Paris alone was 6 hours.)  So we decided to take the metro and go the Eiffel tower to look around.  By the time we to the tower it was 5:30.  We decided not to go up the first day though because it was almost sunset so the lines were super, super long.  we went for dinner and the walked back to see the tower at night.  It was cool because every hour on the hour special little lights on the tower would blink for like 10 minutes.

        Saturday we went on a boat tour of the Seine canal and also the St Martin. That was really nice because we went around the island that Notre Dame is on and I got some really nice photos from it.  After the boat tour we went to the Basilique du Sacre Coeur.  It is the most amazingly beautiful building that i have ever been in.  Its shaped some thing like the Taj Mahal and in side has beautiful stained glass windows and all kinds of art work.  We also went to the Notre Dame Saturday.

          Sunday we started the day off by going up the Eiffel tower! We went all the way to the top! The view was awesome.  After we left the Eiffel Tower we decided to walk down along the river and go along to the small lady liberty.  Afterwards we went to the Arc du Triomphe and climbed the 300 or so stairs to the top to look out over the city.  When we came down from the Arc du Triomphe we walked down the Champs Elysees to the oblique and decided to catch the metro bach.

            Monday we slept in until 9 then drove the car around the Arc du Triomphe and left the city.

Mar 24- Last night I went to a Shakespeare play done by the “Reduced Shakespeare Company”.  They actors were three men who did thirty-seven of Shakespeare’s plays in two hours and ten minutes.   It was absolutely hilarious! I loved it we laughed the whole time.  They did all the plays about the kings (Richard III, Henry V etc…) to an American football game, where the commentary was about how the crowns were passed from one person to another over and over.  They also combined all the comedies into one big one to speed it along because they said that they found the tragedies to be funnier! It was lots of fun.

Mar 23-Sorry that I haven't writen in a while things around here have been a bit busy.  Well Friday night there was a school dance for my level and the level below it.  It was fun I hung out with Mignon, Jelske and Mike.  We had lots of fun.  Then Sunday afternoon Piet, Anita, Denise, Jelle, Simone and I went to visit a castle!!!! It was a 13th century castle built by a Dutch king.  It was really pretty and even had the original dungeon walls in it so (if you were Dutch) you could read what the prisoners wrote on the walls.  The castle had all kinds of old things that people who lived in that time would have used it was really neat.  Sunday night we went to see Piet sing in the hospital choir.  That was really neat the singing was beautiful and kind of opera like.

    Well we leave for Paris Friday and I am going to some type of Shakespear play tonight.  So I will try and write again once I come back. 

Mar 13- Today Denise Jelle Anita Piet and i went out to sight see around the province (Noord/north Holland).  Simone didn't come because she is still working on that great big project.  So we left at around 11 and didn't get home until around 3:30.  We went to a castle but are waiting until next weekend to go in so Simone can come, we saw all kinds of windmill and the sluis (that's a crazy thing where on one side of it the water is really high and on the other is really low, so the ships can go through it). 

A week and a day ago we were building igloos and today we went to the beach! (This crazy Holland weather changes every five minutes, one its sunny the next rain then hail then snow and then back to sunny with in fifteen minutes!) We went to walk along the beach so i could see what a Holland beach looks like. We wore great big rubber boots so that we wouldn't get our feet wet, but when we tried to throw Piet in the water a HUGE wave came and we were soaked! My boots were completely filled with water and when I dumped them out you would have sown it was a waterfall! It was hilarious, and so so SO cold!

Mar 12- Today Simone and I went to Amsterdam with all the kids from the organization, which are in Holland.  To keep up with our totally outrageous reputation we some how managed to get on the wrong train and end up thirty minutes out of the way!  By now we shouldn’t be surprised at something like this happening but you never quite get use to it. But luckly we met up with Florianne and Nadine who missed their train at the station after the one we weren't suppose to be at so we four all arived together.

We toured the whole city and even went into the Red Light District.  We went to many of the city markets like the flower market and Albert Cuyp.  We went to the Van Gough museum and on a boat tour of the canals.  I would have to say though that my favourite part of the day was climbing inside of a giant wooden shoe made of metal for photos.  The shoe was SO big I could have slept in it!

Mar 10- Yesterday we had the day off of school.  So Anita, Denise and I went into Hoorn to go shopping. We had lots of fun we drove our bikes into town at around 9:00 and didn't get home until after 1:30.  We had lots of fun hanging out, trying on clothes and just having a girls day.  Simone couldn't come because she had to work on a huge history project with some girls from her class.

Mar 5- Today we went out to play in the snow at like 11 and hardly came in until after 4:30! We had so much fun!  We went sliding, made snow angels, went on the frozen lake and skated with our boots, had countless snow ball fights and built an igloo.  Yep, we are master architects!  We worked on it for most of the after noon.  We had loads of fun and were soaken wet when we finally came in. i had 4 layers of shirts on and some how still managed to get snow down the front of me on my bare skin! Wonders never cease. Oh well it was TONS of fun.  I just watched the movie The Last Samurai it rocked! I loved it and everyone should see it!  lol well bye bye for now!

Mar 1- hey everyone! Today it snowed! Biking to school was super slippery, but i still haven't fallen off my bike!! There was one good thing about the snow though, Mignon and I had a snow ball fight and made snow angels in our free period! It was tons of fun! Well thats all for today have a good one.

Feb 27- Hello

Friday night was the school dance! It was lots of fun. It was held at this place called "Mani Festo" which is like a club the school rented, it was so cool. It reminded me of the club of The O.C.! The music was great and the DJ had a real turn table!

Saturday night we did a sleep over with a few people and watched movies. That’s about it for now folks!

Feb 23- Today i got of school at 12:15 it was wonderful!!!:D Here if the teacher is sick you get the period free so a couple teachers were sick and I dont take latin so i got to go home!! I went all by my self and didn't even get lost!! And it was only my third time going home!! I was so proud of myself. and for all of you who had no faith in me and doubted i could ride a bike i just want to let you know i haven't even fallen off once yet thank you very much!!  well thats all for now!! doei (thats good by in dutch)

Feb 21- Today was my first day of school it was sooo much different than school at home.  It was a lot bigger but i mean it couldn't be smaller than GMCS! It was so weird to walk in to the school and have no one say hi to you! the hloe mentality is different so it will take some getting use to.  Like the kids here think nothing of cheating on tests and yelling out loud.  I mean I thought my school had no noise dicipline but this school is 10x louder!!! It's nuts. I have at least one free class a day some days two so thats nice.  EVERY ONE bikes to school and i mean EVERY ONE there was over 1300 bikes!!!! Mine was silver so when i when to look for it, all the other colors were eleminated from the great search!! lol! oh well!! it didn't take to to long. hahaha

Feb 20- to day i visited a wind mill i got to go up inside of it and saw how it worked.  tomorow i start school so that will be exciting!! have a great day

Feb 18- Sorry I haven't writen much latly I  have been soooooooooooo busy!!!  Monday I got up at 4:00 am!!! (can u believe it? fefe) to go with Simone and her dad on the big truck. Piet (simones dad) drives a transport truck for a chicken killing factory so we went with him to see how his job went.  we had to go pick up the chicken and drive them to his work. they smelled REALLY MIGHTY bad!!  Later Simone, Denise and I decided to go sight seeing in Hoorn we didn't get far thought because it started to hail VERY VERY VERY hard we were stuck out side in it for like 25 minutes and by the time we took shelter in a shop my legs were so sore!! So we decided to go shopping instead!!  Tuesday we went to the "Holland Flower Festival" it was beautiful there was like 3500 suare meters of flowers. Wednesday we had a sleepover and the hole living room was like one giant bed!! soo cool. thursday was like a down day we rested and recouped to be ready for todays trip to AMSTERDAM!!! it was soo much fun.  i got to go on a train, how cool is that!!!!we did some shopping and sight seeing also. but my favorite part was the cool trains!!! and i got to go on a monorail too!!! well i have to go kisses to all

Feb 13-I finally made it after 11 hours of flying, 9 hours of waiting in airports and an hour of delay!!!! It was a LONG journey!! I didn't get any sleep on the planes!! The kid in the seat behind me, from Toronto to Paris, insisted on kicking me for the entire 8 hour flight and I got lost in the Toronto airport but other than that all went smoothly.  We took the scenic route here (to Schellinkhout) and did some sight seeing. I saw my first wind mill!!!!!!!! sooo cool!!! We did some sight seeing to day also. I took all kinds of pics!! well i have no school this week so i will have tons of time to do stupid things (like light frying pans on fire which simone did when she was on G,M, lol) so I will post more later bye bye

hi

  i fly out in less than a week!!! I am soooo excited!!!

I just found out that i am spending easter in PARIS!!!!!!!!!!! Wahoooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! PARIS!!!!!!I'm so excited!!!!!!!

hi everyone,

    I am sooooooo excited to see my exchange family (Jelle, Denise, daddy Piet and  Mommy Anita) :P It will be Sooooo much fun!!! I can't wait to meet you all!!