Family outings-  mini castle visit and a weekend of activities...

I don't have much time today, but I just want to post some more photos of some recent outings... Gotta make the most of the weekends that hubby is not working as these are quite rare (working every second weekend is a huge bummer but means the other weekends are a bit jam packed with child pleasing activities!)

Before I start inundating you with photos, I think I forgot to mention in the last post that we have a farmers market in the square directly opposite our apartment EVERY FRIDAY AFTERNOON - how lucky are we??!!!! There's a Greek delicatessen, a bakery, cold meats, fruit and veg stall and the usual clothing and bric-a-brac. It's a weekly tradition that we stop past on the way home from school and pick up a cooked chicken and some croissants or freshly baked waffles... yum :)!  

And I should also show you one of my best purchases to date:  My nana shopping trolley! Never thought I would have one but both me and hubby agree that it is pretty nifty and since I am doing the shopping using public transport at the moment, it makes life a lot easier. 

So back to our excursions... a couple of weekends ago, by popular request (ie nagging), we went back to the fantastic castle playground that was featured in a post a few weeks ago. Near the end of the afternoon, we decided to go and have a look at the real castle that was just nearby. It is actually part of the original city wall of Brussels, complete with moat and drawbridge!  I would tell you something useful and interesting about it, except the information we brought home is in flemish, and as of yet, my flemish is non existent.  Suffice to say there were enough suits of armour, swords and crossbows on display to keep even the little two amused for long enough. We went up the precarious stairs to the turret and had a great view over parts of Brussels: 

There was a lot of excitement for the kids to be walking around a real castle turret (castle/city wall same thing really, it's old and made of stone and has turrets and water moats)....

Inside was as you would expect from a really old building..

 Amazing architecture and as I am no engineer/ architect, a complete lack of any understanding how they built these things back then.  

And here is a preserved horse from a couple of centuries ago (I really should take more notice of the information signs but pretty much it is a real horse back from the days when the castle was functioning)...

When we visited, they had an exhibition on which featured olden day rubber squeaky toys - I am not sure what this had to do with the castle as such, but it was light relief for the kids, and at the very top of the castle, they had set up a huge playroom with toys, books, and seating for adults, so that kids could have some free play time. Very good thinking I must say! And even better, there were public toilets (phew). That would be reason enough to pay a visit again!

This weekend just gone, we managed to cram in two full days of outings... And both days were extremely successful.  It is hard to top one great experience after another, but Belgium continues to surprise us in a good way..  

Saturday we decided to take a quick trip to Gent - a scenic town that is renowned for its beauty.   I didn't manage to get any photos of the actual city but here are a couple of downloaded ones to give you an idea:

Yes, it does actually look like that, magical!  I had done my research though, and rather than spending the afternoon admiring the architecture, sipping lattes, and strolling the river banks (as you would expect would be the most appropriate activity in this town), I was hostage to 4 ratty adrenalin bunnies who have rather specific requirements. One of which is that they do not like to be bored. And secondly, that car trips are definitely boring. (As is sitting idly, admiring the scenario, and general relaxing).  Fortunately, Gent is only a 40 minute car trip from our place, and also I had found a large playground area that looked good to explore.  

And, large is an understatement about this play area.... it is actually a huge sports and recreation complex/reserve/domain.. I am not sure what to call it as it is so huge-spanning 87 hectares.  We encountered delight after delight with play grounds, adventure forests, all natural play equipment made from logs and ropes set into the natural forest and even a cafe (with toilets - bonus!) in case we had a chance to relax.

You may notice no actual photos of kids posing, too busy running to get to the adventure playgrounds.. 

 It was absolute heaven for our adventure girls.  Interestingly, although probably not surprisingly, the brightly coloured playgrounds held much less appeal than the natural less structured play areas... Not a safety device in sight nor a helicopter parent. Seems that children are encouraged to be more independent here than what we have been used to. 

And finally, when we were thinking about leaving as the sun was getting low in the sky, we walk round a corner to discover this: 

...a mini beach. Ok, so coming from the land of beaches, this is not altogether that exciting, but what was new and kept our troops enthralled for another hour or so was the raft set up. There were two rafts that could be pulled from the shore to the central island and back again. This could not have been a more perfect place to let their imaginations run wild, engage in team work and enjoy the natural scenery.  I imagine in summer, this place is probably very crowded, but right now at the very start of spring with unseasonably mild weather, it was idyllic. The water was FREEZING but this did not stop them demanding to come back the next day with togs. After this fantastic day out, the consensus from the midgets was unanimous - BEST PLACE EVER! 

Sunday started in a place of misery- after all we were not returning to the BEST PLACE EVER, and therefore, their sole purpose in life was to nag us until we agreed to return. Nothing, I repeat, nothing, could possibly top this.  Aaah, how children's minds work. I love the passion that they have and the way they throw their whole selves into each experience, but it takes work to help them deal with the other side of the experience, the disappointment of not reliving it immediately, the insecurity of not knowing whether the new experience will indeed be worth it,.... I am teaching them slowly but surely, that this mother knows best and that they need to start trusting me on this! We decided not to do another big car trip and decided to stay around Brussels today.  We went to visit the expansive Bois de Cambre which is a huge forest at the south of Brussels.   The playground was a bit tame compared to the previous day's experience, but there was once again a cafe (and a toilet -yippee!) which served Haagen Daz icecream and waffles.  

The highlight of this trip was the roller rink that was set up in the middle with roller blades for hire. So the older two had a great time learning to roller blade, while the little two got to have fun on the bouncy castles.  

I don't think it topped the trip to Gent, but it was good enough and they all had an exhausting but entertaining weekend.... Next one will be a home one, but then it is school holidays (again) and we will be off to Sweden! 

Moving in and other random life stuff...

Sorry for the silence... Last week we had one little dude with the chicken pox . He was a bit unhappy for a couple of days, and then was a box of birds and more than pleased with himself for having a whole week off kindi. Each morning he would inform me that he wasn't going to kindi as his "spots were still working". 

He was definitely NOT impressed that he had to go back this week: "but my spots are still working!" . "Sorry dude, your spots haven't finished working and have gone home...." Big points for creativity though :)

I thought I would post some photos of where we live here.  As you know, finding this apartment was a huge headache, but a massive relief once we signed the dotted line. I can't remember if I mentioned but the normal rental agreement here is for a 3 or 9 year lease! and if you leave within the first 12 months, there is a 3 month forfeit, as well as a requirement to give 3 months notice. Not a very pleasant arrangement for us nomadic types :(. Needing to keep 6 months rent to pay out at the end is not something that I had counted on needing to do. Goodness, we barely can organise what we do a  month in advance, fancy having to know 3 months in advance that we will be moving!!! 

Anyhoo, here's our apartment: 

I had a LOT of reservations about living in an apartment with 4 kids. Particularly since, our holidays in hotel rooms and small serviced apartments had felt squishy and difficult. We were used to living in a large 4 bedroom house, with a yard, lots of toys and a whole cul de sac where the kids could roam and ride bikes at will. I did try and look for houses, but there is really nothing available in the areas that we wanted to live. I think it must be because the population here is very stable and/or a lot of house ownership as the commune does have a lot of houses, just noone wanting to rent them out. Finding a 4 bedroom apartment is bordering on lunacy, so we were really restricted to finding a 3 bedroom apartment and coping with a smaller living and sleeping space and no outdoor space. And as I mentioned before, this was the sole 3 bedroom available in this area. 

But, after 2 months of being here, it has not been terrible at all. The kids have settled into sharing rooms, and so far none of them has killed any of the others. The beautiful surrounds and the calm area as well as the very easy access to all sorts of public transport and shops has made it a perfect place to live. 

 Here is the place less than 20m from our apartment where we catch public transport- buses and trams. There is even a real cafe almost like what we are used to NZ/Aus.  Now that spring has arrived, the flowers and blossoms are coming out, and it looks spectacular. My iphone novice photos really don't do it justice.








This is the church directly opposite our apartment.
Another beautiful old building that adds to the ambiance of our quarter.

And this is the amazing Basilique church which is one of the largest from its era in the world. We have yet to explore this one but it is just up the road from the kids school, and is a landmark that can be seen from a great distance. 

So back to the moving in.... No huge dramas when we moved in except slight oddities that we just had to roll with. For example, it is only possible to move in on the 1st or 15th of the month. Don't ask me the reasons behind this? I guess we would have had to pay an extra two weeks in a hotel if we had missed the 1st of the month... thank goodness the timing was perfect.  There was the usual inefficiency in organising anything. I had to call the electricity company to arrange the reconnection - no electricity would be a disaster of course. I opted to visit the shop in person which was a very smart move. The real estate agency had given me the meter readings and assured me many times that this is all that I needed. I arrive at the shop, and hand over my meter readings and relevant details, but then apparently, there is another number that I need to provide too. I am given a number to call. So I hop next door to McDonalds for some caffeine for strength and make the call. I am informed by this company that they cannot give me the number I need as it is in the name of the previous tenant. Sigh... here we go again.... I call the real estate agency to find the name of the previous tenant. Oh actually Madame, we have the number you are asking for. @$FWUGMW@$* Oh the frustration... why oh why then did you not give it to me IN THE FIRST PLACE WHEN I ASKED LIKE A MILLION TIMES instead of me wasting a couple of hours of my time on a merry go round??!! What's new. Since the ID card saga and the car saga, nothing surprises me much these days :)!

There is a lot  more involved to moving in than what we are accustomed to.  We were very lucky that this apartment had an oven, fridge, stove and kitchen cabinets. Yes, this is not necessarily standard. Unfurnished in europe can mean none of these, just a shell of a building. As it was, we had no light fittings (bare live wires dangling from the ceiling) or curtains, although they had left the curtain rails.  The moving in day was a Saturday which was spent frantically shopping at IKEA to get some bare essentials and enlisting the help of friends to bring over mattresses and bedding.  When we get to the apartment at 5pm, it is a bit of a race against the sun setting to get at least some lights fitted.  Spending the evening without lights was not going to be a pleasant task with 4 kids! Another European oddity, is that the shops are all closed on Sundays. Which is lovely and nice in principle, but terrible in practice. Whatever we hadn't managed to buy on the Saturday, was now going to have to wait until the next weekend. 

So we survived the week with 2 lights and no curtains, camping on mattresses on the floor. We got excellent news too that our furniture would arrive 10 days after we moved in instead of the 3 weeks they had estimated.  The next hurdle was how on earth to get our furniture inside the apartment?!!! Although we are only on the first floor, there is actually no street access to our entry lobby nor to the balcony. There is a small lift that holds a handful of people and windy steep stairs. The moving company had not considered how they would actually get the furniture inside. This caused a few days of extreme stress as we imagined having our belongings stranded outside.  (The company did actually suggest that they hire a ladder lift from the UK for the princely sum of 1000 pounds - um NO THANKS!).  I visited the apartment manager who incidentally lives just down the hill and as it turns out, I can see directly into his office window, for advice. Yes, he says. This is a big problem. And that was that.  But he made a lot of sympathetic noises and was a very nice man so I don't begrudge him for not having any solution. 

After many many hours of research and google translate, I finally found some possible options for us.  As per usual Ponky style, we are a little more difficult than the norm, we love a challenge apparently. You see, moving into apartments is fairly standard for a city full of apartments. This is how it is usually done: 

A truck parks in front, mounts a ladder and the furniture goes in over the balcony. Our problem was that there is no access for any vehicle below our balcony, it actually overlooks a lovely garden/grass area, which is all very scenic and nice, but not all that useful for moving furniture. In addition, access to the path and grass area is through a 90cm wide gate.  In the end I found a company (the day before the furniture was to arrive) that used portable ladder lifts (minus the truck below) and that is how it was done. All very easy and straight forward for a quarter of the price that the moving company quoted us. 

And that is probably the end of the main dramas... We are now fairly sorted, although stuff is still in boxes and curtains are only rudimentary still. We may have unpacked completely by the time we have to give our 3 months notice ;). 

Speaking of ladder lifts - this sight greeted me one evening when we were living in Ixelles. Both sides of this very busy street had been blocked off, three buses were queued up at a standstill and we were told to get off the bus. When you live at the top of an apartment building and cannot get out, this is what happens- a fire engine, several ambulances and police cars to try and take someone out of their apartment on a stretcher.  The things you don't think about when moving into an apartment....

And just a few random pics: This is what happens when we take

 the kids to Haagen Daz

And that dear friends, is all for today.... dinner making is calling and there are unpleasant noises in the background that I must attend to. (Note to self- do not try and write a blog post while the kids are home, hungry and tired...)

A lighter focus- recreation times in Brussels

When we first arrived I bemoaned the fact that there did not seem to be any playgrounds for children around.  All the websites spoke about how wonderful Brussels is for small children and families, and how there is so much to do. I was used to Brisbane, which I still think has the best playgrounds I have ever seen, where there is a playground on every street corner in full view... 

Well, it took a while to find them, but we did and they are NOT BAD AT ALL. In fact, I am quite pleased with the variety and volume of playgrounds around. In fact, I try and go to a new one for each outing so at the moment, the kids are unable to have a favourite as each new one becomes the new favourite. Here is a small selection of what we have been to: 

This is our local park- within easy walking distance. It is huge with an area for the little kids and the big kids, plus football area (of course. these kids are seriously GOOD at soccer) and dog poop area (a must in Brussels). And a bonus is that it is completely fenced. No worrying about children running away or accessing the busy roads. 

Sometimes they randomly decide to lock the park though, like I found out one weekend as they had deemed that it was "too windy".  Obviously, none of them have ever lived in Wellington. 

This is an enormous castle playground park near the centre of Brussels. The day we went in the school holidays, it was almost deserted. 

The kids have requested a similar playground to be built in our backyard when we finally settle. Of course dears :). We may need some help!

This is the view from the castle playground. Yep, a real live castle. Love it! It was deemed "boring" by my youngsters...sigh. 

This is the other playground that is within walking distance of our house, although, with tired little ones, I tend to take the bus/tram for 1 stop.  

One of the first parks we found when we arrived, close to our first apartment in Ixelles.

Then there are also lots of outdoor spaces and places to walk. Again deemed "boring" by the sprogs until they arrive and actually find it quite nice after all!  Botanique gardens - look at those posers...haha.

A forest walk on the other side of Brussels where the expats live. We heard a lot of english and other languages here :)

Here's a bit of a gross fact. THERE ARE NO PUBLIC FACILITIES AT ANY PARKS. Even the indoor play areas (see below) do not necessarily have baby change facilities, even though they are catering for toddlers - logical non?!  So this has been a bit of a problem for us and I polled a mums facebook group, and apparently toiletting in public IS a national pastime for the belgians/ french.  Eeeewww. I am still working on an acceptable solution for our family but I wish they just built toilets where small children could go.  

And there are a variety of indoor spaces and activities too as yes, it does apparently rain a lot in Brussels. Although, it seems to rain less than Auckland, and the rain is far far far (can I say this enough?) more pleasant than the torrential downpours that Brisbane gets during the monsoon-y season. 

Safety seems to be less of a concern here. Less helicopter parenting, kids more able to do more risky things. This was pretty high for a 7 and 9 year old. Proud of them for managing it by themselves! 

The little dude does not like his photo taken, but he does like to be the photographer. Here he is learning the ropes. 

And of course, we cannot forget the local peace keepers that patrol the streets and parks constantly. Obviously very dangerous places to be! They keep the kids in line and make sure they are not breaking any of the rules.  Also, they are quick to point out if I have left my bag unattended on a seat, even if there is  noone else around.

Occasionally we find good places to have a snack.  Here is D having a reasonable smoothie. Smoothie places are few and far between compared to down under.

 And normally I also have a coffee. But given that this is what a cappuccino looks like - I may give up ordering coffee altogether! I guess I should really convert to beer. The first time I ordered a coffee, I was shocked and could not understand why they had coated it with canned whipped cream.  Apparently, they think this is good coffee.... sigh.....

As we explore more places, I will try and take more photos.  The sun is out this week and we are having a heat wave, life is definitely looking up!