{wooden shoes & windmills} zaanse schans, holland

after our first day and a good nights sleep, we were ready to explore the dutch countryside and visit northern holland. thank goodness we weren't jet lagged because we had a busy day planned! our first stop? zaanse schans! i read about it in our rick steves book and thought it looked perfect! they had windmills, wooden shoes, canals and dutch hospitality all in one place! it was absolutely gorgeous.

hayden loved the windmills!

this is inside a windmill that was built in 1646. it is used to make pigments for paints. it was 5-stories tall and really big inside!

cheese, anyone?

eating pannenkoek- yummy!

ordering dutch delights

we got to see wooden shoes made! 

pick a shoe, any shoe!

hayden's first pair

"hey, these are pretty cool!"

"i'll take these and these..."

"now, this is my kind of wooden shoe!"

it's really incredible how fast windmills can move

 hayden loved all of the animals! we were so happy to visit here and still can't get over how beautiful it was. off to volendam!

{ arrival! } the netherlands

we have been so excited to share our family excursion to europe with you!

17 days

6 countries

5,000 pictures

3 happy people

i'll only post some favorites since there are so many but feel free to come over anytime and we'll watch a slideshow- it may take a few hours!

we cannot express how memorable and amazing this trip was. ricky and i have been wanting to get back to holland for a long time now to visit where he served his mission for 2 years. i'm so thankful we were able to travel there and share this special experience together. we hope you enjoy the pictures and feel a touch of european charm.

after flying for 9 hours, we arrived in amsterdam at 6 am and took off running! we were too excited to be tired. our first stop? apeldoorn. it's a small city ricky lived and we wanted to go to church and see old friends. a lot changed! a branch was now a ward and a 12-year old boy who remembered ricky was now leaving in a few weeks to serve his mission. hayden went to nursey and it was neat to hear everything in another language. ricky's dutch was so incredible! it was like he had never left. i was so impressed and it was cute to watch him talk to just about anyone to speak it. ik hou van u!

we are here!

apeldoorn also has an adorable monkey zoo called "apenheul." it is huge and full of apes! this place always stood out to me when he spoke about holland and thought it would be fun for hayden. we had a {monkey} of a time!

"umm, guys? are you sure about this?"

so close!

so cute! monkeys just roam around the park. literally! =)

carrying my baby like the mother monkey!

watching the gorillas

our first taste of dutch food! yummy!

ricky was so happy to have patats. aka french fries

they had the coolest park with the tallest slide we'd ever seen

if you look closely, you can see the sea shells in the soil! it's incredible what the dutch have done to make more land. thank goodness for windmills and the little boy who saved holland by putting his finger in the water dike.

what a great first day!

more pictures to follow soon

{ second birthday }

wow! did we did hayden have a fun party! we rented a cars-theme jump and you should have seen his face when he first saw it! he was so excited! all of our friends and family were there and we had a great time. it was super hot but the kids still jumped away. thanks everyone for celebrating our little man's {2nd} birthday!

birthday boy

the cake!

make a wish!

tara, rachel, me & marla

hayden & bryson

all giggles

i made these favors which turned out pretty tasty! they were chocolate cars on pretzel rods.

hayden would put his new cars in the jump with him

ricky and b-rad

yeah!

us & the blayden's. hayden's best friend is their son grant.

me and alex!

ann & i. we worked together at wealth tv and became great friends.

who doesn't want a piston cup pb & j?! they tasted as good as they look

omi and opa brought this adorable cake over on his actual birthday. we all celebrated with the grandparents by the pool and had a yummy lunch while daddy was taping "family feud" and won a car!

here is a slideshow on the hartpence family blog