Hither and Jan

Actually, it's Annemie and Jan (pronounced "yon" lest you not get my pun)...and Bert and Pieter...and they're my parents' amazing neighbors/landlords- Bert and Pieter being their sons. They were seriously the best neighbors ever...so great they're practically family. I already miss them! When we arrived, Annemie had already outfitted my parents' house with a crib, colorful kids towels for bathtime, baby dishes, a baby monitor, and a whole host of toys which we got to keep. She's a pharmacist and she gave us all these kids' promotional things...toys and bags and travel size products...even a hat and sunglasses! It was like Christmas- we got to open so many new toys. We're still enjoying them now that we're home! They also provided a cooler for our trips and found a car seat for us to borrow, too.

This is how thoughtful Annemie is: they were over one night and I asked about this fruit I'd gotten on a pastry that day I thought was pretty and had never seen before. We figured out what it was, which was really enough for me, but the next morning when we got up there was a little packet of information printed off the internet about this fruit that had been slipped under the front door!

Another night during our visit, they had us all over for dinner and cooked two traditional Belgian dishes for us: stoofvlees and witloof. And they. were. good. Like so good I forgot to take a picture- I just dove right in. To firsts and seconds. And if you know me and taking pictures of food...you know that must be good. I did remember to take pictures of the cherry sundae we had for dessert. :)

It was nice to know when we left that my parents are in such good hands...and that they have some "family" right next door!