A travel journal: Half way

Gosh it does seem like we have been doing nothing, which is actually the typical day for a homeschooler or, more appropriately, unschooler. I put all of my plans on hold because the children were having a great time with their friends. If you try to find the educational and social benefits in this,
you will find many. Speaking a foreign language, maintaining friendships over a long distance, solving conflict on the playground, teamwork to build in the sand, developing leadership qualities while organising a game. There was an article about the benefits of free play for children doing the rounds on facebook, but I cannot find the link. We drew many comparisons between life in The Netherlands and life in Ireland, we found advantages and disadvantages to both, Siobhan and Cara were shocked at how rough and rude a lot of the children here are and we wiped up many tears.
So I guess we have been doing stuff. The girls log on religiously to their minecraft homeschool summer camp which so far has covered topics such as the Grand Canyon, Mount Erebus, Volcán de Parícutin, unique buildings, and this week they are discussing height and must build up. Siobhan is a GameMaster, which means she acts as an overseer in the group below hers, helping people out if they need help, and reporting any meanness or destruction of other peoples' builds. She takes her role very seriously.
I had planned to go to Sweden in the next week to participate in an international homeschool camp, but it did not meet with my husband's enthusiasm so we are skipping it this year and maybe will pick it up next year. There was another European meetup in Switzerland, but unfortunately I only learned of that a couple of days ago when it was already over. I joined the facebook page for Amsterdam home educators or those interested, but they only meet once a month and the meeting for July did not fit in to our calender.
So what did we do over the last couple of weeks? Well we visited a few local spots where we used to go, we met with (my) friends, we went to the dolfinarium in Harderwijk, we went to The Art of Brick exhibition in Amsterdam, we went to the adventure playground (Twiske) where the girls could run to their hearts content, we re-visited the petting zoo and were very disappointed in how run down it has become, and we went to Düsseldorf for a few days where Toni, my husband, is presently working. It was very hot while we were there, almost too hot, so we spent one day panting beside the pool and the next indoors at Legoland Discovery Centre in Oberhausen which was really cool. It has a massive play area with sections dedicated to various lego series such as Duplo, lego friends, the racing cars, Harry Potter, and (the best) lego ninjamo. Now my girls do not know this lego series, nor were they initially interested in this section, but it was very difficult to get them out of it once they got in. There is a hall with laser beams and you have to get to the other end without setting off the alarms. I think they were busy there for 2 hours. Ana definitely does not have coordination problems, and Cara, true to style, went through on high heels and fluffy dress and got through each time.
Today we went to the girls' favourite swimming pool and stayed there for 3 hours until one of the lifeguards came over to Grainne and told me she had to put on her water wings (in 10 cms of water). Excellent excuse to leave...

I have been asked what it is like to stay away from home for so long, to engage in extended travel. I do not really know whether we fall under the category of extended travel, seeing as we have been staying in our own house here in Zaandam, picking up the threads of a life we left behind, and as such not really travelling. The first week was really exciting, the second and third weeks were fun. I feel that I did not do enough planning in advance; I had wanted to go where the wind blew us, but there was not enough wind and it left us (at least me) in a bit of a slump. I think the kids were happy to hang out with their buddies though, so really it was not wasted time. If and when we do it again, I will have a plan of where we want to go and when.
The other factor is the expense of travelling. We have been lucky because we have this house, and can slip in hotels under Tonino's work expenses, but if we did not have those luxuries I do not know how we would finance it. Once again, planning is essential, plan way in advance and look for good deals, stay away from the tourist centres and don't go during the summer holidays. I think that was a big mistake.
We all miss our house in Youghal, we miss our friends and family, we (can you believe it) miss the mild temperature, and I think that the 8 weeks roughly we will have been gone is more than enough for us, unless of course there is a plan in place which is well thought out and does not involve too much hanging around. However, in this day and age there are plenty of communication tools available so we have kept in touch throughout, which makes some days easier.

We have booked our ferry home and I have thrown away my list of things I want to do with the kids. I told them before bedtime tonight that we will hold a family conference in the morning and that they can present me with a list of things they would like to do over the next couple of weeks. This should be fun...

As always I end with photos of our days doing nothing!