Amsterdam

We've spent much of the past two days on trains, traveling from southwest France back up to Paris and spending the day there before taking another train to Belgium. The best part of our night in Brussels was eating Haagen Dazs ice cream on Belgium waffles!

Early the next morning we took a three-hour train ride further north to Amsterdam, where we've settled into our apartment. We're renting an apartment from an artist named Theo who was born and raised here.



Theo created several paintings that are placed throughout the apartment, like this one behind Amber and Ediza. This afternoon Amber helped make some fresh flower arrangements, while Ediza played with dominoes and flower petals on the bed.


The apartment sits above a T-shirt shop that sells shirts reading things like, "Today I hired a detective to track me down." And in true Amsterdam fashion, there's a bong shop a few doors down the street.

On our walk to nearby Vondelpark the streets were plastered in orange (just like the crazy guys at the Swiss train station) for the Euro Cup soccer game (Holland lost 3-1 to Russia). We could hear the collective cheers and moans of the large crowds gathered at parties and pubs to watch the game.



At the park we walked by other groups gathered to watch live theater, including this play set in the water. We also visited the playground, where Amber -- who still thinks she's 5 years old -- got stuck in the tires.