I’ve let a month go by without blogging. Here are some highlights:

Steve flew home to Michigan to work for three weeks. He missed us terribly (and he missed his bike).

We found the swimming pool, about a 30 minute bike ride across town. It does have a great water slide and several hot tubs, though the latter do not capacity limits and are usually standing room only.

On October 31, we attended a Halloween party at the home of an American classmate of Margaret’s.

On November 11th, the kids went door to door for candy the Dutch way–to celebrate the feast of St. Maarten, patron saint of Utrecht. Sint Maarten was known for his generosity. Statues depict him on a horse, cutting his cloak in half to share what he owned with the poor. The half-red, half-white crest of the city represents the torn cloak.

To prepare for St. Maarten’s Day, the girls and I attended arts and craft time in the cathedral pasting streamers onto milk cartons to make lanterns. (A medieval cathedral is a surreal setting for scissors, glue, hot chocolate and cookies.) After dark, we joined the other children carrying the lanterns (lampions) around town, singing St. Maarten’s songs and receiving treats from neighbors for their melodies. It was lovely to watch the lanterns bob up and down the street while toddlers practiced the songs and older elementary school children sang with well-taught precision. We had YouTube to thank for our ability to sort of sing two of the songs.

Monday morning, the doorbell rang at 7:30 a.m. Actually, it rang four times, until I finally heard it when I came down from our third floor bedroom. It was Steve, an hour earlier than I expected him. *Sometimes* travel goes even more smoothly than you expect. This sort of balances the times that it is a royal nightmare.

I’ve been running pretty consistently, and there have been enough dry half-hours to make it really fun. The leaves on the trees have been lovely.

Speaking of autumn, the streets are busy with municipal street cleaning vehicles that sweep up all of the fallen leaves–one more example of the amazingly high level of government infrastructure here.

Last night, the Staggs and we went to a jazz concert: Medinski, Martin & Wood. They were amazing to see live, and the venue is an easy 7 minute walk up the canal. All of our kids had a sleep over, which was not so great for sleeping.

Tonight, early bedtimes for all.