Zander's Vacation Blog

While we were driving Zander made up stories in his head - this is one of them.

Too many bricks

A story by Zander

Once they made a brick plane. And then they put in brick gas and then they flew to the ocean and the plane started getting too heavy - and so they fell right down into the ocean. And then do you know what the life jackets were made of? Brick. So, lots of people jumped in and sunk - and some others swum over their life jackets to get to a boat which they thought was plastic - but what was it actually made of? Brick. So how did it float? It didn't. Then it started sinking and all the people were like, "This is a terrible airport."

Things from vacation...

Well, when we were in Luxumbourg I found a staircase that I thought would lead to one of the tunnels that was supposed to be under the city but it was locked up. Why they dug the tunnels is because when there was war they bombed the city. But they only open them on the first of July - and we were there before that. And we were dissappointed but it was still fun. We saw a lot of castles and tunnels but we couldn't get in. Then we started eating lunch and I wanted to go in afterwards. I asked Mom "Is it time to go yet?" and Mommie said. "No!"

Well, in the very first of my vacation we went swimming for every day of the week. Which in France they want you to learn how to swim with noodles - which is not good for a kid to start learning how to swim. And which they say this - they say breathe with your head... well, they just make you swim in a very strange way. Also, they have this very strange diving board - it was like a piece of plastic like the side of a box - it was like short - not long like beachcombers and it didn't go up and down - and you just had to jump in. You had to jump into like 10 feet deep - the deepest part of the pool. And I tried diving but I was scared the first time cause I was like, "This isn't a deep enough pool!" I thought I would fall so far down that I hit the bottom real hard - cause I'm used to diving in a 15 feet deep pool. But I was OK. Well, we thought that the mom and the dad would be able to stay at the swimming room but you could only swim for 2 days with your mom - which was sad - because unless it was one of those days the mom would have to wait in the top of the swimming place - which was high - but the person would say you have to bring your kid down. So Mom had to go in and call for Callie and Zander and then walk up and then us kids would had to wait for the teachers to come right in - and we would get cold a lot waiting - a lot of the time there is only one single line and like 30 kids.

We are in Brugge, Belgium. Well, this is a music box thats really big - 2 spinners that's made by DHONDTS! Well, we thought we wouldn't go up cause we didn't know what it was or if we wanted to so we almost couldn't go up there but we did. And we were happy when we saw it. We were at the top and when the bells started ringing we listened and then we started running down and Daddy saw half of the music playing on this music box - and I saw the last minute. If you want to know where it says Dhondts - it is on the little board on front of circle thingy that doesn't really look like a circle. It was very dusty - we couldn't get a good shot. And so a Dhondt helped build this thing and that's why we, Mommie and Daddie and our family, we think, likes clocks and music boxes.

This is in Amsterdam and which we are riding on this little old boat which they used in the olden days to carry soda and stuff all around the canals. This picture is actually a pirate boat - it is NOT the tour boat we were in. It was at a museum and they built it to use it for tours and stuff. I said, "Please can we go?" and you said "No" and I said, "Please" and so we asked the man at the end of the tour if there is a hotel and he said, "If you go east you'll find a hotel" which we called the person when we were in the car and then we found out, no it was too expensive. But then I said, "Why can't we go?" and you said that wouldn't have enough time and I said "Could we take the car?" and you said "no" but you said you'd remind to come back someday and visit when I am a grownup. And you know, when we were in this area we kept hearing BAM BOOM, BAM BOOM, BAM BOOM! We looked all around and there was nothing going up down up down up down and so then we went back into the little canal. Then there was this one boat - like someone lifted up the boat and put it on an island somehow! Well we saw alot of boats that were sinking too. In this land they use bikes a lot and we saw a lot hanging near the canal and even almost in the canal. Why is this? Why don't they put their bikes a safer place? Well, I think people are mean and taking it off the road to be mean. When they unlock it they hang it over the river. I once even saw a bike that fell right in a boat - we saw it hanging off and when we came back it was in it. There was lots of house boats in this teensy canal. This is mean. Why do they have to have big house boats for one family? As big as the one we used for everyone in lake powell - for one family!

This is in Belgium, Oostende and well, this is like only 5 blocks down the street from our apartment. This is made for 12 people. So, for like little ones like Griffin and Livi they would sit in the front pretending to drive. And for Daddie and Uncle Jeff? They would be in the front driving. And Grandpa and Aunt Melodie? They would be in the next seat and then me and callie and then, then, in the back is Mom and Aunt Jennie and in the very, very back is Lina and Aunt Tina. I guess Grammie would have to be squashed with Griffin and Livi in the front because there is no more room. She would say,"Oh no! Look, we're gonna crash!" with the little ones and they would not be good steerers and she could help them. I miss Grammie. Now Lina and Livi get to see Grammie more than us since we live in France. I miss Lina and Livi too. It's OK that she is in the front, since the littlest ones need here the most and Grammie knows she can't move pedals anymore - she can only drive a car mostly - it's only the ones behind that can pedal. Oh, and there is another seat that someone could sit down on if they didn't mind someones feet in their face! Which Griffin is always putting his feet in my face.

This is at the biggest flower place in the whole world...you know all the flowers you ever buy in a store? They come from here. You'll see these machines? They hold these carts full of flowers in these red machines - it lifts up them and it swings them around to where they go and puts them there. The tracks were 30 miles long. We came when machines were working - we thought we weren't going to be able to go but we were - since we were late it was only 5 dollars - normally it would be no dollars - that way they can order a new flower or machine if any breaks. They have to spend a lot of money in this place. There's like a street cleaner inside and there are these special machines that pull carts. It's like Wonka's factory 'cause it's so big and all you can do is walk around mostly. It's just like they use like all these machines. I'm amazed of this place. But you know what? The one thing that's really strange about it? They didn't only have plants! They also used dried hay to make little things: little hay chickens, little hay roosters, little hay chicks on sticks.

Well this is a sand cake that I worked for like an hour. Smoothing the sand out. Like you know the softest powder sand on top? I used that for the whole cake. You see that thing that looks like wood? It's actually a pine leaf. Once I got it the best I could, I put lots of powder sand on it and then started to make the circle shape. Its a strange thing but I tried to make it a little up, the walls. I straightened the wall with my hands like this: "whoosh, whoosh, whoosh"and I was building it on a sand hill. Mom and Dad weren't there. They were where they thought it was hot, which it was in the shade. But I'll tell you why it was warm there. That's because it wasn't windy there. I called them to eat my cake but we didn't go until we were ready to go. Then we ate half and left the rest of the cake for the seagulls and we sang happy birthday to you to the seagulls and the sand was pretty soft. I'll tell you how I made this - I got soft sand and put it over the top and then I started mixing that and put more powder sand and hard sand and then mixed that - and then when it got almost to the top I started puting powder sand on it. Well, it was fun but Mommie and Daddie said let's leave the rest to eat for the seagulls. Well, when they ate it they got pretty big pieces, a whole half for each one.

Well this is me in the bowling place cause we didn't get to go on the 12 person bike. I wanted that for my last day thing but I didn't get it because it was only on weekends. So Mom said, "How about, if it's not too much money, we can go bowling instead?" Which I said, "OK" Which do you know who was the winner? Actually it was me. Griffin got 56 points and Zander got 71 points and Mommie got 46 and Callie got 46 and Daddie got 59, so, who was the winner? It was me! Which was strange because I wasn't really playing to win, just for fun. Mom said when you bowl you try not throwing hard, just low. So when I bowled, I went backwards. Mommie and Daddie put the ball into the gutters but we got little fences so they couldn't fall in the gutter but they still did. Once Griffin got the gutter and once my ball got stuck and we waited like 1/2 an hour and then Mommie said I'm just going to hit it with my ball and then Mommie's got stuck and the other ones tried and tried and by my turn it went up and then it went up to the gutter holder and then after that I started getting balls so the gutters would always be full - and I found a pink ball for Griffin. We thought 9 was the least but they had 8's. The heaviest one I saw was 100! By then, everyone was on the last line and I wasn't winning but then I went zooom! and I got a strike and I won and then I said oh! And Griffin was saying "a pink ball, I'm going to use it" but by then everyone was finished and we were leaving and I saw some balls. I thought "Why were the black balls in the light ball section? and so I tried to move them. Oh my gosh, this is 100 pounds! Oh we got lollipops and that was strange and we slept in our beds and started coming back here and that was the end of our trip. The end.