Queen's Day!

Our first Queen's Day in Nederland was officially a success!  By the way, here is an explanation of Queen's Day in case you are unfamiliar.

We celebrated this Dutch holiday by doing all the necessaries…
#1 - Wear orange and/or dress up in your finest dutch duds

C

E

A

K

sisters + besties = sisties

#2 - PARTY - Our version of partying included walking/biking around the city, people watching, & eating treats

I have to note a small cultural difference here - in the states for big public events, you might see some horrendously disgusting public sanitation provisions known to all as "porta-potties."  Here, in Nederland, they bring that dirty to another level.  We noticed throughout the streets, these charming  urinal stands, just out in the open for public use…

This is what E thought of that (and I quite agree)...

#3 - Street shopping - the streets are just absolutely lined to the brim with people selling stuff.  Think community garage sale, but for a whole entire country.  Apparently this is one of the only days people are even authorized to garage sale.  Anyway, here are our spoils.  I will include a price list for you to oooh and aaah at my finds (Rotterdam tray and mugs 5 euros, Uggs - real and new and possibly stolen 25 euros, bootlegged movies 1 euro, times table practice thing 2 euros).  The best fun of all was just walking past all of the stuff and paroozing.  Love me some shopping.

#4 - Watch the coronation on TV.  This year was an especially big deal because Queen Beatrice stepped down from the thrown and her son Willem-Alexander and wife Maxima stepped up.  So next year, instead of Queen's day we'll celebrate the first King's day in over a hundred years!

#5 - Feast on the specialties - We had an "orange dinner" which was mostly just a regular dinner served on orange plates with Holland mugs.  We tried the orange cake that we have heard so much about, and a friend brought by some special Queen's day cupcakes for us to try.

No idea why E is nude in this pic

Finally here are a few pics from Carver's Queen's Day celebration at school.  All of the school kids in the country had a play day with tons of games, face painting, and treats.  They also gave each child an orange Queen's Day shirt and a mug with the King and Queen's mug on it (see what I did there?).  It was a really fun day!

Carver and his buds: Jerainey, C, Nunno, Fabian, and Calvin.

Long live the King!