13 Months of Details

THE TRAVELS

Number of countries visited: 15

Longest train ride: 13 hours (Utrecht to Warsaw)

Longest wait in a train station: 7 hours (Warsaw)

Most expensive flight: $751 (Amsterdam to Omaha, NE)

Least expensive flight: 6,00 euros -- 20,00 euros after tax (Glasgow to Amsterdam)

Favorite cities: Zagreb, Dublin, London, Innsbruck

Favorite paintings: The Lion Hunt, Peter Paul Rubens (National Gallery, London), The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, Paul Delaroche (National Gallery, London), For the Road, Jack Yeats (National Gallery, Dublin), La Chasse aux Lions, Eugene Delacroix (Musee d'Orsay, Paris), Origin of the Milky Way, Jacopo Tintoretto (National Gallery, London)

Favorite museums: Torture Museum (Prague), National Gallery (London and Dublin), MUMOK (Vienna)

Favorite chocolate museum: Barcelona

Favorite purchases: photo album (Krakow), boots ('s-Hertogenbosch)

Best vantage points: Artist's Sit (Edinburgh), Alps (Innsbruck)

Best scenery: Alps (Innsbruck), train ride from Budapest to Zagreb

Favorite books read: Lamb, Angela's Ashes, Made in America

Favorite new food: fuejoada

Least favorite new food: pig face

Best eating experience: Poland

Favorite nightlife experience: live reggae and dancing (Dublin)

Best theatrical productions: Phantom of the Opera (London), The Cut (London), Night of the Iguana (London)

Most meaningful experience: Auschwitz

Best castle: Edinburgh

Favorite shopping experience: Great Market (Budapest)

Number of strangers proposing marriage: 7

Number of new shoes (in pairs, flip flips included): 8

Number of visitors from the USA: 6 (Drew, Jack, Joel, Shauna, Megan, Rick's Mom)

Number of strangers' homes I stayed in: 12

Number of times I walked home from Den Bosch instead of waiting for the bus: 9

Second stupidest moment: First of all, there are two kinds of stupid. There's poor judgment stupid, which we're not going to get into. And there's embarrassing stupid. The top embarrassing stupid moment we're also not going to get into. So, the second stupidest moment is when I got fined on the train. It was a short ride from Tilburg to Den Bosch -- about 15 minutes. I had gotten up early, right after Ruud left for work, and was in a hurry to get home and start my day. I wanted to limit the time I would have to wait for the bus, so knowing buses leave around 25 minutes after the hour, I wanted to take a train that would get me there just before then. My best option was the one leaving at quarter till 9:00. I rushed out the door, hurried and bought my ticket, and hopped onboard. I have a discount card, which gives me 40% off the price of domestic tickets....except before 9:00 am. I was in a hurry. So I wasn't thinking about the time in terms of what hour it was, just how many minutes before that hour it was. Sometimes the ticket guys don't check. Today they did. He was in our car minutes after departure. At that point I still hadn't realized I had done anything incorrectly. I handed him my ticket. He said something in Dutch, which I didn't understand, and told him as much. He pointed to the time, and said it's too early. I about fell over. After buying the normally priced ticket (4,20 or something) and paying the fine (35,00), my 2,00-euro, 15 minute trip cost me a total of more than 40,00. The train was stopping in Den Bosch just as the ticket man was giving me my change.

Worst idea: We'd better not get into that, either.

Favorite moments: There are dozens, hundreds, but here are a few. The backyard barbecue in Segovia, fuejoada night in Edinburgh, first day alone in London, wine drinking with Carien in Kirchheim, lip sync contest with the whole family in Kirchheim, the drive to Paris, climbing trees in Hoge Veluwe, Sinterklaas, dancing to reggae in Dublin, Auschwitz, poker with Marcin and Patrick in Warsaw, the cow hunt in Lisbon, dancing in Barcelona, the first time I recognized a painting by Rubens without seeing his name, talking with Kruno and Neven till 5:30 am...




THE KIDS

Scariest moments: Pete falling from the tree, Ed falling from his high chair

Angriest moment: Pete spitting at me

Number of times I considered taking the next flight home: 3 (pretty good, considering I was here for 13 months)

Biggest boo-boo: shrinking Carien's clothes in the dryer

Best moments: kids waking me up on my birthday and before they left for California, Carl winning his bike race, the treasure hunt, Christmas Eve, Kate going through a phase where she would run to meet me every time I came up the driveway after a walk or run, Kate begging me to do yoga with her, Ed falling asleep on my chest, long conversations with the older boys about constellations, natural disasters, and cows, the millions of funny things they say, all the rare nights when the boys did as they were told and we had fun getting ready for bed, reading to them, giving them presents...

Number of diapers changed: approximately 4.2 million