Today is the big day! We are off to the sport club to meet our SO Belgium local team. Unfortunately it is pouring rain and 3C out(36ish). I don't know whether we'll be outside or inside, so we layer the girls up in shorts,t's,jackets,sweats a nd hats. Jer,Danny and I wear our jeans, we don't want to get active on the first day, we hope to give the girls a chance to mixin with the Belgian coaches. The nav. System takes us off course a little bit( enough to see the shopping possibilities in the town--WHOOT!) but we arrive at 9:15 on the button. We meet Sylvia, who is the Area Dir./ club president, and two of the coaches. David, the long distance running coach and a really super nice gal with an awesome smile(a female PJ!) whose name I can't recall. The girls immediately join the team running laps around an outdoor track in the pouring rain. UGH! But they just head right out, no complaining. I chat with Sylvia and another Mom, Marlene, whose 17 yr. old daughter is an athlete. Marlene adopted her daughter, Esme, and her brother,who has no disabilities, from Vietnam. She also has twin 25 year old daughters who are teachers. After lots of laps, the team goes into the covered bleachers to stretch out and do some calisthenics. Then the distance group, of which molly and Charlotte are now members, do a 5K on the track, while other athletes throw the softball,sprint,etc. When track is through, some athletes head to the football field to practice, but since we are all soaked and freezing we opt for the pool for swimming! This is at a club in the town and once the girls are off with their group to the locker room, jer and I visit the corner cafe fro take out espressos and, oh, why not? A tasty tuna broodje for Jerry. We can sit above the pool and see the action. The girls do a great job, swimming laps and then practice pre-diving skills. I feel bad that I don't have dry clothes for them to change into, but who knew that they would be outside all that time. I later met a dad named Patrick, who mentioned that there is an indoor option for track. "when the weather is bad". What?! This isn't bad?!
We are so happy to get home and have soup,coffee and warm clothes. The plan is to head to a 5pm English speaking mass about 10k from here.
In the afternoon jerry and Danny go to Sports Direct and buy bikes! They are awesome and best of all were an awesome price, about 1/4 what shipping their bikes would have been. The only downside is...you guessed it,the appalling weather! No trying them out today I'm afraid. 
Charlotte and I take our turn with the car and go to ALDI. What a zoo it is, I think because everything is closed on Sunday. I needed to get some things for Danny's lunches for the week. Even though he has had the same length of time for a break it seems like much longer. I know he will be happy to get to school and get a break from the girls...and maybe me!
It rains even harder as we leave for church! We find it no problem, it has a plain country feeling to it, barrel ceilings painted white, bronze stations along the walls. Just lovely. An organist is playing and a young cantor with a lovely British accent is singing when we enter. We are the only people there. A few minutes later two more ladies enter and one asks Jerry and Danny if they could take up the collection and the offertory. Sure, no problem. When mass begins at 5 there are nine people total. When we finish at six, it is 20, including the priest and cantor and organist. The priest was very happy to meet us and invited Danny to altar serve next time. On the way home we stopped at Carreforre for a blonde beer restock, but we all went in. We love that place! It is really fun to wander around and look at all the interesting products...and buy them! Danny noticed that all the liquor was at the front of the store and on sale post New Year's Eve! We decided to buy weird things and have a Saturday night adventure dinner.
Tintin was the movie, Jerry hadn't seen it before, and molly finished her puzzle of Time Square while watching.
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