July 9, 2025
Travel day and the arrival of Meme & Papa! The boys were thrilled for all parts of the day; Meme & Papa, unlimited iPad time at the airport/plane, new iPad app, exploring our new place in Denmark.
Kayleen squeezed in one last early workout class in Amsterdam. Our flight wasn’t till 12:40 and the airport is only 25 minutes from the city so we had a more relaxed travel day. The boys got up with me and did a few iPad learning games before they were unleashed on their new apps. Lenny woke up with one of his most insane hair days yet, good thing he got his new cool hat.
We headed to the airport which was an easy ride but the airport is massive. We got to experience our first human-less checked bag process. Luckily the robot system didn’t take Lenny with any of our bags has he repeatedly tried to put parts of his body inside the machine with our suitcase.
We took multiple moving walkways, flat escalators, to get through the massive airport to our gate. By the last one Lenny had become too over confident and went ahead of us only to stand backwards and forget to step off. He got loudly tossed to the ground when he reached the end and a man, with a look of shock on his face, helped him up. I think he was surprised that Kayleen and I were not more concerned about Lenny, but after the number of times we have seen him wipe out we just listen for Lenny’s reaction before having one ourselves.
The flight was smooth, always a concern when on a smaller plane. It was only a four seat wide plane. I sat with Ollie and Kayleen with Lenny. Len said to Kayleen mid flight, “You’re welcome for me sitting with you.” Pretty self-confident for a guy that just got tossed by a moving walkway.
Once we arrived in Copenhagen Ollie asked his normal question about any timezone change, “Did we go through any time limits Mama?” We then continued our normal questions to the boys about what city, country, and continent we are in. Ollie has got it down but Lenny is a work in progress. His answer in this moment was, “Meme and Papa countryyyy!”
He wasn’t completely wrong as we shortly met Meme and Papa at baggage claim. Our bags came out quickly but their first flight had a delay causing an issue with their connection and their bags did not arrive. Luckily their bags were on a flight that was only an hour away.
Everyone hung out at the baggage claim area while I headed to the rental car pick-up. It worked out nicely as I had to walk for a while and then take a bus to get there which would not have been fun with all the bags and the kids.
The rental car company was SIXT, which I am still fighting with for a few things from a France rental. The guy behind the counter, unprovoked, told me SIXT in Denmark is owned as a franchise unlike other countries where it is owned by the corporate entity. Little did he know sharing this fun fact saved him from me airing my grievances and grilling him about my rental in France. The car we rented was a monster van to fit everyone so I will be taking some wide turns.
All the bags arrived as promised and I drove back to pick everyone up. Everything fit easily and we were off to North Zealand, more specifically Liseleje. I had thought the drive was 2.5 hours but was pleasantly surprised that it was only a bit over an hour. We arrived at the house, right on the coast looking toward Sweden, and met the couple that owned the home. They gave us the full tour of the house and how everything worked. Being in so many Airbnb homes in Europe the difference between true rentals and someones home continues to be obvious.
Lenny was quick to strip down and jump in the pool in his underwear, Ollie opted to sneak in some more time on his new iPad app. I can remember being video game obsessed at his age so feel for his excitement about a new game to figure out. The pool is skinny but very long so hoping I can swim some laps without a cannonball landing on my back.
Meme made a salad and pizza for dinner. We all were happy to stay in after the travel day and Lenny was pushing my buttons by getting his pizza everywhere. Luckily for the rest of us Meme also put the boys to bed! Never an easy task with Ollie who doesn’t know what tired is most of the time.
Kayleen, Jim, and I went for a walk on the beach, less than 1 minute from our house. As soon as we got over the dune we were sure we had stumbled on the remains of a giant squid head. As we got closer to investigate Kayleen realized it was a seal that had “lost” its head and started to change colors!
We moved on down the beach toward the area the home owner had told me was where people swim. He said the beach had many quality “savers” on it. After a few more references to “savers” I guessed he meant lifeguards which he confirmed.
The sun was starting to set when we got back to the house. We realized that what had seemed like an oddly placed single chair was the sunset chair! Jim sat in it, with his large bowl of cherries, as Kayleen and I crowded in close by sitting on the steps to watch the sun light up the horizon and disappear.
