Alwin, Kristin and kids Jacobs

Alwin and family hosted me over Christmas, which was really something special. They were incredibly warm and open, and we very quickly were treated part of the family. A fantastic experience!

I stayed with Alwin, Kristin and the kids over Christmas. They made us feel immediately at home, and we soon felt like part of the family. I highly recomend the whole family. We had a great time and really enjoyed the whole experience!

I have not enough words to describe how I feel after my couchsurfing experience with Alwin + family. I can start by saying, they're extremely good people, warm, welcoming, tolerant, peaceful and in balance with the earth.

After the month I spent with them, I really feel they're part of my life and they have an important place in my heart, is impossible not to love them!

Alwin nurtures with his disposition and great ideas this CS project, he really showed me how is to be a great couchsurfer.
Kristin is an amazing woman, completely dedicated to her family and who really enjoys the impact of the cultural exchange. I have learnt a LOT from her parenting style.
Sander is a lovely, sweet and responsible kid. He took care of me and his brothers' every time we went out.
Jolan is very perceptive, he has a natural skill to learn languages.
Aaron is the charming little one, I was crazy with his smile!

They made me feel loved and a part of their family, I will never forget you guys! D.U

 

It was really great to be with you, to use you're kitchen, to share with you a dinner, i felt like home. You're simply great poeple. For sure see you next "couscous" dinner. Big kis for the kids.

 

Alwin, Kristin and the kids are an awesome family. It was really great to have a dinner with them at their place. We had some very interesting conversations on different subjects.
I really hope I'll see you again soon :) !

Kristin and Alwin invited me to a Venezuelan/German dinner at their place. For me it was the first time I took part in a CS meeting within Belgium. It was a very good experience! It is a really warm, friendly family and although I did not talk too much with them (there were many other guests..), they left a very good impression to me.

 

I met them when I went to a CS dinner party at their house which was really nice. A very welcoming and friendly family with 3 nice kids. Hope to see them again sometime.

 

Alwin & Kristin are very welcoming and as newbies we appreciated this tremendously. They organized an unique Venezuelan-German dinner in their garden on a perfect summer evening. We enjoyed meeting you and your funloving boys. Lovely outgoing family! Thanks for inviting us.

I accepted their invitation for this special dinner just to try it out and didn' t regret it one bit afterwards ! Alwin was very friendly and made me feel very welcome. I mostly talked to other guests, so unfortunately I don't know them very well yet. However, my first impression was a very good one and I hope we will get more acquainted in the future ! Greetz, Kris

I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS FAMILY! ..and I am thinking about kidnaping this children:-p,
big hug for everybody

Alwin & C° were the frst to welcome me at CS. Which is something never to forget.
I (finally) met the whole family in person on Aug 8, 2009 at the occasion of a Venezuelean - German dinner at their place.
Alwin and Kristin are very warm and open people. I admire their level of CS-spirit: they do a lot to make all kinds of people (newbies, tavellers, or just hungry humans) feel good, wellcome and happy.
I especially like the fact that they live a good, honest life, with respect for the earth. Their biological food shop earns our support.
I hope to see this family, and their wonderful three knight-kids, soon again.

Always nice to go to the friendly biological shop of them!

It was very nice to meet them all in Luxembourg on the CS Family Meeting. It was a wonderful time there and it was haunting to see how easy the kids stand each other even thoug they can't not rightly understand the language of the rest. We will never forget this. We are glad about getting to know this open-minded and attentive family especially the cute boys. Hope to see them again one time.
They are always welcome to stay here :-)

 

We met Alwin, Christine, Sander, Jonas en Aron during the Couchsurfing Family Weekend in Luxembourgh. And what a great weekend it was! Together we build up camp, shared food and our children played from early morning to late evening around the campsite, in the forest or in the nearby caves.
The way they communicate, the enthusiasm with the kids and mindfulness way of living makes it easy to like them. Three days together was a bit short, but somehow we know we will meet again, soon........ (hopefully somewhere on the beach!)

I cannot express in words what an impact this family had on me and my daughter. The family is so open and giving and truly felt a great connection with them. I feel like I am a better person in knowing them, and consider them part of my new extended family. I hope to see them again next year, and hope that they will someday make the big trip to see how we live. I love them!

 

It's great to meet someone like Alwin who's highly motivated to make CS community even more open to any kind of people, including families!
... And we had a nice 'jungle fight? or fever?' well can't rembember the name either, but it was lot of fun! :-)

Alwin is pretty determined to put De Kempen on the couchsurfing map (rightly so!). I'm looking forward to meet you at a lot of other meetings and make the bond between CS'ers in Belgium even stronger.

 

Loved it!! The boys are so precious and outgoing. Alwin and Kristin were welcoming and friendly...even when we were late arriving---twice! I felt very much at home with this family and would like to host them in the USA soon! =)

They are soooooooooooooo kind!! They know a lot of things about how to live with nature and how to feel the beauty of nature. I love their way to live!!!! I had GREAT time with them and i wish i could have spent more time with them....
Thanks to them, I really enjoyed my first couch surfing experience in Belgium :) They are just awesome!!!!!!!!!

I felt very welcome in their home. They went about their business of living and allowed me to integrate at my own pace offering me whatever support I needed to feel comfortable. I really enjoyed getting to know Kristin and watching her parenting style.

Alwin, Kristin and Kids are great all together. I walked about 20 km in Luxembourg with Alwin and in the end of the walk, their kids gave me a wonderful energy and I played a lot them. I couldn't resist to play with them till they were in the car to go home.I'm entirely happy to know them and will try to find them again in the earth. Jolaaaaaaaaaaan I love you boys...


Yes, as Alwin wrote, I went to visit them in Belgium, they generously open their door to me, I will never forget seeing children running after train.

So hard to find things that are NOT yet mentionned for them :o) Because, yes, they truly are friendly, spontaneous, open-minded and so easy to talk to. Their boys are adorable, social and very well-educated. This family really is a "must-meet", not only for the Kempen, but for the whole of Belgium. They breathe CS ... Hope to see you soon !

We met Alwin and his big family for the first time in the swimmingpool of turnhout. We had a very good time there and loved bobs pancakes afterwards. It was a nice day with new friends, and kids. Wanderfull initiative to bring CS-people and their kids more together. Even the better that they have made googlemaps of kidsfriendly CS places.

Alwin, Kristin and their 3 adorable kids organized the "Welcoming the spring walk". It was my first CS-experience and it was a fantastic one to start with. They're great, friendly, caring people with a big heart for family, nature and fun!

This family is fantastic!
They are very kind, open minded, authentic, spontaneous, full of energy. I met them on a great Cs-meeting, the spring-walk what they organised themselves. It was super!
Hope to meet them a lot!

 

We stayed there for a weekend after 'meeting' in the family welcome group. We went on a very nice and relaxed zoo trip together and had some nice conversation in the evenings. The kids could play as much as they wanted. See you all in July!

Alwin and cristine are a lovely couple.thanks for giving me a chance to stay with both of u and the kids..
I miss sam,yolan and aaron much...
Get to know about Belgium food and the shoobak game.i enjoyed the game much although i dint win..
i felt so happy and warm to have a couch in your place that make me feel like i'm at home and make me feel i miss my family so much.
Hope to see you all again in future.

Alwin and family had welcomed us with a wonderful Belgian dinner. First CS experience with them are just marvellous. The Sjoelbak is great, Alwin and Kristin are definitely one of the best players. They are generous, kind and friendly. The kids are adorable. It's wonderful to see the kids preparing for school. Funny enough is Aaron's "Goodnight". They are just so cute. In short, they have showered my friend and I with great hospitality. Thank you once again for this first experience!

Alwin, Kristin, Aaron, Jolan and Sander are a real FAMILY, with a great family spirit and a lot of love for each other. They spend a lot of time together and they have made their own family traditions. It is amazing, what job Kristin and Alwin had done, to bring up such a lovely, kind, friendly, helpful, polite and respectful children.
We shared the meals, played games, went to Zoo, had interesting talks about our children, cultures, traveling, couchsurfing and so on. Alwin and Kristin are opened, friendly and interested in other cultures and people. We would like to host them in our home some day!

nice, openminded people with a positive spirit and i appreciate people who love and respect nature:great!

Alexis says: They are very kind. They show you the surroundings and take time for you. They have a very nice house. They play with you, prepare food together with you - they spoil you =) Thank you for your hospitality and for the delicious food! (Fritjes)

Eleonora: It was an awesome experience to stay at this family's house. They are the most warm-hearted, kind and lovely family! We are so thankful for having had the possibility to meet them. It was SUPER-DI-DUPER as we say =)

Katrin, Alwin and their wonderful kids were certainly one of my best CS experiences! They are so nice, friendly & helpful people and spending time with them is just marvelous.

I treasure their benign kind and the way they deal with their children and guests.

I got to know Alwin some better by now and found that he is a true friend, not one shallow CS connection. ;-) I very much value all your help. It will be returned to you when you are in need!

Thanks for everything!

Alwin and Kristin are very kind and easy going family.Their 3 little boys are lovely too.I enjoyed staying with the family.They gave us several useful advices about travelling,having nice breakfest together and good talks.Yeah,it's been my first and great experience with CS.Thank you for your nice hospitality.

Kristin, Alwin and the kids are really an amazing family, I've enjoyed every minute with you! They've hosted me for two nights, we have had a lot of nice conversations, played together sjaelbak (very interesting game, but I'm not so good...:-)),and they gave us their key and a lot of interesting informations for our trip to Antwerpen. Very friendly, lovely family, so I hope, I see them one day in Witten.
Kristin, Alwin, Sander, Jolan & Aaron, you are welcome in my house, everytimes!

I've just realized that I've called our last 2 hosts the soul of hospitality. Well, how many souls can hospitality have? CSing makes me think many.
Alwin, Kristin, & their kids were wonderful--and I thank them for mentioning hygiene. Seeing it online & hearing that it's an issue from someone besides us has motivated our son to give it extra attention & our current hosts verify that it's not a problem here. To be fair, he's adopted, his birth mom drank during pregnancy, & among parents with kids with FASD it's well known that they have a particularly pungent odor when stressed, which happens often. However, except for the time when it emerges, it CAN be controlled if the person's aware of it, motivated, and has access to bathing & laundry facilities, as is the case here.

So I thank Alwin & Kristin for their honesty as well as their hospitality.

Very nice family with olive loving kids!! Really liked staying with these people, they were my first 'official' hosts!

 

Met Alwin on the squash meeting and very short on the museum night. Had a lot of fun trying to keep the squashball in the air, on the walls, the ceiling, ... Hope to see you again on the next meetings and to meet the rest of the family one day.

Friendly people. They know a lot about organic food which i find interesting. Alwin encouraged me to start couchsurfing again. I would definitely ask to surf here if their house wasn't only 200 meters from mine :).

Alwin and Kristen are very interested and interesting people and we liked very much being a tourist in our own city with them. They made us realise that we do not know our own country enough. Thanx for a fun day.

 

i had a very nice time with Alwin, not enough though. we had some nice conversations and i would like to see again, sometime, somewhere.

What a great time I had at the Jacobs! It was a pleasure to meet this lovely family, and it was the best way to spend the last days in Europe..
We ate together, went for a short walk, played sjoelbak (I still have what to learn from Kristin..), drank my first organic beer & champagne! and they gave me a bike to ride in a wonderful route. Tnx a lot! Hope to see you here...

 

nice and sweet guy. i definately want to meet the whole family, and i'm quite sure that it will be sooner then we think. thumbs up alwin :)

they are verry friendley hosts and they told me about cs so i will learn to meet lots of nice people :)

 

The big blue car arrieved with an aura of peace, smile and love and this was the main thing, the members of the Jakob-Family transmitted to each of us!
We felt very close to them from the first day and met them on the same level, we use to be.
I feel a little bit sad, because I had to go to work and could not spend more time with Alwin, Kristin, Sander, Jolan and Aaron. Amelie said this morning: " It is stupid without the boys, when are they back? ". We all will never forget this last week and this is our message to you all in the world. YOU NEED TO MEET THIS FAMILY,CAUSE IT`LL ENRICH YOUR LIFE !!!!!!!!!!!!
We hope to meet you in August in Belgium

We had a breakfast together - I enjoyed every single moment of it. This is an adorable family. The parents are ntelligent, open-minded and the kids nice and polite.
Thanks for visiting us, I hope we'll meet next year again.

Alwin and kristin r generous hosts. The first surprise they gave us was when i see their children waiting in d train station for us (the kids r tremendous cute!. They brought us to farm, eat ice-cream (yummy) and to their kids' school. Alwin is a fast learner, i'm enjoying teach him malay and mandarin.thanks for the great time!

Alwin is full of the passion to learn, he picks up languages pretty fast as well as kristin. We had a fun time learning languages from each other, drinking wine, beer, eating waffles, olives, playing the board game and spilling wine twice on the table. Alwin is humorous too and really show respect to his guest, we were warmly ushered to his house with a 'Selamat Datang' caption and an A4 paper printed with a M'sian flag held highly by Sander at the station. Kristin made me and Wanni fabulous meals and our names from choc.They are simply marvellous! Overall xperience i would like to put them Triple Xtremely +ve. Keep it up! Thanks u guys....and the kids too especially Aaron....the cutest boy ever..

p/s:till now, am pretty sure i was the 1 who broke the shower curtain....feel bad

Before I came here, I was planning to stay here for one night. But I changed my plan and finally stayed for 3 nights. Now you know what I mean! They are very kind and helpful, and their children also are sooooooo cute!I played with kids, but we didn't need words! No borders for us.I don't want to leave here.
Dank u wel and het was leuk je te kennen.

 

We met on a event they organised at the beach in Domburg, suddenly I was surrounded by Belgian family's. All the childeren and some of the parents started building high castles protecting our lunch from the sea. Beautiful day, good experience, really nice people, by the way: I found your cowbell in our beachbag... would you like it back??? I guess we will meet again, maybe 2009 luxembourg?

 

We (3p) went to Belgium to skate around; Antwerp & Brussels (nightskates) & a small daytour around Berlaar, but all the trips fell literally in to water... Happily ever after, the couchsurfing was great! Alwin, Kristin and the kids are very kind, open and sweet and made us feel very welcome. So that made the weekend still good! Hope to see you in The Hague!

Alwin has a great vibe over him, you imediatly feel at ease. Kristin is sweet, a real mom.
They both enjoy their lives and have a great heart for their kids and for couchsurfing...
If you meet this family you will imediatly close them into your heart.
You will sing and dream about them and they will definetly make you smile (and blush sometimes ^^)

 

Met Alwin and Kristin for the first time on a singalong meeting in Dendermonde and afterwards they welcomed me into their house for a little surprise party for Kristins birthday. They're wonderful and they both have a solid gold heart! "De Appelboom" rules and makes Berlaar great ;)!

 

Huh? What? Oei... I've been dreaming too much, and obviously lacked to give this people a reference! Shame on me!

I've met Alwin numerous times, and we're in touch (almost) daily about CS-matters. He's a hardworking volunteer, a great ambassador and I'm very glad he'll boost up the New Member Welcome Team in his moderator role. You rock!

Alwin and Kristen are the most loving people I have met! They opened their hearts and their home to Nichole and I for almost a week. They introduced us to their parents, took us dancing, made the Belgium ambassadors a part of our lives and no experience could have been better. They have the most amazing boys, I love them as if they were my own brothers. Tears swell in my eyes as I think of how I had to leave them today. My understanding of family has become so much more loving thanks to Kristen, Alwin and their beautiful boys.

I hope to keep this family as my friends/ second family for the rest of my life! They are the most loving family I have ever known, and Kristin and Alwin are awesome parents! I want them to adopt me! :-) Sander, Jolan, and Aaran are the most cute little boys in the world ( I wanted to take them home with me!) PLEASE come to California family. Ik hou van jou! I LOVE YOU!

Alwin and Kristin were very kind and easy to chat with. I enjoy anyone who's open-hearted and laughs at my jokes! Lovely people.

 

Both active on the Family Welcome Group we wanted to meet each other. Different occasions didn't work out, so we were very happy when we heard they wold come over to our house to meet us.
To short, but hey, we will meet again soon!
They seem like very nice people, and yes, our children would love to play with their boys. See you soon!
These are people you can have great conversations with. They'll take time for you and make you feel welcome. Very genuine and friendly.
Thanks to CS they became friends of ours. Thanks!

 

a great first experience for our family!!!
Alwin and Kristin are very kind... and their 3 boys lovely...
we have appreciated their delectable organic food and all the self-hand-made toys...
Congratulations for having succeed in adaptation to my teen agers...
They are enchanted.
Berlaar is a wonderland very nice, very clean...
Very nice to meet you... and we are waiting for you, soon!

Alwin invited the same guests as I did, but as there were some works to bed done at his guestroom, the guests came to me. But he visited us, he brought some of his nice beers, and we had a nice conversation. Too bad that he had to leave so early and unexpected to pick up his mum in Schiphol airport.

 

very nice and helpfull people,
open and sharing,totally into organic, which is great.
on these guys you can rely!

 

Quite simply - if every family were like the Jacobs, the world would be an even better place. Alwin and Kristen are inspiring, impressive parents of three wonderful children and they make great CouchSurfers. We'll definitely meet up again!

 

Alwin is a very nice guest. We discovered plenty of things we share (love for organic food, kids, nature etc) and we had a nice time together. Nice to have him around... he must come back with his family!
And you are right, Alwin: we had the same opinion on several things, as f.e. no TV in the house...

it's a very friendly man with a good bio-shop