Soon after Annie M.G. Schmidt was born, her eight-year-old brother came home with the news that he had swapped her for a calf. The two children's relationship was never quite the same again. They were very different. Annie's brother had lots of friends and always played outside. She preferred staying home with her nose in a book. While still very young, she started writing poetry. About her parents, for instance, who were not really happy together. Her mother had chosen her father, but had actually been in love with a man called Maaskant. As a child Annie wrote:

If I had Maaskant by my side,
I wouldn't be unsatisfied.
Instead I went and married Schmidt,
that was the start and end of it.