That's amazing, I have never ever heard that sentence before. And we from Flanders know a lot of Netherlands-Dutch sayings.
At least in Amsterdam we use the expression like this.
And although I too only know the expression with the word "aan" in it, the translation by jauco at the start of this thread seems to suggest they also use it without that word.
What is actually the Flemish expression for this? "Den boom in" (=up the tree) is the closed one I could find.