By the way, for those of you who are my dearest friends, shame on you for banning yourselves from blogging (you know who you are!). I now have time to actually catch up and you all aren't blogging! What's up with that?!
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Since I blogged last night, I was going to spend some time catching up on Facebook tonight, but it won't load. Seems I get this blue circle thing and FB just won't load. So, what do I do? I go google it and it seems there is something wrong with FB and Mac compatibility for some reason. Oh well, guess I will have to accept my friend requests later. Or, pretend I'm doing something for "work" on FB and do it from my work computer.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Brugge, Belgium
Our first trip out of the country as a family was this past weekend. We had a 4-day weekend and drove to Belgium on Thursday morning. The weekend didn't start out so good. A 2.5 hour trip turned into 5 hours because of road construction (should've taken the train!) and I knew it was going to be rough when Avery coughed the whole way there (sitting upright in her carseat). But we still had a great time! Thank goodness I only reserved two nights in the hotel though!! Next time, we're splurging for two rooms. We had plenty of room, but it was extremely difficult to get anyone to sleep (very cute though to see Kaeli & Avery making each other laugh while trying to go to sleep... I hope they always have this much fun together).
We enjoyed a trip to the interactive archeology museum (Kaeli got to be an archeologist and dig for bones and the girls got to dress up on midieval dresses),
a tour of the chocolate museum (with free samples at the end!)
and a brief tour of the canals by boat (my favorite picture is of the golden retriever hanging out watching the silly tourists float by on "his" canal).
After LOTS of Beglian fries, Belgian waffles, and of course, Belgian chocolate (it really is to die for!), we made it home (only 4 hours this time) safe and sound, with one day to spare for lots of laundry and grocery shopping.
Overall, I'd say we had a pretty great adventure!
p.s. For those of you begging for pictures of me and Bryan, hope these are good enough!
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Can you tell which one is which?
So I just uploaded some new pics from our camera to the mac and had to look back at Kaeli when she was Avery's current age. Look at these two pics. Can you tell which one is Kaeli and which one is Avery?
Life is OK here. We had a rough week, but a great weekend. Except for all the rain of course.
They say bad things come in 3's. (1) My bike got stolen, (2) I hit a car while parking in front of day care on Friday and totally scratched up the entire right side of my van, (3) still waiting... will let you know if/when this happens.
I haven't taken a picture of me on my new bike yet, but here's a picture of what the bike looks like and you can just imagine me on it with the girls.
(Kaeli, Avery, Avery, Kaeli. Avery has more hair!!)
Saturday, May 9, 2009
A Little Bit of Home
Today was a good day. The girls are so much fun these days. They laugh all of the time and if they're not laughing then their usually making us laugh. Sure, they have their moments (don't we all!), but for the most part we have two perfect little angels.
After we got up and ate breakfast, Avery took a nap and Kaeli and I waited for the grocery delivery guy to show up with our weekly groceries. Yep, we got our groceries delivered! I went online and ordered (the website is completely in Dutch), picked a two-hour window for delivery this morning, and TahDah groceries showed up on my doorstep. Normally, Bryan likes to take one of the girls grocery shopping on Saturday morning, but since he went golfing, I decided I would try this to keep my sanity and make sure we had food in the fridge for dinner.
Then, we went to the brand new The Little Gym here in the Hague. It was great! Kaeli walked in and said "Mommy! It's just like my Little Gym in Texas!!" Very cute! Then, she was a perfect angel while Avery and I did a 50 minute "mommy & me" class. Avery was adorable. She loves to throw herself backwards and hang upside down. She also liked walking around during circle time to meet all the other babies. She was a big flirt! Then, the bubbles came out. She couldn't get enough of them.
After Avery's class, Kaeli got her turn for her Big Girl class. It's not a combo dance/gymnastics course like in Katy, but it still was great. She loved running around the gym and doing forward rolls and walking on the balance beam and hanging from the bars. Of course, she understood every word they said in Dutch. She's amazing!
The teachers were amazing and it even though the class was mostly taught in Dutch, it still felt great to experience a little piece of home. Then, for fun, we went to McDonald's for lunch. Gotta love American fast food!!!
After nap, we went to the park and met some new friends. We had to leave sooner than I would've liked, but I needed to go get my new bike. It's great (and locked down tight). I can't wait to start riding it soon. Maybe I can ride it somewhere tomorrow?! (Didn't think I'd ever say that about riding a bike!) Hopefully, I will get a picture of this one before it gets stolen!
Then we came home and ate dinner. Put Avery down for the night and watched Kaeli color pictures. She and Bryan were chatting and she started singing a song that I had never heard before. When Bryan asked here where she learned that song, she said that she learned it when Mommy & Daddy were getting married and she was with God. She also told us that we were going to get married again and that she and Avery and Nana and Pa and Grandma and Papa and God and Jesus would be there. We would have to take a car to get there and she gave directions: Make a left, then a right, go straight for a little bit then make a left and make another right. It may be a coincidence but these are the exact directions for how we get to church from our house! Bizarre! And she repeated it twice (once to Bryan when I was putting Kaeli down and once to me when I got back downstairs!). We thought this conversation was interesting and very thought provoking. I wonder how she comes up with these things sometimes or if she knows something we don't know.
OK, girls are in bed and the house is mostly clean, so I'm going to try to go spend some quality time with my hubby. More to come...
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Stupid Fund
Some folks (like my friend Misty) have an emergency savings fund, but not the White Family. For the past 10 1/2 years (have we really been married THAT long?), Bryan and I have had what we call the "Stupid Fund". This is a savings fund for when stupid things happen to you. I've never really understood why we call it that it until today. My bike (yes, my most beloved possession since we moved to the Netherlands) was stolen this morning, right under my nose. At 6:30 when I came downstairs with Avery, it was sitting in front of our house. 15 minutes later, when I came down with Kaeli, it was gone!! Yep, got stolen. Probably by some punk kid who walked by and thought it would be fun to steal a moederfiets (mother bike) with two kids' seats on it. I'm sure it will show up on Markplaats.nl (similar to Ebay) in the next day or two (I will keep a look out). Many of you will gasp at the $$ lost by this "stupid" encounter. In fact, I hesitate to tell you, but considering this post is all about the Stupid Fund, I must admit that this incident cost us around 850 euros (more than $1000). Between the bike itself, which was covered by insurance but won't be able to make a claim because we don't have the two original keys to the bike lock, all of the accessories (namely, two child seats, a windshield & saddle bags), and the cost of the new lock and labor for the locksmith to replace the house lock because the key to the house was in the bike when it was stolen (don't ask...). Yep, that's what the Stupid Fund is for. Now, I've got to go shell out another good chunk of change to get a new (or hopefully, gently used) bike. I cannot live without one here!!
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Celesta's Top 10
(NOTE: This is blog #2 for tonight, so don't forget to read the other one. It's priceless!)
Top 10 Things I Hate about The Netherlands (so far)
10. Our washer, dryer and dishwasher are about half the size of our US versions and the cycle lengths are about twice as long, so it takes 4x longer to do our weekly laundry and dishes. Not good for two full-time careers with two kids. They tell me my clothes will last longer, but I'd rather have a bigger washer and dryer and an excuse to shop for new clothes! Luckily, this is no longer as bad as it was in the apartment. Our new dishwasher is awesome, BUT our new washer & dryer… The cycles are shorter, but you can only use one at a time! Yep, that’s right, I can either wash or dry, not both! VERY annoying.
9. The company that managed our transit apartment: They warned us that service was poor in the Netherlands, but we've really only found this company to really live up to those standards. I wouldn't call it poor service, more like NO service. It took 3 weeks to get a phone cord so that the phone would work (luckily, we had packed one in air freight). They never did get me a key to get my new bike out of the storage room in the entry hall (we have at least 10 keys to this apt, but none of them worked, the repair crew for the apt upstairs unlocked it for us).
8. Paperwork, paperwork, oh and did I mention paperwork. You would think they would have more e-filing or other electronic versions to fill out all of the forms we have to fill out, but I think the only one we've found is the US Embassy. Not only do you have to fill out hard copies, but 75% of the time you have to go somewhere in person to turn them in. Like I have time for that!
7. The Dutch safety/security paranoia: If there is one thing that the Dutch will pay for, it's security. Maybe this stems from years of them getting their bikes stolen one after the other, but really, should I need my own credit card reader, PIN, and randomly electronically generated 2nd PIN to log on to online banking? Probably explains why I had 10 keys to our tiny transit apartment and why I have to show up to everything in person. Oh, and all of my credit cards (personal, work, gas) have there own PINs that I can’t set. I’m never going to remember these!!
6. Flu season: I thought it would be nice to move in winter... the weather can only get better from here. What I didn't consider was cold & flu season. They tell me it's the worst year for this ever. Over 50% of the population were ill in January/February when we arrived. Children (including mine) got hit the hardest. There was an "epidemic" chest infection going around, which of course Avery caught. Bryan and I avoided it for a while, but that didn't last. Bryan just got over a cough that lasted 4 weeks. Hopefully, Swine Flu doesn’t make it here! Oh wait, there’s already a case of a 3-yr old here. Cross your fingers we don’t get it too.
5. Stairs: Because of the lack of land, everything is built UP, which means stairs, stairs, and more stairs. We’re on the 2nd floor (Floor 1 here), Kaeli and Avery are on the 3rd floor (Floor 2), and the kitchen, living area etc are on the 1st floor (Floor 0). So, when Avery wakes up hungry at 2:30AM, one of us has to go up one floor to get Avery to stop the crying, down 2 floors to get a bottle, back up two floors to feed her in the glider, and back down one floor to go back to bed. Now that we’re in a bigger house, hopefully, I’ll be able to let her cry a little. Though, after my friend Misty’s incident, I hesitate slightly to do this. (Since I wrote this the first time, we have since purchased used microwave and fridge for the 2nd floor. This has been great!)
4. The Dutch lack of modesty. (This should probably be #1) We went to the pool this weekend and were in the “family changing room” to change the girls. Bryan and I went to the private changing rooms to put our dry clothes on, but most mommies & daddies just changed in the family room. So, there we were, changing our little girls while a Dutch couple were completely naked and in no hurry to put any clothes on. It was all I could do to just keep my head down and not freak out in front of Kaeli. There are some body parts of people that I just DO NOT want to see!
3. The birds: Sure, I like the sound of birds in the morning, but come one, not at 5AM and not until 11PM at night. Shut up already!
2. Day and Night are really messed up here! In the winter, it’s dark 18 hrs a day. In the summer, the sun is up 18 hours a day. This really messes with me and my sense of when I am supposed to be awake and when I am supposed to be sleeping!
1. Everything is so darn expensive! There are a few exceptions (see #10 of the things I Love), but for the most part, it is extremely expensive to do anything here!
Top 10 Things I Love about The Netherlands (so far)
10. Cheap flowers, cheese, and wine! At least something is worth what you pay for it!
9. The international community here is amazing. Don’t get me wrong, I totally miss my friends, family, and colleagues back home, but there is something to be said when you are in a meeting with 6 people and none of them are from the same country!
8. Dinner out: So I don’t like the fact that very few people go out to dinner with their kids (read, no booster seats or high chairs most places), but it does make for an amazing date night! If you like to eat and leave, you wouldn’t like this place, but if you like to sit and enjoy several courses and a few glasses of wine, then you would love it here. We sat for 3 hours at a restaurant (we had the table for 2 in the corner by the window!) and noone was trying to push us out the door to let then next customer sit down.
7. The spring weather: They tell me this weather is not normal and that it’s been 3 years since they had weather like this, but it has been absolutely beautiful here since the first week of April.
6. Bicycles: I have fallen in love with cycling. It will probably be one of the few things I miss when we move back to the States, but we bike everywhere! I take the girls to day care on the bike. We picked the girls up from school on Friday and rode our bikes to Pizza Hut for dinner. We even took our bikes to the restaurant last night for date night!
5. The flowers: Even in winter, there are flower shops all over the city with the most beautiful flowers, and they’re one of the few things that are actually cheap here!
4. Public Transportation: It's not always as convenient as we'd like (it still takes Bryan an hour to get to work), but at least it exists and it can get you just about anywhere you want to go.
3. Everyone actually follows traffic laws and uses their turn signals! Need I say more?
2. Lives don't revolve around work. People actually work 40-hour weeks. Noone ever comes in early and leaves late unless it's part of a flexible work arrangement that they have developed to help them spend more time with their kids.
1. SNOW!! OK, so it did snow in Pearland this December, and it snowed during Christmas a few years ago (which we missed... By the way, Luis & Alexis, we finally had to throw our snow ball away when we sold the house. Very sad day). But, it snowed on my birthday and several other days as well. I'm going to enjoy having 4 seasons again!!
I've been promising this list for a while. It's turned into a Top 10 list from my original Top 5 list. I hope you enjoy it!
Top 10 Things I Hate about The Netherlands (so far)
10. Our washer, dryer and dishwasher are about half the size of our US versions and the cycle lengths are about twice as long, so it takes 4x longer to do our weekly laundry and dishes. Not good for two full-time careers with two kids. They tell me my clothes will last longer, but I'd rather have a bigger washer and dryer and an excuse to shop for new clothes! Luckily, this is no longer as bad as it was in the apartment. Our new dishwasher is awesome, BUT our new washer & dryer… The cycles are shorter, but you can only use one at a time! Yep, that’s right, I can either wash or dry, not both! VERY annoying.
9. The company that managed our transit apartment: They warned us that service was poor in the Netherlands, but we've really only found this company to really live up to those standards. I wouldn't call it poor service, more like NO service. It took 3 weeks to get a phone cord so that the phone would work (luckily, we had packed one in air freight). They never did get me a key to get my new bike out of the storage room in the entry hall (we have at least 10 keys to this apt, but none of them worked, the repair crew for the apt upstairs unlocked it for us).
8. Paperwork, paperwork, oh and did I mention paperwork. You would think they would have more e-filing or other electronic versions to fill out all of the forms we have to fill out, but I think the only one we've found is the US Embassy. Not only do you have to fill out hard copies, but 75% of the time you have to go somewhere in person to turn them in. Like I have time for that!
7. The Dutch safety/security paranoia: If there is one thing that the Dutch will pay for, it's security. Maybe this stems from years of them getting their bikes stolen one after the other, but really, should I need my own credit card reader, PIN, and randomly electronically generated 2nd PIN to log on to online banking? Probably explains why I had 10 keys to our tiny transit apartment and why I have to show up to everything in person. Oh, and all of my credit cards (personal, work, gas) have there own PINs that I can’t set. I’m never going to remember these!!
6. Flu season: I thought it would be nice to move in winter... the weather can only get better from here. What I didn't consider was cold & flu season. They tell me it's the worst year for this ever. Over 50% of the population were ill in January/February when we arrived. Children (including mine) got hit the hardest. There was an "epidemic" chest infection going around, which of course Avery caught. Bryan and I avoided it for a while, but that didn't last. Bryan just got over a cough that lasted 4 weeks. Hopefully, Swine Flu doesn’t make it here! Oh wait, there’s already a case of a 3-yr old here. Cross your fingers we don’t get it too.
5. Stairs: Because of the lack of land, everything is built UP, which means stairs, stairs, and more stairs. We’re on the 2nd floor (Floor 1 here), Kaeli and Avery are on the 3rd floor (Floor 2), and the kitchen, living area etc are on the 1st floor (Floor 0). So, when Avery wakes up hungry at 2:30AM, one of us has to go up one floor to get Avery to stop the crying, down 2 floors to get a bottle, back up two floors to feed her in the glider, and back down one floor to go back to bed. Now that we’re in a bigger house, hopefully, I’ll be able to let her cry a little. Though, after my friend Misty’s incident, I hesitate slightly to do this. (Since I wrote this the first time, we have since purchased used microwave and fridge for the 2nd floor. This has been great!)
4. The Dutch lack of modesty. (This should probably be #1) We went to the pool this weekend and were in the “family changing room” to change the girls. Bryan and I went to the private changing rooms to put our dry clothes on, but most mommies & daddies just changed in the family room. So, there we were, changing our little girls while a Dutch couple were completely naked and in no hurry to put any clothes on. It was all I could do to just keep my head down and not freak out in front of Kaeli. There are some body parts of people that I just DO NOT want to see!
3. The birds: Sure, I like the sound of birds in the morning, but come one, not at 5AM and not until 11PM at night. Shut up already!
2. Day and Night are really messed up here! In the winter, it’s dark 18 hrs a day. In the summer, the sun is up 18 hours a day. This really messes with me and my sense of when I am supposed to be awake and when I am supposed to be sleeping!
1. Everything is so darn expensive! There are a few exceptions (see #10 of the things I Love), but for the most part, it is extremely expensive to do anything here!
Top 10 Things I Love about The Netherlands (so far)
10. Cheap flowers, cheese, and wine! At least something is worth what you pay for it!
9. The international community here is amazing. Don’t get me wrong, I totally miss my friends, family, and colleagues back home, but there is something to be said when you are in a meeting with 6 people and none of them are from the same country!
8. Dinner out: So I don’t like the fact that very few people go out to dinner with their kids (read, no booster seats or high chairs most places), but it does make for an amazing date night! If you like to eat and leave, you wouldn’t like this place, but if you like to sit and enjoy several courses and a few glasses of wine, then you would love it here. We sat for 3 hours at a restaurant (we had the table for 2 in the corner by the window!) and noone was trying to push us out the door to let then next customer sit down.
7. The spring weather: They tell me this weather is not normal and that it’s been 3 years since they had weather like this, but it has been absolutely beautiful here since the first week of April.
6. Bicycles: I have fallen in love with cycling. It will probably be one of the few things I miss when we move back to the States, but we bike everywhere! I take the girls to day care on the bike. We picked the girls up from school on Friday and rode our bikes to Pizza Hut for dinner. We even took our bikes to the restaurant last night for date night!
5. The flowers: Even in winter, there are flower shops all over the city with the most beautiful flowers, and they’re one of the few things that are actually cheap here!
4. Public Transportation: It's not always as convenient as we'd like (it still takes Bryan an hour to get to work), but at least it exists and it can get you just about anywhere you want to go.
3. Everyone actually follows traffic laws and uses their turn signals! Need I say more?
2. Lives don't revolve around work. People actually work 40-hour weeks. Noone ever comes in early and leaves late unless it's part of a flexible work arrangement that they have developed to help them spend more time with their kids.
1. SNOW!! OK, so it did snow in Pearland this December, and it snowed during Christmas a few years ago (which we missed... By the way, Luis & Alexis, we finally had to throw our snow ball away when we sold the house. Very sad day). But, it snowed on my birthday and several other days as well. I'm going to enjoy having 4 seasons again!!
My Brush with Dutchness
Since we've arrived in the Netherlands, I've been amazed at the things that people will carry around with them on their bikes. (If you didn't know, the Dutch are known for their cycling culture. They bike everywhere and in ANYTHING!) Here are some of my favorites:
- Suit & tie
- Stilettos and a mini skirt
- Umbrella (it rains alot here, so this wasn't surprising, but I'm amazed that their ability to ride with one hand, hold an open umbrella in the other, and not crash!)
- A bass (you know, the big stringed instrument that looks like a giant cello)
- An exercise ball (yes, the big yoga/birthing ball. the lady was holding it under one arm while steering with the other)
- A box bike with 5 kids (they have these bikes with big boxes on the front to carry cargo, but most folks have bench seats in them for kiddos, some of them are retrofitted with car seats)
- The scariest one was the lady with a kid on the front and one on the back in bike seats, plus she was carrying a baby in a Baby Bjorn. No Joke!!
BUT, I needed a new vacuum cleaner. We had bought one for 10 euro from a buy/sell Yahoo group for expats, but it didn't work very well. When the cleaning lady complained this week, I finally gave in and went to get a new one. Luckily, I went while the girls (and Bryan) were asleep, so I hopped on my bike (with the two seats and saddle bags of course) and rode downtown to a place called MediaMarkt. It's like a BestBuy on crack. Anything and everything you could ever need that plugs into a wall can be found here. In addition to the vacuum, I needed to get a toaster, and a hair dryer and straightener for when my mom visits in a month. (I didn't want her to fry hers or her hair!) Long story short, I found everything I needed except the toaster (they had plenty, but I wanted a cheap one), checked out, then carried my loot to my bike. For some reason, it wasn't until then that I thought, how in the world am I going to get this stuff home?! I tried a few different configurations, but none seemed to work that well. Finally, I put the hair dryer in one of my saddle bags, the straightener in the other then plopped the vacuum cleaner box onto Kaeli's seat on the back of the bike. It was too big to fit IN the seat, so I layed it on TOP of the arms of the seat. It was so wide that it also covered about half of my bike seat. Oh, and did I mention that I didn't have any straps to hold it on? There was just enough room left on my seat for me to sit (rather uncomfortably), and I strategically leaned back against the box to hold it in place between me and the back of Kaeli's seat. I'm sure I looked hilarious. Probably should have gotten a picture, but when I got home, B and the girls were still asleep and I really had to go potty! Will have to save that extra laugh for another time!! Here's to fitting in! :-)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
