Writing is in my blood

I felt the need to start writing again. In Dutch this time. Not even here. I’d love to share my posts with my dear old readers, but at the moment I don’t have the time or energy to translate them. It would be nice to post the Dutch blogs here too, as I’m blogging on a public platform, which makes it harder to save everything. Google translate is getting better, so maybe you can enjoy my writings anyway. But if you can’t, a short update is the least I could do for you!

Mr. Amazing and I are still married and still madly in love. We have a young daughter together, who’s eight months already. She makes every moment a miracle. Her birth was a bit dramatic and Miss Joan now has a paralysed arm to prove it. Four months ago, she had surgery and she’s slowly but surely gaining motion. Our little fighting hero isn’t fazed by it and amazes us every day.

100 Days of Happiness – Day 16 and 17

A few months ago, my best friend moved into a new house with her family. Distance, busy schedules and illness kept us from visiting earlier, but this weekend we finally had time to go visit them. There’s no train station in their city (village?), so we took the train to a nearby station and walked. It was only 15 kilometers and their new house is only a kilometer away from a famous Marian sanctuary, so we called it our own little pilgrimage.

It was so nice to see my friend and her husband again, snuggle their boys and talk away! As always, we didn’t have nearly enough time to talk. Whenever we see each other, it seems we’ve only just started talking when we have to leave again. But it was nice to see where they live and instantly feel at home there.

The next day, Sunday, we went to mass in the Marian Hall, as the basilica is too small for all the pilgrims (even though there were six or seven masses planned that day). Afterwards, we received a blessing with the holy statue. It was very special and lovely. Afterwards, we prayed and lighted a few candles. And then it was time for … selfies and shopping!

In front of the basilica.

We received the statue as a wedding present and we bought a nice little wall chapel, which Mr. Fantastic installed promptly upon arriving home.

100 Days of Happiness – Day 15

It’s May holidays here. Two weeks of no school for the kids and a strange combination of festivities: King’s day, Ascension, Remembrance of those who fell during WW II and Liberation day. The weather hasn’t been cooperating and it’s been gloomy and raining most of the time. But that doesn’t stop the kids from playing outside. No matter what the weather is, if the children don’t have to go to school, the playground is brimming with life. It makes me so happy that this is my view!

100 Days of Happiness – Day 14

I love to play board games. Sadly, Mr. Fantastic doesn’t (so it does seem that no one is perfect). But as I was sure I wasn’t the only one who loved to play games, I put an invitation in our “social” group on Facebook. In less than a day, five people signed up to play! So today, we had a lovely evening of the Settlers of Catan. One of the participants was running late, so Mr. Fantastic took her place. In the end, she couldn’t come at all and we had a wonderful time! We’re certainly going to do this again. 🙂

100 Days of Happiness – Day 13

Today we celebrated the king’s birthday. As I’ve only lived in this country for a few months, it was the first time I read it. apparently the weather is always fantastic on King’s Day. At least, that’s what the Dutch tell me. Today was cold, rainy and windy, which meant a lot of people stayed at home. So … not a lot of people at the festivities and the flea markets. We did find some nice bargains at the flea market and then went to the library, as they had their annual book sale. The huge pile of books I bought made me really, really happy!

All dressed up for King’s Day!

After I took the picture, I realised I had another bag full of books. 😀

100 Days of Happiness – Day 12

I‘ve written about our two chickens before. They’re lovely and sweet, though a bit shy. Fatima, the brown chicken, started to spend a lot of time in the nesting box the past weeks. She would easily spend several hours there and we got less and less eggs. It seemed for every three eggs Lourdes would give us, we only got one of Fatima. She was also losing all of her feathers on her lower chest and stomach. It was pretty clear she was nesting and tried to brood the eggs. I always took the eggs away, as we don’t have a rooster, and gently tried to get her leave the nesting box, but I saw absolutely no progress.

Today, our neighbour sent me a message to let me know she was going to buy some fertilised eggs as one of her chickens was trying to brood and if I wanted some. Of course I said yes and after a trip to the pet store together, we both came home with a nice box of eggs. I placed them in the nesting box and Fatima is happily sitting on top of them. She’s very serious about it and I didn’t want to disturb her (she looks very stern when I open the box), but I managed to quickly sneak a picture.

I hope to show you pictures of little chicks in three weeks!

100 Days of Happiness – Day 11

In August I got married and moved to the Netherlands, my husband’s country. I knew I had to be proactive about my social life, as I didn’t have a job yet and hardly knew anyone in the city (only some friends of Mr. Fantastic). I’m not really an extrovert, but I do love interacting with people. It makes me feel like I belong and as my friends don’t live anywhere near me, I knew I needed to get to know some people. As soon as I moved, I actively searched where I could volunteer ánd meet people. Of course, I searched for things I liked, so the library was my first stop.

The government has lowered the budget for libraries, so they’re in desperate need of volunteers for various functions. Two of those functions really interested me: being a reading buddy to a child struggling with the language and be a supporting librarian in the neighbourhood children’s library. I couldn’t choose which one I wanted to do, so I decided to do them both. Every Wednesday afternoon, I go to the children’s library and organize books, help clients and just have a nice time. The library is a three-minute walk from where we live and I often see people I recognize from our neighbourhood. It’s nice to get to know them!

The reading buddy program started a few weeks ago and is a lot of fun. I asked for a family that lives near me and they matched me with a family just a few houses from ours. I read to a 4-year-old boy, who really really really loves cars! He’s the sweetest little thing, but as he only hears Dutch at school, he’s not confident in talking (he answers almost any question I ask with “weet niet”, “don’t know”). So we read and talk a lot during our weekly hour. At first he was a bit shy, but now he runs to the hallway when I ring the bell. As I can’t take a picture of the little boy, I took a picture of the books we read today.

In the background, you can see some lovely tulips I bought and (to the left, only partly in the picture) a nice bouquet Mr. Fantastic bought ‘just because’. I just love spring flowers! If I had unlimited resources, I would put hundreds of tulips in the living room. As I love flowers so much, I’m also volunteering in our neighbourhood “green” group. We maintain the flower boxes, plant shrubs and little plants and make our neighbourhood a lot greener! As I’m so active here, I already know more neighbours than Mr. Fantastic. I think I’m pretty good at integrating. 😀

100 Days of Happiness – Day 10

Mr. Fantastic is an acolyte in our parish and this morning he had to serve both the early and the late mass. We went to the first one together. He has to be on time (aka really early), so I have quite some time to spend in church before mass begins. As usual, I tried to pray and, as usual, I failed and my thoughts went from one thing to another. I still don’t really what my line of thought was, but suddenly I was convinced we should paint the stairs today. So, after the early mass, I told Mr. Fantastic my idea and he was immediately enthusiastic.

There’s a story to those stairs. You see, when Mr. Fantastic moved in five years ago, they had received a basic layer, but that was it. He was planning on putting a few coats. He even bought some round carpet steps (I don’t know what the correct term is in English, but in Dutch it is ‘trapmat’). He never got around to do it, but it was something he really wanted to do. He even told me about it (and showed me the carpet steps) one of the first times I visited him. I was no fan of the carpet steps and though the stairs were getting really dirty, it wasn’t really something I cared for. That is, until I broke my toe going up the stairs! I still don’t know how I did it, but I did break my toe when I (slowly, carefully) went up the stairs. Add to that the few times I almost fell down the stairs because the steps are too smooth, and it’s no wonder I changed my mind.

I’ve already talked about the ‘Sunday date night’, and this week it was my turn to pick the date. I had a hard time picking a date. I was thinking about playing a board game, as I love that, but Mr. Fantastic doesn’t, so I hardly ever get the chance to play games. But then, right before mass, I got the idea to paint the stairs as a date. Of course, painting (and buying paint) in the evening isn’t such a good idea, so we had a date afternoon instead of a date night. It was so much fun! It was the first time since we were married that we worked on the house together (well, we did some small things, but no big jobs) and I think it was our best date in months!

So, the undercoat is done, tomorrow we’ll put the first coat on and maybe Tuesday the second one (if necessary), so we can put the carpet steps on by Wednesday. I’m really looking forward to it! It might seem like something simple and dull, but it made me so happy, both working together and seeing the result. 🙂

100 Days of Happiness – Day 9

The past few weeks, Mr. Fantastic had the chance to skype with his daughter a few times. As she lives in the USA, the time difference makes it hard to find a moment to talk, but now that she’s older, it’s become easier. I just love how Mr. Fantastic lights up when he talks to his daughter and how her eyes glow when he tells her he’s proud of her or he loves her. Though it’s not the perfect relationship by far (the distance and circumstances just makes it impossible), it’s clear they adore each other. And that makes me really, really happy!

 

100 Days of Happiness – Day 8

A few weeks ago, I was asked to interview a television host for an article in the magazine I write for. Though I immediately said yes, I was a bit nervous: I’ve never interviewed someone before! Okay, maybe once or twice in high school. The interview was last week and it went well. Today, I finished writing the article. It’s not perfect, but I feel very accomplished.

Tonight, I went over to the house of a friend / acquaintance. We’re in that weird phase where we’ve only seen each other a few times, but it looks like it’s growing into a friendship. She’s hoping to start her own company and I helped here out with some questions she had. It’s a small thing, but I felt so knowledgeable and professional!

I truly love what I do and it makes me so happy!

100 Days of Happiness – Day 7

The weather was lovely today! For the first time this year, I was able to dry the laundry outdoors, which is so much nicer than indoors. I just love the smell of the fresh clothes, dried by the spring wind. The small change in temperature today made me excited to work in the garden. I can’t do much at the moment, as we’re planning to redo our garden next month, so I bought some flowers for a flower basket and the front garden. If I finish my article tomorrow, I hope to start planting a bunch of seeds my sister in law gave me. Hopefully I’ll have a wonderful herb garden in a few weeks!

100 Days of Happiness – Day 6

In January, I founded my own little company. It’s basically just me, editing and writing texts. It’s the perfect job,  it really is. I enjoy every moment! In the beginning, I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to get enough customers, but that fear was unfounded. I love doing what I do and I have enough work to keep me busy (and at times very busy!). There is one thing, however, that I really don’t like: administration. I’m always happy to be done with making invoices and counting hours. So this invoice made me smile and feel proud of myself: I’ve made 8 invoices in less than four months. That’s pretty impressive and way above my expectations!

100 Days of Happiness – Day 5

We had to go to the capital to take care of some things. Though it was a lovely day, we were inside most of the time. When we were done, we decided we’d make the most of the rest of the day. So we went for a lovely stroll through the city. We shopped a little (I spent about ten euros on household necessities and that was it) and afterwards we went for a drink and later for dinner. It was the perfect way to round up a tiring and frustrating day and it made me very happy. 🙂

Mr. Fantastic enjoying his Belgian beer in a Belgian pub.

100 Days of Happiness – Day 4

A few weeks ago, our vacuum cleaner broke. Literally, the hose broke off. At first, I just jammed it back in, but it would only take a minute before it became loose again. After a few days, I just gave up and stopped vacuuming. If it got too dirty, I used the swiffer or swept the floor. That got old really fast. Also, you can’t really sweep a carpet. Fortunately, Mr. Fantastic worked his magic and today was the first time I could vacuum again. It’s funny how it’s the small things that make me so happy. For the first time in weeks, I’m enjoying a truly clean living room. Oh, the joy!

Alas, no picture today, as it’s now too dark to take a nice one inside. I’m hoping I’ll be able to take some tomorrow, but it’s a very busy day, so I’m not promising anything.

100 Days of Happiness – Day 3

Sunday evening is our date night. Every week one of us decides what we’ll do. We’ve gone to the cinema, went out for a drink, played a board game … This night Jaap is picking the date: an evening walk. We’re taking the train to the next station and then we’ll walk back. He’s trying to find the most scenic route using Google Maps. Let’s hope the weather stays nice this evening!

100 Days of Happiness – Day 2

There’s nothing more beautiful than seeing a tiny baby open his eyes and discover the world. Today I had the privilige to watch our newest nephew do that and to cuddle with him. A lot. What a blessing he is!

100 Days of Happiness – Day 1

Though the weather is dull and the skies are grey, the garden lets me know it’s spring. The blooming pear trees and the cherry tree that’s starting to join them, the flowers with their joyful colours and the birds visiting the bird feeder and the stack of wood full of little critters.
What makes me even more happy, is that they’ve finally started repairing the foundation of our annex. As soon as that’s finished, we can start with our other projects: a new floor in the annex and partly retiling the garden. It will take a while before everything is finished, as we’re saving up step by step, but the most urgent part is getting done right this moment!

Getting the foundation in pristine condition! And you can see the new back door on the left.

7 Quick Takes Friday about a house, a job and lots of love

I procrastinate. Always have, probably always will. If something is important or if I want to do it well, I procrastinate. And I want to write, I want to document this phase of my life and I want to do it well. So: I procrastinate. Tonight, I decided enough is enough. Either I never write anything, or I just write at least some words or a picture when I think about posting on this blog (and I think about it almost daily!). So here goes!

— 1 —

About twenty years ago, I was playing in our garden and found a ring. It was a small,  gold ring and – as we had no idea how it got in the garden – it was mine to keep. I never wore it, but didn’t get rid of it either. Every now and then, little ten year old me would pick up the ring and marvel at the fact that I had real gold in my hands. Real gold! The ring moved houses with me several times and I almost forgot about it. This week, I heard on the radio that the price of gold is the highest in many years and I thought about the ring in the jewelry box. It hadn’t left the box in years and probably never would, so I decided to sell it to a jeweller. After twenty years, it’s now getting a new life and I got some nice cash. It’s not a huge amount, but I started calculating and realized it is about the same amount of money as the pocket-money I received as a kid in a whole year. Yep, a year! I wish I could go back in time and tell little me that I found a year’s worth of pocket-money!

— 2 —

After six months of marriage, I can say it’s awesome. Mr. fantastic is as fantastic as ever and I love being married. I could write a book about how wonderful married live is, but I’m not going to write about it here.
What I do want to write about, is that it was a surprise to me how easy, natural and good being married is. “Oh, but you’ve only been married for six months! Just wait!” Yes, yes, I know. But you know what? I don’t care. You see, I cared too much before getting married (and before meeting Mr. Fantastic). I read every book I could get my hands on, we went to several premarriage courses and I read blogs of newlyweds fervently. I knew all about the dangers and the big, dark troubles that “every” newlywed faces: getting used to each other, getting used to living together, cultural differences, different expectations, in-laws … Often, they would write that the first year is incredibly hard, so I prepared for the worst. At the same time, I just couldn’t believe it could be hard to be married to Mr. Fantastic.
And after six months, I can tell you it’s not hard. In fact, it’s one of the easiest things I’ve ever done. We can do everything together and it feels as if we’ve always been married.
Looking back, it was a waste of time and energy to worry about how things could be in the future. So I’m not going to care about what could go wrong in our relationship in the future. For now, we talk, we laugh, we make time for, care for and support each other and that’s enough.

— 3 —

Right before our wedding we had to get rid of our chickens, as they were too loud for the neighbours. The chicken coop stood deserted for months, but two weeks ago, we got two cute little Wyandotte chickens. They’re so nice and cuddly, but nowhere near as social as our other two hens. I would like to make them more social, but that would require me to be outside a lot and, well, it’s just too cold for that!

Our three new chickens, Lourdes, Fatima and Medjugorje. (Picture, names etc. courtesy of Mr; Fantastic.)

— 4 —

Our house is a nice 1930’s home. It’s perfectly located, but (as with all older houses) it needs a lot of work. We’re planning to do a little bit here and a little bit there, as we save money for each project. The first big project is the back door. It’s an old, unsafe door, with single glass and a 5 by 5 inch hole in the bottom part (yes, really). We’re getting a nice merbau door and windows and I’m really looking forward to it! The next big project is the foundation of our back kitchen. The concrete is starting to degrade, so we have to get that fixed before it becomes a real problem. As soon as there’s no more chance of freezing, they’ll start working on it. I wanted to take before and after pictures of everything in the house, but it already looks so different inside the house, that I can’t get proper before pictures. And as I’m a tad perfectionist: if I can’t get decent before pictures, it’s no use to make after pictures.

— 5 —

Since moving here this summer, I’ve been job hunting. I didn’t like it (so much stress!). There weren’t a lot of jobs I qualified for or liked and I didn’t have a lot of success applying. It was pretty frustrating to only see one interesting job every few weeks and then hear there were 300 other candidates for that job. So I decided to do it differently. I stopped job hunting and started my own company. I love it! I correct, edit and write. It’s wonderful to decide when to work or which jobs to take. It’s less wonderful to do the administration and to decide when to turn a job down. I’ll have to get used to that!

— 6 —

We’re having a busy birthday weekend. Princess, my god-daughter, turned five and she’s having a party. I’m especially looking forward to the awesome cuddles she gives.
Also, my little brother, Knight, turned nine last week. NINE. I still can’t believe it. We’re giving him the first Harry Potter book. He’s already seen the first few movies and claims  he doesn’t need to read the books anymore. Tss.

— 7 —

Speaking about Harry Potter, Mr. Fantastic (finally!) started reading the books. It all started with the death of Alan Rickman. I decided it was about time Mr. Fantastic saw all the movies. A week (and eight movies) later, he started reading the books. He’s halfway through book 5 and I’m wondering if I should start reading them again (for the umpteenth time). It’s a tough choice, as I’ve just discovered the library app and thousands of new books await me …

For more Quick Takes, visit This Ain’t The Lyceum!

5 relationship tips you should forget asap

Mr. Fantastic is at choir practice, so it’s my first evening alone as a married woman. It feels strange, but also very familiar. It was even nice until fifteen minutes in, when I heard a mouse (or, you know … something!). I’m glad I already had my drink, because I’m not leaving the couch anytime soon.

Anyway, I had decided that I would use this “free” evening to write a blog, but hadn’t (still haven’t) decided on a subject yet. WordPress tells me it’s my sixth anniversary on this site and I started browsing my old posts. My first blog ever was almost ten years ago (on a different website) and I had just discovered my mother was pregnant with Knight. How time flies …

Copyright: Hester Fotografie

It seems fitting that I’m reflecting on the past today. My life has changed so much over the last ten years. And not in the least the last few months. And I have changed too. Looking back at the posts I wrote when I was in my early twenties, I’m grateful for the changes that happened to me and proud of the changes I accomplished in my life. And now that I’m married (hey, for over two weeks, so I know what I’m talking about), I finally feel I can say that 90 % of the advice about dating and relationships (pre-marriage) is utter rubbish. There, I’ve said it. So, for your enjoyment: five pieces of advice that can go straight into the bin.

— 1 —

Get married! (or its variations: don’t get married / get married young / don’t get married young)

If and when (an with whom, obviously) you get married is something so personal no one can really say anything about it at all. Yes, sure, there are statistics, lots of statistics. But the fact that 40 % of marriages end in divorce or that people who marry later are 31 % happier (totally made those number up) doesn’t say anything about your specific relationship. And even if each and every one of your friends is married or it is ‘expected’ in your community to get married right after college, that’s no reason to get married.
My advice? Reflect on your own life! What are you called to in life? What do you want from life? And if you are religious, pray about it!

— 2 —

Don’t be too picky!

Oh, puh-lease. Even if I wanted to count the times people told me this, I couldn’t have. If you think you’ll die if you aren’t married, go ahead and marry a guy you picked randomly. If you think it might make a difference whom you marry, please spend some time reflecting about what’s important to you in a husband and in a marriage. Yes, it might take a while before you find a partner and get married. In my case, it took over ten years, but am I glad I was picky! Mr. Fantastic is amazing and he’s the perfect man for me. I wouldn’t settle for anything less.
My advice? Spend time discovering who you are and deciding what is important to you in a relationship. Don’t settle on the important stuff.

— 3 —

Don’t settle!

“Huh, didn’t you just say yourself that we should be picky and shouldn’t settle?” Yes, yes, I know, be picky and don’t settle on the important stuff. But, please, do settle on the small stuff. This can be a bit tricky, because it’s hard to define what’s important. Once again, this is really personal. For instance, food preference isn’t really important for me, but if you’re a dietist and your partner is all about fastfood all the time, it might be a dealbreaker.
Once again: spend time discovering who you are and deciding what is important to you in a relationship.

— 4 —

It’s not you!

Okay, so maybe this isn’t technically a piece of advice and some of you might stagger at this, but hear me out! I’m not saying you’re not good enough if you’re unintentionally  single, but single or in a relationship, you are you. And it sure won’t hurt at all if you work on yourself. Should you start dressing differently, lose weight or get exciting hobbies? If you’d like to, why not. But that’s not what I meant. What’s really important is that you become yourself, because you want people to see who you are (and if you don’t want people to see who you are, you might want to work on that first). And no matter how wonderful life has been, we’ve all been hurt and we’re all formed by our past. I’ve yet to encounter someone who’s ‘finished’. We’re all a work in progress, so get to work.
My advice (that’s getting boring): spend time discovering who you are and start growing.

— 5 —

You’ll find him when you stop looking! (or any “you should … and then you’ll find him” advice)

Ha ha ha. This advice shouldn’t go in the bin, it should be shredded and then ritually burned before launching the ashes into outer space.
My advice? There is no magic trick to “finding” Mr. Right. Okay? It’ll happen when it happens (if it happens, but that’s another topic).

Copyright: Hester Fotografie

The Big Silence and the Big Changes

It’s been a very busy few months, as I knew it would be. The coming week will probably be crazy busy at work, but I hope I get some room to breathe after that. You’ve probably noticed it’s been silent around here, which could be explained by my busy life, but it actually isn’t. The thing is, I don’t know what I want to do with this blog. I really didn’t want to make it a wedding planning blog, because I really don’t like reading those, so I’m not going to write one myself. House renovation blogs are even worse, so I won’t go there either. I could just write about “what’s happening around here”, but frankly, that’s not interesting at all. And I would feel like a fraud writing about “the engaged life” or “the married life”, because I’m just doing whatever. So I don’t know what to do with this little spot on the internet. If you have suggestions, you’re free to share them in the comments. I’m going to reflect a bit more about it and will let you know what decision I’ve taken.