More royalty!

Hi!

This is what I did today!

My last post was about royalty, today I had another 'royalty day'! In december I (or rather St. Nicholas) gave my mom 2 tickets to a guided tour of Paleis Soestdijk (Soestdijk Palace). This is the palace where our Queen mom Juliana and her husband prince Bernhard lived during the years they were married. They both passed away in 2004 and from 2007 the palace and the gardens are open to the public (for a periode of 3 years, in the mean time a new destination for the palace has to be found).


As I child I passed this palace many times. When we headed for a walk in the nearby forest of Lage Vuursche or when we were just touring the area by car on a Sunday afternoon. My brother and I (and I guess also my mom, lol) were always curious if the royal family was home, this was indicated by the royal flag on top of the palace. If the flag wasn't there, the royal family was not in the palace. Also on Queensday there were parades in the gardens of the palace, they were broadcasted on television, I don't think I ever missed one!

Reason enough to be curious to see the interior of the palace, so we had a guided tour today. It was very interesting to see everything and hear the stories about the royals that have lived here. Also interesting to see that Queen Juliana moved in in 1937, had new furniture then and hadn't changed a bit of furniture since then. Personal things have been removed by the royal family but some furniture is still there.


It will be difficult to decide what the next destination will be for this palace. Now that I have seen the interior I cannot imagine Willem-Alexander and Máxima living there with their 3 daughters. A LOT would have to be changed to modernize it!

After I came home from the tour and running some errands, I hodge podged! Or I tried! I saw this on Traci and Gina's Hodge Podge Blog and contest no. 2 is up so I entered this one:

Credits can be found here

This is all for now, going to pick up the kids from daycare!

Her name? Princess Ariane!

Hi all!

So now you know. I was home this morning because Mauro had a doctors' appointment. After he'd gone off to school it was exactly the right time for a special TV moment. The royal prince was going to announce the name of the new princess for the local authorities of The Hague. It was live broadcasted so... curious as I am, I was there.... :)

The prince called her Ariaan so there was confusion about her name. Now it's finally clear that she's called Ariane Wilhelmina Máxima Ines (and not Inez....). Second and Third name after her great-grandmothers and Inez after her aunt (one of Máxima's sisters). So now they have 3 girls. As a mother of 2 boys (and sometimes 3...) I cannot imagine what it's like to have 3 girls ... perhaps for the better, lol!

Now on to some new layouts:

The first one is special, this happened 2 days ago and scrapped it the same night. My little boy was so sad and is so happy he can stay over at grandma's tomorrow night!! The other two LOs are Easter photos.

Credits can be found here

Credits can be found here

Credits can be found here

Well I hope you like them.... the last one I made for my guest CT for Wendy Zine (www.elementalscraps.com), I am her guest for April! More CT news: the one who is responsible for my addiction is Ilona Havenaar and she is now a designer at Divine Digital! She asked me to be on her CT and I said yes, under one condition... I need a cool blinkie... Do you think it's cool enough?

That's all for now, I have one more CT secret coming up but it still hasn't been announced so please be patient!!

Easter & Scrapathon....

Credits can be found here

Credits can be found here

Credits can be found here

While HRH Princess Máxima is giving birth to her third baby I have time to post an update... Sorry I have left you all without any updates during Easter... we just couldn't find any eggs, lol!

Seriously, I had to catch up with some family time after being away most of the week last week for work. We had planned several things for the boys, like going to the Zoo on Monday but in the end they didn't want to go! So we didn't! We did go to the Easter Egg Hunt at a local Castle, Kasteel De Haar:

I have photos but they're still on my camera so you have to be patient :). My little one (3) was very disappointed he didn't find the GOLDEN EGG but we did have fun. It was very crowded and you had to pay entrance fee which will go to restauration of the castle, so it was a good cause.

On Monday we didn't go to the zoo but instead there was the Utrecht Marathon where we headed. We didn't have to go far, it was right by our house, in the village we live in. There were also events for the kids so we had an icecream and they enjoyed themselves there. Today Mauro had an extra day off school so we decided to take the bus (instead of the car) into the city and do some shopping. We never really did that together, most times we go all together or I go alone. He enjoyed this 'special day' with me and so did I.... too bad it's back to work tomorrow!

Have a good night!

I am back ... Happy Easter!

I am back just in time to wish you happy Easter... I had a couple of long, long working days (but that included dinner, the bar and a lot of 'sweet meet breaks' with candies and cake).... Nevertheless I would like to wish you happy Easter from all of us

Isn't this cute... all you do is upload a photo at Dumpr and you can make funny things with your photos! Just try it!

Toot ... this is incredible!

OMG... can you believe this? My little boy (and my LO) is on the cover of the April Scrapstreet Magazine? I entered a contest for the cover but I never actually dreamt of winning it... I didn't even know either, not until I had a look at the new online magazine and realized that this was MY layout!
Gotta run.... we're organizing a huge simulation game for the people who do our training so I will be in a hotel the next couple of days... it's fun!!

Sooo quiet

Hi!

I have a busy week ahead of me because I have to be out of town for work for a couple of days... To get some energy out of this weekend, Andy took the boys with him this afternoon, take the big brother home and on the way visit grandma and granddad ... what a great idea. Cannot believe how quiet the house is after a weekend with 3 boys around... I mean 3, 4 and 15 are NOT the figures of the amount of decibel they produce, lol! But I have to say, the trouble the oldest is causing in school is (luckily) not showing in this house, usually he keeps quiet here... (it is because I let hem on my computer ;) ???

For the past 2 hours I have been exploring Digishoptalk, they were down for maintenance for the past 24 hours but now they are back up... I like what I see sofar!! I did this LO, so typical for the relationship Milan has with his granddad, he loved being away with them last week. In fact he didn't want to come home (but when he got home he was happy, *** relief ***):

Credits can be found here

I received my first kits from Wendy Zine!! These are for sale at Elemental Scraps. Look at them:

The second is my absolute favorite, probably not surprising... all boys!! Hope to get some scrappin' done tonight! I won't be able to get any done the rest of the week, or at least until friday when I have a day off (or a very long weekend because it will be EASTER!)....

Have a great Sunday!

Planes,Trains and Automobiles

Just another LO I did tonight!

Credits can be found here

Tagged and CT News!!

So I have been tagged by Petra (milo82)! Here are my 3 favorite songs, let me know what yours are!!!

1. I love you by Ilse de Lange

2. I don't feel like dancing by Scissor Sisters

3. La Pared Shakira & Alejandro Sanz

Let me know what yours are!!!

So I have had some major news on my CT applications this week! I was invited to do 3 (yes THREE) guest CTs... just wow.... They are:

1. Sara Amarie (May) at OScraps

2. Monique Eerhart (3 months April-June), soon at Pocket-Pearls

3. Wendyzine at Elemental Scraps (April)

I am soooo excited about this... I also have a secret on a permanent CT gig but can't tell you that yet... hopefully soon!!

Dont forget you have been tagged!!!

Good morning flowers!

Isn't it going to be a wonderful day today? 19C and the sun is out... My little boy almost makes me jealous, because he's on a vacation (and I'm not)... :)

It's an office day today... so I'll be inside most of the time. But I am going to enjoy tomorrow if the weather is just as nice as today!

Let me know what you did today!!!

Have a good day!!!

Pyramide filmpje

Sunny Sunday!

Hi!

What a lovely Sunday! Because of the summertime (the clock was put an hour forward this morning) we were not up too early, nor were the boys so this was good! We had decided last night (or the boys had) that we would go to the "Pyramide van Austerlitz". This is a playground with a small lunapark and a big terrace to sit outside... It's perfect for Sundays and many families think alike so also very busy... I used to visit this as a kid with my family so it's sort of tradition... The boys had fun:

{The movie is in the next post}

Didn't scrap today, just changing my blog header to get a more Spring feeling... The weather is supposed to stay good all week! This is a good thing because the youngest is going on a break with his grandparents. They take him to the 5 dollar vacation...lol. It's true (or almost, it was 5 euro :)... I booked it for them and the catch was that they did not know (out of a selection of vacation parks) where they would be staying. They know now, they are going to the Veluwe and are very happy with it. I hope they have fun! Mauro and I will visit them Wednesday afternoon when Mauro has no school.



All for now, hope the movie works :)

I can't read my blog!

I hope you can read my blog because I can't?? Don't know what is wrong... is it that weather.com thing I put in there 2 days ago? Will fill you in on details later! Love!!

Bath time

Hi,

Just this one for today... almost weekend :)

Credits can be found here

Hi,

I am back again... I finished one LO last night:

Credits can be found here

And then I have some new for you, you might want to grab these:

Grab them NOW from www.pocket-pearls.com because they are only free for 2 days!!

Stefanie Burt, you ROCK!

Weather!

As I love Spring weather I just updated my blog with the weatherforecast from www.weather.com.... Love it... it will be 17C next week!

Pop it swan

I saw these frames at DST and just had to try them. It makes a part of the photo pop out.
Credits of this LO can be found here and the frames are for sale here at Scrapbook-Elements, they are by Ake Pangestuti.

Catching up on scrappin'

Hi all!

I told you I had some major work to do in catching up my digiscrappin'! I tried to do 1 or 2 every night of the weekend... last week was too busy... the weekend out of town, a lot of work to do and then on Thursday night one child with fever ... he felt better on Saturday so he was back in school again today. To give Milan a bit more quality time we didn't stay in today but called grandma to meet up at what the boys call 'The Yellow Letters'... They can't read yet but they sure know when we pass one. You might think it's the big M (also yellow, and they recognize that too from a mile distance)... but no... it's (time for a commercial break here...lol)... IKEA!

We first went to the restaurant to have the 1 euro breakfast (lol, like I hadn't had breakfast earlier that morning, well grandma hadn't) and then we took Milan to the playground. It was only the second time he was going there (before that he'd too stay outside watching his big brother play, he was too young... it made him furious ;)). So he loves everything about it, the namesticker on his shirt, the number stamp on his hand, his jacket and shoes in the locker and then PLAYTIME! Too bad I didn't have a camera with me, you should have seen his face!

It gave us time to do a quick shopping round, I bought clamboos for the boys' beds, one in green and one in aqua (only 4.95!!).... dad has some DIY to do next weekend, lol!

After picking Mauro up from school and giving him a little time to unwind we had to head for music class. We hadn't been last week because we were away for the weekend and now I noticed that all the kids were giving cards and drawings to the teacher. She is a very nice lady but it was an ordinary class (I thought) so I asked the other mothers what the occasion was... When they told me she was diagnosed breastcancer and will have surgery next week I didn't know what to say. I talked to her after class but what more can you say then that you hope it will all turn out alright? I have been talking a lot to another woman who recently went through all this and she feels ok now, but it has such an impact on your life... never the same! I hope we'll see this teacher back really soon!!

Now on to the layouts:

These 3 are for Melissa Bennett's CT:

I used her kit Bloomers for this LO, credits can be found here

I used the Tin Roof Rusted Alpha and Tin Roof Rusted Stars on this LO.

Credits can be found here

For this LO I used Spring Peeps. Credits can be found here

And now on to something different. Did you notice Weeds and Wildflower Designs has a new kit up! It's called Discovering You... but I'd rather call it Amazing You! :). I love it, and they also put up a matching freebie. So I bought it and used it instantly tonight...

Credits can be found here

I think this is all for tonight... hope you liked it!

Lionel.... and Ben Mauro!

Guess what we did last night??? Yes we went to see Lionel!! His Coming Home Tour was in Rotterdam and we had tickets! We were both really impressed by the show, I mean the man has 4 decades of experience and songs! So we went from the Commodores to 2010 as Lionel said himself (he IS funny). When the band was introduced we noticed the guitarist. Of course we first noticed his name Ben MAURO! But today I looked at his website and this 'little' Ben has been playing with the world famous, just check out his resume! So it's not just his last name...

It was a great gig.... but got far to little sleep since the other Mauro decided to wake up at 5.20 am... sigh!

Weekendje weg...

DSC02385
Originally uploaded by Karen Kool.

Hallo... we zijn weer terug....

Hi we're back... just had a fantastic weekend in Limburg, sunny weather so we were outside most of the time! More news to come but I have been busy every night this weekend, first I have to catch up on my CT duties....

Have you already visited Weeds and Wildflowers Designs? It has been 'open' less than a week but the digiscrap stuff there is amazing!!!

Right now I am downloading freebies but also thinking about buying the other elements and papers on there!!

Also did some more digi-shopping today, got some books from Amazon, and some stuff from My Digital Muse... Nancy Comelab had a terrific sale again:

Can you resist?? I think these frames are fab!

Off for now... have to pack (so glad the swimming was cancelled tonight... gives me more time...)

Tired... but on and on

Credits can be found here

Credits can be found here

Credits can be found here

Plus I was working on one other LO that I can't show you yet... I was getting along fine until I wanted to put in a title and use one of the gorgeous alphas I bought recently from www.pocket-pearls.com . They just started off their new shop and website last week and had a great kick-off! I will not show you yet because I was promised to get the missing "Y" after March 15th! Curious? Be patient!

I am tired... at least my eyes feel tired... it's not that I have worked too hard today but it's because I have been working 3 nights straight with my new computergadget! It's a WACOM!! I had a tablet on my list for a long time but wasn't sure if it would be of interest for me and they are not that cheap. But then I found a thread at DST where some members recommended it(to someone else), but then buy a smaller 4x6 inches tablet. And so I did!

Lucky me I can't get on the computer here tomorrow because of my Aquarobics and on Thursday because I will go out with a friend.... and then all weekend I won't have access to the computer at all because we are going out of town for the weekend (until Monday!)... Oh nooooo, I just realize as I am writing this that that will be 5 LONG days without... It's hard to be away from scrapping and all the forums...LOL!

Hope you enjoyed the LO's and this is where we will enjoy our minibreak (just click on the picture but it is all in Dutch)

Weekend Sales!

Weekend Sales! I think these are gorgeous and couldn't resist... 40% off sale at Designs by Shelle !!! So hurry!!!