Hi!

Everything normal again, everything settled... cold weather as usual and work as busy as usual, lol! My friend Petrina is now in Holland and even though I don't get to see her every day like on Aruba, we will see eachother again on Wednesday, I am looking forward to that!

Two weeks ago St. Nicholas arrived in Holland so our days are filled with st. Nicholas candies, arrivals, shoes near the chimney waiting to be filled with gifts etc. With 2 little boys in the house (who still believe in St. Nicholas and his helpers).... it's a fun time! Today we went to the town of Veenendaal to run some errands and of course we met some Zwarte Pieten in the streets with their bags full of candy. Even the youngest now knows exactly how to put his hands up so that Piet can fill it up! I have to make a picture of his little hands tomorrow! Yes, tomorrow St. Nicholas will come to Andy's company. Oh no, not in his office this time because this year it turned out too small for the amount of children all the people that work there have. This year they moved 'out' and St. Nicholas is now coming to a different location in Amsterdam. Every child gets a gift (paid for by the company) and we have the music (accordeon players) and coffee, lemonade, cookies and candy... Usually it's one of the highlights of the year for our kids (even when the now 17 year old was a lot younger!).

Last Saturday St. Nicholas arrived at the village where the grandparents live... here are some pictures....

The red balloon Mauro is holding was given to him by a Piet. The whole story this year at the Sinterklaasjournaal is about the red balloons and he was so proud to get one!! Unfortunately it got loose from the thread when we were watching the Sinterklaas show at the community center... he was SO sad!!

Ok and then it was also time to do a few layouts... I couldn't find all of my mojo yet but I started again and that's something! And I hope I will get inspired by all these great sales this Thanksgiving weekend!!

Images are clickable, this is also where the credits can be found!

So tomorrow will be a Sinterklaas Sunday here (instead of most of you celebrating Thanksgiving this weekend). We will have the traditional gift night next weekend...will post more about that next week!

Take care!

Bye bye Aruba… Disney photos online

Finally, I have all our photos from Disneyland Resort Paris online… we stayed there for 3 days and 3 nights and I had 800+ photos!! I know …just a little too many! I tried to make a selection but still there are quite many, You can have a look at them here

www.flickr.com

This is a Flickr badge showing items in a set called Disneyland Paris (algemeen). Make your own badge here.

I didn’t really have time to cool down from Disneyland, when I got back I heard that I would leave for Aruba and Curacao on Oct. 30th so only 2 weeks later! It was even faster than that, my ticket was booked only a week in advance!

From Thursday night until Sunday I stayed with Eric and Petrina on Sero Biento, you have already read about that in my previous post. Petrina used to be my friend and co-worker when I lived in The Hague in the early ‘90s. Last year, in October 2007 she moved to Aruba… and now I got the chance to see where she lives now!! I was really excited that I had the opportunity to combine the business trip with the fact that I could see her place!! Well, if you look for something affordable to stay at, Sero Biento is definitely worth looking at!

Dag 2 op the happy island

Een rustige zaterdag! Heerlijk ontbijtje gekregen van Eric (roereitje met tomaat) en Petrina! Daarna hebben we even rustig rondgehangen om tegen de middag naar Oranjestad te gaan. Ik was gewaarschuwd dat het op zaterdag wel erg druk is in de stad dus ik zag wel wat voor me (Hoog Catharijne op zaterdagmiddag...) maar niets was minder waar. Het was juist rustig!!

We hebben wat rondgewandeld, een leuke foto gemaakt voor collega Dick,


en daarna geluncht bij
Iguana Joe.

Weer terug naar ons eigen complex Sero Biento waar ik nog even mijn werkmail check, en skype met Milan en Andy... Milan vind het maar raar volgens mij!
Hier onze huisdiertjes:


's Avonds gaan we eten bij Gasparito waar we lekker buiten zitten (muggen weer!) en van de local menu eten (Aruba combo)... heerlijk met chocoladetaart toe! Daana vallen echt m'n ogen snel dicht (sorry Raymann, de uitzending op BVN heb ik niet helemaal gehaald ...jetlag).

Bon bini, ik ben er...

Ja hoor, ik ben op Aruba!! De KL733 was zelfs 50 minuten voor op schema. Onderweg zat ik naast Hongaren wat ik een beetje vreemd vond, wat doen die nou op Aruba. Later bleek dat ze gingen trainen op de Freewinds, een schip dat (nu nog) voor de kust van Oranjestad ligt. Petrina vertelde weer later dat het met scientology te maken heeft, haha ik vond het a zo'n vaag verhaal!

Maar goed, Petrina en Eric stonden me dus al op te wachten. Op m´n immigratiepapiertje had ik keurig 'for business' aangekruist maar toch wenste de beambte mij een fijne vakantie.... haha!! Nou nu voelt het ook nog zo hoor!

Ik had geen beter startplekje kunnen uitkiezen dan www.4rentaruba.com!! Ik heb m'n eigen studiootje met natuurlijk een tv met BVN maar vooral.... draadloos internet. En daar maakt mijn eee-peeeceetje dankbaar gebruik van!!



Hier zit ik dus nu binnen!

Gisteren was Petrina vrij dus zijn we even het eiland rondgetourd. Koffie bij Paddocks (Joan dat was toch jouw tip) en lunch op het strand bij Boomba. Verder mail gecheckt, afspraken bevestigd en bij Petrina blijkt Charlotte te wonen die bij het ministerie van Onderwijs werkt... Haar baan klinkt echt reuze interessant en toch weer een link naar mijn eigen werk!

vandaag nog even de stad in, maar nu eerst ontbijten.... gewoon bruine boterhammetjes met pitjeskaas haha!! Morgen verhuis ik naar het hotel om mijn werk van maandag en verder te gaan voorbereiden.

Groetjes!!

Aruba - for business!

Hi!!

I thought I just let you all know that I will be in Aruba from tomorrow!! Yes, you heard it right, me on the happy island! I am so glad I got the opportunity to go on a business trip there! First of all because I will enjoy meeting the people there but second because I will see my friend Petrina again. The first few days I will be staying with Petrina and Eric at Sero Biento (if you ever need a great affordable place to stay). I will do some work from there and then after the weekend I will move to a hotel and travel to Curacao for other business meetings as well. I have travelled to the Carribbean before but never to the Dutch Antilles so I am really looking forward to it.

I will be back on Nov. 8 but when I have access to the internet I will try to do a small report!

Have a great week!

Photo excursion today!

 

Petra and I did a Fall Photo Excursion today!

The excursion was organized by a nature photographer Fer Boei

A group of 15 walked through the forest of Doorn (Kaapse Duinen) to see mushrooms and make photos! The weather was a bit rainy (most of it in the afternoon).

I am sure Petra will blog some to on her own blog… I have many more but won’t post them all :)…. at least not before I have edited them with lightroom!!

From Fall weather to summer at the end of the week… I have to go on a business trip to Aruba and Curacao so I probably won’t be around for a while… I will be back on Nov 8th!!

Karen

Almost there and new layouts!

Yeppers… only 2 more nights! We are going to leave by car on Sunday morning REALLY early to make the most of the day.

Disneyland Paris here we come! We are staying at the Hotel Cheyenne for 3 nights:

 

 

I will be writing a travelblog although I don’t know if I will be able to post it when we are in France, there is no wifi at the hotel :(.. who know we are lucky enough to pick up a signal anyway!

Ok then I also did some layouts this week, here they are! All images are clickable for credits and some love :)

 

So this is all for this week, next week I will be back with an (hopefully) exciting trip report for anyone who is interested!!

Have a good weekend!

Karen

Layout time

Hi,

Ok, time to showcase some of my own layouts from last week... I did a couple and one is still not finished (I think it's too empty but then again I like it...still unsure if it's finished or not... if you understand what I mean)... But here are the ones I did finish, first I did a Halloween LO with the new kit by Dawn Inskip, did you read the news about her on DST?

Well this is her latest kit (you can buy it at NDISB for example):

And here's the layout:

Then I did one with her Friend's Expressions


And finally I did one for myself but with a lot of stuff by Melissa Bennett in it, I am on her CT and have so many items in my EHD that I mixed and matched:

Not a lot more news today... the week was pretty 'normal' as expected. The weather could have been better but it's Fall and the weather is like that, a lot of rain and a bit colder...we turned on the central heating for the first time yesterday!

Tomorrow I am going to try to sell some of the clothes and toys the kids have grown out of. I have hired on of the tables at a small market at the community center here, it's just for 2 hours and it's just for 2nd hand children's clothes and toys...so great for me. Later in the afternoon we will take the boys to their grandparent's house...they will stay the night there so mom and dad can go shopping on Sunday...spend the money we earned the day before, lol!

That's all for now...only 9 days until Disneyland Paris!

Just another week...

Hi!
Ok... it's Monday, just another week has started... for some very special (for example Petra is virtually throwing all kinds of delicious food at me because she's already cooking for the عيد الفطر

or `id-oel-fitr, (we call it Suikerfeest), the traditional day after the Ramadan... I have known Petra for about 5 years now (or is it longer, lol) and she makes these yummie sweet cakes!!

I hope I don't get them just virtually Petra, LOL! :)

Other than that, for us it's just a regular week. Work, school etc. We have made a count down calender for the boys (oh well, I didn't make it, Andy did, credits to him) and they put a sticker on it each morning... only 12 nights until... Disney!! We're going to Disneyland Paris during fall break! I think we -grown ups - are even more excited than the boys are... About a month ago the oldest was in the back of the car when we were driving (where he is supposed to be) and told me... Mom, I don't need to go to Disney! I was a bit shocked by such a revelation because my boys love themeparks (just not the scary rides!). "Not to Disney? Why?" He replied "Well, the local bus is an attraction too!!" Hmmm... I know I have great kids! But this? The thing is that they hardly ever ride the local bus and they LOVE it! We always go by car when we need to go somewhere... they only use buses on days out from school or the daycare they visit.... Hmm...my boy is a real thinker!

In fact my week didn't start very 'regular'... after holding back CTs a bit I was asked as a guest for .... Dawn Inskip. I was pleasantly surprised when they asked me because I haven't been such a great scrapbooker lately (lack of time and inspiration). But when I look at her shops I might even get some ideas for new layouts!

A layout that wasn't done by me but by Petra is this one (she took one of my pics from last summer):

Doesn't that look awesome?? Sometime I just don't know how she does it! Thank you Petra (did I teach you how to do this... ever??? I don't think so, lol)....

Well this is all for now, I will leave my own layouts until my next post!

Have a good day!

Birdpark Avifauna!

Last Sunday we had a beautiful day, it was almost like one of these days that are called Indian Summer in the States! We had tickets to see the birdpark and so we did arrive there around 10.30 am and left close to 5.30 pm... the kids walked around, played (a huge playground) and I took some photos of the birds:

Next zoo will be Ouwehand on November 9th, I just got our tickets through Girafpas today!

Two new layouts!

Hi!

I finished two LO's today so I thought I'd blog about them first, pictures were taken during our trip to Greece:

Then of course, it is weekend!! Today we went to De Bilt,

It is a small town nearby and there was a Parisian market there, in fact they sold all kinds of stuff. We did some shopping there and we ended up buying a bench for the front of the house at BSC. I will take a photo of it tomorrow as it's hard to explain what it looks like. This store is changing their garden furniture for winter sports now and so they were having a great sale. I also fell in love with a teak furniture set in that store... But even though we could probably get it for less than half price it was still too much for us. Besides, we swore we would never ever get wooden garden sets because we have to do too much to keep it like it is (or like we like it!). So that was a no-no anyway!

Tomorrow we will go to Avifauna with our Girafpas . I mentioned this before, it's a great deal on different zoos, this time we will visit a bird zoo. The weather is nice so it will be a nice day out! And probably a little time for photos too!

bye for now!

Day off!

Hi,

Usually I am not working on Wednesday, but there is always plenty to do, taking the kids to school, doing laundry, run errands etc. Today is a bit more relaxed. We took the kids to school together this morning (1 child each as they are in different buildings) and now I am enjoying my cappuccino in front of my new EEE pc in the kitchen... typing my blog. Ok I have had this little laptop for a while but I couldn't get it wireless so it feels new!!

Andy has just left for his fysiotherapy, he's finally doing a bit better but not ready for work yet (as his job is a physical one, maintenance of central heating). When he comes back we can run some errands , he can't drive the car with his injured leg so I drive. Can't believe that one game of tabletennis in Greece caused all this :). The upside is that the boys are happy that their dad is there when they come home from school!

Ok , just one layout for you today (image is clickable for some love):Credits
Holliewood Studios Falling for you
Taylormade Stitched in Place

Sun(ny)day for skiing!

Hi,

Today is a beautiful Sun(ny)day! The skislope in Nieuwegein
had Open house today and the kids could take lessons. We are going skiing in Austria next December with our friends Myra, Eelco and Tim and today we all went to the skislope. The kids took their lessons and we enjoyed coffee in the sun on the terrace and later on a nice lunch. Grandma and granddad also joined in and were proud to see the little ones on the skis!

More photos on our Flickr site (link on the right!).

Have a great day!