Where We Once ‘Winkled’

09/21/21

Winkel –  To shop.

A Dutch word that never fails to amuse me 🤪

We’d pre-planned a shopping date with Oma as babysitter for Tuesday, so we readied ourselves and drove to Arnhem.

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That’s the city we’d typically go to for a day of shopping when we lived here. It’s street shopping, meaning in and out of stores, walking down streets and allies, where I’d be completely turned around and lost if not for Mike always seeming to know which way to go, to get to wherever we are headed 🤪

It didn’t take too long until we felt like we needed food, so we went to one of Mikes favourite places to get fries. Spot him ordering below.

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It’s very much a Dutch thing to eat fries, but Mike REALLY loves them. 

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I love the mayo and peanut sauté sauce that covers up that fact that I’m eating fries 🤪

We walked and shopped and didn’t really find much. The stores being on what I consider to be the slightly pricier side and a fair chunk of them currently having very similar styles.

I always enjoy ‘Dille & Kamille’ a shop with a variety of home and gift items.

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Mike gets sick of my picking up all the little cutesy things, wishing I’d just look at something of substance, but I can’t help that A; little things are cuter and B; we have only suitcase room, so that’s what I’m keeping in mind 😏

This adorable wooden seashell hairbrush set was spotted in a children’s shop. I found it to be extremely precious.

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The €60.00 price tag meant it stayed there and wouldn’t be a gift for the newest niece though 🤪  
A follower wisely reminded me though that there aren’t only mermaids but also mermen, so technically it could have been for Lake 😜🙌🏻

There was a ‘pepernoten’ pop up shop due to it being fall and nearing their Sinterklaas season (look it up if you’re curious, I find it confusing 🤪 It’s like a pre Christmas thing, which is very much like Christmas 🤓) so we purchased a bag to take home. I remember mom getting ‘peppernut’ cookies from the farmers market when we were young, so there must have been a seller of European decent 😊

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Back at the house, nearly empty-handed from shopping, it was decided that a calzone, kapsalon and pasta would be ordered in for supper.

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Babysitting had gone well for Oma, and she’d taken Lake on a 20 km bike exploration 😅

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* I ask that you do your best to ignore any spelling mistakes, as on my iPad the set up is different, and I can’t find an easy way to do a spelling / grammar check. Thank you for your understanding 🤪

A Proclamation To The Parents

Jan 22, 2020 –

Mike and I arranged a dinner to be eaten with Mother and Father…at their home.
Because they have a bbq and also because we had news to share with them 🤪

Mike purchased steaks and mushrooms and I went over to the parents a little early to prepare asparagus and a wine sauce for the steaks.
Mom made Cajun fried potatoes and supplied bread for garlic toast ☺️

We sat down for dinner and dug in.
Enjoying the tasty meal, as we tried our best to act casual, eat the food and not stress out too much for the conversation that awaited 🤭

Mike and I had discussed how to segue into the topic we wanted to broach and we used our newly purchased house investment to do so.
Just as we began talking about the correct subject, Dad got a phone call and left the room for a moment, right when we needed him to stay seated 😅
Mike kept the conversation going and once Dad returned, he causally mentioned how ‘whatever we decide to do with the house project, it has to be done by September’.

Mom responded with the expected, ‘ Why by September?’ to which I said, ‘Well, that’s when the baby comes.’

.
.
.

Dads response was exactly as I expected and had told Mike it would be.
A very abrupt, ‘huh?!’ With a quizzical face and slight leaning back in his chair, though he recovered quicker than Mom.
She sat with a very wide, yet unsure grin and even larger eyes, while sort of just saying, ‘whaaaat..?’ 😂
Suffice to say they were surprised 😉

The ensuing conversation was of course as one would expect.
‘How far along, who else knows, do we have to keep it a secret? This is fairly unexpected’ etc etc.

Yes, they were the first to know, yes they had to keep it a secret from the rest of the family and yes it’s not what one would generally expect from me, the one who dislikes small humans and the idea of them 😬🤪🙈

We told them fairly early, as their semi permanent house guests (my sister and her family who were living there during house renovations) were away on a trip during that time and we wanted Mom and Dad to be the first to know.
Making our secret slightly less difficult to bear alone, dragging them along in the required silence with us 🤪👍🏻

Feb 3rd – Holland

I can’t supply a whole lot of detail on this ‘revealing’, as I wasn’t present 🤓

Mike had booked his ticket to go home for a visit before we knew our lives would be in an upheaval come fall but the timing worked out well for him to be able to tell the news to his parents, in person ☺️

He waited longer into the trip than I would have but come one evening chat with his parents, he let it out.
Supposedly in a way that they did not understand for a moment or two but once it was explained, the emotions were that of happiness… not surprisingly 😉

So, at this point both sets of parents were made aware of the news and the fact that it was to be kept between the 6.5 of us 🤞🏻😜

As I wasn’t ready for the onslaught of words from humans, we were waiting to tell anyone else at that time, because we didn’t want anymore to have to deal with ‘knowing but not being able to say’, so the telling to the rest of the family and then ‘the world’, came at a later date 😉

Oh, Baby 😳

Well, if you haven’t heard it yet via the Instagrams and the folks who assemble there… then I’m a little surprised but it’s totally fine 🤪

First question – Due date?

Come September (9th if we are trying to be specific) of this year, our family is going to grow by a mini person 😬

That’s right, we’re expecting.

That still sounds so weird ^ 🤪😬

As of this moment, I’m 16 weeks along with our visit ever offspring and things have been going good 💁🏻‍♀️

Which leads us to the second question- How I’ve been feeling?

I experienced ONE instance on a Sunday morning while preparing for church, where I suddenly got nauseous and hot and shaky but as soon as it came, it then left, never to happen again.

Thus far 😜

There was also a week or so nearer the beginning where I slept most of the day and felt hungry but absolutely nothing held appeal and opening the fridge invited disgust, so suppers for hubby were, lacking 🙈
I consider those symptoms prettttty minimal compared to things I’ve heard others go through during this stage of life though 😬

Now it’s mainly been hunger and having to eat ASAP 😜
Which doesn’t stray THAT far from my usual I guess 🤓

Next question – Are we finding out the gender?

YES! I’m not a patient person when it comes waiting for a thing that could otherwise be known and neither is Mike, so the decision wasn’t even really a decision, so much as an appointment booking 🤪

Now it’s your turn to answer questions that I have!

I can give as little, or as much detailing about this all, as you want.
I don’t want to overdose you on stories and happenings to do with this ‘situation’ 😜 unless the information is desired.

Do you want to know who we told, when and how?
Do you want to know room plans, LIFE plans?! 🙈

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO KNOW ?! 🤪

Keep in mind that the above question is asked in an ‘only slightly raised volume but mostly nice and happy’ way… I know caps can be confusing 😉

Out And About: A Smorgasbord Of Things

Disclaimer: The following observations are things I noticed during my time living in Holland.
They are in no way about certain people and the opinions stated are just that, my opinion.
I don’t mean to portray anything as a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ difference, simply ‘different’ then what I was used to.
😊😉🇨🇦•🇳🇱


As time goes by, I plan on sharing some of the things I learnt/noticed/experienced during my time living and traveling in Europe.

This is the fourth such post and I apologize in advance if I repeat some things, when moving around the different subjects.



Out and About: A Smorgasbord Of Things



After we leave the **cozy** Dutch home, we exit onto a small car port, generally occupied by… a small car 😉

(It became an exciting thing when we would spot an actual, real, big, truck on the roads😋)

Whether you walk or take the car (or you’re Dutch and take the bike), a grocery store is usually no further away then 5 minutes and the journey will be taken mostly on a cobblestone street.

How a rock, cut a certain way and laid in the ground can add so much charm? I don’t know, but it does😁

(Someday in the far future, Michiel and I plan on incorporating some cobblestone into our landscape so there’s a hint of Holland for him, in that very eye pleasing way 😉)

To the grocery store.
Those weren’t as hard to adjust to as you’d think.
From woman, that was usually the question I’d get, ‘Oh is it very hard to find groceries there?😬’.
The answer? Nope, for the most part it was pretty easy to find the things I usually looked for, once I figured out what was what, due to different packaging and looking for things much larger than they have available 🙈

Sour cream came in little, almost half cup sized containers and salted butter isn’t a very popular thing, so Mike had to look for it with me. Sour dill pickles were never found, after about three jars and some other failed attempts at locating any, I gave up.

The jar that had stated ‘extra sour’ was full of bologna (not literally) and they were still a ‘sweet’ pickle.

‘Paprika’ is probably the most popular chip flavour (it’s a flavouring found on many other things as well) as the other options are generally plain or cheese… I still don’t understand how Holland doesn’t have ‘Old Dutch’ potato chips, what could be technically more wrong? 😜

I did search long and hard for plain puffed wheat cereal (never found it) and corn syrup was no where to be seen and its substitutes weren’t as thick and also on the healthy side, so super expensive 🙈

Holland has one thing we never found anywhere else though… cold, carbonated , Lipton Iced Tea… HOW I MISS YOU 💔

Baking powder and vanilla come in small, paper packages of a couple of tablespoons worth and it took a special request to the vegetable man to get a spaghetti squash 😉

Leaving the store you’ll pass by the flowers but unlike here in Sask. where you avert your eyes and say, ‘No, I just bought $89 of groceries and a Starbucks to get me through it, I don’t need a $45 bouquet  flowers’, you’d probably say something more like, ‘Hmm, three bunches (normal to large sized) for €10?  ($15) Why not?!’.

(Though rarely would you catch me saying either of those sentences because I’m not a big flower person 😂🙈 This bouquet Mom and I made there one spring is the exception though 💕)

Going out of the store, possibly with flowers and groceries in hand, there is a good chance you’ll smell someone smoking, as it’s allowed to do everywhere there.

In Sask. smoking in public places/near entries etc. is not allowed and hasn’t been for quite a few years, so going from that, to a place where it’s quite popular, you do notice it a fair bit.

More so in Amsterdam then the smaller towns and villages.

But back to town/food stuff and less about the air pollution 😏

Certain days mean certain food trucks are around, depending where you are.
Our favourites were the loompia truck, fried spring roll like things which sound super delicious at this moment😬
The kibbling, which was fried fish with a special tartar like sauce and of course, the occasional cheese truck 😉👌🏻

And though it’s cold out and what I’d consider unpleasant to sit out in, many a restaurant/cafe has outdoor seating with some blankets (or not even) and people will be sitting outside, coats and scarfs on, being *cozy, sipping their warm drinks.

I never did that and I hope I never have to… they also have seats inside, for a reason 😜

They do have many restaurants there, though eating out isn’t nearly as popular as it is in Canada or the USA.

The variety in Europe beats both though, in the sense that you can easily find a Greek or Italian restaurant, owned and run by a true, Greek or Italian and the taste proves as much.

The Chinese restaurants proved to be a great disappointment to me though, having variety of dishes but all generally the same flavour, which wasn’t much flavour at all 🙈

The amazing Greek restaurants made up for that though 😉👌🏻

A Dutch’ snack bar’ is somewhere the younger crowd could be found grabbing a quick bite to eat.

Where fried foods and ice creams are made fast and cheap and it is something they grow up with and love.

My first few trips to a snack bar were a little sketchy and hunger inducing until I adjusted to the usually, slightly run down, cold atmosphere and found ‘snacks’ I liked, opposed to Mikes choices 😏

( They also have these scary looking, self-serve counters😜)

There are fewer, large chains and Starbucks are found few and far between.

If you’re going somewhere early in the morning and want to grab breakfast and a coffee to go… it ain’t happening.

That isn’t a thing that is done and it was a little hard for me to get used to, since I don’t like morning tasks and would usually opt for coffee on the road before thinking to wake up earlier to enjoy my cup of coffee at my house.

While I lived there, ONE drive through coffee place opened.

ONE.

If you are tempted to go into a ‘coffee shop’ to warm up and you’re in Amsterdam, proceed with caution 😏

A ‘coffee shop’ is a place to go smoke/buy drugs and or space cake and ‘plants’.
If you’re looking for the liquid, caffeinated, brown kind of coffee, you’ll need to find a cafe with a name, not a ‘coffee shop’ 😋

**Cozy.
One of THE most used words of a Dutch person😏
Actually they say ‘Gezellig’ and when translated the closest word is cozy.
Everything, is cozy.
Oh your house has a fireplace? How cozy! (that example I do understand).
Oh your house is small? So cozy!
It’s 4 in the evening so let’s turn off the lights, light candles and make it cozy.
It’s cold out so let’s drink coffee and be cozy.
You joining us would be cozy.

And on, and on 😉

You could say I really, don’t much like the word cozy anymore after having almost everything turned cozy for over a year 😉
If that’s their thing, great… but it’s just not something this Canadian could adjust to 😋

‘Go Big Or Go Home’ Home Edition

Disclaimer: The following observations are things I noticed during my time living in Holland.
They are in no way about certain people and the opinions stated are just that, my opinion.
I don’t mean to portray anything as a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ difference, simply ‘different’ then what I was used to.
😊😉🇨🇦•🇳🇱

As time goes by, I plan on sharing some of the things I learnt/noticed/experienced during my time living and traveling in Europe.

This is the second such post and I apologize in advance if I repeat some things, when moving around the different subjects, you can read the first post here ‘Go Big Or Go Home’ Kitchen And Surroundings

‘Go Big Or Go Home’ Home Edition.

So, once we leave the kitchen space of a *typical Dutch home, we head to the bathroom.

Where else would you go after being in the kitchen 😜

Anyways, they generally have one small bathroom near the entry as the houses kind of main bathroom/guest bathroom and that one contains a toilet and a sink.
A sink that fits one hand at a time, no joke 😳

(And it’s usually just a cold water tap)

They will have a ‘normal’ 😉 sized bathroom somewhere else, with a sink you can wash in, a toilet you can sit on without hitting your head on a slanting ceiling and usually a shower/tub of the size I’m used to.

Though I hardly ever seen a bathroom that had a fan in it?
They have brick houses, so humidity, post shower isn’t such a worry to get rid of as it is for our dry walled/wooden homes in Canada.  I guess the Dutch must not smell when they go number 2 either, because personally, I like a fan for that reason, be it my stench or someone else’s 😝

They are big on subway tile in the bathrooms and for the most part, they had an older, more sterile feel then the decorated bathrooms I was used to.

Having three bathrooms, all with a shower/tub and all diversely decorated in the home I grew up in.

I think it’s due to the fact that the homes last longer and can be years old by the time someone else moves in and if a bathroom is tiled and usable it would be one of the more costly/left last, to renovate places in the house?

Not really sure, if you know why, better, let me know in the comments! 😊

On to stairs… the blasted, narrow little slats sticking out of an almost upright incline. Continue reading “‘Go Big Or Go Home’ Home Edition”

Mingling Theatre Goers

Friday March 31st –



One last early morning… something I could readily say I wouldn’t miss 😜

Out we went and though we never seen as much the last two rides as we did during the first two, there was of course still very interesting moments 😉

Three rhinos crossed in front of us, a female, calf and a male who was trying to keep the female in his territory.

Calves generally stay about five years with their mom and she won’t breed again during that time, so the male was wasting his time.
That didn’t stop him from generously marking his territory as he crossed the road, spraying and dragging his feet through it.
It’s good we were a few yards away 😜

Also, we learnt that the rhino horns actually grow out of the same stuff as our fingernails?!

Multiple impala, wildebeest and giraffes were seen throughout each ride and usually a few zebras as well but that morning we got to see a bigger herd of them, including an adorable little baby😁

We stopped by a thorny bush and Chris pulled off a small branch for us to all take a look at. Continue reading “Mingling Theatre Goers”

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