the orange is abound

for those of you who don't know much about holland other than tulips, canals, and loose legislation on drugs, the national holiday is fast approaching.

30 april - queen's day

it's in honour of the birthday of the queen's mother, juliana, yet somehow the date stuck even after she was no longer queen.

http://www.whatsonwhen.com/sisp/index.htm?fx=event&event_id=20757

the holiday seems to be the perfect excuse to wear orange, as the family's founding father was william of orange...the royal family will visit a small town with a bit of fair-type atmosphere.

the other oddity of the holiday is that it's the only day in the calendar year that you're allowed to have junk sales without a permit...don't expect to understand it. just enjoy the cheap goods on offer!

p. s. - it tends to rain. LOL

a not-so-typical tuesday...

Our little family woke up late today (8:30), first Sofia and then the Saint & me in a panic that it was 8:30 and we hadn't gotten out of bed and i had to get to work. Then follows the typical scurry of rushing around to get the usual morning things done - get dressed, change Sofia, feed Sofia, get coffee, feed us, walk dogs, me leave for work...

Eventually, I got to work by 9:30 which isn't bad considering the traffic. Having realised long ago that it's not worth risking a car accident, I don't zoom on the way, either. Why on earth would someone think it is worthwhile? Better yet...why don't they realise it's not??

I could go into the annoyances of Dutch driving, but that would be repetitive if I mentioned it in the first post and it's not going to change no matter how much I investigate the topic, so I'll skip it in favour of something more fun. As 2008 is still fresh, I thought I'd do a list of things I never tire of, both cloggy and otherwise in nature. Here's a Top 10 of things that I'll never tire of, as I'm short of time to write more than 10 and you'd likely get bored of reading them...

1. Amazon.com will ship to the Netherlands - you may pay a higher postage fee, but it opens a whole new world to your door.

2. The friends I've made here, both Dutch and non-Dutch - I couldn't be as happy as I am here without them. Lesson learned - try new things if you're in a foreign country as it can lead you to great, new people who soon become great friends

3. Affordable great wines - the how and why is a mystery with everything else being taxed a rate higher than what I was used to seeing in Florida, yet wines are very reasonably priced and splashing out on an amazing wine will only set you back about $10 to $15. Who can argue with that?

4. Tulip fields in bloom - you've never seen a prettier or headier smelling sight that a tulip field in bloom. In the darkest of the winter months, I know it's around the corner and it keeps me going.

5. The variety of independant cafes and restaurants - it's something I would miss if I moved back to a smaller city in the USA where chains have nearly taken over everything!

6. Free range eggs - available in every supermarket for a mere 50 cents more than a caged one. Why would you ever buy caged??

7. Walking/biking to a selection of stores - if you live in any given Dutch city like I do, the chances are huge that you can walk or bike to find a little shopping centre within 10 - 15 minutes from your doorstep.

8. Reliable public transport - yes, there can be delays, but I've had very few problems when needing public transport here and I don't find the price to be overly expensive for the service.

9. Cheese, cheese, cheese - to be honest, I wouldn't have touched aged cheese (oud kaas) with a 10-foot pole before living in Holland for a few months. Once I tried it, I've never gone back and it's opened my eyes and taste buds to a whole new range of cheeses that I would've never had the nerve if I hadn't moved here.

10. Paying for supermarket bags - I don't mind it at all, because it makes you think about how much you're using. I don't know anyone here who doesn't recycle their plastic bags and reuse their supermarket bags until huge, gaping holes appear and you're forced to throw them out.

In my case, I use a bag made of recycled string. You can normally find them at any healthfood store available for purchase. That's where I got mine when I realised I was tired of paying for bags that I'd throw away. Not only am I doing something to help the environment by not throwing away plastic ones, it's easy to squish up and carry around in my handbag, so I've always got a bag if I need one. Why don't you pick one up the next time you need one? I can promise you won't regret it.

Probably should have done this ages ago, but so be it...

I'm going to attempt to document my own feelings and experiences as an American woman living in the Netherlands. I've been living in Holland for nearly 5 and 1/2 years. It seems like every year goes quicker than the previous one. Maybe that's maturity in the experience or just maturity, I don't know.


Here are the basics - I'm 38, I'm married to the Saint as my Mother and her two sisters call him, and we have a darling daughter named Sofia. She's really that cute, it's not just me being a biased parent. Anyone who meets her says the same thing.


We also have two dogs, a male lab named Henkie and a female mutt named Lija. Henkie was adopted from a Dutch animal shelter and Lija was adopted via a wonderful organisation here that rescues stray dogs from Bosnia.


We live in Utrecht, a city of 250,000 located very close to Amsterdam. By North American standards, it would be a suburb, but it's been around since the 1st century, so I don't think Utrechters would take kindly to the suburb tag.

Utrecht is in the 4 most populated cities in Holland for population together with Amsterdam, The Hague, and Rotterdam. These 4 make up an area known as the Randstad where the majority of the 17 odd million Dutch live. There's even a temp agency with the same name to give you an idea of how many of the jobs in the country are located in the area.

Traffic around here must rival a major city anywhere in the world. I'm not just guessing that fact, I live it 5 days a week when I drive to work. It's a 44 km commute (30 miles) and it can often take over an hour. That's not so bad you say...but here's the catch..I'm driving on motorways with posted speed limits of 100 - 120 km an hour. You do the math. It shouldn't take as long as it does.

I can promise to be honest, but I can't promise to post all the time.