Summer

Well better late than never.
Summer's finally here.

I got myself some spikey haircut this morning and at 1 we picked up the boys from school, together with Pieter who came to play and we headed off to the Kralingse Plas.
Couldn't remember when i had been to the beach there.
Ages ago.
It was a beautiful afternoon with sun and a bit of wind, sailboats passing by and
yes, sand everywhere.
But everyone is clean now and in an hr i'll go and pick up Joel from the airport.

ps; thanks to the blogger guys who fixed my template, coz i didn't do anything and now its ok again !!

Want to see what Sam lookes like?

That's the whole Hijstek bunch
(My sister said he had black curls but appears to me wishful thinking)

Want to hear some great stories?
Like i wrote before, when i called her Friday afternoon my sister hadnot had anything to drink or eat that day. Apparently you have to bring everything yourself to a rumanian hospital.
Marcel wasnot there either and A. was minding the children so Mars called Ella's (rumanian) teacher and another rumanian friend of theirs to ask if they could help T. out.
Both were refused at the entrance.
Don't know why exactly but Ella's teacher came prepared; she changed her clothes for a pyama and that's how she smuggled herself in (and maybe her bribing the concierge helped a bit too). T. said she almost wet herself when she saw the teacher entering in her PJ's.

And she was interviewed for the newspaper. Her gynaecologist had tipped a journalist that they had a Dutch woman in the hospital who had her fourth (in rumania woman get 1 child at most coz nobody can afford any more children) baby!!!
Breaking news.
T. said she'll buy extra papers to prove it.

Furthermore:

• painting is done at the back and almost at the front. It looks really really beautiful but i am so afraid of heights i get literally sick so after R. had seen me crying and begging to come down, we both thought it best i went somewhere else.
• and so i went to the Open Dag of the SKVR and registered for a fotografy course.
  

Sold to the final bidder

I sold my weddingdress this morning.

A young girl with her mother came over and she was actually the first one that fitted into it.

For € 450 she's got a real bargain (together with the shoes and a bra i paid € 1600) and I am a bit sad.
One day i would have liked to see C. in it, but hey i am the one who never had anything special with marriage and apart from some extra bucks i've definitely got more space in my closet.

*sigh*

The boys are staying over at my mother's so we're putting C. to bed around midnight, hoping she'll let us sleep in tomorrow morning.
You're right.
Fat chance

It's a boy !!

And his name is Sam (pronounced some, not sem).

Born 10.15 rumanian time, 2900 kg.

T. was at the hospital around 9 and gave birth 5 quarters later so it's been a rollercoaster but i spoke to her just now and she had the baby with her.
Although Sam was drinking, she hadn't had anything to ear or drink since she came in !

It's custom over there that mothers and babies stay for 4 days in the hospital but she had expressed her desires to the doctor on every occasion she had, that she wanted to go home asap, so there's a good chance she will be dismissed tomorrow!
My brother-in-law will be home around 7 tonight(he doesn't even know coz he's in the plane right now!) and for now A. is guarding the castle.

Hoorray for Sam !!!!

D-day

I've had one of the worst nights, tossing and turning with a knot in my stomach coz i thought my sister had gone into labour.
She called me this morning, her water had broken and after my phone call she was off to the hospital.
TTYL

Watskeburt?

So, to follow Watskeburt wat is niau?

• R. has been painting all the woodwork outside in between rainfalls. With massive woodfires in Portugal and enormous fluddings in east and central europe (34 ppl killed in Romania they said on the news yesterday) we're experiencing a normal Dutch summer. Lots of rain and from time to time some sun.
  Today we got ourselves a real creepy ladder and i am freaking out just seeing him go up on it, so I stay wisely inside.
  
• C. and I went over to Binnepret, the kindergarten she's been to before and registered her again, now as off her 3rd birthday. All the kindergartens in Rotterdam (at least this area) have become socalled voorscholen. Pre schools.
  With the high percentage of originally-non-dutch population and the fact that -still- a lot of the kids that entered the school at 4 didn't speak any Dutch, they have moved the idea of a real school to the kindergarten. Meaning the children have to go 4 times a week, including 1 or 2 afternoons to get them used to the afternoon part of a school and they sort of prepare the kids using the same themes (seasons, counting, days/months etc) as the first and second groups.
  So, other than keeping her at home, we have no choice then to send her to a preschool too.
  I did make an agreement on limitation of the days. (parts of it actually, 3 mornings and an afternoon or 2 mornings and 2 afternoons). For starters she'll go twice a week and after a few months , we'll see if she wants to go more often.
  
• After school (m. is doing fine at the moment !) i've taken the boys to the hairdressers and
  
• I made a new appointment with someone who's interested in my wedding dress. About a yr ago i placed an add on several sites offering my dress, and had some women fitting it, but it didn't really suit anybody. Actually i totally forgot about the ads untill this Femke mailed me 2 days ago and she 's coming this Saturday. We'll see. I don't even know if i wanna sell it.

• 
  

With A. gone to Rumania, the kids spend a whole lot of time behind the pc and T. is actually getting better at it than his big brother!

How many holes do you have ?

I guess M. was about 3 or so and we were having lunch at home.
My colleagues (pff, i'll look that one up with the spellingtool later) T. and J. were there and just as I was passing the butter on, M. asked what people were made off.

Of an egg and a sperm I said, actually managing to keep it rather cool.

Okay he said and ate on.

T. and J. let go of their breath and looked, rather disappointed, at M.

Two nights ago we took this a little further.
I don't remember why but I think it had something to do with them wanting to hear a story from several yrs back when M. was already there, but T. and certainly C. "didn't exist yet".

I agree.
Dangerous words -depending on the visitors you have- coz questions are bound to come.

Now M. was telling a story of how a baby comes out of a tummy, in some sort of an egg.
"Not like a chicken you know, but similar"
Ehh, M. it's not that babies come out in an egg, it's that they are "made" because an egg from a woman and a sperm from a man come together.
And here came the question we had been awaiting for a few yrs.

"Yeah, but how exactly do these come together?"

3 children and R. looking attentively to what i am going to say now.

Well, when a man and a woman cuddle these things come together.
"O yeah?
But how exactly?"

Hey, if you're asking for it, you're going to get it!
"Well, the man sticks his penis in the hole that the woman has for that."

"where the pee comes out?"

'No, women have another hole that is near there"

T.; 'So you have 3 holes; 1 for poop, 1 for pee and 1 for babies?"
I': "yes"

The boys among themselves now; hehe, i have only 2 holes and you C. how many holes do you have?
M,: but I have a slit behind.
I; "you mean, a buttock slit? Everybody has that. That has nothing to do with poop, pee or babies"
T.: O yeah, but in the middle of my slit is a hole where the poop comes out
Cannot disagree on that one of course and just while i was thinking this was all for now, M. strikes back.

"Eh, mom, but what do you mean about that cuddling?'
I; " you know, they kiss and hug"and I pull him towards me to give an example.
6 yrs and that's what embarrassed him and he didn't want to talk about it anymore !

To be continued no doubt.

Tears

The whole weekend had been a challenge for M.

After the scary video on Friday, he developed a stomach pain that mysteriously came and went, and looking outside at a grey sky (hey, we live in the Netherlands, better get used to this) and the thought that it might rain, was enough to bring him into tears.

From time to time he would crawl on my lap and cuddle with a shaking lip, wiping the tears from his eyes, saying he didn't know what was wrong but he didn't feel good.
He missed his best friends in Romania.
And he could do with a sandwich with peanut butter.
But then again, he had a terrible pain in his ribs.
And he wanted to play at Pieter's coz Pieter had such great toys and he had nothing to play with.
And maybe it was better if he slept at our place this night.
And T. had been at the computer for half an hour and he only for 5 minutes.

R. took them fishing (the plan was for eal, but somehow there turned out to be very little eal in De Schie ;)) and even during that he cuddled up to R. and after an hr thought it best to go home coz "mommy has been alone for so long now".
R. went to the gasstation to buy everyone icecreams, only to come back to the car to find T. consoling his brother that daddy was soon to return.

So this morning we had to use all sorts of convincing phrases to make sure he even went (without dragging him) to school.
R. took T. and C. into T's classroom and I went in M.'s class to speak to the teacher.
She said they use this video since 1998 and every yr there are about 1 or 2 kids who can't stand the one-eyed creature they use to explain things and those kids go off to the toddlers again.
They're showing that video only on Friday's, so for now, i could reassure M. he wasn't going to see it, but what are we going to do Friday morning?

Random talk

Ok. we're doing a quiz here.
Anyone knows who the following pieces of random conversation come from?

No!!! That is too tight. Auwauw, too TIGHT !

While seated on the toilet:
"daddy, what exactly does it mean if you work in a restaurant and the boss tells you you are fired?"

"I don't know why that is but it just seems to me, i sleep better while it is light than when it is dark on the hallway"

Yummie yummie, delicious.

I hate that stupid dragon egg. His leg and tail keep falling off and i wish i had never bought it.

The colour of money

Since his 6th birthday M. is
1. allowed to use a knife ("ik ben zes en ik mag een mes")
2. getting 20 cts pocket money a week.

I know.
20 cts doesn't really get you far nowadays but on the other hand; whenever they really want something we just give it to them. It's more to make him understand you simply have to wait and save money if you want to have something and some things are more expensive than others. Now he has been behaving like Dagobert Duck, endlessly counting his money and it just burned in his pocket and today he couldn't hold it any longer. He wanted to buy a dragon egg.
We went to Intertoys, to the counter, he put 30 cts on it and looked up to me, hoping to hear that was it.
After i urged him to keep on going, he said; even my little paper? (he had a 5 euro note).
Yes son, even your paper.
On the way back he was clearly divided and you could almost hear him think
Man, a dragon egg is the coolest, but it just stinks you have to loose your money for it.

Getting wiser doesn't always make you happier.

Schijn bedriegt

R. picked the boys up from school this afternoon coz he had taken A. to the airport this morning, and learned from M.'s teacher that he had been crying in class and was brought back to his old class.
First he said to us the rain and thunder (be glad you're in Rumania A.!) had frightened him but later on we found out this whole new week had gotten to him + don't know why but the teacher had shown them a creepy movie on tv.
He had sat on the lap of the kindergarten teacher and done a drawing over there and after half an hr he was OK again and went back to class.

so, apparently he was more nervous about this whole group 3 thing then he let us see and after a week it all came out. He is so perfectly innocent and adorable!

Waarheen leidt de weg die wij moeten gaan?

New York is probably off.
Although most of us working girls have (semi)working husbands, we also have non-working but nevertheless way too much money consuming, kids.
So, after some emailing to and fro I think NY will become some place in Europe.
And it turns out there's a whole blank (east) i haven't visited yet.



create your personalized map of Europe

Q. I should be asking is; do I want to go there?
I mean I have never been to Ireland too, nor to Sweden or Finland.
Or Iceland, or Portugal or ..

What do you recommend?
We're 4 girls all turning 40 this or next year and needing a break.
Think shopping, think wellness, think sun, think time for ourselves (I crave for reading a book for more than 1/2 page), think museum/historical sites. Any info heartily welcomed!

On a totally different level; you should have warned me!
Me and my big mouth trying to squeeze a wheater forecast into my sidebar.
Help.
Now my info is all on the bottom. Can i just try to pick a new (the same) template or will i loose my links then?
Anyone from blogger online?

The art of manual driving

A. will be leaving for Rumania tomorrow morning (remember my cunning plan from a couple of months ago? Well there you have it).
My sister is due in about a month and since she has had her other 3 kids at least 3 wks earlier, there's a fat chance this one will be born in a week or so.
Thing is, my brother-in-law is doing an international MBA and has to go to Dublin next week.
Great timing!
If he skips this part of the course he has to re-do it in 2 yrs and they will probably have other things on their mind by then.
Anywho.
A. is going over there to help. She is great with any kids of any age, my niece and nephews (or cousins, never get the hang of that one it seems) know her, they speak English rather well, A. speaks Dutch rather well, so No Problemo.

But, there's also a slim chance, A. has to drive their van one time or another.
Be it to bring my sister to hospital or take over coz my sis isn't feeling too great (remember any average 50 kilometer in Rumania takes you about 1 hr, coz of the state of the roads (bad) and the other traffic; horse-and-carriage or ancient Dasia (thus slow).

Now they have a manual and she was used to automatic. Was yeah, coz even before she left during the summerholiday I taught her how to drive in my Ford Focus. Small car, diesel and she was doing great.
But driving a van is a bit different.
Lot bigger and a lot heavier.

So Monday evening I threw the kids into their beds and we headed for The Spanish Polder.
A half-deserted industrial area where at night only hookers, cleaners and other ppl learning to drive pass by.
While there we swapped places and off she went.
She needed a little adjusting time and especially after we finally figured out we needed to pull down the handbreak, things went smoothly!
Really.
I did say that i though it would be a good idea to try it out in the real world too, coz that is what she will be doing in Rumania too.
Yesterday evening we were off again.

Now the thing with clutches and sticks is, once you get it into first gear, you'll probably keep driving. I mean you yank it over to second and third, but you have taken the first and most difficult bump to overcome: from nothing to first gear.
And the reason i am making this whole post at someone else's costs is that
1. it instantly brought me back to 20 odd yrs ago or so when i was learning how to drive (and hey, i'll admit it for all of my loyal 3 readers; it took me 4 times to pass my exam !!)
and
2. T. and A. will be such a good pair

See. I let A. drive home yesterday.
(Once again A; you were doing great ! I mean, i do understand i put you in some sort of a rotten situation just telling you you had to take left and then right and before you knew it you were on a major roundabout ;))
On some points, the engine dropped dead and she would nervously look in the rear mirror and restart it immediately and would drive off perfectly mumbling sorry sorry.

And this is exactly what my sister does!
She still nears a crossing (should i say intersection?) saying out loud: When nearing a crossing, Look Right and Left !!!!

I just imagine the 2 of them.
My sister holding her belly saying; Look Right, look Left
A. killing the car, saying sorry sorry (there's a chance my sister will be hanging out of the window to say this to the ppl behind them too, coz she used to 'sorry' all the time too) and then heading off.

I think i am going to instruct Job to record at least one of these situations and with my current blogging savvy-ness i'll audio blog that for you!

ps; what's this Flag thing doing in my blog?

T.'s first swimming lesson

For those of you with sharp eyes; he's the one on the very left.

Why is it that they pump up the heating in indoor pools during summertime to tropical temperatures so after having dragged the kids for 15 minutes along the Beukelsdijk, getting them into (tight) swimmingpants and waiting behind a 5 overheated-mothers-who-have-about-one-minute-left-before-the-lessons-start-line, you just sit there for dead, wiping the sweat off of your upperlip?

And as you can see, now that i've discovered the picture blogging, there's no stopping me.

whoooow, I am a photoblogging genius

Coz see, I can post pictures now !!!

My sister send me some pictures of Galia and her family which they visited during their holiday in Bulgaria. I have no idea if you're reading this Galia, but you look great!
I just showed them to T. at the office, i will have my mother look at them and everyone else who knew you while you were here!
Kisses for you, Slavi and Simona !

Show me the money

G. and Always Right have been organizing our skiing vacation for next year and came up with this hotel.

Looks good doesn't it?

It better, coz it costs a whole lot of money too!

354 euro a night to be precise.
Eh yeah.
That's what you get with 3 adults and 3 kids.
Skiing lessons not included.

R.'s jobdeal better get thru or M. has to found himself a krantenbaantje.

Back to school

Yesterday M. and I went into town to get his schoolstuff for this year.
a 17-inch multimap, very very hard to get with accompanying ruitjespapier (nowhere to be found) blanco papier (nowhere to be found) and lijntjespapier (last packet!), a very cool (namely Monster) gum, een lineaal, een etui, pencils and a sharpener. Let's just say The Lot.

Getting back he wrote his first name on the paper, just so everybody would know this map was his, and then wanted to know how to write his last name.
O and by the way, could i just teach him to write and read some more?

After we tried to explain this was not just a trick and could not be done in 5 minutes, R. taught him how to write the basics; I, fire, rose, nose, boos and bos.
O and tuinkabouter.
Coz it rhymed with Wouter, one of his schoolfriends.

Today when coming out of school, I asked R. to bring them to the office coz normally all i get out of them at dinner is;
Oh, school was OK.

Did you like seeing everyone again?
Yes.

And what exactly did you do?
Oh, i don't remember.

Right.
Well 5 minutes after the school bells rang, M. is losing interest fast coz all he managed to tell me, was he had learned how to write I (ik in Dutch) and then the phone rang and they where so distracted nothing else came out of them.

Jeez.
So much for quality time.

Much ado..

About nothing.
Don't have any big enough topic to make a real post 'bout it so I'll just give you my random thoughts for now.

Thursday night we all went out for dinner to one of the Bear restaurants.
Up till the last 15 minutes or so the kids behaved rather well.
R. said ; you either praise them for being good or scold them for being bad. There is never a restfull moment.

Holiday is almost over and M. is getting a bit anxious about Group 3 where he's going too.
Everyone has been telling him that this is for real now.
No more playing the whole day long, but learning to read and write.
So yesterday he wanted to practise Loco with words. He'll be fine.
I got him a new vest and he told me he wants to wear that coming Monday and show it to the teacher.
Actually he's wearing it now too coz he's at Pieter's party.
Pieter is the son of the sister of the man who's funeral T. has been to a couple of days ago.
I would read that one just once more too.

Yesterday we have been talking to A. and her (and J.'s) plans. Don't know if it's allowed to say too much about it, so I'm probably even less coherent than usual, but I can tell you; she has a cunning plan too and it involves someone from this household. Hehe.

I've made several enlargements (huh? Vergrotingen) from some vacation pictures and some are really cool. I've framed most of them and hope R. will help me hang them up today.

K. Back to ironing again.
A. might have done a load a few days ago but this is a neverending story.

Family ties

Beware people. This is one of my rare deep moments.

I loved Family Ties, with the guy that is now senile. And no matter what happened everything was resolved with humor and they would simply do "the good and wise" thing.

In real life, my mother has been trying to ruin herself for the last 2 decades and there's nothing we can do to convince her otherwise. I was talking to D. the other day (who's had and having her share too) about the fact that at least for the last 5 yrs or so, I have been really expecting a phonecall from police/neighbors telling me she had been found dead.
R. told me this morning that in fact it has come to the point that whenever i am talking to T. (my sister and co-worker have the same name, so he can't tell from just overhearing me) and something seems to be wrong (like when she called to inform about the break-in at the office last week) he assumes it has something to do with my mother.

His own mother's been accusing us of, well let's just say the weirdest things, mostly coming down to the fact that we weren't living our lives the way she wanted to.
Although we have seem to found a fragile way of dealing with each other, mainly coz she really has the children's interest at heart and they love her to pieces, it is becoming clear that babysitting 3 energetic kids is getting out of her league.
Are we to wait till she admits that herself?
T. had his hand slammed between the car door and the roof coz she let the 3 of them play inside the car (parked in a Busy street) while she did some groceries.

Am I being mean now?
Am I too hard on anyone?
If I know so well I'd better attend my own children instead of work? No I am not getting into that one. I am prepared to think of a lot of alternative solutions of anything anytime, but I am going to keep my work. Firstly because I love it. Secondly because it gets the bills paid. Thirdly coz i want to know whatever happens in my life i can support my children. Fourthly coz i didn't go to school all these yrs for nothing. Fifthly....
Now if I finally win that million it's a different story. But for the coming period i am a working women.

T. (co-worker) had a funeral service yesterday. A 47 yr old male friend passed away after having been in coma for about 4 wks, caused by meningitis.
Absolutely healthy before.
He has 3 children, a 15 yr old daughter living with him and his 24 yr old girlfriend.
2 boys, one of 17 living with his former wife and one of 18 who just entered college.
He separated from his wife 7 yrs ago but never got a divorce.
He was a well off doctor and his ex gets the whole lot now. The practice, 2 houses, several cars and loads of money. The girlfriend is out of a job (she was his assistant), out of her house (coz that belongs to the ex too), basically lost her nearby future.
T. said the daughter had made a very provocative speech in the church about how she only discovered love since last June (when she went to live with her father and his girlfriend) and how money can never replace love... You get the picture.

Man.
Family ties.

Cold turkey in France

G., our friend and accountant had become 50 a couple of weeks ago and invited friends and family over in a little castle in the French Ardennes.

The total weekend can be summed up as follows;
About 40 Dutchmen and 4 Frenchmen drinking from noon till 6 in the morning.

For the whole weekend i slept about 8 hrs.
The kids a little more but no more than 16 hrs.
C. had taken her duck and dummy out of the bag I packed that morning and left them at home so we gave her the cold turkey method and now she's off of the Speen. (under protest tho and only under the condition she is to get some cuddle or a doll today, coz she's a big girl now)

Not only do the French eat late. They eat f* late.
Saturday we started at about 21.30 and had our main course at 12 midnight!
We'd given the kids sandwiched with sprinklers by then coz they were out of control.

If you play a 'Murder game/Whodunnit" start early. To make a long story short, I had to team up with Jeeves, the butler and bribe several ppl into witnessing I was the only heir, but at 23.00 I was so tired I just hired mr. Sly (a thug, in real life being my husband) to murder the other 2 who were going for the heritage and thus safeguarding my interests.

But hey, just before we left I had P. send out the last mailing for LFF and we have 86 ppl joining us now!
Only thing is some registered more than a week ago and haven't been back since. Anyone any suggestions about how to get them back again? I think the site would profit from livelihood and more ppl sending each other messages.

What do you want first, the good or the bad news?

Ok The good.
R. 's got a J.O.B. !!!!
*yeah and other shouts of joy*
He can start the 1 of September. Only thing is A. is in Rumania by then, helping my sister out with the probably by then being born baby.
So we're officialy without babysitting help and with C. running around the house and the boys getting out at 3 pm from school we have a minor detail to be sorted out.
But hey, you absolutely, certain no way, hear me complaining.
I am very glad our life is getting back to normal !

And then the bad;
The office has been burglared again.
They tried to get in thru the window again and this time didn't simply smash it in but pushed the whole thing (i mean glass and kozijn together) in.
Apparently while doing so, it fell down inside, making a terrible noise (also breaking 2 flowerpots we had posted behind the window) and they fled.
Police came and someone put some wood in front of it to prevent any other assholes from going in and this morning i had a contractor put the whole thing back again.

But like the one we had had couple of months ago; nothing was taken!

Our insurance company did mail us a form to claim damage coz with the current rate of the office being broken into, something is bound to happen soon !
Oh the joys of living in the big city.

It's a small world

Just got an SMS from my sister; in 1 hr they have an appointment with Galia, our first aupair !
They are on holiday in Bulgaria and asked for her address this morning. I''am really sorry i can''t be there. I''d love to see her again.

And guess what. Last vacation day. We go off to visit a castle. We have a (french speaking) guide show us around. She says something of the paintings hanging there from Dutch painters and asks me if I recognize something in the painting. I say No, but i remember having heard from a bulgarian girlfriend (meaning Galia) that..
She didn''t even let me finish and reacted as if bitten by a wasp (weps the kids keep saying)
What, what, do you know bulgaria
Eh, well not really I know someone from Bulgaria.
From where?
Ehh, from Varna
Ohh, that is not possible, I am from Varna too !

Another thing.
At the last camping site in Montbard (some small village east of Chablis) there was a nice indoors pool next to our camping. The boys had been asking to go there from minute 1 so in the last day, R. took them under the strict rule they were to listen very closely (neither of them can swim).
Ok. so they turn out to have 5 baths among which one for small children. In one of the others they produce waves.
R. leaves T. at the small children one and goes with M. to the other one when he hears behind his back; Hi T.!
A boy and his sister who have judo with T.a nd M.
Live in our very own street in Rotterdam. Parents bought a house over in France 9 yrs ago and go there every summer.

There''s just no escape.

Children behind bars

Wow. Check this out

Contrary to all movements and advice I am only diversifying more ;)

I should stick to one subject

At least that is what this bouncer says.

And in a way I think he's right. So if I call my blog; the making of...a new business, i shouldn't bother you with my poop stories.

On the other hand this blog is about my life instead of only about LookingforFriends (where we have 52 registered users as we speak !)

What do you think?

easiest ofcourse would be to adjust the title.
I just might do that.