Happy Days – Week TwentyEight
Celebrating my birthday week with strawberries, walks, friends, and multicultural family traditions! 🎉🍓
Birthday week! Hoorah. 🥳 This week marked my 52nd turn around the sun on this little blue rock. Grateful for friends and family and health and love.
May 19 – Day 191
I have mentioned several times already that my gardening this year has been woefully hands off, but still it is bearing fruit - literally! We have our first strawberry of the season and I as able to pick it before the magpies got to it. It was a bit sour, but still delicious.
May 20 – Day 192
Went for a walk with Santi around our neighborhood. My stress level was pretty much off the charts, so going for a walk in the beautiful afternoon helped me calm down a lot. I am grateful for my husband and his calm nature. Even though I had a lot of work to do, it was in everyone’s interest for me to take the time to get out and walk, touch the grass, breathe the fresh air, receive natural Vitamin D and get out from behind my desk.
May 21 – Day 193
David and 2,500 of his closest friends and neighbors were doing their 4-day 10km walk this week. It a 100+ year Dutch tradition to get kids physically fit called “Avondvierdaagse” (four evening days). His school all had orange hats. The older kids walked 10km for three days and the last is 6 so they walked 36km in four days. Super proud of our boy.
This beautiful sunset on our bike ride home from day two was a delightful ending to a lovely evening.
May 22 – Day 194
My birthday was on day three of the evening walk. So, while the kids were walking 10km Santi and I had a drink and a brownie at a local bar. It was a nice date.
May 23 – Day 195
I have been working on a project for work and a large part finished on Friday in AMS. It was a super stressful process but it’s done. One part is finished but now there is lots of other work resulting from that step. It never ends. 🤣
I got back home in time to congratulate David on finishing the walk! This is a “still” from a video that was shared among the parents. So. Many. Kids!
May 24 – Day 196
The international women’s group throws several events throughout the year where many members get together and have a fancy-ish dinner. This spring social was at a lovely place, but it had to be in a tent because of Dutch spring weather (meaning rain). Even still it was fun and this fellow Californian and I got to hang out a bit. It was a lovey evening and even though Santi and I went together, we ended up getting a bit separated and had two different tables, but that way we got to interact with more people.
May 25 – Day 197
On Sunday Santi and I took a road trip to Zutphen - a small town just over 100km away to the east. It took about 1hr 20mins to drive. We met up with Argentine/Dutch friends of friends and had a lovely tour around the town. Santi made and brought homemade empanadas and it was especially poignant as it was May 25 - which is the beginning of Argentine independence in 1810.
We had a lovely wander around the city and saw the incredible city wall, much of which is still in place 900 years later. We went into the cathedral and while the library was closed, there was a partial replica where they have books that are chained to the reading podiums. Books were so precious, they were locked down.
This little kitty didn’t mind having its picture taken, but it wasn’t super thrilled either. 😀
I was talking with a Danish friend this week and mentioned Dodo and the Dodo’s and had to go back and listen to some of their music. Enjoy!