The year 2019 is almost gone!

Goodafternoon everybody!

We have still not really bad weather. It is a bit chilly, around 5-6C, sometimes a bit of sun. Not much wind, so that helps when you are outside, it feels not so cold when the wind isn;t blowing strongly.
During the night in the estern part of our country there is a tiny nightfrost, here at the coast we still haven;t that. Hoorray!

And how was your Christmas?
I can say ours was wonderful! Christmas day we took it very easy, did all in a kind of slow motion way and it was nice to do so. Later afternoon we unwrapped our presents from Miss Edna and we had a real good time with it. One present, no, two presents were reallt remarkable and good fun, Jan received a puzzle book with a Dutch wordsearch!! Isn't it funny to receive that from over the ocean?
And Miss Edna found me too  a fantastic thing. It is a cook book, titled The Art of Dutch Cooking, written by a Dutch lady, the Countess of Limburg-Stirum! Now how surprising is that! It is written in English, but with all kind of recipes of really Dutch things! From starters, to meat, fish and deserts, cookies etc.
Oh, I will enjoy reading that and I am sure I will try some of them.
We had lots more of things, like for Jan a warm and cosy sot pair of lounge trousers, and some yummie cookies, and I received an address book, a pretty shawl, socks, and also a lovely, sweet lookijg with on a brrom! And we had more, so she made our Christmas very special.
And I sneeked in also a present for Jan this year, a small bottle of aftershave of his favourite scent. He didn;t buy it for himself the last few years, because it is not really cheap, but I thought this year we had the opportunity of having a some more money, it was about time to do this. And he was really happy with it.
After we finished the unwrapping, slowly I started to make our dinner. And I can say it was delicious, all succeeded so well, during the savouring of it we watched a wonderful show on tv. Then we had a bit later our cup of coffee with some oh so yummie bonbons, and all was well and cosy.
Next day we went to my friend Heidi early afternoon to have a cup of coffee. I made her the stew pears and she was happy with them(I know she likes them a lot). It was a nice visit, very relaxed, I think we spent there may be two hours, may be a bit more and then went home again.
That evening we had a soup for dinner and then some french bread with all kind of meats and some cheese, also very tasty and also very easy to prepare LOL.
Looking back I can say we had a lovely Christmas.

And then suddenly, after looking forward to it for so long, it is over in a light flash! The days after we also took it rather easy, took all as it came or as we liked and now is left only one holiday this year, New Years eve and new Years day.
Tomorrow I will go out to buy us some of the traditional "Oliebollen" and "Appelflappen". I still don;t know really what we will have for dinner on New Years Eve. It will be something quick and simple for sure.

It was a kind of rollercoaster year for us, lots of things happened (as well good as less good)and some changes took place. I just can hope and wish that next year will be less of a bumpy ride and that for all our health stays in order. We surely can use that for some time.

It is all for this year. I hope you all will have a fabulous New Years Eve and good start of the new Year and I am wishing you all the best and good luck for next year already. Thanks for your visits this year, hopefully you will come back next year?
Take care of yourself and you loved ones, life is so short, take advantage of the good moments and cherish them.
Till next year!!!!

Christmas is almost there!

Goodafternoon everybody!

Ourweather is still not bad, today it is somewhat cloudy, during the night there was some rain, but temperatures daytime are still around 8C and at night also above zero, so that all is rather good. There are other places on earth where people do have cold temperatures, and like in Australia they would be happy with some of the rain.
That really is a disaster for all living down under! I hope the fires will be soon under control and that they will get some lower temperatures.

This week I did every day something. Sounded like a good plan it it worked rather well.
I am happy with myself that I settled two things that were really necessary on financial side. Now I can sleep relaxed, knowing it is done.

Finally on Wednesday I went to the hairdresser to get a severe haircut. Oh my God, how good it feels to have your hair in good order, short and easy to maintain LOL.

Almost every day I did some grocerie shopping, most of it for Christmas, and I am almost done for that. There are just a few small things I have to get tomorrow, like some bread and lettuce, and one or two fresh herbs. That you just have to get almost the last minute.
Shall I share with you what I have in mind for our Christmas dinners? Why not?
Christmas day we will have a prawn cocktail as a starter(with tiny little shrimps, called here Dutch shrimps (very confusing shrimps and prawns), made with a whisky sauce.
Then we will have big shrimps(or prawns) just quickly fried in the pan, I will marinate them first in some oil with a lot of garlic and some fresh dill and parsley. We will have a salad as side dish, may be a few slices of baguette to dip in the marinade. And probably for desert some stewed pears(but that could change still in something else).
photo shrimp 1

Shrimp two looks a bit like this

Second day( that is called Boxing day if I am right?) we first will visit my friend Heidi in early afternoon to have a coffee together and a little chat. I will bring her some of my stewed pears in a glass jar, that she can use later to put some flowers in or burn a candle in it.
Our dinner that evening will be very easy! I have a ready made soup, asparagus with fennel and parmesan cheese, then we will have slices of French bread(baguette) with several delicious meat in thin slices, like a special salami, a dried ham from Spain(which is rather salty), one or two sorts of French cheese and some slices of smoked salmon. All that will be left over from that, we can have the next day or may be even days. LOL!
I hope there will be a good Christmasshow on tv that we can watch during our meal(s), I didn't really looked for it in our program guide yet.
And of course on Christmasday we finally can open our presents, that our calling out to us already for 3 weeks or so. I don;t mind, really, it is just such a happy sight when I look at our Christmas tree with the presents under it, all wrapped up in beautiful paper, some even with bows on them. Lovely!
And the best always is the anticipation, the waiting for it!

That is about all I can tell you about this week.
There is only left one thing for me to do and that is wishing you all

                                           MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

A bit of a sad day.

Goodafternoon everybody!

I am not really in a mood to do a lot  writing today.
Let's go to the weather report first. It has been not too bad, we had some rain(yesterday quite a lot) and some days the wind was really strong. Even this morning it was blowing too much to my liking.
But later on this week it should get better, even some higher temperatures, around 10 or even 12C, which is nice.
The longer the really cold weather stays away, the better(at least for me LOL).

I had a quiet week, although I have the feeling I did quite a lot of things(I probably did so, but nothing worth really remembering I guess).
Trying to get all things for Christmas, mostly the food, as much in advance as possible, and every day or two I find something to go into the "Chrïstmas dinner stash".
Also did send away some Christmascards. It almost isn't funny anymore to send cards, because the stamps are expensive and get more expensive every year. Still I find that getting "real"post, so I mean envelopes in the mailbox, is lovely.

Although this Friday we had a sad news envelope in the mail. It was a card announcing the passing away of an old friend. We didn;t have much contact, but every now and then we had a phonecall, or little email. We knew him already for about 20-25 years. And today was the funeral service.
So Jan and I went to it, of course, it was rather early in the morning, at 10.00a.m.
Again one person of the""old group" that passed away . There aren;t many left anymore of that group that knew eachother because we all went to the same pub in earlier days. And some of them met also outside the pub. Like a smaller group that came to Christmasdinner at our house for several years, or even went on holiday with eachother.
At moments like this morning, you notice more that you are growing older.
A funeral is part of life, but still it is a sad moment.

Okay, hopefully next week I will be here with a more uplifting post.
Wishing you all a lovely week.

Christmas is in the house!

Goodafternoon everybody!

Weather here is quite good, today there even is a bit of sunshine, temperatures are around 8C, there is somewhat more wind. During next week temperatures might drop a wee little bit, but there might come more rain. All in all we still cannot complain.

Last week I fnally did a task that was on my to-do list for a longer time. I had a phonecall with the tax office to settle a thing, it didn;t take long, the lady at the phone was very helpful and all is done as it should be. I aso did almost finish another task, have to do the last bit somewhere in the next two weeks and yes, I will do that, and then the annoying but necessary things are done(only tax stuff has to be assembled like every year, but that is for February/March).
I was happy with myself when mentioned things were done. The second task will not take long now because I had a very good phonecall and also chat by net and now i know how to do it. Sounds kind of mysterious perhaps, but it i all in the financial corner, part to do with pension, part with kind of tax.

Then last Tuesday jan had the appointment with the cardiologist, finally.
Outcome: nothing to really worry about, Jan has a bit of cholosterol too much, but he is taking medicin for it and there are no disturbing results of the small test done. Still the cadiologist wants to see Jan in another 3 months to talk through how he is feeling. The doctor knew Jan had a surgery not long ago and still is reovering from it, so he wants to give him time to do so and see how his condition is in 2 months time. Seems this cardiologist was  very nice man, easy to talk to and making some sense too. Well, if Jan says so, it has to be really a good doctor, someone who takes some time to listen and to talk, even if they are very busy and have terrible tight schedules.

Thursday was the holiday of Sinterklaas. We didnt do much about it, we watched on tv a nice show with Sinterklaas in it, it was rather funny and amusing. I just had some special sweet things, like little marzepan balls, and an almond pastry, as on this photo:

During the day Jan and I already took down the boxes with Christmasdecoration, so we could carry them into the room the next day.
And on Friday we started the decorating. We didn't start too early in the morning, but around noon we began. Gosh, every year I got surprised how long it takes to get everything done andwe didn;t manage to finish it that day, so Saturday till mid afternoon we needed to get everything done. I must say I was quite pooped out. Nevertheless, the result is great again and it lookes all very cozy.
And now I could place all the presents I got from overseas under the tree! Okay, we have to be patient till Christmas, but it looks so nice!

So today I ordered myself to have a lazy day! I need to do that to kind of protect myself, LOL.
In the morning I sat at the couch and looked a bit of tv, very late morning I finally took a shower, and then sat down again, to have a little bite and watch some more tv(speedskating this time) Then it was time to make my blogpost.
When I will have finish there still is some cooking to be done, but I will not do something difficult, it will be very straight foreward for today.

I still had some time this week to get some more into Windows 10. Mostly I read a few tutorials, or small classes, and some of them were very nice and easy to understand. I will not rush into things, slowly does the trick(I hope).
I am already ever so happy with the speed of my new laptop. It is a difference of day and night to the old one!

Now I will have to think of the dinner for Christmas, I want to get the things I might need quite in advance, so that I don't need to make the grocerie shopping the last few days, because then it always is sooo crowded everywhere.
Good, that's for next week, now it is still  "lazy time", for a little while anyway.
Perhaps I will do a quick solitaire game, then prepare the simple dinner as much as I can(you know,peel the and cut te potatoes, cut in parts the broccoli and putting in the pan, season the chicken breast filet), so that around dinner time, there isn't much more to do then really cook and fry the things.

Wishing you all a lovely week, and stay safe!

Windows 10 isn't bad, but will not be soon my friend!

Goodafternoon everybody!

Weathr here isn;t bad, it is a bit colder, daytime around 5-6C, night about zero in our aerea. Today it is rather friendly, with some sunshine and some blue sky, no rain expected. Well, just about the kind of weather this time of year(although I remember others years, that it was much colder and we had snow and frost).

It has been so mild with the weather that some of the daffodil and tulips bulbs we planted already show up above the soil! It can do no harm, but if they grow more and suddenly there would come a very cold period, I don;t know what harm that could do to them. Oh well, we will just have to wait, to see and accept.

Last week I spent some time here and there, to get somewhat familiair with Windows 10. Some things aren;t so bad, but there is still a lot I have to figure out. Good there is internet where you can find lots of things that can help you, but still the fact remains I am not really good in it and never will be, so several things look difficult or to me and have long explanations and there I mostly get lost LOL. It needs time and for all patience and a bit of courage to. Hmmmmm, I have the feeling I am lacking on two of those(the last two ROFL).
Never mind, somehow I will get there.

Oh, I was in the city this week, I had to find myself a nw pair of shoes. I have one pair, that is really at the end(but they still walk so good, however, they don;t look good at all anyore) and I have another one that has a little leakspot somewhere in the bottom, so when it is raining slowly I get one wet foot.
Lately I already looked around but it is difficult to find, because I have very small feet and have to look a in the child departement. Nowadays it isn;t that bad, but still hard to find something to my liking and also fit well and comfortable. Perhaps I could find more on the internet, but I like to try on before I buy and I hate it to have to send back and order again etc.
This time I was lucky, I found a nice pair of shoes, more the sporty looking kind and there was a discount of 50% on the price because the shop had Black Friday week!!! So I have a nice pair of shoes for very little money. And if they only will last one year they served well for that money.

Also I made finally time to make a visit to Heidi. Good I didn;t go there the week before because she told me she had been ill. I was angry with herfor not letting me know. And then she always starts laughing, when I say that kind of thing. I think she doesn;t let me know(unless it is very serious)for not letting me worry about it. Very kind of her, but sometimes I better like to know, and perhaps I can do something for her. Lucky she has her mother living very nearby, so she can ask her to do some shopping, or walking the dog, but I wouldn;t mind to do that too. May be not every day, but once or twice, so that her mother can do other things, you know.
She felt much better this week and it was ever so nice to see eachother again and have a good chat about lots of things, some not serious, some of more importance. It is good to have someone you can trust completely and tell whatever is on your mind.

I also made a start of doing some important stuff, that should have been taken care of already but the hospital stuff of Jan intervened that and then it takes me some time to get less stressed again, and then I have to gather courage to pick up the phone and have conversations abut subjects I am not all to familiair with. Perhaps some of you have the same.
Now next week I have to finish it.
And what comes then???? First the holiday of Sinterklaas, but we don;t do much about it and the day after, that will be the 6th of December Jan and I have to start decorating for Christmas. Perhaps it will take a bit more time, because Jan still has to take care to not lift or stretch out too much(although it is going well with him), which doesn't matter. And I will have to start thinking about our Christmas meal this year. At the moment I have no idea yet, it will come to me suddenly(I hope).
Then I got news that a Christmasbox I sent rather early, already arrived at the address! Wow, the post really did it's best this year! Now I pity the receiver having to wait that long before she can open the presents!
Have patience and courage and perseverance, my dear LOL!

Well, this is about all there is to tell for now. Next week Jan will have an appointment with the cardiologist, at last! That to hear about the results of the test they did about 4 month ago or something like that. Well, I suppose result wasn't alarming, otherwise they would have let him know something much earlier.
So with all things to do next week, I think I will be quite busy. And also a friend called last week that he wanted to pay a visit coming week.
We'll see how much of the planning will take place, hahahaha!
I think my washingmachine is ready with the program, so I have to hang out the laundry and then I will have still a moment to perhaps play a little solitaire and then dinner has to be made. Very easy today, because I prepared the large part of it already yesterday. Just have to warm it up in the oven. Tadaaa!
Wishing you all a safe and wonderful week!

This post is done on a new laptop, yeah!!!

Goodafternoon everybody!

Weather is nice today, it seems. When I look out ot the window, I see a bit of blue sky, even sometimes some sunshine. Temperatures are around 9C at the moment which isn;t very bad.

So last week Jan and I went to a shop to look for new laptops and we did found two. Yes, we bought after some discussion both a new one.
We have quite a big screen which is pleasant to work with, I think it is 17 inch.
Mine is a bit "heavier one"than the one for Jan. With the PSE I want to install again and some other things I do, I wanted one that could handle it without getting right away slower.
Jan mainly uses his for reading the news on internet, or searching things on the net he wants to know more of, that kind of thing and for doing a few simpeler games. So he didn't need one like me, we thought.
Good, it took a bit of time in the shop to let them at least install the starting stuff for Windows(we had to pay a little bit for that, but I didn;t mind, it saved me a lot of stress already, hahaha and in the ened the salesman forgot to put it on the bill, and when he noticed it, he let if be, nice hey?)
Now I am every day some time busy with getting around in Windows10, at least to put on the most necessary things on it, like installing Firfox as browser, then figuring out again how I installed all the see=ttings for it and every time it is a little struggle again!!), but I managed in the end, pffff. I must say that I don;t like the new starting menu from Windows 10 with the apps. They are very small, and I cannot help it, but I liked the starting menu in Windows 7. Perhaps I just have to get used to it, but that will take some time.
And I have to do it twice, some of the things, also Jan's laptop has to have e.g. Firefox and such. I have to do it, but I don;t like it. There are lots of people who have no trouble(or not much) with all those installations and settings and more, but I am not one of them.
Well, I am only busy with it for 3 days, so that;s not long, but I get tired of it.
I just will have to do it slowly, and then I will get there I hope.
Already happy that I make this post and read some blogs and the more difficult stuff will follow.

The "stormy"weather here in the house has left us, most of the time LOL! Oh, at times there are still some .........how shall we say it........ disagreements, but not as much anymore and not as longlasting either. So all together it is going better.
Just yesterday I went to my friend Heidi's house to take a little walk with their doggie, as she asked me too. The family had a day out and so Tom(that's the dog) had to have a walk in the early afternoon. Of couse he was happy to see, all the more because he knows he always gets a few treats when we get home again(and I always give him a few more than he normally gets, yes, I am a softy).
Pity it wasn;t as good a weather as today, because yesterday it was colder and some more wind.But it was okay, and also good for me to be out with the dog for a moment, it freed my brain from computerstuff for a wile!

Today I made it easy for myself for dinner, We will have a ready made soup out of a can(peasoup the Dutch way) and I will put in it an extra smoked sausage and that should fill out stomachs enough.

Well, I think that is all for today. There is  a World Cup speed skating on this weekend and if I hear it well, it is starting now on tv, so I will end now and have some fun with watching the skating.
You all have a wonderful week!

Moods have been a bit better to handle., LOL!

Goodafternoon everybody!

it is really late afternoon in our time zone, I have been lazy and busy during the day. I wasn;t up all too late actually, but then I sat down on the couch with my morning tea,watched a bit tv, had a sandwich, and then my eyes just wanted to shut, so I took another short nap!
When I woke up I made coffee, and by that time Jan woke up,so we both were rather late. After the coffee we watched some speedskating(it was the 1st Worldcup), that took some time(and it felt soooo good, not having to rush).
Then I made dinner preparations, I have for this evening stewed beef, we will have boiled potatoes with it and I;ve made some apple compote. Also made stewed pears for dessert. Well, you see, I've been lazy, but also busy today.
Oh well, we can have sometimes some lazy moments. It is also good to take the time for it every now and then.

As I mentioned in the post title, the moods are a little bit better to handle. Although this week there were moments of less quality, in all it was going better LOL. Let's hope this trend of going better will continue, hahaha.

I already sent away a Christmas box this week! Yeah, it was filled and ready, all presents were wrapped, so I though I better send it away now. Perhaps  somewhat early, but I can remember one year, that it took around 6 weeks to arrive and that's no fun at all. So better a bit to early arrival than too late.
Now I am curious to find out how long it will take.
If it arrives early, the poor receiver will have to wait a few weeks before opening the presents. It is kind a bit sadistic, thinking of it. Or isn't it??????
But I know the receiver will be good and wait till Christmas.
I always do that too. I might receiv e presents early for Christmas, or perhaps for my birthday, I always wait till the day it was meant for, really! But it is sometimes hard to do, I acknowledge that too.

It seems still far away, Christmas, but in about 5 weeks it wil be there!
Soon it will be time to get out the Christmas decorations again. We always wait till Sinterklaas has returned to Spain after his visit here. Yesterday it was actually the day he arrived in the Netherlands. Oh, I am sure a lot of kids are slowly getting nervous and enthusiastic at the same time. It is such a wonxerful time for the little ones! I can remember well Sinterklaas time from my youth.
And at the 5th of December it was usually the day we got our presents. Not just handed over to us, oh no! In the early evening suddenly the doorbell rang and there was some banging on the frontdoor. Then we went looking(hand in hand with our parents, because it was a bit frightning too) and there stood a bit bag or sometimes basket with a lot of presents in it. It was such fun to open them, and with a lot of them there were little rhymes attached that we had to read outloud before opening the present( that of course when we were a little bit older and were able to read easy). And when still very young, we never noticed that just at the time of the doorbell ringing, our father was in the kitchen or at the WC, or something like that. Sometimes it could also be a friendly neighbour who did the ringing. Wonderful times and priceless memories.

Okay, it is going towards dinner time, so I better finish now this post and in a few moments will make the last preparations for dinner.
Have a lovely week!

Has the weather something to do with our mood?

Goodafternoon everybody!

At the moment we  cannot complain about it, it isn;t very warm, around 8-perhaps 10C, at daytime, but mostly we have sunshine periods, not too much wind, although there are sometimes some rainshowers, of course.
But on the whole, it isn;t yet very bad.
Nevertheless..... I am wondering.
I know that sometimes weather can play with our moods, but although we have rather bright weather(disregarding the fact, that it becomes dark already in the late afternoon, yak!), it seems that the lowering in temperature has effect on some husbands moods!!
Jan is very irritable the last week or so, any minor thing that happens, makes him fall out, I cannot say anything or he reacts not too nice, and as reaction to that, I also say sometimes things not in a nice tone, well, you know how that works.
But really, the most small thing can have this effect on him at the moment, so it is rather difficult to sail through his moods at the moment.
But I had a phonecall just two days ago with my friend Heidi and she has the same problem with her husband, LOL!
so we both wondered if the weather had something in it to cause it.
I know I sometimes can be picky on Jan, him being rather a stubborn person, not giving in quickly, I am keeping a watching eye on him, because I just worry and want him to feel good and as healthy as possible with his medical conditions.
Perhaps I am doing that at times too much, but good heaves, sometimes he can react at things, .............................................
I think everybody recognizes it, it happens to all of us at times I suppo, and it solves itself most of the times without problems, but you know, there are times that it is just too much and I feel like exploding ROFL!
Good, that's off my chest, it will not really help, but somehow it's feeling nice, hahaha. I think next week it is time for Heidi and me to meet, have a cup of coffee, talk about that problem, and all the things happened, and after that chat we both feel a LOT better. You just need sometimes someone to talk to, about anything that happenes in your life and Heidi and I have that kind of friendship.
I am lucky to have her as a friend.

Between all those irritation moments(giggle), it was also a rather nice week. I cannot mention anything really special that happened, but I managed to get quite some things done, that were already on my list for some time, mostly things in the house, a few little jobs in the garden, etc.
 I hope to be able to go shopping for my laptop next week, time is running a b it out now, for changing to windows 10.
It would be nice to have a laptop that will start withing 5 minutes or so(mine is taking around 15 minutes or even a bit more!) and where I can work again with my Photoshop elements program(hopefully it will work on windows 10, because it is already quite an old version, PSE 8).
I already have made our dinner, I've made cannelloni in bechamel and tomatoe sauce(the cannelloni are dried ones, that you can fill with minced meat or whatever you want, and they will cook in the oven in the sauce in about 20 minutes). I will make a simple sald to it from cucumber and tomatoe to it and for dessert we have stewed pears. We both love them and it is the season to buy and prepare them. It is easy, doesn;t take very much time.

My bottle gourd was delicious, and I still have enough left to make one or two more meals of it. Oh, last week I also made once stuffed peppers, which is also easy to make. So you see, I am busy also with cooking, I just love to have that oven again, it makes life easier. You can prepare a meal or part of it in advance and you just have to finish it in the oven in the evening.

The parakeets are coming back again too. First, some time during summer, we had just two or three visiting us, but nowadays there are sometimes 7 or 8 at a time! To it the tits(not always, but they do come) a lonely robin, lots of sparrows, it is sometimes real traffic in the garden. And there are also lots of pigeons and crows or perhaps jackdaws(is that a birdname?). That are the ones i donlt like too much, because the snatch away the food for the parakeets and others. I know, they also have to survive, but they sometimes scare away the little birds and I don;t like that. So at times I am like a guard, watching into the garden and when I see those pesty birds, i scare them away LOL. It is almost an impossible job, but helps a bit.

Good, that is it for now, I hope to soon type a blogpost on a new laptop, where everything will go much faster way. It also takes ages to start up my email, so that would be nice too to have a quicker upload of the program.
I wish you all a lovely week and that everybody stays safe( I saw the bushfires in California and Australia on the news, aweful!) and healthy!
Till next week.

Mostly a rather quiet week, hoorray!

Goodafternoon everybody!

We have rain at the moment, nt heavy, but dripping. Possible that in an hour or so it will be dry again.
Temperatures are still not really bad, around 12C, and at times there is some sunshine and then it all looks rather friendly.
Hope this will last for much longer, so that frost and snow stay away as long as possible LOL.


I don;t have too much to tell actually. It was a rather quiet week, and that was so nice to experince again hahaha.
here was only one day, Jan just did a bit too much and he felt that the evening!
I had warned him, but you know, hubbies tend at times not to listen to us.
Okay, next day he took it easy and he felt much better.
He can do little jobs every now and then now, but not for too long. I knw that irritates him, I think he feels a bit useless by it, but he just has to take care of himself after that operation and that takes time.
It will go better slowly, in a few weeks he wil be able to do much moore again.

Did you have a nice Halloween? We don't do anything about it, but I always go out in the evening in the garden to see if my friend Edna's is flying over and wave her a hello and goodbye LOL. This year she flew together with her daughter and that it was nice to see they both had a wonderful time in the air.
Tomorrow my friend Edna will have her birthday! If you have time post her a birthday wish on her blog. She will love that!
I did sent her a little birthdaypresent and card which by wonder arrived at time!
Sometimes the post does a good job too.

Have to go to the kitchen now to look at the meat I have on the gas. It is meat that has to stew for some time to get really tender. It is more a dish for Jan than for me, but that doesn't matter. I try to make different things during the week and once it is more to my taste and the other time more to Jan;s taste. And there are also things, of course, both of us like evenly.
May be there will be meat left over from today and then I think I wil make it into a one-pot thing. I have a bottle gourd, which I can dice up (or part of it), with some paprika, mushroom, onion, put that together in the oven for about 20 minutes, oh, may be even put some potatoes to it) and in the last 5 minutes I can add the meat to it and we have a delicious dinner. It isn;t much work, doesn't take too much time, what do you want more?

Good, that was it for today, hopefully I will have some more to tell about next week.
In the mean time i wish you a wonderful week.

It was a bit of strange week I dare say!

Goodafternoon everybody!

Our weather is still not really bad, although now it is changing and probably getting a bit colder later this week. There was some rain, but most annoying was the wind, which was at times stormy.
However it stills seems nice enough for some blooms to persevere, LOL.

The week started kind of well, Jan was doing fine, and I was happy about it, of course.
He even felt so well that he even tried a little outing to the market(he went there by tram) and had a nice stroll there. I think he did a bit too much, because he still has to be careful because of the wound(more the inside than outside, because that looks good).
That was on Wednesday, and at the same time i went to city centre to do some almost last Christmas shopping, which was rather succesfull. I was back home late afternoon and I felt my legs, pfffff!!
That evening I already saw that there was something not fine with Jan, nothing to really worry about, but he wasn;t feeling 100%.
I thought may be that it was because of his walk, that was a bit too long and straining perhaps.
Next morning he felt worse, he thought he might have strained a muscle the other day that caused the pain he felt.
Well, I went for a quick grocery shopping and coming home asked how Jan was. But I already saw it wasn;t very good and he told me the pain he had was more in the area of the kidney. Okay, I didn;t want to wait longer and because our doctor was mjust that week on holiday, I straight away called emergency from the hospital and asked what to do. I explained about Jan, that he he this surgery not long ago and with his medical background I worried too much to wait for a doctor. They said we could come over right away.
So we took a taxi and there the whole circus of tests and waiting started again.
After several hours also a number one doctor came by to examen Jan and wanted some more photo's and an echo too.
By that time jan had a painkiller, because he really had severe pains. That helped a bit. But it seemed Jan's pain and cause of it was a great mystery to the doctors, yes really!.
They didn;t know what to do, so at the end(we were there from 02.00 p.m. to 11.30 p.m., can you believe it?) they said there was no direct cause of medical urgence to keep him there, so we could go home. The pain was a bit less by the time, but still Jan wasn;t feeling really great.
Good we went home and hoped for the best. (they gave us however the advice, that if it came back or got worse or whatever we could come straight away to the emergency again).
Finally Jan did get some sleep during the night and next morning the pain was about 90% less and during the Friday vanished as in a miracle!
And nothing more during the weekend. so we were as much puzzled by it as the doctors!!! Perhaps all together Jan was perhaps right that it was a strained muscle or perhaps a nerve and by the painkiller he got it got "unlocked " again.
who knows????
We just hope this was the last of it and that we dont have to go back to emergency for a very long time!

I probably was so full of adreanaline from that long day in the hospital and all, that I got a burst of energy on Friday and did a lot of housekeeping jobs LOL!
I did a laundry, I made a soup for the evening, I cleaned the floor of the kitchen, cleaned the toilet, oh, vacuumed cleaned the house, and then I though it was enough and I sat down and almost didn;t move anymore the rest of the afternoon and evening, hahaha.

And so I ordered myself to keep it very easy on Saturday and also today, to reload myself again to have a good start on Monday again.
Yesterday evening I enjoyed watching the Strictly come Dancing on the BBC again. The couples that remain now are really getting fantastic and the show of yesterday was wonderful, it was the Halloween-special. Oh, I aways love the costumes and decors, the people responsible for that are real artists!

I am also looking around for a new laptop, I hope to find one next month without too much trouble. It will cost me a bit more money, but i decided I better buy a complete new one this time.  A new one will hopefully last a bit longer than a second hand one. And of course Jan also needs one with with the Windows 10. I still don;t know if we will buy the official windows 10 program and put it over the windows 7 on his laptop, or just buy a new one too. Or may be we can find a good second hand with windows 10 for a nice price.
That will be the project for next month, among other things.

I also made a very quick visit to heidi and her hubby Danny this week, just to see how he was doing after his operation. Happy to say, that went well and he just has to recover now. It will not take all too long.

Good, I don;t think  have more to ramble about today, so I better finish this post.
Time to have a cup of tea and sit down some more(LOL), and later I will have to hang out the food for our birds, some apple pieces for the parakeets and also some small portions of peanuts in a little net, and of course some seed for the sparrows and tits(but also the parakeets like it, the raskals!).
And sometimes, when I look out of the window,  suddenly see a little mouse, enjoying some of the seed the birds spread around. He is so cute. And he stays cute as long as he stays outside!

I wish you all a wonderful week to come, to you who celebrate Halloween: stay calm and have lots of fun, and to all of you, stay safe and healthy, please.
Till next week!

All is going well till now!

Goodafternoon everybody!

We´ve had some colder weather, quite some rain, still all together not so bad for the time of year. And I saw on the weather report that next week we might even reach temperatures around 17C, with almost no wind and quite some periods with sunshine! That would be good, because then it would be much more agreable for Jan to go out.
And he has to, to gain some condition and to get his muscles working again, and it also is good for the bloodcirculation. specially in his underleg and feet.

Last Tuesday Jan's brother Rob, came by to do some little jobs in the house.
He would come around 1 o'clock p.m., because first he had to buy a ramp for the shower in a shop not far from our house.
I had the idea, that when Rob would be busy, I could go out to do some shopping or whatever. The day before Jan and I already prepaired as much as possible the tools and such so Rob (or Jan ) could start working without loosing much time searching for things.
But..... it ended in me helping Rob with some of the jobs LOL!
Well, obvious Jan couldnl't do that(he isn;t yet allowed to lift things or sit on his knees, bending too much etc).
So I helped Rob in holding things in it's place, getting the right screws, and more. But.... lots of the things needed, were done. Most important was the ramp in the showerIspecially for Jan at the moment). Then there was needed a kiind of shelf in the kitchen on the place where we had the dishwasher. Now we just need to find a small cupboard, that will fit there.
And there was needed a new piece of wood on the kitchen door outside. Actually we should replace that door, but for the moment this is good enough( a new door could be rather expensive!). Now it needs a coat of paint and it will do fine for the winter.
well, it sounds all not much but it takes all time to do. I am glad Rob could help us with the jobs.
After my not intended help in carpenting and so, hahahaha, I was happy to sit down in the evening on the couch and I went to bed earlier than usual!

This week Heidi's husband had to go to hospital for an operation on Thursday, not all too serious, he only had to stay over for one night and came home again Friday afternoon.
The Friday morning Jan and I went to hospital in the morning to have his staples removed. Well, that went sooooo quick, all the visit and removing didn;t last more than about 15 minutes! Gosh, never thought it would go that quick, because normally there always is a waiting time for the appointment. Not this time.
The cicatrice looked well, and has no need of an adhesive plaster anymore.
The nurse only put on some small pieces of plaster, just to kind of strengthen the adhesion.
Jan still will have to carry cummerbund(is this the right word) for about 4 more weeks. At least during the day, he can remove it in the evening when he doesn;t move too much anymore and during the night.
And then we'll have to wait for about 3 months, when he will have his next appointment with an echo.

This week Jan planted even some more bulbs in containers. He did sit down on a little stool, and the containmers where at about the same hight, so it was something he could do, although slowly and careful.
Now hoping we will have three of four containers next spring with a selection of tulips and one container has daffodils. 

So all together with some grocerie shopping and a market visit for some fruit and cheese and veggies, it was a filled week. And yesterday I finally made us again a Boeuf Parmentier(kind of Sheperds Pie), because now I could prepare it and heat it up in the oven, yeah!!!
we had it yesterday evening for dinner with a bit of salad and for desert I made us the first stew pears of the year again. It all tasted really good and I have an easy task today for dinner. Yes, you might have guessed, we have the Boeuf Parmentier again and the stew pears. Wonderful, LOL.

Hmmmm, I think it is time I get myself a cup of tea(or may be a coffee. I don;t know yet), I am getting thirsty a bit.
I hope you all will have a wonderful week to come, with not too bad weather and lots of moments you can smile about.
stay safe and healthy!

Slowly coming into sort of normal rythm again

Good afternoon everybody!

So far, so good. as you know Jan came home Saturday a week ago and till now, it seems to go rather well.
Of course he cannot do much, has to be careful not to put much strain or strength on his belly.
But he seems not to have lot of pain of the wound, only if he has to sit down or come up, that sort of thing, or reach for a mug on the table, he has to do that carefully and slow and then he feels it.
He has an elastic bandage around the waist and belly, to give more support there and he still have to use that for some more time. Only in the evening he takes it off, when it really starts to bother.
Last wednesday we both went to out doctor across the street and Jan could walk that distance without much trouble. We went there to get our flu shot.
Gosh, I think the doctor hit perhaps a muscle in the arm or so, because the place where i had the injection, still is hurting when I touch it or lie on it.
I will tell him to do better next time LOL!

Then Thursday morning we had to go to hospital for a control appointment for Jan with the surgeon. Oh my, we pensionados aren+t used anymore to get up very early, you know and we hadn to be there at 8.30 p.m. so get our of bed at about 07.00 p.m. to be able to get dressed and have a cup of tea and such not in a hurry. We went with the tram, yes, lucky Jan could sit sduring the ride, and then he walked all the way from the tramstop to the hospital and the the department. Quite a distance for him now, but it went well.
Wound looked good, we only have to put on an adhesive plaster every two days, as long as there is some wound fluid. Today it already was almost dry, so to be sure, I put on another adhesive plaster.
Coming Friday we will have to go to hospital again, to have the staples removed)yes, first time they closed the wound with thread, second time with staples too). Hope that goes without too much problems, and then, when all goes well, Jan has to return after 3 months for a control. Then they will make again an echo to see if all hold well and works okay.

It is a pity, that the weatherr isn;t really good now, it isn't really cold, but we have wind and lots of rainshowers, so not the best condition for Jan to go out and try to have a little walk. It would be good for him to do it, and build up again some condition. It doesn;t matter if it is colder, but at least it should be dry, if possible with a bit of sunshine and not so much wind.
However today, the temperatures were realy nice, around 19-20C so Jan did a little of work in the garden(with my supervising eye and help for lifting things!!!).
He placed some flower bulbs in two different containers, cleaned out a few smaller pots with plants that were finished, and after half an hour he he enough of it. He was a bit tired and I understood him completely.
Still it was a start and he has to build up from this to more.

This week his brother came for a visit and Jan asked him if he could help with some smal jobs in the house, that at the moment Jan cannot do(and me neither). That was no problem. so he will come on Tuesday to do it.
Most important thing is a handrail in our shower! It is a lot safer, when you can hold yourself and also for stepping in and out.
Specially now for Jan, but also in future. And there is some carpenter work to do also for Rob(Jan's brother).
And I want to ask him to come by another time, perhaps next week, to do some jobs in the garden. There is a bush, that has to go, but for me it is far to heavy to dig it out, here is needed some manpower, really.
And there are some smaller jobs to do in the garden that are also for me at the moment too straining and difficult. So I would be happy with the help of Rob.

That;s about it for this week, we both slowly come to a sort of relaxing and catching up some sleep. And I am happy with that.
Thanks all for your thoughts and prayers lately!
stay safe and healthy as much as possible, and till next week!

Another hectic week!

Good afternoon everybody!

Weather here at the moment, rainy, windy and not very warm.
during next week temperatures could rise again a little bit up to 14-15 C, and with a bit more sunshine. It definately is getting into Autumn weather.

Well, you know about Jan having to go to hospital. (thanks to everyone with good well wishes!).A little as a surprise he could go home again last Wednesday. The wound looked good, almost dry, so medical wise it was okay to go home the doctor said. I wasn;t all too happy about it, though it might be just a wee buit too soon, but nothing to do about it.
It went rather well Wednesday evening, next day too. of course Jan feels the wound when moving, and he is very tired, but he had something to eat several times(little portions to start with), he has to regain strength again.
Thursday evening we had small dinner, and then when just finished around 18.00 a.m. Jan looked at his dressing gown and it had at several places a very strange color and it felt wet.
So we looked further and at the wound with adhesive plaster and that was all red and tearing it off at the bottom of it blood. Oh dear, the wound was leaking!
First I dried it as much as I could but it kept leaking. I could the hospital first, and they said well, come over to us. But How? I have no car and I wasn't sure if a taxi driver would take us, but they wouldn;t send an ambulance.
All stressed up I called my friend Heidi and asked if her husband Danny could bring us to hospital. In 15 minutes they were there and off to hospital ER.
(I had a sheet of plastic I layed over the seats in the car).
To make it short, Heidi stayed with me till about 19.45, then she had to go, because she had to go somewhere with her daughter.
It all took till 1.30 at night till Jan finally was brought to a ward! He was completely worn out, but I was too!
Next morning they operated him again, and it seemed that in "stitching him together, they missed a little part, that opened again caused a hematome and that started leaking. How nice!
After operation I went to hospital at about 1.30 a.m., and Jan was already awake(well, more or less LOL). We wanted to know if he had to stay for another night, of course, it took till 7.20 a.m. that a doctor decided it was better he stayed another night.
Yesterday he could come home, after still long waiting for the decision! we were home at about 18.00 a.m.
Hopefully now it will all go well and heal as it should do etc.
The worst of all is the endless waiting you have to do before you get any results or answers. I know, it is very busy in a hospital, and the doctors have many patients, but there must be a possibility to cut the waiting times? I think it does no good to the patient as well as relatives. Very stressing.

But okay, we are home again. Jan cannot move around a lot, of course and has to be careful not to put too much pressure on his belly.
So this morning I helped him to take a shower, I felt better to be next to him, to avoid any problems.
He tries to do as much as possible himself, but I don;t want him to move around too much yet( he has to move every now and then, but by little bits), so I am very busy with all those little things, like bringing him something to drink, helping him to put his socks on,making him a sandwich, and lots more things you normally don;t do. Rather time consuming, but it will only be for some days and then he already will be able to do a bit more himself.
As long as he heals well, it is all okay for me!

You can imagine I didn't have much time to do anything else this week, than gooing to and from hospital, and actually running around like a headless chicken ROFL!. It wasn;t one of the best weeks of the year, I can tell you that.

Now I will finish the post, hopefully next week there will be some lighter news to tell. I have a luandry turning in the washing machine, that is almost ready. I will hang that out, then I will have a little time to sit down to watch some tv or do a little game on the computer and then I will have to make us some dinner. Time is running out very fast today.
Have a wonderful week to come, stay safe and healthy.

Shocking week!

Good afternoon everybody!

To start with the weather, it is raining now with lots of wind, although the temperatures aren't too bad yet. But they will drop from now around 17-18 to 14-15C later this week. It really is getting into autumn-weather.

Where to start? The week started quiete good, quiet, some plans in the head to do, all quite as usual.
Wednesday evening I already noticed that Jan wasn't all 100% himself. He also didn;t have much appetite in the evening, I asked him why, he answered that he had some tummy trouble. Okay, that can happen. But it got worse, he really hurt when having tose "stitches", so I said he needed a doctor. He wanted to wait till morning so I could call our doctor. But it got still worse, he vomited also, so I called the SMASh(night emergency doctor's post). First they asked if we could come to the doctor's post(in a hospital rather far away from us), but I refused. Jan was in no comdition, to get into a taxi.
So the night doctor came to us. Couldn't find right away a cause, gave him a kind of painkiller and medicin against feeling sick and vomiting.
Urged us to call our doctor in the morning. You can imagine we didn;t have a good night, specially Jan not, the poor soul.
Next morning I right away called our doctor. Explained it all to the assistent and urged her to send the docor over as soon as he could. He came around midday, and called for an ambulance, because he didnlt know exactly what the cause was, but said Jan was a fragile patient, so better take no risk.
On to hospital emergency. We were there for about 4 hourse at least, Jan had all kind of tests and scans. They couldn;t see anything causing those pains in the belly. Gave us the choice to stay in hospital ro going home. ou shouldn;t give people that kind of coice, I think,. but okay, there was no direct medical reason to keep him there. He got however the advice, that if it got again worse, we should call directly to the ER of the hospital and we would be fetched by ambulance.
I wasn;t happy with it, but Jan wanted to go home and see how it went.
For a bit early evening it seemed to go slightly better, but already soon it all came back and even worse. So at about 5 o'clock night I called the ER.
Explained, and asked for ambulance to pick us up. Then I got the answer that they couldn;t send it, but I had to call for the 112(emergency phonenumber for police, ambulance and firefighters). Strange, but okay, I did so. ecplained and there they said the hospital probably could send the ambulance. All very confusing but after half an hour there suddenly was the ambulance.
Then the whole circus started again with all kind of tests and scans(in the meantime, Jan got some painkillers, so it didn;t hurt that much). Becaue of his diminished liver function and slight kidney problems he cannot have all painkillers, but they knew that.
After a long session of tests and waiting, I think we were there busy for about 6 hours, finally they stumbled onto something.
I try to tell it all as short as possible, which isnt easy, sorry.
At last there came a specialist Jan knows from earlier stay in hospital and he told him that they seemd to see on the scan, that 3 bloodvessels, going to the intenstins, were smaller(partly blocked) and therefor the intestins didnt get enough oxygen rich blood causing in longer terms mortifying of the intestins, and at first possibility of getting into a knot. And that causing hose pain-stitches Jan felt.
Two options: doing nothing, he would die, very soon or in short time.
Second option: an operation right away, with no garantee of succes, that was all depending on the situation of the intestins, that they only could see and know when opening the belly and taking a look.
Quite shocking, isn;t it?? We never could have thought of this to happen.
Well, there wasn;t much to argue, Jan decided he wanted the operation.
Then after may be 10 minutes came the surgeon who would do the operation, explaining us what they would do. As they already were operatinm they would place some stents into the vains leading to the intestins, so the blood could run freely and well again. And then they would see how the condition of the intestins was, if there was a knot in them or not, and if there was any kind of mortification to see or not.
Jan was in the operation room wihin an hour I believe.!!

I was a bit in a stress, you could say! About just two years ago I had almost the same situation, that time when Jan's kidneys had to had to be brought back to life again. He could die or he would survive. Well, that time he survived.
Now it was about the same. Quite a tricky operation, (specially because Jan was already having a fragile liver and also kidneys and all together it made it more tricky)with no knowledge of the outcome till the had opened the belly and even then, or just die.
Pffffffff, not the thing you are waiting for on a Friday!(or any day of the week)
I right away called Heidi, I just needed some support. She came right away, I think within 15 minutes she was there, and she just could see Jan for a minute and wish him well, before he went to the operation room.
Then I just had to wait. After Heidi and I (and also Séverine came over, so sweet)had a cup of coffe I decided just to go home and wait there.
 At about 5 o'clock a.m the surgeon called me to tell the operation went well, there seemd to be no dammage, they placed the stents into the vains and that worked really well. Of course we still had to wait how all would settle again,  but he was moderate optimistic.
Tonnes of weight fell of my shoulders!

I visited Jan Yesterday afternoon and of course he was terribly tired, but that didn;t matter. He still wss there! I saw the belly and I think he has quite a scar there, but that can heal. It will all take time, but that doesn't matter too much.
Gosh, I was soooo happy to be able to give him a little kiss and look into his eyes and hold his hand!!!!
In an hour or two I will go to the hospital again and see how he is feeling today. We just will have to take it day by day, won;t we?
Good, that was our week.

I will finish now, I think my laundy it just about ready, so I can hand it out, before it is time to go to Jan.
Please stay safe and look after yourselves and your loved ones. Life sometimes has nasty tricks up it's sleeves!

Probably last of the summer days.

Goodafternoon everybody!

Yes, this weekend we have still summer weather. Yesterday it felt already niice, but we had lots of wind, today there is much less wind and the temperature feels good. I think we reach around 21-22C. But..... next week temperatures will drop already, not too much but all counts in this time of year LOL.
Temperature will be around 17-19C and slowly the nights will be colder too, to under 10C, and you can feel that.
In the evenings the room feels chilly and so we put on the central heating on, and I wished we could have waited with that somewhat longer.(it all takes gas and electricity, and it isn;t very cheap these days).

It was a quiet week, I did achive a few things(small things, but okay, I did them hahaha), not interesting enough to mention though(and some I don;t remember off anymore anyway LOL).
But..... I did try out the washing machine! yeah, and I already know that the program I tried, will not be used a lot, it takes a lot of time! So next round of laundry will be done in another and shorter program, that will do the job just as good(I think).
And I also tried out the oven last Friday, just for a little thing, but it works fantastic(after I figured out how exactly use it, hahaha).
Today I made us an oven dish for dinner, yeah! I have cannelloni with minced meat, tomatoe sauce and bechamel sauce and covered with grated cheese.
It has been such a long time ago that we had that for dinner, so I am really looking forward to it! I will add a tomatoe salad to it and for desert there is a yoghurt with peach taste. Not bad for a Sunday.
I don;t make the cannelloni tubes myself. I buy them ready made, dried, and i just have to fill them with the minced meat (fried with diced onions, fresh basilicum leaves chopped, some pepper and salt).
It's much easier than making your own, although that always taste just a little bit better. Still, it is too much work for just us two. Why do it difficult if you can do it the easy way.
Only have to put it in the oven for about 25-30 minutes and yummie, it will be ready.


I cannot think of anything else to tell, so I better leave it for today and hope to have more things to share next week.
Stay safe and have a lovely week!

The kitchen looks renewed fo a part!

Good afternoon everybody!

Our weather is going up and down and up and down again. Frustrating!
Last week we had some rather cold days(if you compare with the heat we had before), we reached may be 17-18 C, sometimes cloudy and sometimes a it of sunshine. Also a day or two with dark clouds, making it look all very gloomy, and a day with lots of rain. This weekend we have better weather, with temperatures around 20-21C, sunshine so it looks nice and also feels quite good.
But that will be over soon. Next week is expected cool weather with may be temperatures between 15./16 to at the most 18C. Brrrrr, that will be a difference. We will need to put on the heating at times I guess, to be comfortable when we are sitting in the room.
Oh well, it is to be expected of this time of year, I only hoped for a bit longer summerlike temperatures.

Yes, it really happened! I have my new appliances, whoohoo! Last Thursday two guys came with the stuff, early morning at about 9.30 and I think they were ready with it all at about 13.00 a.m. Gosh, it looks a bit different now.
 I also have a spare pladce in the kitchen now where I had my dishwasher. We didn;t buy a new one, because I can do the dishes and that myself, it is done so quickly, no need to have a machine doing it for me. It uses a lot of water, more than I use by hand. But now we have to figure out waht to do with the space. Best would be to make some shelves there and use it for my pans or something like that. I donlt know if we can find a ready made cupboard of the size needed and what it will cost. Or may be we can find someone who could make us what we want. Till we figured out what to do I can hid the gap with a little curtain, that will look at the least better than that dark hole LOL.
Next week I will try out the oven, first have to look into the booklet to read the meaning of all the little drawings. All is rather obvious but I feel better when I first saw the explanation in the booklet.
After a few time it will all be very easy going.
I am happy that finally we were able to replace some of the old stuff, because they were really at the end of life! LOL.
Best had been to may preplace the whole kitchen(with cupboards and so) but that we cannof afford. So for now, it will do.

Oh we also did  buy something else at the same time. Not long ago we bought ouselves a new tv. Well, we werenlt all too happy with the sound. So now we have a soundbar and that makes a lot of difference. Sound is much better and you also can adapt it to your liking or to the program.
Pffff, that were a lot of expences in short time.
Necessary? Yes, most of it and the soundbar? in a way to, and why not give ourselves a little present?

Next project will be to find somebody who can take away an old tree in our garden. The tree is dead, not too big, but overgrown with ivy and it is bending over to one side. I fear it will break when there will be a storm and then the damage might be quite big. specially when it fall is into the neighbours garden.
One of our beighbours migth know somebody who could do it for us for a not too heavy price(when I call a specialized company for it, I think it will cost me a lot of money). Let's see what this person will charge us(if he wants to do it) and then we can decide. But it has to be done this autumn.

Another good thing from having the new appliances is, that we had to clear out the fridge, and one or two cupboards and drawers, so the men could easily connect some pipes etc.
It gave me the chance to look over all the stuff and clear out some of it. It feels so good when you finally decide to throw some things away, and get rid of some things that take room and that you never use(so it came out seeing it coming out of the cupboards LOL). Okay, it wasn't all too much but again a start.
It is unbelievable what you gather over the years, specially when you have a house where there is quite some room to stuck stuff away for a while ROFL.
I will have to do that kind of clean out several times more, believe me, because we have far too much of everything standing and lying around!
Good to bear that in mind and when I have another burst of energy I should do some cleaning out again.

The daughter of Heidi, Séverine, is zstudying now! She is doing a study to become speach therapiste. I think it is great. She has to travel to another city, about an hour travel all together, with the subway and then also tram or bus. And her mother is worrying a bit about that. I understand, because she is still a yongster, only 17, and then all alone making the travel, specially when it dark in wintertime and so. But it seems most of the time she can travel with one or two other students, doing the same study, so that is reassuring.
I hope Séverine will finish the study, it takes at least 3 years, and isn't that easy as it may seem. I wish her all kind of luck.

Okay, that is it I think for this week. Time to grab a bite(it will end in a little sandwich I think hahaha) and then perhaps already prepare a bit for the dinner this evening.
And also I can perhaps sit for 15 minutes in the sunshine, taking advantage of it while I can, because next week I don't think it will nice enough.
Have a wonderful week everybody, try to stay safe and healthy!

This week I will have the new appliances!

Goodafternoon everybody!

The weather isn't great for the last few days, but a little rise of temperature is coming this week.
We had quite some rainshowers, also sunshine, one or two days with too much wind, we even had to start the central heating on in the evening, not for long, just to make it feel comfortable. I really do hope that temperatures will rise again and stay for a while around 21-22C at daytime and that night temperatures will not go too low yet.

There wasn;t much going on last week, although I had one day an injection of energy suddenly and I took advantage of it to clean on top of the kitchen cupboards. Yeah, it was necessary. I always put on some newspapers or kitchen paper on them, which helps a lot against  getting dirty. But still it needs a cleaning every now and then. It is taking some energy, because I have to climb up a ladder and down again and up again etc. etc. Still, I am happy I did it, even cleaned some little windows that I only can reach with climbing up the ladder, so I was rather happy with myself LOL.
And I also did it now, because I expected the guys with the new appliances soon.
I had hoped they would come this last week, but had no phonecall. So I called, but they didn;t call back and then Jan went there on Saturday to ask why not calling back and when they thought they would come placing the new stuff.
It seemed they had some trouble with trucks not working or so, could be true and they had a lot of work(the last thing I do believe). But okay, now they will come on Thursday, between 10.00 and 12.00 morning.
Oh, I will be so happy to have it all finally and I am getting even a bit nervous about it. I will have to take time to read the instruction books of the apppliances, most of it will be simple enough to handle, but I always have trouble with instruction books. I wonder why often the instructions are written in such a way that it looks aweful difficult, and once you get the hang of it it is rather simple?????

Well, we will see how it all will go, First the installation of the things, hopefully the guys will not encounter any hidden problems!

Pity that slowly autumn is getting into the garden. Lots of plants lost their flowers, although we still have some blossoms here and there. The hollyhocks are still blooming, and also the roses are showing a second life! Jan already took out our tomatoe plants, we had a few tomatoes of them, but now a great harvest. Now we only have to clean the plastic pots, take out the used soil and so. We can use the soil from the pots in the borders, there it casn recycle itself, so to speak. Some parts of our borders need some more soil and this is a good way to do it. It isn;t always necessary to buy bags full of new soil.
If next weekend the weather will be nice enough, I think we will replace some smaller bushes. We probably will cut back and then dig out one of our hortensias( the white one), because it isn;t really pretty anymore. I have a cutting from it standing in an other part of the garden, so I still will have a white one and it is kind of special to me. I once got it from a good friend of ours, lots of years ago as small plant, and it grew and flowered well for many years. Our friend died long ago at rather young age, so it is a memory of her.
Now I still have the cutting of the original to hold on to the memory.
In it's place we will plant another hortensia, a dark red one that at the moment grows in a pot, but is getting to big for it.
Also have to replace a smaller azalea, with a fantastic color of flower, so it will be more in sight when it flowers.
There always is work in a garden, which I don;t mind, but some things will get tougher to do, the more we get older. But for the moment we can handle it still rather well, we'll see how it goes the next few years.

Also I am looking around for a new laptop(two actually),  can buy a new one but that is rather expensive, so that will be the last option. I am sure I can find soon a good second hand one, that will serve me for a couple of years.
First the new appliances and then the new laptops and then the installing of the programs I always use and that in windows 10! Oh dear, I hope I will not encounter too many problems with it.

At the moment, when Jan and I are at our computers (most of the time Jan reading the news and then playing a game and me at times reading some blogs and then playing a little game, not yet ready for designing again sorry), we put on "old" records we sometimes didn;t play for a very long time. And it is nice, you know! Sometimes it brings memories, and sometimes you didn;t even know you had some songs on disc. It isn;t easy to remember which artists we all have, because I think we have around 600 records, then we also have quite some cd's, so music enough!

Good, that is it about for today. I think  will make myself a cup of tea, play may be a little solitaire and later on watch a bit of sport on tv.
I am having a really easy Sunday, and it includes the dinner.Yesterday I made us a chicken soup, well filled and there is still so much left that we will have that today too! Perhaps just a sandwich with butter with it and our stomach will be filled again. If we get a biit hungry later in the evening we always can take something like a sandwich or may be some frankfurters( most of the time  have one or two cans with in the cupboard, always handy to have).

Wishing you a lovely week, hopefully you will all stay safe from any hurricanes, or heavy rainshowers, or extreme heat(all depends where you are living obviously).
See you next Sunday!

Please let the summer stay a bit longer!!!

Goodafternoon everybody!

We had a few very warm days here again, but now weather is going really to change this week. YHou can notice it already today, although we still have sunshine, but temperature has dropped to around 21 and will drop a lot more this week according to weather report. It will be no more than may be 17-18C and I am not yet ready for that!!!
If that goes on for several days, we might need to use the central heating again, because inside our house it always feels a bit cooler. And when you don;t move around too much, you easily get colder and don;t feel comfortable.
Oh, I just hope it will be a kind of "dip" and that next week the temperatures will go up to again 20-22C, and that we will have a true nice and rather warm Indian Summer.

Our guest has gone home again. I am talking about Tommy, the dog gfrom Heidi. She came last Tuesday afternoon to pick him up. she had first a little chat with us(it was very warm that day) too cool down a little bit with a drink.
And you know, we only had the dog for a few days, but in the evening we missed him, because we were already kind of used to let him out.
I must say Tommy was no bother at all, he was so quiet, you almost didn;t notice he was there, really.
Oh boy, he gave Jan a shock, yes! I think it was Monday evening, and Jan wanted to give him a short walk late evening, so first Jan prepared himself(putting on his shoes and so) and then came in with the leash for Tommy.
He called him, but no reaction! he called again, still nothing, so he touched him to get his attention. Still nothing. Now we both were worried! So I looked and touched him, but he still was breathing, although almost not noticable.
Well, I shook him with siome force and then he awoke and in no time stood on his feet. Seems he was just sleeping very deeply asleep! PFFFFF! I already saw a scenario of us calling the vet ambulance and Heidi and all that. But no, nothing of that. All was normal and well. LOL.

Wednesday I had a rather productive day. Meaning I was in cleaning mood and such. yes, worth to mention because it doesn;t happen every day ROFL.
I accomplished several things, made me feel good, Jan was nice to me and took over the vacuum cleaning.

I am also spending a little time at the computer searching for recipes for my friend Edna, that will have to be easy and quick things with low sodium. I already found some things, but I will gather first a fair amount, so she will have a varied choice. It is nice to see what is possible, and there is much more to find than you think, that tastes good, is easy and quick and also good for the health.
It will also be good for us, because I try to cook low sodium too. Specially for Jan, with his retaining fluid rather easy and also for his kidneys. So it will be an interesting search for me too.
I have loads of recipes in maps that I collected over the years and also still from my mother's collection.(She was a great cook, and loved to prepare special dinners for friends and family from time to time).
But I donlt know if it is the same with you, but I notice that at the end I make just a certain amount of those recipes more often or regularly.
I like to try out recipe, that's for sure(and I will be able to do so again when I have the new appliances), and I have a great hubby, that always taste them.
He is a real easy to satisfy, of course he has his likes and dislikes but he rarely says he really doesn;t like the food I prepare.

It is such a shame that one of our favourtie quizzes, called The smartes person, is finished again for this season. It is a quiz in which you actually have to have some good generale knowledge. But now we have a new season of The Voice of Holland Senior again. That is really interesting at times.
And soon (if I am right it will be next Saturday) a new season of Stricktly come Dancing starts at the BBC. I just love that program.
There also started some new detectives so there is more than enougfh to watch( sometimes we just don;t have enough time in the evening LOL).
We could watch during the day some things we recorded, but most of the time I don;t have the patience for it and of course there are things to do during the day.
last few weeks I watched the tv serie Victoria(about queen Vicoria of Great Britain) and I loved that too. The second season of it just started this weekend, so I recorded that and still have to watch it. Yes, I not only love to see detectives, but also from time to time historical series.

Good  think I did enough rambling for today, hahaha. It is about time I take a look at the stew I am making with lamb meat. That will be for this evening dinner, together with some boiled potatoes and a salad with mini-tomatoes.
There will be enough left of the meat for tomorrow also, so that will be an easy job for dinner then.

Have a wonderful week to come, stay safe and hopefully you will have some good weather.

Second summertime.

Goodafternoon everybody!

After some time with more autumnal temperatures and weather we suddenly arrived into a second summertime! Around Friday temperatures were going up quickly and today we have around 30C again! That will stay for at least till Thursday, then there may be a little drop of temperature to around 25C, with may be a small rainshower too.
I hope we will go into September with some weeks of nic e weather say with temperatures around 24C????

Last week we went for the appliances, yeah! That was on Thursday. Talking with the salesman, he suggested that someone came over to check on the possibilities, and take extra measure. so it happened.
We will get soon a phonecall with appointment for placing. I don;t think it will take very long.
We ordered a washing machine, oven, cooktop(on gas), extractor hood and fridge with freezer(yhou know, up the fridge, under the freezer with 3 drawers.
Wow, that will be a change! And all the appliances didn;t cost the money I calculated more or less. I come at the amount that I calculated for the appliances( and I only took 4, even not yet with the washing machine) WITH placing the stuff. They will have to make a few new connections, perhaps change a few things. But all together the appliances weren;t as expensive as I thought. It is a very good shop were we went, it is a family business, and they still have service, they don;t try to sell you the most expensive if you don;t need it. I will have to wait of course how they will do with the placing, but I am sure I will not be disappointed. And they have the good service that if anything might not be working of something like this, you just can call and they will fix it.

Of course I could do with a whole new kitchen, but that is much too expensive. So this is the next best thing. And till now I am already a happy person LOL.
Oh, soon I will be able to make again canelloni in the the oven, or a Boeuf Parmentier( it is a bit like aSheperd's Pie), or Russian Pirog or Piroschki( comes close to a pie, I think) etc. etc. Wonderful!!!!

This weekend we have our guest, meaning the doggie of my friend Heidi.
He's called Tommy,and is no trouble at all. Only thing is I have to get up a bit earlier LOL! As any dog he needs to go out to do his thing. It is only for a couple of days. They will pick him up again on Tuesday.
I think he feels himself rather at ease here. Of course he know me from the times I gave him a walk and was visiting Heidi.
Poor thing suffers a bit from the warm temperatures. Lucky we have a rather cool sitting room, so he is better off there than in the garden(even in the shadow).
I gave him his walk this morning and early afternoon, Jan will do that in the evening. Yes, we devide the task ROFL.

Good time to finish this post. I wil have a little time to do perhaps solitaire game and then will have to prepare something for dinner. Not yet a complete idea of what I will prepare, but be assured it will be something simple and quick.
Hopefully I will be able to tell you next time that the appliances have been placed and that I understood without problems how to operate the oven and washing mashine hahahaa. I am always suspicious with new things, but most of the time it shows that it isn;t compicated.
Wishing you all a very nice week!

Summertime, where are you???

Goodafternoon everybody!

Slept rather late this morning after a not so good night, on and off really.
So I thought as it is Sunday and I don;t have to go anywhere and I can do some things also a bit later, I will try to have some sleep in the morning. And it worked more or less.
Our weather isn;t all too great at the moment, just a bit too cloudy at times, there is some rain, slightly too much wind too. Temperatures aren;t great either, it isn;t cold, but also not summery weather, we have around 20-21C.But by the end of coming week temperatures should rise again to may be 24C and perhaps even stay for a longer time. Now that would be lovely!

Have to take a tiny break now, because I want to see if the washing machine is ready and I have to check a pan with some meat for a stew. Tell you about it when I am back.

............................

Back again!
Laundry was ready, so it is hanging to dry now.
Stew isn;t ready yet. I was yesterday at the market, we needed a b it of fruit and veggies and I bought there some goats meat. Yes, you read it well.
I had it before and it was wonderful. After letting it to stew for an hour or two, depends what part of the goat you have, it becomes so tender and I like the taste of it. I have 3 slices of the upper leg, it isn;t too fat, lots of meat on it and it is on the cooker right now, with some onions and mushrooms. And I rubbed the meat with some Ras el Hanouit, a Morrocan mix of spices, without salt.
You hardly need any salt with it, wonderful. Just added a bit of dried chilipepper to it to make it a little bit more spicy.
I also made some fresh apple sauce well, it is more apple compote, because i like to have some small pieces of apple still in it), with some raisins in it and cinnamon.
So I only will have to boil some potatoes later. or I can add some chinks to the stew later. That also is nice, because the potatoes will take a bit of the taste of the gravy. I haven;t decided yet, LOL.
And as desert we will have some melon. Yummie!

Oh, it looks as if slowly the sun is coming through the slouds. That would be nice. Everything looks so much friendlier with a little bit of sunshine.
Next week Jan and I should do something in the garden. I try to keep it up a ittle bit, you know, the deadheading and watering the pots(although at the moment we have enough rain to keep them wet). But there is some pruning to do, specially the ivy, that grow like almost mad! It is nice to have something green on the fences, but it needs a lot of pruning to keep it nice.
And there are a couple of bushes that need replacing. I have an azale, that stands to hiddenwhich is a pity. It has such a wonderful color when it blooms, it must been seen more. And then I have a hortensia, i once made a cutting of, standing now in a big pot, but is growind out of it. I like to put it in the "free"ground, next to our white one(this is a dark red one). i think it will look wonderful.
It is nice to spend some time in the garden, doing some minor jobs, it makes your head clear.

I am not yet in a very designing mood, I think I will wait with it till I will have another laptop. yes, I know, I am talking about it already for some time, but first we will have to g for the appliances(hopefully we will go to the shop next week), then we will have to see how much money that will cost. Hopefully we will have some more savings left for the new laptops.
Don;t want to wait all too long with it, we must have them still this year, because on ours we have the Windows 7 and that will not be supported anymore buy next year.
First the appliances and installed well, we hope. That already would be something wonderful.
Having an oven again will be fantastic and makes life a little bit easier, cooking wise spoken LOL!

Okay, not very much more to ramble about, so better I finish this post.
I might take a cup of tea and perhaps a sandwich or so, watch a bit of tv and take it easy for the rest of the afternoon.
Have a wonderful week, you all, take care and stay safe.

Changing weather, what a pity!

Goodafternoon everybody!

Yes, the weather is definately changing over here. The temperatures dropped a lot, and as it seems next week even some more.! Now tht is a bit too much for me. Seems we may only reach just 20 C, with some sun some clouds, some rain, etc. Not much for summer weather.
kay, temperatures of 35C isn;t necessary but I would like for some more time something around 23-25C.
But who knows, may be somewhere next week they will suddenly find another high pressure area that will bring nicer weather.

If all went well, my friend Heidi is home from vacation again.  understand she doesn;t phone me right away during the weekend. She probably is happy to be home and can unpack the suitcases and first relax after the journey.
So i wait for her call later this week and then certainly we will meet to have a catch up chat.

It was again a quiet week here. Although I made a phonecall concerning a pension payment of Jan, it is just a small amount, so I asked to pay it in one amount. I needed to fill in some forms, I will send them next week and then in a few weeks tiime we will receive the payment (if all goes well).
So a little job done.
Now next week I shall phone the hospital to hear if there is a result already of Jan;s heart tests. I know they are extremely busy and have a lot of appointments to do, but still I think it all takes much too much time. He is busy with it from the month of March and still doesn;t know anything. I assume, no critical things are found, otherwise we should have had an appointment with the heartdoctor already. But still, all shouldn;t take that long. And that is where I cone in, making a phonecall and put some pressure there LOL.

Oh, there is a little sad news to tell. we had a parakeet coming here, that was already of age, so we gave him the name of "Der Alte" (the old one, and it is the name of a German detective serie, long running also).
Beginning last week Jan looked at him when he was sitting on the rosebow and said to me:"Kyra, this one isn;t going to live for a long time anymore, read my lips". and two days later I found him lying in our garden, stonedead, poor thing.
 I think he was happy to live his last days in our garden, feeling rather safe here and having his last meal. Ahhhhhh, I was so sad when i found him.
I picked him up and put him in a plastic bag for a moment and told Jan the news.
And you know what? Jan burried Der Alte in our garden. Now isn;t that sweet?????
(You see, we are quite some softies LOL).

I have so much fun watching the birds, specially at the moment the sparrows. I think we have a colony of about 15-20 sparrows coming to our garden and more or less fighting over the seed in the seedcontainer. Gosh, they can make a noise! And  have to watch out when I fill the container, because sometimes some younger ones are less cautious and as soon as they notice the container is being filled, the take a kind of dive to it like a jetplain and I am almost torpedoed by a sparrow ROFL. I did feel sometimes the wind of their wings trough my hair!

Yesterday we had a really delicous meal. There was a discount of mussels in the supermarket, so I bought us a package with 2 kgs. They tasted so good, yummie. with two dipsauces and some french bread with garlic butter, it was a good meal. We like to eat them, if possible a few times a year.
And it is quickly done, you only have to cook them for a few minutes, that's all.

Good, no more things to tell today, last thing to do is giving you the 2nd part of Arlene's clusters.
Have a wonderful week and stay safe please.

Download  HERE

Easy living does the thing at the moment LOL

Goodafternoon everybody!

Glad the heatwave is gone, it was just too much. For now we have rather typical dutch summer weather, temperatures around 22-25C, nights around 13-15C.
sometimes a little bit of rain, good periods with sunshine, at times some clouds. All together not bad at all. I can go on like this for much longer.

We had a really quiet week, not much happenening. I had planned to go looking for the new appliances for the kitchen, but found out that the shop is closed for holiday, so we will have to wait till after the 12th of August. Oh well, we have done for quite some time without and oven, and the gas top is still working, and the fridge too, so we can add a few weeks to it(hopefully, I say this, because things have the ability to just finish their lives just a tiny wee bit too early if you are unlucky ROFL).

I did the usual homestuff here, every day a little bit, not too much because something around the shoulder is bothering me, I think I perhaps strained some muscle, or may be catched a cold on a muscle and had a little inflammation or something. It isn;t really hurting, but at times bothering, not enough for me to go to the doctor. We'll see how it goes during the next week.
It are always little things that pop up and suddenly go away too.
I only noticed, that the last year or even two, things are taking longer time to heal with me. I see it when I have a little cut, or when I fell on the knee for example and have a bruise on it.
Perhaps it is just the age, or it has to do with the medicins I am taking. Well, as long as things still heal and leave no mark, I am happy, hahaha.

The b irdies are really funny, you know. Not only we have visits from the parakeets, but we get more and more sparrow at the moment, You could say it is an extended family of sometimes 15 or 20. And they can make lots of noise too! And  love them.
Also we have again some tits. We've lost them for some time but now some young ones come feeding from the fatballs I hand close to the little shed.
I think they also will come nearer in autumn and winter, when I hand some fatballs on the rosebow.

I've made a few photos from the garden, specially the new plants.
Here is the little rosebush( species is named Rosa Magic Rokoko.

here a Rudbeckia "Happy Smileyz"

And I;ve made a photo of a clematis. Usually we have two species on the rosebow, but this year only one came to bloom, but it is a lovely one.

And last photo is of our hollyhocj. t is one that grwe from seed I collected somewhere from a garden where they were standing at a gate.
t took two years but this year we had flowers on it.

That's about it for today. But, as promised, I have some clusters from Arlene for you, made with the Mysteries of the Woods kit.
She made several more, so today you have part one and next week will be part two(that will be a clusters and a quickpage).
She isn;t feeling all too good at the moment, so hold her in your thoughts every now and then.
Thanks in advance!
See you next week, stay cool and safe!

Download   HERE part one of the clusters