Should a bit of luck smile upon us. LOL?

Goodmorning everybody!

No, I am not desporate, we just had some tough times this year and I think we deserve a bit of easier one for the rest of the year, hahaha.
May be it started last week. at least we had letters from the tax office that we get a little bit of money back, hoorray, now it has to come on my account, I hope next week it will be done.
There also was something wrong in the social benefits payment, we got that sorted out buy a guy in a social centre(where we come at times to see our volunteer coach), he made an ever so important phonecall, wrote a letter for us, it's on the mail now and now we cross fingers that soon we will receive some money back from that too! And we could do with an extra "reserve".
So perhaps a bit of luck is sprinkled upon us?LOL

Then  didnt hear for already a longer time from Heidi and I began to worry a little bit. We often have weeks, that we have no contact, but it lasted a bit too long now. I tried to phone her, no luck, then finally shed called back, but it was the day before yesterday just at the time I was serving out our dinner, so it wasn't the best time. I called her back later that evening, and her daughter told me she was having a nap. finally yesterday( after still several tries), we got in touch, pfffff. I wasn;t feeling at ease yesterday all day long, just hadn;t a good feeling, and it showed I was right about her. Lucky she hadn't trouble with her lungdisease, but she suffers from mouth ulcers which is very annoying and painful. She is under control for it and has several medicins for it, so it will disappear after a while again. But you can imagine that it is hard to eat something or drink (which is the easiest, with a straw). So the poor girl isn't feeling very great, then with all kind of things of "normal"life getting in the way too(those things can "grow over your head" at times ), she was in no mood to have a chat with me( and  think she didn't want to worry me either).

Our weather isn;t too bad at the moment. You could call it kind of unsettled, some sunshine, sometimes a bit of rain, one day wind from the west, the other day from the east, but still temperatures are not bad, they stick at around 20C and that feels okay, specially when the sun is shining.
I spent a little time in the garden yesterday, pruning some of the ivy, which grows like mad, grin.
Our dahlia's still are blooming and they are just wonderful, only have to put them on another spot next year. And as I have so many I can give Heidi a few of them(you can easily split them up after you dug them up in late autumn).
Now I will have to think of something to eat this evening, as Jan is working, it should be something qick and easy, I will have dinner earlier and then I will prepare a plate for him, that he can just warm up in the oven. 

This evening for sure will be detective evening at tv again, LOL. Oh, we also watch other things, but our heart is for a big part at the detectives, specially the British ones, but also Danish and Swedish ones are great! And sometimes our neighbours, the Belgians have some good ones too.
We also love to see some good documentaries, about all kind of subjects, or films about nature.
Then we follow some sport, and the news, of course, and here and there a good quiz, pfew, we have busy times in the evening ROFL!
And then we register on dvd and video also some programs, because they are broadcasted at the same time, yeah, it demands  a good planning, and usually that is Jan´s task, grin!

I think I covered all that I could share, and it is time for your freebie. A kit, that I named `Mode du Passé. Hope you can do something nice with it.
Have a wonderful weekend, thanks for the visit!

Download    HERE

Time slips away like sand

Goodafternoon everybody!

It's early afternoon, but as I am used to post early morning, I feel I lost half a day LOL!
Well, loosing time seems to be quite a "normal" feeling at the moment. The days pass by in a kind of rush, and when I look back at them, I just cannot remember with what time passed. I know there are things I achieved during those days, but I am "missing"also moments hahahaha. No, don;t worry, I think my brain is still working okay, but days sometimes are filled with all kind of little things to do and they aren;t all worth remembering.
This week I finally got to the hairdresser, and what a relief that is, believe me.
Also had an appointment with my "volunteerwork coach", which was nice as always. He gave me another two weeks to orientate myself to volunteerwork I might like to do( this coach is very nice to me, and gives only positive reports to the guy of social service benefits, ), but also I might be taken in in a group for language lessons to non-natives, specially women on another location. They know I am not a teacher, so giving lessons myself already, hmmm, I don;t know if that is a good idea, but I can help perhaps in setting up language course, in getting material for it, calling around, typing things if needed etc. etc. I hope to hear from the starting group soon, they will have a meeting and I am invited to it, to brainstorm with them. Might be nice.

It hasn;t been the best of weather to go out for a longer time last week, we had lots of rainshowers, some real heavy ones, at times also some clearing up and sunshine, but the temperatures dropped enormously to about 16-17 C daytime. And that is really several degrees lower than usual temperatures in the beginning of September.
But may be later this week it will crawl upwards again a bit. I really hope so, because i am not ready yet for low autumn temperatures and such. I am crossing my fingers for having a loooong Indian Summer, short autumn and winter and early spring again.LOL!
I will have to spread my dahlia's otherwise in the garden next year. Oh, they are doing very well, but they grew much bigger than I thought, so they will need more space between them and another place in the garden.
The tomatoes are doing okay too,  we had several times a salad containing a few of our own tomatoes.
Just need to cut them down a bit, remove more of their leaves, so that the tomatoes at the plants will catch more light and sunlight specially. And we have to hope for a week or so of much warmer temperatures, so all my tomatoes will ripen at time.

Today Jan has his last day of social work this week(no, it hasn;t ended, just this weekend LOL,) but I wonder if it isn't a bit too straining, 3 days in a row. I asked him, but of course he denied it, still I see he is rather tired after 3 days from 16.00-19.00 a.m., which may not seem a long time, but he misses his after-dinner nap like this. He comes home around 19.30 a.m. drinks something then after some time he has to have his dinner, and of course then it is too late to take a nap.
He helps people of age with their evening sandwich and drinks, preparing it, clearing off, getting the little kitchen in order etc. for a group of about 15-20 people. Most of them are at that department for

medical rehabilitation, after an operation of e.g. a hip, or a fall at home, something like that.

So the larger part of them are still capable of eating themselves, but have sometimes a bit of trouble making their sandwich, (and sometimes they just like to be pampered a bit, hahaha). One day there is much more to do than on another day, there are evenings he has time to take a pause, even take a cup of soup himself if there is some left over, then is isn't so straining of course.

It's a kind of work Jan likes to do and does it well, it also helps he has his background of nursing, so he has a keen eye to see where real help is needed and so. Plus he is easy in little conversations with them. 

well, I will keep an eye on him, so to speak and if I think it is just a bit too much  will try to convince him to perhaps spread his 3 days differently. May 2 in the weekend, then a day od rest and then another shift. But that will be hard work for me to get his that far hahahaha.

 

And.... did I do some designing this week? Not too much, but I did start another kit again.

I am spending time at the computer though, but it is filled with other things at the moment. Have to keep up a bit with a few blogs I follow, and now again I will have to spend some time searching for a nice volunteer job if the language thing will not blossom, and slowly Jan and I have to spend some time in the garden, preparing it again for autumn and winter. We still have a bit of time but with the weather changing to less good all the time, we'll have to pick the moments.

 

But there is a freebie for you, made by the wonderful creative Arlene, clusters and a quickpage made with the Seaside Sunset kit.

Leaving you now, with wishes for a lovely day and good start of the week.

 

Download    HERE

 

My Freebies of Jan,Febr.March 2016

 DOWNLOAD  HERE

 DOWNLOAD   HERE

DOWNLOAD    HERE

 DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD HERE

DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD  HERE (SUDDENLY YOU WERE THERE KIT)

 DOWNOOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD  HERE

DOWNLOAD   HERE

 DOWNLOAD  HERE

DOWNLOAD  HERE

What's wrong with people nowadays?

Goodmorning everybody!

In a way it is a good morning, because it is another day, we are still alive, it still is summer, and such. The way it isn;t such a good morning is that the guy from upstairs, didn;t show up. He would have been here to paint last week Thursday, then came to say he couln't come but wuld come Thursday.
Then on Thursday morning he dropped a note in our mailbox, saying he couldn;t come but would come at around 6 evening. And surprise? Nobody came and no message or phonecall or whatever either.
I have his phonenumber, but Jan refuses to call him, saying: "I refuse calling him, because it then looks as if we are begging". I can understand him in a way, but don;t agree completely either.
So now Jan will start painting himself today( I wouldn;t have him do it during the weekend, because he had his volunteer work to do).
Glad at least we have a bucket with paint, brough by this guy earlier. It is something.
But I feel rather pissed off, and I think I am allowed too.
I don;t know why it seems to be so hard to keep a promise? Or why make a promise if you are sure you will not keep it??

Well, we keep this in the back of our head and next time something will happen we will act differently.

we have a bit of strange weather at the moment. Temperatures are around 25 C, as it was yesterday too, but in the evening there was some lightning and thunder, not too much, also rained some, saw on the news that in other parts of the country they had real trouble because of the rain.
Now during the day it should be quiet but towards the evening they expect new rains and thunder and lightning. We'll see, if we will be lucky again.
If it will stay dry most of the day, I might make a trip to the market, have to drop a bill at the bank too, and it is on the way to the market.
I am not sure yet, but perhaps is will be best to do, leaving Jan to his painting, in peace and quiet.
(I know how I am. All the time checking if he is okay, not suffering too much from his back and so, and it is better for his and my mood that I go away for a while LOL).

I've managed to make a little kit for you, named it Seaside Sunset.
Hopefully you can do something with it.
Sorry it is kind of short post, but at the moment I cannot think of anything more that would be nice to read for you. Oh yeah, one thing we Dutchies are very proud of!
We have the world champion 200 mtrs. sprint. called Dafne Schippers. A lovely young women of 23 years old, who also took the silver medal on the 100 mtrs. sprint at the World Championship Athletics in Beijing!

And here is the kit

Download   HERE

My Freebies of June-July-Aug.2015

Download Food for the Soul

 Download Arlene Food for the Soul clusters

 Download  Solveig's song

 Download  Arlene Solveig's song clusters

 Download   Galina

Download Arlene    Galina clusters

 Download   Summer Light

 Download   Arlene Summer Light clusters

 Download   Nostalgia of Summer

 Download   Arlene Nostalgia of Summer clusters

 Download   Seaside Sunset

Download    Arlene Seaside Sunset clusters

May be a promise will be kept!

Goodmorning everybody!

The good news is that about all has dried well after our big leak, and yesterdaymorning the guy did turn up at our door with a bucket of paint and such. So at least we have that, but he had no time yesterday, he promised us to come tomorrow and do his painting. Okay, let's hope and see.

With all that going on last week I forgot to tell ayou another strange thing that happened.
Somewhere last week Jan was in the extension to look for a tool or so and he called me to cme and help him because there was a ................pigeon there.
During the warm days and also because the room had to dry, weleft open the window and the door to the garden. I suppose the pigeon came in through the door.
It was not easy to grab him but finally Jan managed to get him out. Okay, that can happen.
But two days later I heard a strange noise coming out to me, first thought it were just two pigeons fighting a bit, but then went looking and again a pigeon had entered the extension room.
After a while I managed to get a towel over him and grab him and released him in the garden.
I must say, those two birds didn;t leave a too big mess, amazing.
So now we put in the door again the door with fly-screen, to prevent the birds to come in LOL.

Oh my, August is almost over with, and next week I will have to visit my volunteer coach again.
Then I am sure we will come to an agreement again for doing some volunteer work. To start again will not be easy again( as I am used to free time all the time, hahaha), but it will be a good thing.
The last time I saw hime he suggested I will do the same as before, helping out in classes with language lessons for not natives and I think I still like to do that.

First thing now is the painting, hopefully it will be done this week. Then we  can put back all we moved for now to give the guy some room to work.
And then really hoping we will not have any leak anymore, not this year, not next year .!!
I am completely DONE with that!

Okay, today should be a rather good day, speaking of the weather. Last couple of days we had quite some rain, although temperatures still were not bad at all. We only have a bit too much wind to my liking and there is a chance to some rainshowers. Then all should turn into some more "quiet"weather, but that always can change from day to day at the moment.

Sorry I don't have a freebie for you now, still in very low gear concerning the designing. I did start another kit, but it will take me some time to finish. I am not spending as much time at the computer as before, probably that will come back too later when the weather is getting colder and it will be dark sooner.
For nw I just like it that we don't have to turn on the lights on at 5 in the afternoon already!
And when we wake up, it is light and often the sun is shining and that feels sooooooooooooooo good.

Think I will do a bit of blogreading and perhaps do a few things on the new kit, then get dressed and eat something, then see what mischieve I can come up with hahaha.
Till next time, I suppose it will be somewhere in the weekend.
Have a lovely day!

2015 is not our most lucky year till now.

Goodmorning everybody!

Heavens, what a week it was, specially the start of it.
Remember I told you about a leak last week? Okay, it first stopped more or less but in the weekend we had some considerable rain and I think it was Saturday evening or Sunday(gosh, cannot even remember it anymore) as I noticed there was again a leak at about the same point.
But.........as longer as it lasted the more water came done and we had to find all buckets we could and use about all our big towels to keep a kind of dry. At some time it really came in jets of water down.
So Jan went up the ladder again to look at our little roof. We first thought it was the cause of it but after some time Jan came to the conclusion it was due to our neighbours above us.(again).
Okay, things can happen, but nobody was there.(as you may remember I told you it is kind of special house they have). Well, I had a phonenumber from the owner, tried it, no answer. We tried several times, no luck. But in the mean time the water kept coming down, a bit less, but still in a steady and quite quick dripping tempo.
Finally Monday we put a little notepaper in their mailbox and kept our ears open for any sound from above!
You can imagine we didn;t sleep very much at night.
Good, Tuesday morning finally somebody rang at our door. Not the owner, but never mind, he could do something about it. Which he did. He thought it was hthe hot tube they have there, so closed of the water. But later he said it was due to a clogged rain at one of the balcony's. Whatever it was, it stopped leaking after ab out a day. Snd the guy promised us to come by next week to paint the walls and ceiling of the room where the leaking was. You can imagine it all (floor as well as wall and wood ) has to drie first well. Now I just hope this time the promise will be kept.
It is really hopeless that in case of emergency you cannot reach anybody.
Now we can claim it perhaps with our insurance, but that is again such a lot of trouble to go through, and I don;t know if it will bring much. Let's first see if the guy will come for the painting, that already would be wonderful.

So not a good start of the week, hey?
No, really, this year hasn't been all too prosperous for us till now. With the oprations of Jan, my hospital holiday, some other things that didn;t work out the way we hoped for, gosh, really hope the last part of this year will be better for us.
I think it is Murphy's Law we are talking about. Once something is going bad it seems to attrack another thing and so on and so on LOL.

Still there is a bit of good news to tell too. Yesterday I went to the hospital appointment with the lung doctor to hear about the lung function test. Well, as I thought, of course my lungs aren;t in the best condition anymore, but for now I don;t have to come for yearly check-ups with her anymore.
If there is an issue, I can go to my doctor, as for prescriptions and such. She adviced me to keep using the Spiriva inhailer, for more protection and ease in breathing. Well, I am okay with that, Only have to take it once a day, wonderful.

The weather is getting better again. already yesterday it was nice weather, so after my early hospital visit I decided to make a quick visit to town centre. It was aweful quiet there, I did visit a few stores, had a nice time and then was home still rather early. and in the afternoon I did sleep a lot! Yeah, suddenly I felt soooo tired, I just had to lie down for a moment. Well, that moment took longer than I thought, but I think I just needed the rest after all the excitement earlier in the week!
Today is somewhat cloudy at the moment but temperature is okay, think about 22/24 C.
And the next couple of days it will get warmer and sunnier. Good news for the backroom, we can have windows and doors open, so that all can dry as quick as possible there!

We had a try of our tomatoes yesterday, yeah! Two of them were ripe and I just mixed them with a bit of cucumber I had in a salad. Okay, the tomatoes weren't yet very big, but the taste was okay. Now only hope that all the others will ripen too in time. If so, we will have a good little harvest from them.
Fun to have it, only takes such a long time untill you actually can harvest LOL.

That's about it for this week, not leaving without a freebie. I have some lovely clusters and great quickpage for you made by Arlene, with the Nostalgia of Summer kit.
May be you noticed I have changed the bloglayout. Okay, that's one of the few things I did at the computer this week. It will do for now, for autumn I should come up with something new again.
So only have one more thing to do:
Wishing you a fantastic weekend!

Download    HERE