All kind of things kept me busy.

 Goodafternoon everybody!

Our weather has been wonderful, pity today and coming days temperature is down for a bit(we had 18-19C, now it is around 15C). Most of it to do with a stronger wind blowing from the East and North. Nut all together we still cannot complain, it was sunny which already makes me feel better.

Touching wood when saying this, my stomach hold okay, that little pill seems to help indeed. Well, I continue for a while and make an appoinment with my doctor when the pills will be almost finished, he said to do so for evaluation. 

But there was not so good news from my friend Heidi, you know she had a respiration infection last week? Well, yesterday morning I received a whats app message from her that she has been in hospital last Thursday evening. After a CTA scan it came out she had pneumonia. She just had finished her antibiotics! It was that bad, they said, that she had to saty in hospital, so she came home that same evening late. It will take however quite some time to recover from it and regain again some energy. Lately she already wasn;t feeling that good, very tired, lacking of much energy, probably the infection was due to that for a large part and with her underlaying PAH disease that isn;t good of course. Now she just has to learn to do mostly nothing at all, which has been always something difficult to do for her LOL. I just think it will take weeks or may be even a month or two before she will be feeling comletely okay again. And cross fingers that the pneumonia will not get worse!

Was there any good news this week? Yes, nothing special but all was allright, I did some shopping, two days I was staying in, and had one day I did a lot of work in the house, I was happy wth myself abou that. Friday it was such nice weather, that I took the tram to go to the market. It has been such a long time I didn;t go there, so it was a bit a treat you could say. And yes, I did buy some plants there, not much, but I couldn't resist and I bought with the same stand I think 8 or 9 packages of seed od all different kind of flowers. The plants I bought were  1 Digitalis(pink color) and thre smaller Cosmea, in screaming purple color, like this

Nice hey? Now crossing fingers that all the seeds will become beautiful flowers too, It gave Jan some work, but that is good. It keeps his mind busy as well as his body a little bit.

The seeds I bought, if I remember well, were, Marigold(in dark orange, great), Columbine with yellow, red flower, Lupine, something called Fried Egg(isn;t that a wonderful name for a flower?)Indian Blanket flower, Wallflower and even one tomato. we still have a package with small petunias, but we will save that for next year, to sow it real early next year.

Gosh, it all of this will come up and grow well, we should have in summer and late summer a buch of flowers all around. 

I am still crocheting on the blanket, every day or two I make a few rows and I and making a pillow cover, but when i was hopping around on the web to look for some nice patterns for pillow covers, I saw soooooo much, that now I almost don't know which one to choose. I am quite sure I will try y hand on a cover with the Alpine stitch, and then I will see after that, hahaha. As long as I am busy with something it is okay with me, I guess.

I see that the sun is shining again in the garden, so may be it is time to take a cup of tea and take advantage of the sun.

Wishing you all a wonderful week, and stay safe.

Easter with lovely weather, whoo!

 Goodafternoon everybody!

Happy and blessedEaster to you all.

It is a beautiful day here, we have sunshine, nice temperature of around 16C, it is nice, to be able to sit in the garden in the sun for a bit. It will stay this kind of weather probably all week, so we cannot complain this year about Easter weather. I can remember other years, when we had terrible and cold weather. 

Still a bit busy with the stomach, although it is getting better slowly, just every now and then it is a bit akward. But hey, as long as this little pill works quite well, I should not complain and I am NOT! 

This week Jan and I finally got out to look for a new set of couches. We first though about a corner couch, could be nice, but at the end we chose two separate ones, 2 1/2 seats, not too big, but with enough space to sit and Jan can lie down on one of them for a little nap in the evening.

We chose for a beautiful upholstery fabric in a sumptious warm red color. I think it will fit great in our sitting room and with the new curtains. It will also make the room look a bit brighter. We also chose a new coffee table(it wasn;t completely my choise but I can live with it, hahaha). Onle delivery time is aweful, it will take at least 4-5 months. I couldn;t believe it, but although on a lot of furniture websites they clain delivery times of 6-8 weeks most of them seem not to be able to do that. May be we could find a furniture shop that could deliver faster, but we found one that suites us, so we will just wait a bit longer. 

Now we just want to find us a new rug for under the coffee table, and for now I think that is enough.I will be happy when we will have the new couch, it will sit a lot better and will give us better comfort.

I told you about my friend Heidi last week, it seemed to go okay with her, but now she is having a respiratory infection and taking anti biotics at the moment. Poor soul, she isn;t having good times lately. And for her this infection strikes harder in her condition. I really hope the antivbiotics will do a good job and that she will recover real soon. 

Still busy with the two afghans I am crocheting. So no news to tell about that. One is almost ready, and when so I will take a new photo of it, okay?

Now it is time to enjoy for a moment the sunshine. My dinner is about ready, we will have big shrimps(gamba's), marinated in some oil, with of course salt, pepper, tiny bit of chili and lots of garlic. I will fry them quickly in a pan and we will have baked potatoes with it. 

Wishing you all a wonderful week, stays safe and healthy.

It looks as if slowly we will have spring time

 Goodafternoon everybody!

Today we have sunshine with temperature of 11C. Not really warm yet, but much better as last week and it will be even better. In one or two days we might reach 18C, then later on it will go down again to around 14-15C. Well, I can live with that if there is enough sunshine, with sometimes a bit of rain. 

Although may be a bit early I bought us already some spring plants, that will last, if all goes well way into summer, like some petunia's, busy lizzie, etc. Good for Jan, he has to plant them somewhere, LOL.

My friend Heidi had to go to hospital in Amsterdam this week, for two days, having some tests, a heart catharisation, MRI, and all those unpleasant things, because she wasn;t feeling really well lately, they still have no real answer to it, but it might be she will have to take another medicin for her condition But that's not sure yet. She now uses Flolan for her disease(pulmonary arterial hypertension(PAH), a disease of the heart and lungs)., It seems she is one of few who still have this, there are now more and other medicins for it too. well, we will see what comes out of the research. Most important is, that she will feel not so terribly tired all the time. Nevertheless it would be smart of her to take it a bit more easy and this time she might even do that, hahaha. I know her, she always has a thousand things to do, but she has to think about herself better. we want to have her around for still many years.

She is home now already, she is feeling a little bit better, now it is waiting for answers.

I also had a telephone call with my doctor for the stomach business(it is going better, but wanted to know how long to use the extra medicin he gave me). Still have to take it till I made an appointment with him, which probably will be somewhere next week. I called him and his assistent told me he would call me back and of course I just was in a shop when he called. 

Oh, Jan and I also got our rehersal vaccination for Covid last Thursday. They had a mobile vaccination post just near our house and we could go there without appointment. So of course I took this advantage. With summer and better weather coming along Covid infections could drop, but better be protected than regretting it afterwards, don;t you think? Let's hope it will work good enough for at least half a year. I think we will have to take another vaccination by the end of the year, just like the one we have each year for the flu. As long as it helps not becoming ill, or too much at least, when catching it, I will take it.

Before making this post I was in the kitchen preaparing for our dinner, I've made us a sheperd's pie. We didn;t have that for some time and it is tasty. I still had some sald from yesterday, so this will be our dinner with some vanilla custard as desert. Simple, but good enough, don;t you think?

I am still crocheting and have photo's of the ongoing projects for you.two smaller afghans.

The color of the second one isn;t that good on this photo, I have a picture from the web, where you can see it better.

It is the one bottom right of the batch.

I still have some work to do, haha. The second one I am making with a "built -in border", it looks fine, may be I just wil make one or two rows of  single crochet stitches extra to it. don;t know that yet. For the blue one I will have to crochet a border around when finished. Hmmm, I could already look into some possibilities on the web for that. 

Okay, dear visitors, I am finished for this week. I wish you all great weather, a wonderful week, stay safe.

After some winterdays, here a few Spring-photo's

 Goodafternoon everybody!

Today it looks much better than last Friday. Friday afternoo it started to snow a bit, but next day there was a cover all over, and it felt cold!!! Nights were rather cold with even some frost, but that will be over next week for sure.

Still it was a jump back after that lovely weather we had before. Today the sun is shining, although really warm outside it reaches around 8 C. All the snow here disappeared and I felt so sorry for my lovely tulips. They must have had quite cold feet and there leaves too, even their heads were bent, as if they were kind of depressive, hahaha. But.... snow gone, a bit of sunshine and they are bshowing the blooms in all beauty.

Hopefully that was all the winter weather for this year. We can do with some really nice temperatures, and we want to sit in the garden, in the sunshine, having a cup of coffee and sniffing up some fresh Spring air.

The whole week again it was a little bit trying out how the stomach would act, well, one late night and about all next day it wasn't feeling great, but the other days I couldn't really complain. I still am taking one pill of the one the doctor prescribed. If all goes well today again and tomorrow, I will quite taking it(as my doctor suggested) and see if all goes well without it. if not, I can call my doctor again. Cross fingers that will not be necessary.

I was in town one afternoon and in the sale I bought Jan 3 new pair of trousers, (he really needed a few new ones, that would fit as they should). Now I only have to take the length,, put in a little safety pin and bring then to a little shop for clothes repair etc. I brought lately already 2 pair of trousers and they did a lovely job. As I have no sewing machine, I would have to do it by hand but never would get it done as good as they did. It costs a small price and I am willing to pay that. 

I was in a buying mood that afternoon, also bought a few pair of trousers, leggings, (something in between those), very comfy to wear and for a real low price in sale too. Gosh, sometimes you just find what you are looking for, hahaha.

Next thing will be to buy us a new house phone. We have our mobiles, but still can do with such a phone, connected on cable. They call it here a DECT phone, it is one a charger and you can walk around with it, if you want. The one we have at the moment is already an oldie and is playing little tricks lately. I will try to find one with some larher buttons (or do you call it keys???), which will be easier to see and touch. Yes, it is also called a Senior telephone, hahaha.

In the evenings I am still crocheting, I finished a small baby blanket, it is more a cradle blanket I think, but I am quite happy with the result. Now I am making a larger blanket in a lovely blue color, I will try to make a photo when I have done some more rows on it.

 

Oh, I see it is already late afternoon, I will have to prepare a little bit for our dinner, so I say goodbye to you, wishing you a wonderful week to come, stay safe and don;t forget a little prayer for Ukrain, because that is still horrible and getting worse and will not be over for some time.

Till next Sunday.

Can't wait till Spring is really there.

 Goodevening everybody!

Yes, I am late today, but it was a day of doing small things, but nice things. We've had real nice weather this week, at least during daytime, the nights are still quite cold, just around zero point. Pity, that the spring feeling we accumulated, will go away next week, because temperatures will drop again to may be 11C( as for lately we had 16 to 18C).

One thing will be good next week, that there could fall a bit of rain. It has been very dry here, certainly for this time of year, so the garden can do with some rain.

All week was kind of focused on my stomach and I must say that the little pill seems to work. I have almost no trouble, at least not druing the night which is already a blessing. every now and then it is still a bit "not nice"feeling but it doesn't last too long. So I will continue next week with the medicin and see how that will go. I hope to cut on this pill when all goes well again, and hopefully I will not need to take it again.

It was a nice week to do some gardening, so Jan did some and i did some too. It really looks again like a garden waiting for Spring and summer again, LOL.

Today I was repotting a few seedlings and noticed we didn't have much potting soil, so I went to the dupermarket nearby and bought us two sacs of 10liter, and for now it will be enough. So it was nice to be busy with repotting, I also pruned some roses, and so on. Oh, while I was out for the soil, I hopped in another store to see if they had perhaps some nice bulbs for not too muh. They had not, but ...... I found a little dustbuster, ours died long ago, or almost had no good power anymore, and this one was a nice price and will do. This is the one:

They are handy when there is just a bit of dust or crumbs or something and not having to pull out the vacuum cleaner all the time.

Some tulips are blossoming, I've made a photo of a real nice species, it will post it next week, and hopfully together with another tulip that is just about to blssom(a new one I bought for this spring).

I am as always busy with some crocheting, I started another baby blanket, more a crib blanket, but it didn;t came ot as I wanted so I started it over and i think this time it will look nice. Perhaps next week I an take a photo of the part that is done.

That's all, folks for this week. I wish you all a wonderful week in safety and good health. Bye, bye

Ha, I've made dinner for today and tomorrow!

 Goodafternoon everybody!

The last few days we had quite nice weather, lots of sunshine, pity there was a bit too much wind now and then, but out of the wind it was really nice in the sun. Today it is much less, only about 8C and there is chance to some rain(which is not bad, it was rather dry for longer time). Next week however there will be days with 16-18C, sunshine and so on so that is a good prospect.

This week was mainly dominated by my stomach troubles. So I decided Wednesday afternoon, just before I went for some grocerie shopping,  to hop into the doctor's office and try tp make an appointment. On wednesday's the doctor is there all day, but what I didn;t epect was that his secretary right away went to the doctor to ask if I could have a visit with him that moment. That was ever so kind of her and so it was. Explained all and he gave me first a little pill to try out for a few days. and call him Monday to tell how things were going. If there would not be much progress, he would sent me to hospital for an endoscopy. Well, the pill does help (i can take as much as 3 on a day, but I tried first with just one) and it helps a lot. At least during the night I can sleep through without trouble, only in the mornings I still have a bit of trouble, but much less than it was. So we will see what the doctor tells me tomorrow. Perhaps I will have to take that pill for a longer time, or only on times I feel there is coming up stomach trouble again. I do hope I can get rid of it, because it interferes into daily life you know. 

But... I did have better mood and more energy after sleeping better and on a day it was still nice weather, I was courageous and cleaned the windows on the back(from room and kitchen) inside and outside. WHOOOOO!!. It felt good to have accomplished again something.

Jan is still quite busy sowing all kind of things, the other day I bought him seeds of parsley, dill, paprika and chilipeppers. I hope some of it eill come up and give us some harvest. 

Tuesday Jan and i went voring for the council and as it was real pleasant weather Jan made quite a walk, you know. We went all the way to a flower shop and bought some primulas and ranunculus, they give a lot of color this time of year. And then we walked home again, slowly but steady and I was glad he could manage that. On the way home we even made aquintace with two cats, hahaha. One seemed to be on a stroll with her owner(sweet, isn;t it?) and I could caress her, which seemed to be something unusual. Her owner said that Josephine  normally was very shy with strangers. So I must have some good-will vibe towards animals, LOL. The other cat was sitting in a garden, but came towards me when I talked to him. He looked to be well taken care off, because he was on the fat side(bit like Garfield, hahaha)

Today I made us dinner for two days, and that's practical and often the taste is even better on the second day. I've made stew meat on Indonesian way, also meat balls to eat with some peanut sauce, rice  and noodles, all a bit the Indonesian way. And that's about all for this week.

Just wanted to ask your support in any way for Ukrain, because we shouldn;t forget about this war! Deep respect for the courage of the Ukrain people and it's leader Zelensky! And let us hope this war will be over very soon.

I wish you all a wonderful week, stay safe and healthy!

We might have real Springweather this week

 Goodafternoon everybody!

Oh my, I cannot believe the change of temperature during this week. I think yesterday it was around 14 C and looking at the weather app on my laptop it could be in the sun already 16C! That with not too much wind it really seems like we are heading to Spring time. Next week it still will be nice, might be some rain(which is welcome by now), and temperatures Tuesday on the highest of around 16-17C.

I was a happy camper this week when we got rid of a lot of not longer needed stuff of all kind. The bulky waste has been collected on Tuesday. Now we will try to have a next one, LOL.

It was all by all a quiet week, I did some housekeeping jobs, Jan is busy every now and then in the garden. I am almost ready with my baby blanket in white. Just have to tie off the yarn ends (I always have trouble with this part of crocheting, hahaha). And may be I will try my hands on a sweet crocheted applique for on the blanket to finish it off. And then is the question.... what will I make next? Probably it will be another blanket or I thought about making a baby sleeping sac, I saw a few real cute ones on the web and it is something a little bit different to make.

Next week we will have to go to vote for city council elections. Nice that the polling station is very near our house. I thik there will not be a huge number of people that will go voting, but as long as we can vote, we should use that right I think.

Strange to think we can go voting and not too far away in Europe there is a ugly war going on in the Ukraine. I fear it will be a long lasting one, with many casualties. But we have to continue our help to Ukraine, and pray there will be found some kind of solution for this situation.

Today I have a lightjob for making our dinner, yesterday I've made a pan of chicken soup, well filled and we still have more than enough for today too. So a simple meal today, I probably will give some buttered sandwiches to it and that should fill the stomach enough.

Time to make a cup of tea and perhaps find a nice pattern online for the sleeping bag.

Wishing you all a wonderful week, stay safe.