European vacation, Part 2--Bloemendags and tulip fields

Tuesday, May 3–On recommendation from both our Dutch friends, we drove over to Limmen to see the displays for Bloemendag ("flower day"). The residents use just the blooms from hyacinth and other spring flowers, pin them to backgrounds to make pictures, and leave them up for the week. Everyone rides/walks around to see the displays, which are sometimes political, sometimes sports related, sometimes whimsical.

Afterwards we drove over to Volendam for lunch at the St. Catherein where I love to sip beer and watch the ships, bought some tulip bulbs which we are assured don’t need a certificate because there’s less than 50 bulbs and they are clean, bought a couple of scarves because I just can’t resist them, and Skip bought a piece of painted porcelain HE couldn’t resist. Then we returned to the hotel to nap in the late afternoon because we were still suffering the effects of jumping ahead 6 hours, had dinner at the hotel, and spent the evening on the patio, knitting and watching the sunset.
 
Wednesday, May 4–Skip and I chose these dates for our vacation because we wanted to see the tulip fields. 

Two different pink tulips here

SO RED it hurts our eyes!

We also drove over to Anna Palowna for their Bloemendag displays and stopped at a little restaurant/deli on the corner for lunch.

In celebration of Mothers Day on May 8

On our way back to the hotel, we stopped at Gre’s again to have dinner with them. We thought, Fons wouldn’t be able to join us for a take-out Chinese dinner because the church choir was singing at the war memorial in Akersloot–May 4 is the Netherlands’ Remembrance of the Dead, the day they honor armed forces members and civilians who died in wars or in peace-keeping missions since the outbreak of WWII.Between this and the Queens Birthday on April 30, the entire country was swimming in orange!  However, the ceremony finished early and Fons was able to enjoy yummy hot Chinese food and good conversation with us again.

Last years travels, Handwoven magazine and gardening

Hubby and I were transferred to the Netherlands last September and stayed for 3 months. We were joined in November by DS #2 and his SO. This is us hanging out on a windmill platform just south of Amsterdam. On my "Bucket List" I have now added a ride on a windmill wing--once a year, you can pay the miller to strap you into a harness and rotate you with a stop at the top to admire the view, upside down of course. DS and I want to go back and try it out--ya only live once and may as well make it worthwhile!

We met many amazing Dutch folks (the bakery with their evil caramel cakes

and the fish store owners who would cook reheatable meals were favorites in our neighborhood). And I hooked up with a group of local spinners. They were also accomplished weavers and knitters and I thought US folks should have an introduction to these amazing people. I've been working on a travel article for several months now, and have gotten confirmation from Interweave Press that it will appear in the upcoming issue of Handwoven Magazine. I'm honored to be able to introduce you to Annie and Ineke--you should know that the Dutch are just as bad at enabling fiber purchases as anyone else. This is the spinning fiber I bought at the annual retreat.

On another topic, we've just spent the weekend working at our other house where I grew up and which needs a bit of renovation before we can move in. We're hosting a family reunion there in 2 weeks and want to have the garden in some sort of shape by then. Last year it looked like this...

Garden is finished! August 4, 2008

We've taken down the old deer fence, cleaned out all the dead plants and numerous butterfly bushes, lifted the walking stones, laid down a weed barrier and are in the process of covering it with pine/black walnut mulch made from trimming the trees on the property. We'll then re-lay the stones and put up another deer fence. My arms and back hurt from all that shoveling, but next year and all future gardening years will be much easier once this work is done. I'm really looking forward to eating all those fresh organic veggies and fruits.