A Busy Month

This past month has been full of so many fun and interesting experiences. I'll briefly highlight them and then if time permits, I will add some more thoughts and details.

Ralph and Lola visit us in Holland. It was wonderful to have them here!!


Alyna's 16th birthday.

It's not very exciting with just Mom and Dad to celebrate with.
It's hard to stay sad when you get some fun shoes and cute clothes.

Fun with missionaries.

Elder Delpais, Elder Wells and Elder Bell - we got to take them to dinner!We spent the day with Elder Van der Stek and Elder Black and Lydia as we traveled to the volleyball tournament and spent the day in Gronningen.

The Church All-Nederlands volleyball tournament.
All the wards in Holland as well as some from Belgium and Germany came for the day. Our youth took second place. Alyna was not happy to be there but it was an interesting day.

Diane Siegfried and sister Kay came to visit.
We visited Keukenhof and Amsterdam and had such a fun time. It was sad to see them leave.

Fly home
On our international leg of the trip, Dennis got "bumped" to first class and let me have his seat.
He/It was so sweet!

Junior Prom

The shoes were a little tricky to get into around all that dress.

Brandon Netzly and Alyna all ready to go. So cute.

Lisa's Bridal shower
Carol, Peggy and Michelle were sweet enough to host a shower for Lisa at a time I could be home to attend. What great friends!
Emily, Michelle, Kimberly and Nedra at the shower.
It was a lot of fun to see a lot of Lisa's good friends and catch up on what they are doing.
They are all so darling.

Mindy and Jeran, Kara and Lori arrive in Providence.
A happy reunion.

Peggy, Trish, and Cheryl brought us lunch before the Providence reception.
It was a nice moment to sit and visit before all the fun of the next few days.

Lisa and Cameron get married (along with all the related festivities.)
Lisa and Cameron at the Manti Temple.
The happy couple with the proud parents.
Both families.

Dennis, Alyna and I fly to Madrid.
Dennis and Alyna enjoyed playing a game on the subway where you can't hold onto anything and you can't move your feet. Dennis eventually won.

Our first view of the temple as we arrived.
The city of Toledo - made me want to sing songs from Man of La Mancha the whole time.

It was so nice to visit with our friends, Garry and Lanell Moore. They are currently serving as temple president and matron of the Madrid temple. They were wonderful hosts.
Alyna in front of the Royal Palace. We were not able to go in because the King was greeting the International Olympic Committee as Madrid is bidding for the 2016 Olympics. There was lots of police activity going on around the palace and even sniper guys up on the roof. All very interesting.

After seeing this, I wasn't sad that we didn't get to see any bull fights.
In the park, there were all these interesting statues. This was the one I though best represented Alyna. She is a good learner and has a big heart. She has a very orange personality - at least if you believe facebook which says she is yellow or red, depending on the test. At least she is always lively and ready for fun. She loved being in a big city park at night with all the night life.

One of many monuments in the park.

Flamenco dancing. Very Spanish!

Being "home"
We had a wonderful couple of weeks but it was so nice to get back to our peaceful home.

A Week of Sightseeing with some of the Briscoe Family

This past week we've had the opportunity to have Ralph and Lola visit as well as Tom and Sandi, Diana, Emmy, David and Daniel. They were all here to enjoy dinner and a session of General Conference with us on Sunday night. (We get to view, via the internet, the 10 AM session at 6 PM and the 2 PM session at 10 PM.) Tom and Sandi and kids left Monday morning for a trip to Paris and Ralph and Lola headed to Germany and Switzerland to visit the temples there.


On Thursday, Dennis arrived home from his trip to Utah and Ralph and Lola returned from their travels. On Friday we drove to the other side of the country and met Tom and Sandi and crew at Keukenhof Gardens. The temperature was perfect and the gardens were breath-taking. We all enjoyed the two hours that it took to stroll through the gardens. Afterward, we drove to Delft for dinner at a good Indonesian restaurant.



Saturday morning, Tom's family headed home and Ralph and Lola, Dennis and I did a little local sight seeing of places of interest to us - Alyna's school, Dennis' work, etc. We also spent some time grocery shopping and preparing some of the food for Easter dinner.

Easter Sunday was really nice. We had a really nice church service and then in the evening we had about 20 ward members here for dinner. It was fun to have some time to sit and visit. Luckily for me, they all speak fairly good English.

On Monday, or second Easter, Dennis and I and Ralph and Lola took a car trip to Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg and France. In Germany we went toTrier.
Trier is the oldest ancient Roman city north of the Alps, and has many well preserved ruins. Most notable of the Roman remains here are the 1500 year old Port Negro (Black Gate) - the old city gate, a well preserved ampitheater, and a wide array of underground baths. There are also two very old churches which were built together, the oldest of which was built by Constantine in 300 A.D. This is a great place to spend a day or two, and if you're up for seeing another country, the Luxembourg border is less than 30 minutes away.

We went to the American cemetery in Luxembourg were one of Ralph's cousins is buried. From there we went to France and found the Maginot Line which is a set of bunkers that were strategic in WWII. It was an area Dennis remembered from a film, The Major and the Minor starring Ray Moland and Ginger Rogers.

Ralpn sitting on top of one of the bunkers.

On the way home, Dennis showed us the place that he lived when he fist came to Holland in the town of Heerlen. It wasn't far from there to Castle Hoensbroek so we also visited it.

The Highs and Lows of a Week with a Teenage Girl

This first week of April has been busy and full of highs and lows. It was the first week since we've been here that it was sunny and fairly warm all week long. The daffodils and forsythia are now in full bloom and the magnolias are just beginning to open up.

Alyna had several tests and big assignments due as well as trying to prepare to take the ACT test. She studied hard but also found time to watch some sitcoms and enjoy the sunshine. She did well on all her tests and assignments so that was good. She had one day where she only had one class so she skipped it and stayed home and studied. That day, she also got a special delivery.

For several weeks now she has known that she was going to get asked to Mountain Crests' Junior Prom which just happens to be the weekend we came home for Lisa's wedding. We had been wondering how Brandon would ask since we are 8 hours time difference and many thousands of miles. On Wednesday afternoon the doorbell rang (which doesn't actually happen here very often unless we are expecting someone.) It was a floral delivery service. The pictures will tell the rest of the story-
It was our great luck that Dennis was heading home to Utah the next day so Alyna hurried and prepared an answer. Dennis took home this card and a picture of her with the flowers and a little wooden shoe keychain and Dennis, Andrew and Lindsay delivered it to him on Friday night. It was a really fun event for all of us.


(The YES! is written using the petals from the flower.)

The next big thing for Alyna was the ACT test which we signed up for in January before we knew that Dennis would be out of the country. It caused a bit of stress for all of us becasue the test was being administered in the American school in the Hague. I haven't driven in any of the big cities here and was very nervous. Alyna was nervous about doing well on the test and taking it in a very unfamiliar place. Dennis helped us out a bit by driving over there the Sunday before so we could see where the school was and mark it on the car GPS system. Anyway, so we got up at 5:30AM Saturday morning and drove the hour and a half to the school. We went in and as we were waiting for the test administrator to appear, Alyna remembered she had forgotten to print out the admission form. She went and talked to the administrator when she got there and the lady was a bit grumpy about it but finally said that she could make it work. I was the only parent there so Alyna finally said I could leave. About half an hour later she called in tears and said she had forgotten her wallet and they wouldn't let her take the test. She was so upset with herself for not double checking the web site and frustrated that after all her preparation time she wasn't going to be able to take the test. It was a good learning experience for all of us.

That evening Alyna came into the kitchen while I was finishing cleaning up and said something like, "You are sure ready to be a grandma!" I was a bit confused. We hadnt been talking about babies or siblings or anything. I asked why she said that and she said that I had just decorated the bathroom like a grandma would. I was quite taken aback. I had finally decided this week that the downstairs bathroom needed some kind of decorations in it besides the bottle of liquid soap so I had gotten a little rug, some flowers and a colored towel and put in it.
I guess that it may look a bit "grandma-ish" but it looks a bit homier. Any suggestions on how to not make it look a little younger and funner?

Sewing Projects

It has been very cold and rainy here since we got back from Andrew and Lindsay's wedding so I've had a lot of indoor time. I got spring feever long before there was much spring type decor around so I had to get a little creative. I made this little table topper for our coffee table out of handkerchiefs. It was pretty simple but Dennis thought I had gone a bit mad.

Then I wanted to make something to brighten up our dining room table. There aren't a lot of fabric stores near-by so I was searching for any type of thing that was a nice springy color and found a sheet on clearance that I thought would be just the thing. So here is our dining room table now. It's a little hard to tell but it is a pretty lime green color.

I bought a quilt kit while in Utah and was so excited to sew it up. The name of the pattern is "Off-Kilter". The trick was that the fabrics used weren't the ones shown on the pattern and I had to try to figure out what pieces of fabric were meant for what. I guessed wrong on one major thing and ended up having a challenge on how to solve the problem with what I had or could find here. (If you can't tell what the problem is, great! I'm not going to tell.)




Ric-rac helped solve the problem and gave the quilt a added interest.

While we were home last, we took my computer in for repair and realized that it would be a while before I got it back. So Dennis bought me a cute little notebook computer. It is so small and so light that when I carry it I worry that I won't realize I have it in my hand and will just drop it.
Also since it fits into some of my bigger purses so easily, I thought it might be nice to have something to protect it from all the grunge that usually ends up in the bottom of my purse. So I made this cute little bag/purse for it. I used three bandanas in prints popular here in the Netherlands and a little batting. I thought it turned out really cute. I got to try out some things that I've been wanting to try as well as practice using my BRS foot while doing some free motion quilting.
My last project is the one I am working on right now. I have the major blocks done but I'm trying to decide if I'm brave enough to do some more free motion quilting on it and the best way to go about it. The name of this quilt pattern is "Hip to Be Square". It has some travel themed prints in it and I would like to put some of our travel/vacation sites on it - like Paris, London, Bryce Canyon, Mulege, Canada, Hawaii....... (Sorry it's not a better picture. Maybe when it's done.)

HIgh Tea

Today we had our Relief Society Birthday celebration. We had a high tea party. Everyone signed up for a food to bring and were encouraged to wear their fanciest hats and bring their cutest purse. Not many people had fancy hats but there were some pretty fun purses.

There were about 20 sisters in attendance which filled up all the chairs and was about all the room could hold. The room was decorated very festively with green and pink.

There were all kinds of interesting foods and in true high tea fashion, the desserts where at the beginning of the buffet and the sandwiches and vegetable stuff was near the end. There were teas of various kinds as well as fruit juices.

I made a raspberry chocolate torte. (Mindy, don't fall off your chair!) It got rave reviews. Okay, it did start with a cake mix but then it got lots of special attention - thanks to a recipe from Taste of Home Celebrations cookbook. It had a raspberry filling layer and it was suppose to have a ganache layer and then fresh raspberries but I couldn't find fresh raspberries this time of year and the ganasche hadn't cooled enough to whip properly so I ended up just making a fluffy chocolate butter cream frosting.

These are a couple of friends. The one on the left is Mickey. She is the other American in the ward. The lady next to her just got married and moved here from the Philippines. She is getting baptized next Saturday.

This is Armanda. She is an amazing cake decorator and a great lady.

The girl on the right is Lydia. She is our Young Women President.

It was a nice event and everyone seemed to have a good time. We had several investigators and non members attend and although my Spanish and Dutch are pretty limited I did try to at least smile, listen and nod and try to figure out what they said (they kept talking to me so I must have responded appropriately, or else they just thought I was a little crazy.)

A Bike Ride

Today was a brisk but sunny day so I decided it was time to get out on the bike and explore some more. A lot of times when I’m out riding around I either forget my camera or just don’t stop to take a picture and then later I wish I had. Today I remembered to take the camera and also decided that I would stop about every 10 minutes and take a picture of the most interesting thing around. I had one destination and that was a windmill I had seen from a distance several times but never seen it very closely. It is located in a little hamlet not far from here ( about a 15 minute bike ride).

As I rode down the street from our house I saw this. This house is decorated in typical Dutch fashoin for someone turning 5o years old. The Dutch are really into birthdays, so they see these types of milestones as cause for celebrations. 50 is a particularly big birthday to them, which they refer to as "Seeing Sara" for a woman or "Seeing Abraham" for a man. On the occasion, family members will construct a straw dummy (sometimes several) and put it outside of the house wearing the birthday boy or girl's clothes. The dummy will be adorned with items demonstrating their hobbies (like a golf bag for a golfer) and will be finished off with a gray wig. This display is to inform all the neighbors of the special milestone. I think I need to go on a Mediterranean cruise in May!

This lovely old house sits out amoung fields and farm houses. They have been working on renovating it since we got here and it looks really nice now. The thatched roofs always intrigue me.

Swans use to be scarce here and so they were put on the protection list and now we’ve seen quit e a few. They have been a lot in the fields lately and not on the water.

I love traveling down these picturesque little roads. There are always trees along the road and quite often a canal on the other side. It is so peaceful and pretty. It will be fun in another couple of months when all the leaves are on the trees and shrubs.

I took some pictures of some lambs that are just a couple of hours old. There were also some a day or two old. (I need to crop the pictures in order before I put them in here.)

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