A Year in Europe

Who’d have thought this day would come upon us so fast? We flew out of Sydney a year ago. It’s one of those strange sets of circumstances where it simultaneously feels like we’ve been here forever, and like we only just got here. Time has passed in the blink of an eye, yet has taken so long for some events to pass or come to fruition, that we thought they’d never arrive. We’ve learnt and grown so much, and yet, there is still so much further to go.

As my first semester of Dutch language class draws to a close, I realise there is still a long way for me to go. I try hard not to feel inundated or intimidated, and remind myself that I’m still learning and refining my use of the English language every day. Some days I’m a better self-motivational speaker than others. I plug on.

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Would you like to know more?

Progress

It’s been a long couple of weeks. It began with meeting the movers who would reunite us with all our stuff. Now, the building we are in has a hook, but it isn’t able to be used. (Long story). So we had an elevator. A platform which is put together on the street which they pile all your stuff in to bring it in through the window because the stairs are too narrow.

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Like so.

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This worked really well for everything except the King Size Mattress. It didn’t fit in the window OR up the stairs. We’ve been on an air mattress, and have had to order two single mattresses to counter this … adventure.

Then we brought the rest of our stuff from the interim apartment in a car we’d rented, and were finally home.

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As we settled in, we began filling in some of the more obvious gaps in our possessions. We were finally able to buy ourselves an espresso machine like we’ve been planning on for the last 5 years!!!

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We had a brief but wonderful trip to Zwolle to catch up with family and have a “Mum-cooked-meal” down on the farm.

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There has also been brief sanity trips to knit night to get away from the boxes and packing material.

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That in a nut shell wraps it up.

Nothing huge has been going on since the move, just lots of furniture tetris trying to figure out which layout suits everything the best. There is a sore back from the air mattress. There are kittens who are exploring the new uncharted territory of a balcony. And there will be a more exciting post next week wen I have a little more time to wander around with my new camera!

Amsterdam. Level, Property Ownership; ACHIEVED!!!

That’s right! Not only have we bought our first property, we’ve bought it in Amsterdam! We signed the paperwork on Friday and then went out for a celebratory lunch of traditional Dutch croquettes (giant bitterballen ) and frietjes.

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Those of you following along on Twitter will have seen the pictures posted on Saturday of our new balcony view …

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original 1930’s fireplace …

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and my new shower curtain! (so very me!!!)

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But on Sunday the fun really began, as we headed out furniture shopping! Now, our stuff (which we have been parted from for nearly five months now) will be arriving on Tuesday. But we left a fair whack of stuff behind for many reasons. So now, we get to replace some of it with stuff that will fit where we will now be settling in.

We began by looking at bookshelves,

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and desks,

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before moving on to dining tables,

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comfy chairs,

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then there was this gorgeous side table,

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and of course, couches.

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So much to choose from! So many design decisions! And none of it needs to be bought immediately. We can take our time making our house, our home.

This will be our sixth move to our seventh residence of 2012. Wish us luck!

Movements

For the past few months we have been living in the centre of it all.

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Very near here in fact.

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And on the other side …

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For the hell of it, this is a photo of garbage night in Amsterdam. This takes place twice a week, and the piles of rubbish along the tiny narrow streets average 5’ high, 3’ deep, and 20’ long. It’s an experience! Especially when you’re surrounded by pubs, cafes, and restaurants!

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In one hectic weekend, we went out of town to a wedding. This involved driving for the first time in Continental Europe. It was an experience! Sorry for the blur, but my eyes were having trouble focusing on the drive back at 1am!

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We caught up with some more tourists who I took for a brief tour around Amsterdam. (though this wasn’t technically on the weekend, but a few days later. They were at the same wedding on the weekend… does that count?)

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We also moved all our stuff to a new, and yet still temporary, abode. This is now what’s down the road from us. Still a canal, but just a touch greener!

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I can’t wait to discover what’s at the end of this path!

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I’ve also been getting lots of fabulous old fashioned post! So now I just have to write back to you all! Thank you so much! I’ve missed having pen pals! 😀

Maps

Something I had wanted for a long time was a huge world map on the wall.

When I finally got one, Himself and I had the brilliant idea that we should mark it all up with all the places we wanted to visit. Keep our goals in plain sight as it were.

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So we began putting little labels all over it of where we wanted to visit.

Quite quickly a pattern became evident as to where we really wanted to get to, and what part of the world held the most interest for us.

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Can you guess where we’re moving to?

We’re boarding a plane tonight! All our things are already on their way by sea and will reach us there in a few months. The kittuns are in boarding and will follow us in a few days.

We’re off on a grand adventure!!!

But don’t worry, I’ll still be updating here and there’ll be photos. Boy will there be photos! 😉

See you on the other side. Of the world!