Day in Utrecht

We spent the afternoon exploring Utrecht. Too bad it was so cold!


We were on a mission to climb the to the top of the tower of the Domkerk.


There were so many stairs!!! 465 of them.



But the view was amazing.



At one point we were in the part where the bells are and Dave loved watching the mechanism work as the bells tolled.



Are we cute when we're cold, or what!?


The scrabble tile sign above this game shop really excited Dave. Mostly because the letters had different point values than in the American edition.


If you look closely you can see a UFO lodged on the building in the distance.
 

Happiness is...

Mexican food and girlfriends.

I have new friends!

American Womens Club of Amsterdam

 

Snow!

This morning we woke up to snow! The Temperature has been hovering around freezing here for weeks, but whenever there has been moisture it got just warm enough to produce rain. Well, I guess last night it stayed below freezing long enough for us to get s dusting of snow. I hope my bike lock isn't frozen shut!



Stuart and Emerson's first snow.

Awesome Amsterdam Website!

I just found the coolest website! It provides panoramic spinning images of neighborhoods in Amsterdam. There is a HUGE list of places to see, some of them are just popular intersections, some of them are shots of entire neighborhoods from the top of a building.

Here are my favorites:

Our neighborhood, De Pijp.
The Ceintuurbaan bridge over the Amstel, where we watched fireworks on NYE.
Ferdinand Bolstraat where the closest Albert Heijn is to our apartment. This is one block away from where we live.
My favorite little bridge, the Magere.
Sarphati Park which is 2 blocks away from our apartment.
This little plein (or "square" in English) is half a block from our apartment. The laundromat is here, the organic bread maker is here, and we pass by it to walk to our gym. In this shot it looks pretty much how it looks now, all wintery with leafless trees.
 

My favorite winkel

Currently, my favorite winkel (or "store" in English) is HEMA. It is the Amsterdam version of Target and I just love it! I could go there every day and find something new that I "needed" to buy. See, it's just like Target!

New words in Dutch

We learned that "biologisch" means organic, and we gathered "hazelnoot" meant hazel nut...


...but did you know that (at least in this context) "pasta" means NUTELLA!


Now that's my kind of pasta.
 

Chinatown

Another outdoor market we love!

Today we went to the Dappermarkt to get some cheese, fake hair, and gnomes...




Just kidding, we only got cheese. :)
 

NEW New Years Resolution

I started a tradition a few years ago that at the start of each new year I would think up a new cooking goal for myself. This year I am breaking that tradition, hopefully just for this one year, and instead giving myself a NEW new years goal.

Due to the fact that I will be living in Amsterdam for one entire year I plan to keep a photo blog of sorts similar to an "Amsterdam Daily Photo" kind of thing. No thoughts and feelings and silliness (like there is on this blog). I have lots of plans for this new photo blog so make sure to check it out!

Drumroll please... now, introducing, Torrey's new photo blog:

One Year in Amsterdam

Hope you like it!
 

New Years on the Amstel River

Videos of New Years on the Amstel River in Amsterdam

Happy New Year!

These are Oliebollen. Literally, oil balls. They are traditional Dutch donuts meant to be eaten on New Years. You can find them sold in stores and from little carts all over Amsterdam. But, today on NYE, everyone wants one. There were lines out the door of every bakery we passed!

Day in Den Haag (The Hague)

Word of the day: Detritus

His explanation for using this word instead of a normal word like debris was "words are fun."

No more crunchy underpants!

Meet our new favorite thing: Silan fabric softener. For the first couple of weeks that we were here all of our clothes were crunchy. You see, we have a washing machine, but no drier, and therefore, no soft fluffy clothes. However, this little bottle of heaven seems to make quite an improvement in the softness of our clothes. Amazing!

Quote of the day: Sunday

"You told me you were going to die before me!" "Yeah, only if we live naturally."

Blending in to their new habitat

The common house cat, felis domesticus, has evolved over millions of years to be indistinguishable from its surroundings:



Btw - today is Stuart's 2nd birthday!
 

Honeymoon destination chosen: Vienna, Austria

When asked where we were going on our honeymoon we offered a few different responses... "our honeymoon is a year in Amsterdam!" or "we're not going on a honeymoon exactly" or "wherever we travel to first once we get to Europe we will call it our honeymoon."

Well, it turns out, that our first planned trip will be Vienna, Austria in mid-January. It happens to be the top city on Dave's "must see while we live in Europe" list (mine is Venice, Italy but we're going there in April for my birthday). So, we decided to go before spring semester begins and my classes start and his work schedule kicks into high gear. Plus, it is sort of a belated birthday trip for him, so we thought Vienna would be perfect.

Dear Kitty,

Ok, well, perhaps "everything" isn't closed today... museums are open! So, we decided to do our first "touristy" thing here in Amsterdam. We went to Anne Frank's House. I was there about 10 years ago but was ready for a refresher. It was so moving and powerful.

You know you're in a different country when...

...the day after Christmas is called "second Christmas" day. All that means to me is that everything is still closed!

It may be Christmas but it is STILL Hanukkah too

I have a little dreidel. I made it out of clay.
When it's dry and ready, dreidel I shall play.
Oh dreidel, dreidel, dreidel, I made you out of clay.
Oh dreidel, dreidel, dreidel, then dreidel I shall play.


HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!
 

Christmas Lasagna

My adorable husband made the most amazing lasagna tonight. We figured since a lot of places would be closed for a few days it would be a good thing to make because we could eat it for many meals.

Breakfast on Christmas morning

It's Christmas morning and we're in Holland so of course I want to make Pannenkoeken. We decided to make Poffertjes (which in the US we call silver dollar pancakes) and I even put sprinkles in some of them. Sprinkles are a very Dutch thing... like it's a food group. In the US sprinkles go on ice cream as a topping, in Holland you can put sprinkles onto bread and eat it like a sprinkle sandwich.