My friends, I invite you to follow this link. No nasty surprises, promise. And SFW.

*sings*
Falalalala lala la laaaa. And I've actually decked the halls, sort of.

...as mentioned in my previous blog about Saint Nicholas day's traditions. (Some of you may remember last year, when I made a Big Tit.)
We're celebrating a week late this year, because some in our group are celebrating with family on the proper date; but never mind that, it's still fun.
Here are the 'surpreezes' (phonetic spelling invented by yokospungeon ) I made this year. There are small gifts hidden inside, and each one has a little poem attached.

The polystyrene mouse contains a packet of sparklers, that'll come out when you pull the tail. It's not that weird of a gift because I know the giftee loves them.
The zebra is a plant watering can, wrapped in zebra patterned paper with some extras taped on, and there won't be much left of it when it's unwrapped; that's why it's nice to have a picture!
The cardboard saw is marked  'eyebrow saw', and has a poem to explain that the receipient is getting a handy tool to prune her husbands very bushy eyebrows; inside is a tiny pair of scissors (which was on her wish list). Making fun of people is part of the tradtion; Saint Nick can be humourous or gently teasing, he's never really mean though.
stoneshop  made a surpreeze for which the receipient will need an angle grinder to open. There was welding involved.
*rubs hands in glee* This should be fun!

Actually, this is a recycled posting from last year. Here you go.

Here's a bit about Saint Nicholas traditons, the way I know them:
( Read more about Dutch Saint Nicholas traditions )

So how did all y'all do when I asked you to tell me what you know about these traditions?

( Click to find out. )

I'm curious to find out how much you, unDutch people, know about a specific Dutch tradition: Sinterklaas, or the Feast of Saint Nicholas.

Please don't look it up, as I know is easy to do, I'd like to find out how much you know and where you picked it up, not how well you can look up stuff on the internet  ;-)

And please answer before reading the others' comments, as there might be spoilers.

Don't worry if you can only tell me that you know not a single thing about it, it's all interesting to me.
So humour me, please. Thanks!

Today was Queen's Day. If we have a national holiday, this is it: it's a celebration of our Queen's birthday, only it's not her birthday, because that's in February and we'd have awful weather. So we celebrate it on her mother's birthday instead.

[Error: unknown template 'qotd'] If you know me at all, you should know by now... and if you don't, why would you care?  ;-)

Today is Valentine's day, a day which doesn't mean dick to me by itself; however, any excuse for releasing a bunch of BookCrossing books will do. I had about 50 books prepared; all of them with words like 'love' or 'heart' in the title, or hearts or Cupids on the cover. I'd made them look nice and sappy with some glittery heart shaped stickers, and each of them had a pink heart shaped sticky note with the words 'Voor Jou' (for you) on it, and a bit of shiny ribbon.
Luckily, it was a dry day, so no bags were needed. I loaded the books into a suitable release vehicle and we headed into town. The first journal entry was made before we even got home!


Added on february 18: The catches so far. Most of them are, of course, in Dutch.

one
two
three
four
five

As Christmas was approaching, we realised no one had invited us for a Christmas meal. Last year, we had family over for dinner; that was nice, but we didn't really feel like doing that again this time. So we decided to spend a few days away from home this time.
I found a nice short trip arrangement on the Stayokay, which is the former youth hostel organisation, website; as we are former youth ourselves, that seemed very appropriate.
I inquired whether or not there was room for us in the inn, and (also very fitting) it was almost full, but they had a room for four which we could have at a small extra fee for the empty beds, which they would not be renting to anyone else. So we had a room for four to ourselves. The downside of that was, of course: bunk beds. But I was sure we'd find some way around that.

We were going to Terschelling, which is one of the islands that form a string to the north of the Netherlands. It's 30 kilometres long. It's possible to take a car on the ferry, but that's fairly expensive, and besides, what for? There's nowhere to drive to.
We decided to take our bicycles instead, and get some exercise.


Of course, we also took our laptops and a small stack of books to release.
And since we knew about a BookCrosser who lives there and sometimes feels a bit left out (because it's much harder for her to attend meetings or hunt for books) we also took a banana box full of unregistered books, so she'd be able to release them all over the island, and possibly net a few new BookCrossers that way.

Aaltsje (that's her name) was waiting for us when we got off the ferry, and her eyes lit up when she say the full box!

It was already dark, but we found the inn quite easily. We had a nice dinner, a short walk around the village and headed for bed. Don't tell the staff, but we put the matresses on the floor. We're not used to sleeping in separate beds.

The next day was Christmas day. We spent it exploring the island by bicycle, which is nice, but a bit windy. We found a very nice old windmill, the one on the picture above, that is now a great place to stop for coffee and tea (although the tea tasted a bit salty!), and later on we stumbled upon the Wreckage Museum, which was full of things found on the beach or while diving. Very interesting and well worth a visit.
I took a few pictures that day, and you can find them here if you're interested, or click on the pic.

I drew it myself, based on an idea from 'The Little Prince' by De Saint-Exupéry. It says 'a year is over before you know it', which is true, especially if you live on a very small planet. Now that I think about it, that would only make your days go faster... oh well, shorter days probably result in shorter years, too.
Anyway, I wish you all a very happy, healthy, lazy and active 2008. May some of your most cherished dreams come true. But not all of them, because then you'd have none left.
Happy New Year!

(Originally posted on MySpace)
I've just gotten myself a Christmas tree, but since it looks much the same as last year's tree did, I'm not going to bore you with a picture. Instead, I'll post a wonderful Christmas themed video of the Little Mole.
The Little Mole is the brain child of Zdenek Miler from the Chzech Republic, and I've known him since my childhood. Short films like this one were and are shown on German television in the 'Program with the Mouse'.
Without further ado, here he is: the Little Mole and the Christmas Tree. Enjoy.

(Originally posted on MySpace)
Here's a bit about Saint Nicholas traditons, the way I know them:

In the period before the festivity, children are encouraged to leave their shoe in front of the open fire (nowadays, central heating works, too. Those Black Peters are smart!) with something for Sinterklaas' horse: a carrot or some hay.
It's best if they sing a song or two, so Zwarte Piet can hear them through the chimney, and tell Sinterklaas that these are good kids who have sung him a nice song. In the morning, there will be a tiny gift or a piece of candy in the shoe.


Bigger gifts are given on the evening of the 5th or 6th of December. The gifts are all supposed to come from Saint Nicholas and are often packed in a big cloth bag.
They are left on the doorstep by a friendly neigbour who rings the bell or knocks on a window, pretending to be Black Peter, and then hurries off before the kids get to see him. Sometimes, he'll throw some candy into the room first, making sure all the children get to see is a gloved hand!
If there are no neighbours, all of this happens while father or mother just had to pop out for a small errand, and when (s)he comes back Black Peter has just left again so they have miraculously missed each other!

The mysterious bag is respectfully brought inside, and usually people will take turns unwrapping a present. There are gifts for the grown-ups, too. Most of the gifts will be accompanied by a poem or rhyme, signed by either Sinterklaas or Black Peter; the poems often make fun of the receipient of the gift, but in a friendly way. They are all read out loud.
Some of the gifts are packed in such a way that they resemble an animal, an object or even a person; your gift may be wrapped in cotton wool and covered in something sticky, like syrup; or the package may be very hard to open, or contain nothing but a note telling you to go and look in the fridge where your present will be hidden. These 'trick packages' are called Surprises, pronounced Surpreezes, and making them is one of the most fun traditions surrounding Sinterklaas.

As soon as children don't believe in Sinterklaas anymore, they become a Hulpsinterklaas, or Sint Nick's Helper: they make or buy presents for the other members of the family. So during november and early december, it's not uncommon that a parent will not be allowed into a kid's room, because 'surprises' are being made inside, and no one should see them before the big event.
It's often a bit sad to find out that Sinterklaas en Zwarte Piet aren't real, but on the other hand, being a Hulpsinterklaas makes you feel really grown-up!

If the group of participants is too large to make a gift for each, names will be drawn, so each person has to get a gift for just one of the others. Sometimes, groups of grownups celebrate Sinterklaas this way with no children present at all. Usually, there's a set (and low) budget: Sinterklaas isn't about getting expensive stuff, it's about creativity, silly rhymes and fun.

To me, celebrating Saint Nicholas Day is one of the nicest traditions we have here, and it's a shame that many people drop it in favour of putting presents under the Christmas tree.

(Originally posted on MySpace)
Then you'll apreciate the special trick packaging I just made for a Saint Nicholas gift. It looks like a Great Tit. The present hidden in its belly consists of fat balls to be used as bird food during winter. So please look at my lovely tit:





I'll tell you a bit more about Dutch Saint Nicholas traditions some other time, if I can be bothered. For now, try this site.

(Originally posted on MySpace.)
...a very happy, prosperous, thoughtful, peaceful, loving, healthy New Year!

(Originally posted on MySpace)
Here it is: my Christmas tree. Mostly the same ornaments as last year, just added a few. Which is fine, because it's a bigger and much fuller tree.
Well, it should be... I paid twice as much for it!

It looks so much nicer if you take the photograph in a darker room. But then you can't see the ornaments, just the lights. I tried taking a pic with the flash on, but it looked horrible.

(Originally posted on MySpace)
Tomorrow is Christmas eve and we're having guests for dinner. My parents (sort of), his parents (sort of), his sister and her husband and two kids. Yes, that makes ten!
So for the first time in my life I've started cooking a day early. We just made the soup and dessert so we won't have to do it all tomorrow.
The menu is as follows:

- lassi (mango yoghurt shake), three kinds of pappadums, three chutneys.
- dahl (lentil soup), naan bread.
- yellow rice.
- a sweet curry with sweet potatoes, carrots, coconut milk, almonds.
- a spicy curry with cauliflower, zucchini, egg plant, onions.
- fried okras as a side dish.
- raita (yoghurt based salad) with tomato, cucumber, radishes and mint.
- kheer (rice pudding). See recipe in earlier blog posting.
- coffee and tea with tiny chocolates.

Sounds classy, no? As you see, it's all Indian. I love Indian food. I hope our guests do, too. We're including a sweet curry for those who don't do spicy, so we should be allright.
Now let's see if I can find another plate tomorrow, because we're one short and I really want to have matched plates, just this once!

And we have a lovely Christmas tree. I'll try to take a picture of it. Tomorrow. If I have the time...

(Originally posted on MySpace)
Here's my card for all of you lovely MySpace folks! Enjoy.
(Click makes bigger)

(Originally posted on MySpace)
Today I was informed that a certain assignment I was going to do next week was postponed.
The guy who was supposed to make the wall nice and even before I would be able to paint a marble effect on it, has a badly infected joint and can't work, so I can't either. There goes my income for December!

So I decided to try something I haven't done in years: go out and find some shop and café owners willing to have a temporary decoration painted on their windows for Christmas. Sint Nicolas would be nice too, but it's a bit late for that now.
I found the designs of frolicing Christmas trees I made at least five years ago, and even the HTML to advertise my temporary activities on my business' website. So now that the page is back up, the next step is to dress in nice white-with-paint stains and hit the street. I'll take prints of the designs (or if I can find them I might even laminate the original drawings and take those), some flyers to leave if I can't talk to the person in charge, and business cards.

I haven't done this in years, but it's probably a good idea. I might even come home with some new assignments for 'real' work. Wish me luck.