HALLOWEEN 2012

Today was our first TRICK or TREAT PARTY ever!

During the last 12 years in The Netherlands we had to improvise to keep this scary, sweet tradition alive-in the name of my American husband of course!

The Dutch know what Halloween is, but nobody really cares about it!  As soon as our children were old enough to appreciate the sweeter things in life we were off:  Our cars were filled to the rim with dressed up children and we drove around the neighbourhood to our pre-arranged addresses!

Not today! Let me take you on a tour around the neighbourhood and show you what our boys had to deal with: 

This one is quite harmess!

 Fall decoration in front of our house:



Let the fun begin:

Further along the road:You will find lots of skeletons on our Ridge:

If that isn't enough, dead people are hanging everywhere!

Actually not, this is just the spiderweb!Around the corner:

Are they real or not?

NO SEX IN THE SUBURBS

Written by  Miss Kitty, Suburbanville, BC, Canada

Here she is, my first guest contributor: Miss Kitty!

She is a self proclaimed expert in the field of cosmetics and beauty products! This is something I don't know much about and therefore her assignment was simple: What are the hottest items on the market for both men and women at the moment?

But as you can read, Kitty had something else on her mind!

Happy reading!

Loss of libido is a common thing that happens to many women in long-term relationships.  Forty three percent of us have experienced this at some point in our lives. As you’re reading this right now, I’m willing to bet that the majority of you would prefer a nice glass of wine and a hot bath to a romp in the sack most nights.



The question is: Why does this happen? I know that when I was in my twenties, (With far less of a hectic lifestyle) I couldn’t wait to play a game of “hide the sausage”. My sex drive was turbo charged. I thought about sex more often and was insatiable in my partner’s opinion. In fact in all of my relationships before I met my husband were like that.

 

So in spite of thinking that I know what has turned me off sex, why are so many other women in the same position?

Children, pre-imenopause, medication, and stress can transgress into a loss of libido while emotions are usually the culprit for younger women. When I was younger with my first real lover, he messed around with some bimbo in our parking lot. I was so angry and hurt that things were never quite the same after that. I kept analyzing all of the things about him that turned me off.

Moving forward ten years, my libido went into a complete funk after my son was born. I poured all of my emotion and affection onto him as I grew up in a very non- demonstrative family. Five years later when my daughter was born it became even worse, the thought of sex just seemed way too much of an effort and time consuming. Days were long and hectic with a full time job and having two young children. When I got home, I just wanted to relax and not have to think about pleasing another person.



When the physical side starts to fizzle in many relationships, the person who is wanting more activity in the bedroom, usually then will start lashing out, possibly having affairs, or think about leaving the relationship. Many of our couple friends in the last year split, a few had affairs, and some acquaintances even started swinging!

Not that I’m into that kind of thing, but I can only imagine that if I tried it, I’d end up with a balding guy with a ponytail and bad breath! Nope, not my bag, but it seems to work for some people! Honestly though I don’t really know the answer. Because so many women that I know in long term relationships feel the same way, I wonder if  mojo just fizzles out after seven years or so. The famous seven year itch…

Some women have had success with hormone therapy and have lit the sheets on fire once again, but am I on to something when I say that human beings just aren’t meant to be monogamous?

Signing off, Miss Kitty!

Hello again, this is Christina writing!  With this note I like to say a big "Thank You" to Kitty for sharing her 'dilema'with us! Here is my thought: Isn't it sad that sex in a long term relationship is the (extra-ordinary)  exception and not the norm?  Having sex should be like ageing: The older we get the better we become!? Just a thought...

TOO MUCH TIME

 RANDOM & (EXTRA-) ORDIONARY THOUGHTS during a bus ride

From Coquitlam to Burnaby[/caption]

                                                                                                                                                       To fully appreciate Justin Bieber you need to be a teenage girl! Our male dominated household is a “Bieber-Fever - Free Zone!”

Blame it on my ears:  Katie Perry, Kelly Clarkson & Carly Rae Jepsen sound like one to me!

The movie”JACKASS” should be renamed into ‘Dumb Asses”.  Honestly, who comes up with this dangerous, disgusting stuff? Men?                                                                        While I am thinking about movies:  I don’t see the attraction of ‘The Walking Dead” either

 On the other hand, I think Peter Griffin is cool!  “Family Guy” beats “South Park” any day!

 What is it with men and their obsession with black socks?

 Forget about reading “50 Shades of Grey”. See what 50 shades of black socks do to your libido when you try to match them back together!

Best invention in the sock department: The ones with the names of the week printed on.    Or buy hiking socks.   They make it even easier to get the right foot into the right sock: They have the letters written on them!  This is a wonderful no-brainer for early in the morning.

The best invention for homemakers who are in charge of the laundry: Colour catchers! These sheets of paper changed my life! They save so much time and deliver what they promise!

Is it too late to teach our boys home etiquette? They need some fine tuning! Why can't they compliment me on a job well done when I present a new dish? Instead they are yelling: "Don't like it".

Joey's mom in Korea, (he is our exchange student) you did something right here: Your son would NEVER, EVER say something like that to me.  If he doesn't agree with the new dish he quietly reaches for the ketchup bottle! He is a clever one.

 Mom was right when she told me fewer, but thicker rolls of toilet paper last longer than single sheet rolls.

Please anti-wrinkle cream - manufacturers, tell the truth, are your creams really working? I have reached the age where I want to believe your promises!

What happened, can't “multi-task” anymore!.  I was able to read an e-mail, respond to it, answer the phone, watch TV and talk to Dominic – all at the same time!  Now I need quiet and peace to do one or the other! BUT, I am still able to make yoghurt and crunchy flakes at the same time!

Blueberries and pumpkin spiced lattes are an acquired taste.

Why should you drive with 16 and drink with 19? The other way around makes so much more sense to me..                                                                                                                                                                            Drink when you are 16, get shit faced many times over, puke and get it over with. Then become a responsible driver with 18. You won’t have any desire to drink anymore (or at least not so much).

I wonder where I will find Cruz's well hidden birthday present. Probably at my next spring cleaning.

It was brilliant how Brando cracked the combination lock of our new suitcase. He watched YouTube got on with it. Scarry what teenagers know and learn from their downloads. But in this case, very helpful indeed - and easier than you think!

Wouldn't it be nice to become Penny's roommate and hang out with Sheldon, Leonard, Howard and Raj? Would love to meet Howard's mother ...

Don’t know whom I am talking about? It’s the Big Bang Theory!

Would you like to add to this random rambling?  Please let me know!

FRIDAY NIGHT FEVER

It wasn’t a night to remember, but it was a fun night out!

Three real blondes and one brunette with a combined age of 201 years added more sparkle and energy to our dead Haney pub/club on a Friday night than all of the mid twenties combined!

Ladies, we rock!

Originally we started out as a cinquet, but ended up as a quartet. We lost Blondie No.1 as fast as we uttered “Let’s go dancing”. She couldn’t bear the thought of having any more fun without her husband and called it a day.  (Do blondes have more fun?)
Needless to say, the four of us didn’t feel guilty at all -  For tonight they were our ‘mansitters’ and that meant: Our babysitter came free of charge!

Our handsome quartet left for the closest dance floor in town, The Haney:  A pub at day time, a club on Friday and Saturday night.

The HANEY

It’s 10.10pm: The club/pub is still empty, the dance floor hasn’t even been cleared of chairs and tables yet – but the music is good. Top 40 music with NO artificial techno beats. Are we that early? Where is everybody? Right, next door at the Caddy Shack! They are holding their “Rookie of the Year Award”!

There is nothing better than a strip - show to lure the paying public from the public house! We are tempted to wander inside but reconsider after we read the cover charge. We all have the same thought: Let’s rather buy a drink for that money and not get intimidated by skinny bodies covered in lacy lingerie! This is fine with me, I’ve seen it already.



Back inside the pub/club we take matters in our own hands and rock the place! No turtleneck and hiking boots could stop me from joining my enthusiastic, dancing mother friends:

Alana has the groovy, trendy moves

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Jaqui goes with the flow and rocks it any way she likes.

Kerrie gets so carried away that she demonstrates the “litter box” on the dance floor for us!  This lady has no shame, she actually admits she has stolen this move straight from a Shrek movie.



(The “litter box”: Drop down on all fours, keep arms extended, toes on the floor. Alternately wiggle and kick one leg into the air. Pretend you are a cat in her litter box).

And for me? All moves are inspired by my former life as aerobics instructor and my German heritance (marching step-touches).

After 20 minutes of enthusiastic exercise we are still the only ones dancing! It gets busier, but still, the youth is hanging, checking their i-phones instead of moving their legs.  We are not the youngest anymore, we don’t have last names sounding like Travolta, Timberlake, Jackson or Usher, but we definitely have their attitude:

We can move like Jagger! I call these creative, innovative dance moves.. Or as Grace Jones said we are “Slave to the Rhythm”. Let me compare this to the young crowd who finally follows our lead. Uniformed in too tight dresses and high heels, they move like one. Nothing fancy here, all rocking to the same, dull beat of the same techno background. I couldn’t help but feeling sorry for them.  They never experienced the innocent disco scene. The great sound of pure, honest music. We danced to the originals. Not to artificially enhanced, computerized, pre-fabricated sounds.



We only know what we know and what we remember. I wonder what these young women and men will remember. Probably only the text messages they received while standing in the middle of the dance floor, moving as one.

I said it once; I have to say it twice: Ladies, we rock! And don’t let any twenty –something tell you otherwise! They might be extra-ordinary in their own way, but we are extra-ordinary on the dance floor! They don’t even know how to do the ‘litter box”, we do!

 

 

 

 

Plan Ahead & Seize the Moment

 I love having a plan or spending time on making one! And since I became a mother I also like to have plan B and C in case plan A falls through.

It is Monday morning. After some strategic planning, the day was all accounted for.  The plan kept me moving and talking from 8.45 in the morning till 3pm in the afternoon.

By 9am, 15 minutes into my first appointment I realized there was no plan anymore: My lady friends stood me up! One due to flu and the other one due to miss-understanding!

I could have gone home, feeling sorry for myself and finish vacuuming the basement - the  Hoover was still out.                                                                                                                                                                

Instead, I thought “Sod it” and set off on my own (the basement will still be dusty when I come back). I did what I planned for the morning:  a brisk walk through our wonderful nature. This was a wonderful opportunity to have some ‘me’ time while trailing through rocky, muddy and wet terrain.  Ignoring the bear warning signs, I set off into unchartered territory.

If I have nobody to talk to, my brain has vivid conversations with itself. Marching through the morning mist, inspired by the colours and beauty around me, I couldn’t help but thinking:” How many meanings are there for the word “Snicker doodle?” (E.g. Have you been snicker doodled before?)  How will I celebrate when my book “Very Berry Extra-Ordinary” will hit the No.1 spot at Amazon .com?  What is the best strategy to get onto the Oprah Show? (I should get her phone number and call!)  If somebody will hand me one Million Dollars, what is the first thing I would buy?”(Pay off the house first or rather go on a cruise- or better still pay off our parents homes and then go on a cruise?) Ok, this is not mind blowing, world changing stuff, but these issues needed to be addressed anyway.

What am I saying?

Plans are good - but be prepared to have them changed!

And more importantly, seize the moment!

Like the previous Friday when I decided to reinvent myself as the next master chef!  The day started off with no plan, and all of a sudden there was one! The rainy morning was a perfect excuse to hang out at the library and stock up on weekend reads, i.e. cookbooks.

The Cauliflower Gratin caught my eye and after following the instructions step by step, the dish looked exactly like the picture in the cookbook.

Or on Saturday when I was forced to change my Saturday afternoon plan for our teenage son.  It involved a 45 minute car ride to pick him up from his soccer match.  He inconvenienced me – again- because he forgot one of our family rules: communicate with your parents if you need their help!  But, this trip turned out to be a blessing. Forty-five minutes alone in the car with your son can be turned into bonding time if you ask the right questions and keep the radio on low.  In Holland our children were always on their bikes and went everywhere on their own (much shorter distances, bicycle paths and street lights everywhere). Here, they still need us to get from A to B.

If we always wait for somebody else to join us, or if we need constant reassurance from somebody else, or if we ask permission to does something then will never get things done!

We don’t need to wait till the 31th of December to reinvent ourselves or to change a habit or to start something new. Let’s do it right now. The right moment, the right time, the right circumstance doesn’t exist! The right time is now!

We all should do what we planned for today – even if it means we have to do it alone!

To me, this is what being Extra-Ordinary is all about!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DAVID BECKHAM COVER(S) UP

I know I promised you “Fright Night”, a haunted house filled with blood thirsty creatures roaming around during full moon, causing goose bumps, palpation and sweaty palms to every living soul. 

Unfortunately, this has to wait till the next time!  Something else came up and I need to get the following off my chest first. I am a woman- changing my mind / my script / or my intention is part of the gender description!

What or who spooked me? My de-railing comes in the form of Mr. Eye Candy, David Beckham.

Personally, I like his looks and I love the idea of him being a devoted (?), progressive father. Anyway, I spotted his latest picture in his undies for the H&M campaign (you’ve seen the one, taken by tourists in the tour bus?). This alone caused my housewife brain to go into overdrive.  Then I picked up a dated edition of “Hello’ magazine during my holy hour at the library! Here he is again, Mr. Handsome, besotted father with his daughter in his arms. I can’t remember the quote exactly, but it went something like this:

“Now that I have a daughter I can’t run around half dressed anymore”

Or did he actually say “naked”? Or was it “...in my boxer shorts anymore”?

Is he joking? Or does a prude lurk inside this well chiselled, well camouflaged body of his?

If this is the truth can I make the assumption that his three boys have never seen Victoria in her Eve costume? (This should read “Adams costume” actually. But you will only get this pun if you know her maiden name)!  

For Goodness sake David, get real! Your daughter has three brothers. Sooner or later, at one occasion or another, she will find out what that dangly thingy is you guys have and we girls don’t.

Of course, it is your own business how to bring up your children!  But wouldn’t you agree that it is much easier to let it all ‘hang out’ or simply grin and bear it - at least in your own home?  Confined to your own four walls? Let’s face it: If you can’t run around naked within your own four walls, where else can you?  And if you do, look what happened to the future Queen of England.

 If your children won’t see their own parents naked - how else will they learn about the small differences?  Where else should their see it or learn from? At their friends house (I hope not!), on TV (most likely), at a peep-show (Holy C.., better late than never?), on the beach (you have some explaining to do right there and then) or in some books and magazines (probably the safest bet).

As for me, I whole heartedly support the ‘no secret’ policy! -  That’s what we did (and still do?) in Germany.

My three boys know how I look like.  I never made a big deal about it. And the result?  They don’t really care about this whole subject on being nude!

 Do you agree? Is this part of being extra-ordinary? To me it is!

On this note, I wonder what is going on in Madonna’s house!

Happy to hear from you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10-10-10

This is my tenth blog, this is our tenth month in Canada and here are 10 wonderful adjustments we made to our previous, European life:

                      

No more random ‘drinking’!

I am still not over it and have to stress it over and over again: The liquor prices are ridiculously high!  Just looking at them makes my eyes water! If we want to stay on track with our immigration fund, we have to suck it up: Intoxicating liquids are for special occasions only.  Luckily, there is always something to celebrate! On the other hand, the big bonus is when you have a spontaneous get together, everyone brings their own grog!

Coffee – to – Go! 

“When in Rome, do as the Romans do.” True to this saying I am blending in: My thermos filled with delicious home brewed blend follows me wherever I go.

Cycling

My bike has turned into a tool for recreational purposes only. Gone are the days when I used it purely for transportation. Blame it on the distances! The upside of conquering the steady inclines and steep declines? It beats an indoor spinning class any day!

Let it rip

Not any more- at least not on the Autobahn. The speed limit on highways is between 80 - 110km/h. No wonder it takes forever to get anywhere.  Surprisingly, hardly anybody drives within these limits, but still enough drivers do and it forces us to slow down!

Good-bye repairman / Hello handy husband

No more expensive maintenance and replacement costs for household appliances. Follow these simple steps to get your new part within 24 hours (written from the mechanically challenged woman’s view):

Let your husband find out what’s wrong with your dead appliance.                                                                                           

     Take out the broken part, find the serial number, order and pay for the item over the phone, pick it up the next day and let your husband finish what he started!  

The following is the Dutch or German protocol for getting an appliance fixed:                                       

  Make a phone call, stay on hold for at least 10 minutes, make an appointment, (lucky you if you  get a date within 5 working days) and receive an allocated time slot for the repair man to show up e.g. between 9-12pm. On day in question take time off to stay at home, (don’t leave the house for any reason whatsoever!), the repair man arrives (normally at 11.55am), he will fix the part - or order a new one- which can take up to 10 days and he leaves. If your appliance doesn’t have warranty anymore you are stuck with the bill for the repair man and the new part. Oh, and I nearly forgot: Ladies, no chitter chatter with the friendly repair hunk, keep to the bare minimum: Companies will charge you for every minute their representative spends in your house!

 

Asian Influence

 Our fourth official language at home is now Korean (next to English, German and Dutch).                                        

    We added chop sticks to our array of forks and knives.                                                                             

    Our children are getting a beating in the daily ping-pong tournaments. But in time they will get better and will be champions in their own (Caucasian) League.

Bargain shopping

As I mentioned in “The Move”, costs of living are high.  But here is another trick learned while being the conscientious housewife: Collect coupons and follow the trail of weekly deals!

 Value Village is a paradise found. It’s my favourite spot to go whenever I have some time to kill (a community charity store with everything you can imagine on offer - and more).

Shopping across the border is much cheaper in every possible category. If only the border control officials were friendlier...

Lessons learned: The local Farmers Markets are for treats and not for stocking up on fresh fruit and veggies! Of course you can buy your heart out if you truly believe in supporting the local producers of organic, pesticide free goods – bear in mind you will be charged up to 4x the common prices.

Emergency Help

If one of your children happens to break an arm (as our youngest son did), go straight to the Children’s Hospital in Vancouver. Don’t waste your time with any other hospital which doesn’t have a paediatric department! Simple reason: the anaesthetist won’t treat your child- the risks are too high if they are not trained and specialized. In our case we received calming (morphine), soothing pain relief (gravol) but had to travel to another hospital to receive special care (an operation on our son’s arm)!

Added sugars

When you take the time to read food labels you will notice that most pre packed food items have additional sugar added to it. In order to get back to my former, tight, 6-pack tummy I was forced to start cooking again with fresh ingredients only. I never said I am a Martha though...

TV in small doses

We stopped watching regular TV! The frequency of commercials is driving me crazy! I prefer Netflix: You pay $8.oo/month and have access to TV shows, movies, documentaries... whatever the heart desires. The disadvantage: They are not new, but the big Plus is, no commercials and no week long waiting time to watch the next episode. Our first addiction was “Prison Break”- (we are talking long, long nights, every night for three short weeks). To this day it still puzzles me how anyone could stand the suspense and wait one week for the next episode? Our next Netflix project is “Damages” – which falls under our category of “a great night in!”

These were truly 10 wonderful, extra-ordinary months. Have you made any adjustments recently? Do you have thoughts to share? Please let me know! I would love to hear from you!

Until the next time – with an update of one of my favourite events of the year: Halloween!