Our Temporary Resident

 

We woke up one morning about five weeks ago to find a duck in our back yard. She had already thrown out lots of my precious anemone (that forgot to flower last year) and had laid four eggs in the pot. After deciding not to eat them (and yes there were suggestions. Duck eggs make wonderful sponge cake), we wondered what to do and decided just to watch her hatch them

By now there are 15 eggs in there and she has been sitting on them for over two weeks. A lady from the city will come and move her and her chicks to the lake in the park when they are hatched. There is no way she'd get the over three walls, down into a courtyard, across the road and the park safely. We are enjoying her company.

Spring

Spring! If you ignore the hail, sleet and below zero nighttime temperatures.

April already

It's April already! What is happening to this year? I have lots of photos and stories to share from our trip to France. Eggs, diggers, new houses, spring moments...

Just got to find the cable for my camera......

Taking it slow and thinking

Taking it slow was the order of the last week. A cup of coffee, a double chocolate muffin and a whole day of sunshine. They added up to a beautiful, slow and deeply refreshing day. It would have been better if I'd have had my coffee shop friend (not in the Dutch manner!) there with me, but she chose to move away, so I had to enjoy it by myself. Which I did.

I read this today:

"The Hebrew Talmud says: 'Be very careful if you make a woman cry, because God counts her tears. The woman came out of a man's rib. Not from his feet to be walked on. Not from his head to be superior. But from the side to be equal. Under the arm to be protected, and next to the heart to be loved.' "

I love it. I feel like shouting it at all those blokes who say things like "what do you expect for a rib?" Only it is too long to quip back and why gratify them with the idea that I might entertain the thought of them being equal to me? But then I suppose they are, we are equal, just not the same. That is good too. 

I’ve been meaning to show you a present that I got for my birthday. Helen, my mum, made me a new quilt. It was meant to be a replacement for the old one that serves us well, keeps us warm and lives on our sofa it is at least 25 years old and used to be dark blues and reds. Well since I snook it away from her when I was about 13 (it wasn’t made for me, but I always like it and it did go so well my room as a kid) it has been a faithful part of my home where ever I have been. It is no longer blue or red of made of brushed cotton. It is more kind of pale blue and the cotton is soft, but there is certainly no “brush” left on it. As you can probably imagine, it’s not a replacement. We now have two quilts on our sofa now. A nice new one and a comfy old one.

Once a week I spent the evening with friends. Really, I should say at least once a week I spend an evening with friends without family or chosen family. I get a whole evening just to chat. For a working mother of a toddler that is something quite special. I enjoy it. This week I spent the evening with a friend who has just quit her regular job (a successful buyer for a big aviation company) to follow her dream to live from her art. Okay, she has her husband’s financial support, but more importantly she has the will to make something of something she is passionate about. I admire her so much for that. We talked a lot about it on Monday. I am inspired. Go for it, woman! No names yet as she still has colleagues who don’t know. But believe me, when all her immediate colleagues know, then I shall be showing you what she is up to right here. 

Happy Birthday!

I have a special place for January in my heart. Okay it can be very dark, cold and miserable. In the past two have been snow filled which makes it even better. I think lots of people have a special relationship with their birth month. Birthdays are great, I love them. It is so nice to have people from all over ring you, send you cards or just drop you a text message. Granted we now have mobiles, computer and applications like Facebook to remind us about them, but I don’t care. Thanks for all the calls, mails, texts….I think I appreciate those calls all the more because I am soooo bad at birthdays myself. Typically I remember or am reminded early in the morning, spend all morning thinking about calling that person to then forget until it is too late at night. Sorry!

The other reason I like my birthday is because two years ago I decided that the best thing I could give to myself was a whole day. My company gives us the afternoon off (thank you very much…..) and I add a half-day’s holiday to it. Time to do just as I want. The rules are no admin stuff, no doctor’s appointments, no work, just pleasure. This year I fiddled with my sewing machine, skyped for two hours to my far away friend in China (almost as good as sitting in the kitchen drinking tea, only almost) and then stamping through the snowy park to a café (Sugarbird Cupcakes) for hot chocolate and cake. Sugarbird Cupcakes is somewhere I have been wanting to go since we moved here, but somehow had to be made into a proper date before I actually got there. Y and I really enjoyed it as you can see.

And now it is February and February brings a whole round of pleasures. Karneval is one of them. Living in Düsseldorf means you have to really be fore it or leave the city. It is a bit like Marmite, either you love it or you hate it. This year we’ll be dancing inside on Saturday and following the children’s parade on Sunday. The big parade on Monday is better seen on TV anyway (oh and yes, I have to work…… there are disadvantages of not working in a part of the country that doesn’t celebrate).