...months later...

but i'm still here, if you're interested. real life just leaves no time left over for updating much... ;)

short update (since das alex is driving a sleeping lotte around south holland):
- we sold this our current house about 3 days after it went on the market;
- we have almost everything important together (the paper/ financing stuff) for the new house. we're still trying to find tiles and a bathtub, though;
- lotte's birthday is tomorrow (a monday), even though i'm 1000% sure i gave birth on a saturday;
- since about 2 months, i'm feeling more than unwell and never really got over teh ear infection. currently i'm also happy about a cold, i'm sure i got from auk last time i saw her;
- about 3 weeks ago, i went to take the admission exam for the photoakademy in amsterdam. my pictures passed with a "basic but potential" (which seems a whole lot better to me than "nice pictures, but no"), i answered half of the written test correctly (believe me, it wasn't an easy one) and passed the practical test with (a dutch version of) photoshop with flying colors. meaning; a) i've been accepted; b) i don't have to do a basic year first and c) i can start in september.
by that time, we have moved and lotte's another half a year older and won't have any problem with spending a day out of the week with oma.
- "sport" (next to lifting/ carrying a 10kilo heavy kid) will be on my agenda again. oma and opa k. surprised us with a mama-bike (more space and safer, in general) and now we can bike everywhere (within reasonable distances) while lotte sits in front and tells me her stories about everything she sees. she loves biking and i don't have to carry her all the time anymore.
awesome-o!

3-2-1, ours!

Today, we have bought a house. This one:






... obviously it has to be touched up a little...

it's a "double upper house" (the first floor isn't ours, the upper 2(/3) are. 150square meters (without the attic, that still needs a stair in order to get there)); 6 rooms, a little bike shed, a mini yeard in front of the house, a huge park across the street. a nice neighborhood for missy to go to school and kindergarden in. and the main road is supposedly less busy next year...

and hey, a guest room at one point!

surprise!

i'm still alive and kicking...

i'm still a still a mom with home employment and finally figured out, that that is great and will stay like it a few years longer.
don't get me wrong, i miss going to work and talking to adults, bitching about work, gossiping during lunch.
but we decided to have the baby and i wanna do it as good as possible. which means i will take care of our kid as the main caregiver, not some weird person, i don't know more of than a name. they couldn't care less whose kid they have unless they get paid...and no, it doesn't mean that i condemn working mothers.
just because you go and work, doesn't mean you're a good/ bad mother. just because you stay at home doesn't make you a good/ bad mother. at the end of the day, you should decide on what's best for you. if you'd like to be your own kid, i guess you're doing the right thing.
i'm not always doing the right things, but would i like to be my own kid? so far? yup!

and no, i'm not sacrificing anything staying at home. it felt like it in the beginning, but thinking about it, i have to say no. i can always go work some mediocre job (i'm not exactly career material anyway) when she's bigger and less depending. when she'll go to day care or to grandma for a day...
she only grows up once. she only makes these huge developmental jumps now. i don't wanna miss it. i wanna stay at home, thank you very much.

that train of thought is pretty much the only development on my part these last few weeks...

we went to the us for 2 weeks with alex (who had to work) and went to nyc. it was overly crowded with tons of people and i really didn't like it this time. so we went home early instead (but had real new york cheesecake). :(

we're kinda looking for a new house. one with more rooms and in a nice neighborhood, with a park nearby, good schools, etc. we even made a bid, but no luck so far.

i missed grandma's 70th, because missy still doesn't like the car too much. but we're going to berlin for christmas.

alex and i went on a date last sunday. we dropped off missy at grandma's (armed with food and milk) and went to see the golden compass. i liked both. the movie and the date. ;)

i've had it...

due to a lack of time i can't get the lotte update done as i wanted to.
thus, we have a lotte -only blog now.

anything lotte related will go: HERE.

...and i will get my blog back to post the occasional irrational thought when i want to.

cheerios!

I knew they have a weird health system here...

when i was pregnant, i was almost mad at the stuff they didn't do. at least compared to germany. no checks of anything in the important few weeks, where so much can go wrong. maybe just because i was missing some mineral due to my eating habits...
once you made it past the first 12 weeks (the magical time, where your chances of miscarrying supposedly drops by a lot) they seemed to be caring enough.
before? no. i always thought it was a way for them to save money. why spend money on something that could be aborted the natural way anyway?!

and nothing was worse (to me) than not knowing if everything with the little human being growing inside of you is alright...
(lucky me, i at least had an ultra sound when i was about 6 weeks along, so i could see the heartbeat and didn't have to rely on luck at the midwife (if the fetus lies right, you might be able to pick up the heartbeat, when it is younger than about 16 weeks) and their instruments.)

but, times seem to be changing.

Netherlands considers introducing preconception care

The Health Council of the Netherlands, a scientific advisory body, has recommended that the Dutch government introduce an integrated programme of preconception care, to reduce perinatal mortality, miscarriage, premature birth, and congenital abnormalities.

The Dutch government commissioned the council to draw up its advice because the Netherlands has lost its pre-eminent position on perinatal mortality compared with other European Union countries, partly because of a higher proportion of older mothers and mothers belonging to ethnic minorities (Ned Tijdschr Geneeskr 2004;148:1855-60).

The council's key message is that current antenatal care, which starts after the eighth week of pregnancy, can miss chances to improve the health of the mother and child. Information on health interventions should be brought forward until at least a month before any planned conception to allow the health benefits a chance to have effect, it says.

- british medical journal

should i ever want to repeat the horror that is birth, i might be lucky and receive better care and not feel like being left standing out in the rain.

baby's 29-weeks statistic:

- incredible crotchety;
- tooth number 7 is through (bottom tooth);
- rolled off the bed a second time;
- manages 2 ice cubes of apple sauce/ parsnip (heated up and mixed with a little baby rice);
- says "papa" (even though "mama" was first!).

we have also decided that i am not going to oklahoma or atlanta with alex. because it doesn't seem worth the hassle of it all. instead we will join him (well, he will be working) in new jersey at the end of november.

i'm definitely getting old

baby's little uncle came up with a brilliant plan yesterday.

we went flowriding close by. and because grandma came with (watching missy) i could go in as well.
it's been a blast, so next time we will drag alex along as well.

if you don't know what flowriding is: take this link to youtube.

p.s. kuschi, you should try it! you'd like it. dwd.nl in zoetermeer...