And Now Presenting...

And now presenting...my latest foray into the writing world. I have become a blogger at an online magazine, Lifeclectic. Check me out.

In this blog post, I write about my experience this week at a breastfeeding class. Yes, the class was given in Dutch and, yes, I was one of the only expats. As if expectant mothers, don't have enough to sort out, I get to learn about parenting from two different cultural perspectives.

Turning the corner

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how I haven't been able to walk into a store yet and get excited about buying things for our little one on the way. Well, I have turned that corner at least with respect to clothes. My mom and sister have been a big help on that (Thanks guys!) They've hit the stores and garage sales back in the U.S. and sent me some of the most adorable clothes. It got me excited and, in all honesty, probably took away some of the intimidation.

I can't bring myself to spend more than EUR 5 or 6 yet on a piece of clothing - they seem too tiny to justify much more and I know myself well enough to know that it will bother me much less if the baby never fits into the clothes or throws up on an outfit if I know it cost less than $10. As a result, this price range has limited me to the discount of the discount stores here in The Netherlands. It's not so bad actually. Everything is 100% cotton for the most part and has very basic patterns which is how I like it anyway. And, honestly, sometimes I actually appreciate having fewer choices. It can all be so overwhelming otherwise. Here is sampling of what I've found so far....

Garbage In, Garbage Out

I title this blog in homage to my father. He is alive and very much kicking. Whenever I enter my house with more than two shopping bags or exit any car, I hear my dad's voice ringing in my ears, "Garbage In. Garbage Out." He used to say this to us as children on two different occasions. His philosophy was when a new item of clothing especially a pair of shoes entered our house that one item needed to be donated or thrown away in it's place. In a house of four females, this was essential, but didn't always work. He (and my mother) would also bellow this when we pulled in the driveway. As we were exiting the car, we were expected to take all personal items and trash with us into the house.

With that adage in mind, my husband and I took two trips to IKEA and bought a lot. I find myself getting physically uncomfortable when too many objects pile up in our living space. It could be a function of the size of our house (large by Dutch standards, but small by American), but it became markedly noticeable after I returned home from my round the world trip last year. For eight months, I managed with a back pack and was (reasonably) okay. I rotated my clothes often as was a privilege of traveling in SE Asia, the real birth place of GAP and Polo clothing, but I have very little attachment to objects. I would rather just donate an unused item and get it back into circulation for someone else's use and to unclog my living space.

My Dutch husband, on the other hand, fights a nationalistic and genetic disposition to keep anything of remote value. If I had a euro for every time he has said, "But look at this (insert name of object). There is nothing wrong with it. It is perfectly usable...." Or, "I can sell it online." The responses that I have learned to combat this are: "When was the last time you used this?" and "Who do you think would actually pay money this?" One perfect example is a CD rack. We have had a very nice, high quality metal (empty) CD rack mounted on our wall for as long as I can remember. I wasn't really expecting a fight from him as I took it off the wall and started to carry it towards the trash pile we'd started in our greenhouse. I think my husband actually stomped his foot in objection. I finally let his, "I will sell it online" line win although we both know that he has yet to sell anything online. My question this time was, "How many people do you know that still actually listen to CDs?" Turning his head to avoid eye contact he insisted, "Plenty!"

The CD rack aside, we amassed an impressive pile of unused stuff to throw away. My husband arranged a special garbage pick-up for Monday morning. This means we could put all of our trash on the curb outside of our house after 10pm on Sunday night. And so we entered into another Dutch ritual...the Trash Scavenge.

Three types of people emerge when a trash collection occurs. They don't bother with the weekly trash pick-up. That is left to the pigeons and sea gulls. The special, big item pick-up is what draws these personalities. The first to arrive are the Metalheads. They drive the streets at night with vans searching for mostly metal based trash that can be exchanged for cash. I have half a mind to think that the garbage collection agency tips these people off to pick-ups. Two vans arrived within minutes of us setting the first item outside of our house. The first van belonged to a couple of Eastern European background. The only words they knew of Dutch were the words for "steel, metal, and thank you." The woman walked right inside our house and started looking through the piles of stuff we had not yet had a chance to put outside. It freaked me out. I wanted to be cordial, but still. What is really keeping these people from trying to take whatever they want from our house? Who else do they have in the back of their windowless van?

The second Metalhead was nice enough to help my husband carry some of the heavier items out of our house. It was the strangest (yet nicest) thing. He opened the side door of his van while we were taking trips in and out of our house. We glanced inside and immediately knew what he was after. We exchanged only smiles with each other. He helped my husband and then I started bringing him items I thought he'd find interesting - an old CD burner and keyboard, for instance. All he said was, "Thank you, thank you" over and over again before driving off. Everyone was happy.

Passersby unabashedly started looking through the garbage bags and piles as we made trips to the curb. These are the Freebies. Whatever they can find of remotely any use will be either used in their own house or will find its way to yet another attic. It is an explicit rule that smaller articles of trash should be put in a garbage bag, but the implicit rule in The Netherlands is that the bags shouldn't be tied closed. The next morning, even the bags we had left untied had been torn to shreds by people - Metalheads and Freebies alike, I am sure -searching for any last fragment of hidden treasure.

A few years ago, we bought a new entertainment center for our living room. And like the adage goes, the old one had to go. My husband once again convinced me he'd sell it online. Sunday night I finally convinced him that putting it out on the curb would do more for us in 30 minutes than what two years of your "I'll sell it online" has done. The fifty pound solid wood entertainment center was gone in fifteen minutes and done so quietly I didn't even hear it go.

The third group involved in this ritual is the Dumpers. When a person starts piling stuff on their curb on a non-garbage collection day, every one of his neighbors walks to their window to watch and then turns around and says, "Honey, do we have anything to throw away?" We mentioned the scheduled pick-up to our immediate next door neighbors and they happily joined in, but by the morning our trash pile was unrecognizable to us. Mattresses even found their way to the front of our house. I am sure our neighbors perused the piles for any trade-ins too. I should have set up a camera to document this phenomenon.

It is such an accepted thing in our area that the garbage collector doesn't even make us indicate how much will be collected at pick-up. It is just impossible for someone to say that. So much came and went in the night.

Feathering the Nest - Part I

We have a four day weekend in our house. Thursday was a national holiday in observance of Ascension Day. I haven't seen any religious festivities celebrating it, but it does seem to be enjoyed in a a combination of three ways: driving to Germany or France to camp, hitting a nearby beach, or doing home improvements. For us, this weekend is our first real step in getting the house ready for the baby - in other words, nesting. And where else to start this off, but IKEA.

My husband, for various reasons, doesn't like IKEA. He appreciates IKEA's business model and is increasingly impressed by the price/quality of their products relative to competitors that seem to cut more and more corners these days, but he hates the IKEA shopping experience. I myself hate the rat in a maze flow of our local store, but it is one of the only one stop shopping places near us. During my pregnancy, it is the only time I have felt truly, world spinning, mouth-watering-about-to-yak nauseous. From the moment we park the car, we are consenting to being funneled through narrow curving lanes in a prescribed order with a parade of strangers. It feels like the home decorating process has morphed into some exhibitionist museum display. In the end, this means I have approximately 45 minutes from the time we take the off ramp to the store until my husband has reached his shopping breaking point. We manage it by pre-shopping online through IKEA's website, but on busy days like public holidays, it can be a true relationship test.

We started out wanting to purchase a baby crib and mattress (pictured) and ended up also buying five decorative pillows, a couch with a two person fold-out bed (pictured), three rugs (see picture for the one for the nursery), four window blinds, a closet organizer for the baby's room, shelving, a throw blanket, and two sets of sheets. We also ended up having to make a second trip back on Friday midday which was pure torture. I kid you not, I almost threw up in the parking garage before we even entered the store I was that nauseous. As my husband says each time we enter the house after a trip there, "We survived!"

And then began and still continues the assembling and re-arranging process. Some of you might ask, "If you hate the store so much, why bother?" The answer invariably is that IKEA is the most sensible option for many of our purchases. The flat pack design actually is pretty essential for life in a Dutch city. We have a four door Prius and prior to that had a two door Ford Focus. We own a traditional Dutch canal style house meaning a very narrow floor plan with steep stairways connecting each floor. We would have to pay a mover to deliver a fully assembled cupboard or couch through the second or third floor window of our house. Instead, we choose to assemble a piece of furniture in the room in which it will be used. It then typically cannot ever leave that room.

Stay tuned for Part II when I go into more detail about our redecorating plans.