All good things must come to an end, says the proverb with which I don’t agree. I could easily be on a holiday for the rest of my life. Especially in the Val di Rhêmes in Italy where our holidays ended.

As planned we started in Slovenia. We first stayed at Camp Soca in Bovec. Great camping, great hikes, but oh my, it was so hot. So we only hiked once. And went to Italy twice. We ate the best trout ever in the camping’s restaurant! The camping offered a WIFI-spot in the bar, where it was enjoyable in the evenings.  Still, we thought a lake would be more refreshing, so we went to the Lake Bohinj. We stayed at Camp Danica. Great place, we even had a internet connection in the tent. I can tell you: very addictive.

DH had this memory lane idea: he wanted to go to Krk, Croatia, where he stayed as a kid. If we learned something this holiday, it is that memories aren’t the best holiday guides. In about 35 years Krk changed in an easy accessible island (via a bridge instead of ferries) with many tourists. Loads of tourists. No fun. Great camping though, camping Pila in Punat (internet yes, on the most unexpected places). Our greatest challenge: make the lady at the reception desk laugh! We succeeded.

We traveled on. Italy! Finally. We went to the Veneto area and found ourselves in Bassano del Grappa on the campsite Santa Felicita. Now that is a place I can recommend! No cooking necessary, because a very good and inexpensive restaurant is your neighbour: L’Antica Abbazia. Do as the Italians do, enjoy an exquisite dinner.  I loved shopping in Bassano (the Italian H&M is a cool (airco) must: Oviesse). We went to Asolo - such a lovely place. But it was hot, hot, hot. That’s the second thing we learned about ourselves this holiday: we are great sun lovers, but we don’t like the heat. We know where to find this. So, on the road again.

To the mountains this time and we finally found our paradise on earth: camping Val di Rhêmes in Gran Paradiso. Lots of Italians there and I loved their Bon Giorno! and Buona Sera! Always said with an exclamation mark (or two or three), always expressing more joie de vivre than you can handle, often shortened to Giorno! or Sera! We did two great hikes and stayed there till the end of our holidays. Next year, we go to the Gran Paradiso and this camping of the Louvin family straight away.

We drove home via Strasbourg, where we made the second memory lane mistake. We stayed at the Maison Rouge hotel which I enjoyed so much on a business trip some 25 years ago.  A bit past glory nowadays. And Strasbourg, being a UNESCO place, was much more crowded than I remembered. Oh, we loved shopping at the FNAC and Galeries Lafayette, but the historical centre was not our cup of tea. We ate, however, exquisitely. At ‘Chez Yvonne’.

And now, home again. Preparing for work. Preparing for my exam in October. I would not mind winning the lottery.

This is Abdelkader Benali telling us enthusiastically about his reading 1q84, the new Murakami. He did this during (and in fact sort of opening) Murakami Night at Selexyz Scheltema in Amsterdam.

I am an unwilling Murakami fan. After reading the first book I just thought: well… , but in the weeks (!) after finishing the book the characters and the story kept haunting me. It ended up in buying a next Murakami. This happened about 4 times and after that I reconciled myself to the situation: I am a fan. So on hearing about the night about his new book I  put down my name immediately.

It was fun. Benali was infectiously, Christine Otten told us about the music in 1q84 together with Booktunes. We saw beautiful stills from the film Norwegian Wood, which we can see from 9 December 2010 (both main characters beautiful young people with handknitted scarves and hat (!)).

But Luk van Haute, one of the 3 Murakami translators, made me come up against hard facts. This was really, really informative and made me eat my humble pie. I used to say that you could better read the English Murakami translations, being much more readable and swinging than the Dutch translations. Well, Van Haute made his case clear: this is certainly true if you want to read adaptions instead of translations. Do read the English books if you want to read a Murakami in which translators decided to leave out things as: young girls drinking pina coladas, song titles, even whole parts of stories (in English it is the Wind Up Bird Chronicle and not Chronicles like the Dutch title). In short: do read the English versions if you are afraid of sex, drugs and rock & roll. And he gave many, many examples. So I will buy and reread the Dutch translations of Kafka on the Shore, the Wind Up Bird Chronicles, Blind Willow Sleeping Woman, After Dark. Of course, not a real trial. Wish I could read and knit at the same time…

Selexyz: well done! Do it more often!

This was KIP (Knitting in Public) weekend for me and I probably knitted less than not KIP weekends. But I had so much fun.

Saturday I made my contribution to make the city more beautiful with knit work: call it urban knitting. The cycle racks (fietsnietjes) were dressed in tight dresses, making a colorful picture in area of the Westergasfabriek. It was organized by BreiWerkWest and to be honest I really did like the result.

The weather was no fun at all and we finished during the first half of the football match. Tried to watch somewhere inside of the several cafes in the Westerpark but every place was crowded and noisy. I went home and managed to make such a weird movement that I heard my back snap. It hurts.

Aching back or not, nothing could withheld me from seeing ‘Nijinsky’, Cédric Ygnace really gave a masterful performance of the life of this dancer,of whom very little film images are saved.

The European Fiber Network (EFN) organized a wild hunt through Amsterdam. An act for 3 women, 3 wip’s, one camera and lots of creativity. Not particularly knitting creativity. We had to take pictures of several very Amsterdam things with a WIP, like endangered species, non knitters, animals, draw bridges, museums, trams, coffee shops, etc. We were so lucky to find an endangered species that was a non knitter and an animal at the same time that was willing to knit for us. I managed to fall again and also managed to take a pictures of that. Not for the competition, alas, falling knitters didn’t get you points.

Afterward we gathered in the OBA restaurant on the 7th floor. It would be nice to make OBA our regular knitting place for the Mondays. Enough light and big tables. Cassandra and Miranda added up our points and yeah…. Nancy, Jacky and I were the winning team. But in fact, everybody was a winner. It was a lovely afternoon, ladies. Thank you for organizing it!

I don’t believe this. More than 1,5 month ago since I blogged. O.k. - you can find me on Facebook (hope this is the right link) and you can find me twittering. My blog is for bigger things. I have been to Hamburg. It was nice, but not nice enough to come back regularly like, say, Berlin or Paris. I have been to Bruxelles with students and I learned a lot. My students may be young but they have a big ability to care for each other. Such a good experience. I have been devastated by the results of the elections. I am very busy writing and editing a book about management in agogical professions.  My dearest friend endures a course of chemotherapy. I so admire her optimism and enjoy her cleverness. Go girl, go! And it is almost the end of the schoolyear. It Is So Busy! Only 4,5 weeks and the year is over. Everything must be done by then… pfoe… help me!

It’s my birthday (thank you!) and look what my DH bought me for a present! I can’t stop looking at them. They are superb. Mara Skujeniece designed them. She takes much inspiration from her Latvian origins. Only Latvian origins could think about using cones of yarn as a source for art. I don’t think I will ever use these two as vases, they are much too beautiful.

We (zij ook) hadden ons er al weken op verheugd: een wolweekend in Ameland. Ik had wat stiekeme dromen: zou het nu lukken tussen mij en spinnen? Met een spintol was het geen succes vanwege armen die niet meer zo draaien als zou moeten. We zien wel.

Op weg. Voorspoedige reis. Te laat aankomen en toch nog de boot halen is natuurlijk subliem. Zo in een taxi rollen en bij de Stayokay belanden. Breek me de bek niet open over dit genre accommodatie: ondoorzichtig prijsbeleid en weinig waar voor je geld. Maar het wolweekend gezelschap maakte alles goed. Een heerlijke variatie in leeftijd en een hoge mate van Hollandse nuchterheid.

De doendingen werden aangevoerd door Alet van Textielwerk. Helemaal uit Zeeland komen aanrijden met een tot aan de nok toe gevulde auto.

Meteen ’s avonds na het eten aan de slag. Vilt verven. Dat greep me nog niet meteen. Er moesten direct zwaarwegende keuzen worden gemaakt. Koele of warme kleuren. Weg van het eeuwige groen koos ik voor koel. Het was goed om dat te proberen. Plannen voor de volgende dag. Strengen wol verven.

Dat verven van zo’n streng zette me aan het nadenken over wat ik nou mooi vond om mee te breien. En zo zocht ik naar kleuren die dicht bij elkaar lagen en niet streperig zouden werken. Grappig genoeg waren de eerste kleuren die ik vond koraalrode kleuren. Met wat grijs. Ik ben nog steeds beduusd van het mooie resultaat. De andere twee dingen waren minder mooi. Maar wel veel van geleerd.

Wol verven, ja, daar wil ik op mijn eigen manier wel mee doorgaan. Het spinnen werd niets. Ook niet op zo’n apparaat. Dat moeten anderen maar voor me doen. Ik merk dat ik het wel leuk vind om in de buurt te zijn van vrouwen die dat doen. Er is namelijk veel liefde voor het materiaal en veel kennis. Het geluid van de draaiende wielen is bovendien rustgevend om bij te breien. En ach, je kunt het toch niet alle twee tegelijk doen. Verder heb ik niet veel gedaan het weekend, want ik worstelde met een griep die me bij de keel greep. Dat is minder leuke napret die nu al een paar dagen duurt.

Maar Alet en Judith: het was een topweekend. Niet in het minst door Agatha, Anna, Janna, Marian, Monique, Myren, Nellie en Ymke, natuurlijk ook Froukje. En ik hoop op Ravelry nog veel van de producten te zien.

We were in Ireland for a few days. After arriving at Cork we drove straight to Killarney to our guesthouse Fairview. We were so friendly received. Beautiful room. Great breakfast (full Irish) served by Tommie, who wears a bow tie even at 8 in the morning. We did the Ring of Kerry and because it is off season we enjoyed it practically alone. That was great. We did not see any puffins, or whales, or dolphins, because it was not their season too. That was not so great, but a good reason for coming back. As if you need a reason to go back to Ireland.  We went to Dingle and we did Valentia Island (three times because of the wrong direction and a ferry that didn’t go). On our way back we stayed in Cork (not again) and we finished in Kinsale. We had, by the way, very fine weather.

Now, it is waiting for spring to come. We have had enough winter. For years, if you ask me.

If you happen to live in the Netherlands, you should go to the new production of the National Ballet: Don Quichot. It’s wow and wow and if you want to see all the possibilities of the body, this is your chance. Of course, winning an Olympic medal is a tour de force, but it is only a few minutes. These dancers give their top performance for a whole evening. Smiling.They make you think it’s party time whole evening. Enjoy.

I joined Team Pootje Over on Ravelry and I obliged to finish as much WIP’s (work in progress that does not seem to get finished) as we get gold medals. I so hope my aims are overambitious. I did met the first gold medal. Here’s my Ravelympic gold medal in Wip Dancing…

It looks rather drab on the tailor’s dummy, but wearing it I was quite happy with it… I also finished the January Mystery Sock named Gansey Girl by Debbie O’Neill. I really choose the wrong yarn, but so glad this project is out of my system.

In the mean time there is lots of sadness. My best friend has breast cancer. That makes me mad. An operation is performed and she gets an infection. Back to hospital. That makes me even madder/sadder. I don’t want my best friend to have pain. There is nothing I can do. How fragile we are.

So funny, the pun is gone in English… this cake is made from a recipe of a monastery in Bologna (in 1994 published in Tip Culinair, a Dutch culinary magazine that doesn’t exist anymore) and it’s a hell of a lot of work to make it. The Dutch expression ‘monnikenwerk’ (monk’s work, meaning a lot of work) is therefore appropriate. The topping of mixed dried fruit is 24 hours soaked in black tea with orange juice and cinnamon. The cake itself is made from honey, butter, chocolate, almonds, raisins, applesauce and spices. You have to cook it a long time in the oven and it is really, really special. Usually. I hadn’t been baking for a long time, so the cake could have been smoother and softer. But it was so relaxing to do, that I decide to do it more often. And, it makes nice pictures, don’t you think?

Guess what we are eating tonight? A wrap with sauerkraut, cheese and pumpkin seeds with a salad with tofu and a dressing from lentils. Isn’t that animal friendly and environmentally safe?
The John Adams Institute (of which I am a longterm satisfied member) organized a lecture by Jonathan Safran Foer based on his new book ‘Eating Animals’. No novel, but a story about why we could better stop eating animals, pardon meat. An infonovel.  Before the lecture I didn’t plan to buy the book and didn’t plan to eat just vegetarian. But Foer is a charming, convincing, honest, inspiring, humorous, wise man and a gifted storyteller.

So that’s why I will buy the book and that’s why we are eating the wraps and salad tonight. So, along Foer’s lines: today we are vegetarians and may be tomorrow. But that is what we will decide for tomorrow.