The Cooking Coach and the Importance of Dutch Cheese

Dutch Cheese - A Measuring
Stick for Dutch Culture?
(c) The Writing Well

I read an article today on the Weekly Telegraph written by Karen Vivers about the role of Dutch food in helping her settle here in the Netherlands. It's an interesting read - the simpleness of Dutch food.... and a reminder that sometimes we don't need everything to be complicated or in her words, "bigger and better." I agree that food here in the Netherlands gives a real insight in to the Dutch culture and people.

Karen gives cooking lessons and culinary tours of Amsterdam and you can find more information on her site: www.thecookingcoach.eu - an interesting expat in the Netherlands!

A New Blog for 2012

2011 has brought lots of changes to the van Mulligen household. One of the consequences of these changes is that my focus has been solely on my role as a mother for the last few months.

Time restraints have left this blog a little neglected in recent months and whilst I haven't had time to sit in front of my PC and write, I have had lots of time to think.

Becoming and fulfilling the role as a mother in a country not your own brings its fair share of challenges, questions and unforgettable experiences. The language and culture are different. The systems and support processes are unexplored territory for new parents abroad. Sometimes it's hard to know where to start, where to turn and what it all means.

With the birth of my third child in the Netherlands, I've decided it's time for a change in direction for my blog writing too.

I am excited to share the creation of a new blog entitled "Life with a Double Buggy". My new blog will focus solely on parenthood, and particularly the expat parenthood journey. It will be a platform to share my parenting experiences here in the Netherlands. I hope it will help and entertain other expats out there.

That's not to say that A Letter from the Netherlands is dead, far from it. It will remain here and I will also post on different topics here and there when I can. In short, whilst this blog is still being read it will continue to occupy this space!

I hope that many of you will follow me over to "Life with a Double Buggy" and I look forward to reading your comments along the way.

From the Dutch Sinterklaas to Christmas

Yet again, I find myself apologising for my blog absence. Time is once more not on my side..... Between school runs, a baby with reflux and a toddler in the house I barely have time to blow my own nose, let alone write a blog post.

However, a quick update and hopefully the start of more frequent posts again....

The last few weeks have been centred around Sinterklaas, the Dutch celebration of the birthday of Saint Nicholas. As a Brit, this celebration has taken some years to get used to but I think having children has finally integrated me. I no longer find it acceptable to use left over  Sinterklaas wrapping paper for Christmas, nor bother to ask about the whole black slave issue.... It is what it is.

My house has been full of drawings of Zwarte Pieten going down chimneys, boats made of egg boxes, pepernoten and paper shoes for weeks. My 19 month old has embraced the festivities in a way we could not have imagined. He has wandered around with permanent head attire alternating between a Zwarte Piet hat and the mitre of Sinterklaas. He points enthusiastically to the CD player with calls of "dah, dah, dah", meaning "Put the Sinterklaas CD on again please mama." (It has been played so much my husband and I have talked about a ritual burning.) My son then hums his way around the room whilst playing, stopping only to run to the shoe cupboard to get his shoe out every time the word "shoe" is mentioned in a Sinterklaas song. And believe me, that's a lot. For those not in the know, children leave their shoes out with a treat for Sinterklaas and his horse (traditionally by the chimney but let's face it most houses don't have chimneys now so our kids leave their shoes in front of the booze cupboard....) and Sinterklaas makes sure there is a present put there in return. My 19 month old has cottoned on to this very quickly indeed.

Yesterday we celebrated "pakjesavond" and to avoid that it became one big unwrapping frenzy we decided to use a die, especially created for the occasion by my husband - instead of dots there were small mitres. Throwing a six meant you could open a present. A few rounds of this with a 4 year old made us change the rules: throw a 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6 and you open a present. Throw a 1 and you throw again........... It cut down a whole lot on the tantrums for sure.

So now, Sinterklaas is over. The school classrooms have been emptied of boats, white horses and Black Petes. Our house has been cleared of the drawings, shoes and boats (but not quite of pepernoten which I think we'll still be eating for my birthday in March...) and Sinterklaas and his helpers are heading back to Spain. The path is cleared for the following festivity - Christmas.

The Christmas tree has been bought. Once my son is home from school the decorating will begin and I am happy to say that the British member of this household is back in her element with a celebration she knows all about.......