Powerade Shoot, Zwarte Piet and Thanksgiving

It's football season and what better way to spend most of our Saturdays (and Sundays when the timezone difference has our game starting in the middle of the night) than watching UW football via our Slingbox  with our expat crew!  Go Dawgs!  We have a ton of Husky love out here!!!

November 5th was Museum Night here in Amsterdam; a once-a-year chance to visit all of Amsterdam's museums at night with snacks and drinks being served. It was a big hit this year!  Kirk was out of town, so I spent the evening with Ali, Lisa, Richard and our neighbors Kelly and Keith!  We made stops at the Jewish Historical Museum, the new Maritime museum (Het Scheep Vaart Museum), Nemo (Children's Science Museum) and the Artis Botanical Gardens!

The Maritime Museum was absolutely beautiful. It is one of the world's biggest collections of nautical art and artifacts, including globes, ship models and more. We sipped wine, walked around the ship, ate white chocolate covered strawberries and enjoyed a laser show.

While I was enjoying Museum Night Kirk was in London and Los Angeles for a Powerade commercial shoot.

While in LA he had a blast seeing friends, visiting with his Mom, eating Mexican food, hitting up our old spots and boogie boarding in Malibu!

Back in Amsterdam, another fun evening was had with the girls. We enjoyed a chocolate tasting at Chocolatl. Like a wine tasting, we nibbled on 7 different chocolates - 3 dark, 3 milk and one white.  The 90 minute guided tasting was very informative, fun and delicious!

Christmas is right around the corner and the Dutch children are getting restless with Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet making their rounds. Sinterklaas is the Dutch Santa Claus that hails from Turkey via Spain, and Zwaarte Piets are his helpers, aka slaves. Friendly reminder from last year's post, Sinterklaas is not like our jolly old santa but a skinny white bearded man dressed in bishop gear and his "helper" Zwaarte Piets are actually white boys and girls dressed in black face running amok.  They hand out sweets to the little dutchies while parading around Amsterdam.

We met with some friends for the parade!  Unbelievable!

On November 14th we went to see My Morning Jacket and The Head and the Heart at Paradiso!  The show was amazing - both groups rocked out hard. The Paradiso by far is our favorite local venue. We managed to get really good seats and the 5 minute walk to and from is nothing to complain about!

Later the same week we made it out to the Heineken Music Hall to see Wiz Khalifa with our friends Ben and Erica. Our good friend David hooked us up with tickets. This venue is more like a small Key Arena or big Showbox (Seattlites will understand), not nearly as intimate as Paradiso and Melkweg, but the show was awesome! Thanks David!

We ended the evening playing on a jungle gym in the nearby park. Hip-hop and zip-lining, a pretty typical Wednesday night.

Unfortunately for us, but great for them, our lovely friends Jonathan, Jennifer and their son Jack made their way back to the States after 4 years of living in Amsterdam!  We will surely miss them as neighbors!  Good luck with your new journey!

Once again, we were lucky enough to share our Thanksgiving this year with some great friends - Round 2 at the Haley's!  This year we are joined by the Bowman's, Rohrer's, and Ali along with our hosts, the Haleys, of course! We had been so looking forward to this gathering!  It sure is a nice peice of home to celebrate with West Coaster's and a Mid-West couple!

The next morning we gathered for Apple Cup!  Our season started off pretty good but an injury to our quarterback definitely was a game changer!  Luckily he recovered and we beat the Cougs 38-21!!!  Go Dawgs!!!

Seattle, Los Angeles and Visitors!

Lately we've had a ton of visitors - starting with Brian from my soccer team in LA.  He did a 2 week trip with his brother, sister-in-law and nephew and made a stop in Amsterdam.  Thanks Brian!

I made a 2 week trip out to Seattle and LA for weddings and visiting friends and family.  This was my second time home since moving to Amsterdam.  Doesn't get any easier traveling far and having to leave family and friends with an unknown date of when I will be back - overall a fun trip though!  First wedding, long time childhood friend - John Quirk.  It was definitely a high school reunion - reminiscing, drinking and dancing the night away.  Congrats John and Lee!

While in Seattle, Emily and Kai kindly offered their home to me once again for the the weekend stay.  Friends were invited over for a small bbq.  So nice seeing everyone and I hopefully convinced some new visitors to come out.

The next day I met up with my Delta Gamma crew for Lisa's baby shower.  It was wonderful seeing everyones beautiful faces and finding out about a few new pregnancies - congrats Emily and Michelle!

The following weekend my cousin Joseph and his fiance Maria married on 9/10/11.  It was a sunny, warm, clear day - a perfect evening for celebrating their union.  I helped out with the reception set up while listening to Husky football a few miles away.  Could not help my self but smile as I could hear the crowd roar - Go Dawgs!

All of my family looked stunning.  Such a wonderful time with family and old friends, definitely glad I made it home.

Inbetween visits with family, friends, weddings and baby showers I made my way to Los Angeles. Candace provided me with the usual - a free place to stay, rides to Tacos Por Favor and Rick's.

Megan met up with me so that I could meet her handsome son Samson!!!  He was such a precious, sweet and charming boy!!!

I also met up with Vanessa and Candace for burgers and a brief intro to Vanessa's baby boy Julian.  It was so nice to finally hold him - been waiting a long time.

A visit to Santa Monica would not be complete with out meeting up with old soccer friends at Rick's.  I was so thrilled to see everyone healthy and happy!

While I was gone, Kirk had a couple visitors - Angie and Alistair.  This was Angie's second visit to see us in Amsterdam and Alistair's first.  I wish I could have been there - sounds like they had a nice time biking around the city and meeting our Amsterdam friends.

Finally, a visit from Kirk's family - Ryan and Nicole.  They came out for a quick week starting and ending in Amsterdam and visiting Barcelona in the middle.  We had so much fun showing them around this awesome city.  It's always nice to show family/friends our experiences, our apartment and friends.

Their excursion through Amsterdam included our first visit to Heineken Brewery.  Fun times to be had in this old place. A group tour, a couple tasty beers and a ride (yes a ride) - definitely should be added to the Johnsen's Amsterdam tour itinerary!

 A crisp sunny day we had drinks at Hansel - with Indy of course.

Our days were limited with the cold weather right around the corner - we thought we would take advantage of this nice weather and rent Paap for the evening.  Our usual boat tour started at his home where he showed us his newly remodeled kitchen and we caught a glimpse of his stereo.  Crazy!

 After boating we checked out a unique Dutch bar - this pub is really adorable and also a must for visitors.  Gives you a really good sense of a Dutch brown bar.  Small, intimate, eccletic, and different. Can't find anything like it in the states that's for sure.

It wouldn't be a Johnsen tour with out hitting up the Red Light.  I always enjoy watching the reactions of our friends as we tromp around the RL grounds. We get loads of questions, giggles, stares and then we drink at a fun bar.

The night ended with the girls dancing at Jimmy Woo's and the boys bar hopping. The next day we biked out to Ouderkerk - along the Amstel.  We stopped on the side, popped open a bottle of wine and sat on a bench - what a beautiful way to end their trip.  We loved having Ryan and Nicole out.  It is always so wonderful and special to share this city with family - we miss them so much!

The following week my boss Paul came out for a night - we met up with a couple Dutch colleagues for some rijstafel and drinks.  The next weekend - another sunny day we biked out toward the Ouderkerk  and stopped for some Midget golf with the Haley's.  Yes miniature golf is called midget golf.

Afterward we met up with the rest of the gang for a picnic in Vondel park with a couple new additions - baby Jack and Liv.

Next round of visitors - Candace and Andrew from Los Angeles and Nate from Seattle.  Candace is my dear friend from high school and also Santa Monica.  Before I moved here, I briefly stayed with Candace and Andrew - we talked about it then - a visit to Amsterdam would be in their future.  Nate is a friend of Kirk's from high school who was out in Paris for work and took the train over for a few nights.  We had a packed house. Our first evening started at Tara - one of our favorite bars.

We also set up a boat ride with Paap - this time he took us to the new Maritime museum on the Ij.

After our beautiful night cruise we walked thru the Spui and along Leidsestraat, so our guests could get a good feel for the city.

Another favorite night spot - the Whiskey Bar!!!

We really enjoyed having Nate out for a short few days.  He plans to come back with his wife next summer - possibly for some golf in Scotland.

During the week Candace and Andrew headed off for France and Italy, but then returned for Kirk's birthday party. We met up with good friends for drinks at Zeppos Kapitein and then dancing at Casa Johnsen!

The following morning Candace and Andrew left on an early flight back home! Later that evening, I threw Kirk a surprise party at Jeff and Nidia's home.  We had a nice table of yummy appetizers, desserts and of course beer pong and disco ball.  Kirk was definitely surprised.
We all hopped on our bikes and went to Ali's housewarming party.  On the way we spotted the Dam's carnival.

Overall a wonderful and packed 2 months - our lives never seem to slow down.  It often takes me blogging to realize that we are never really bored.  A lot of good times, good friends and good memories.