Tag: 55+

Other travels

Libraries = Freedom

The Cedar Journal June 5, 2023

I read this week about the banning of books in a library.

Sad!

While I was on vacation to Minnesota I stopped at the local libraries near where I stayed. Moose Lake Public Library in Moose Lake, Minnesota which is part of the Arrowhead Public Library system, has always been a home away from home sort of place for me. I, at one time, knew each of the staff that worked in this small library along with the many volunteers who donated their time each week to either re-shelving books or reading to the pre school children at story time, I don’t know many of the library staff anymore but a visit home nearly always includes this special place.

Among the stacks of books are memories, my kids as teenagers looking for a book on … whatever subject they seemed to be interested in at the time.

This Jade plant is part of the permanent staff at the Moose Lake Public Library

This library in particular was the site where I learned of a combat buddies death, the one place I was able to get free WIFI to my check email.

It is a place where my Dad for many years also went to check his email and I always knew if he wasn’t sitting at the feed store chatting with his fellow local farmers, I could nearly always find him at one of the computers checking his email.

This visit home this year was not easy, it never is as things change from year to year, but the small libraries that dot the local towns and communities of the United States contain the dreams and future hopes of those who use them, including my dreams that all people can live free.

Like a seed library I found on my visit to the Nokomis Public Library. With this wonderful gift to the community it could inspire an entire generation of gardeners. It inspired me, that I might grow some American peas in my Dutch garden. A success story as I see my pea plant now sticking it’s tiny vine out of the straw bale I planted it in.

This pea seed travelled a long way from the Minnesota Public Library to my garden in The Netherlands.

With all the wonderful things that a library provides it saddens me to hear that there are struggles going on in some libraries in my native country.

Banning books, burning books is NOT FREEDOM!

If a title is not liked or the contents of the book is maybe questionable to some populations moral leanings, then in my opinion, leave it alone! Don’t force your views on others, don’t quell the information that might inspire or encourage someone in our society to take action, create, fulfill a dream or imagine a dream yet to be fulfilled!

Books make all of us better individuals or society as a collective more diverse in our thinking. Yes, maybe that is old fashioned thinking but it is true.

Slowly reading a book, makes us all think about the world differently.

Do something positive for your local library this summer. Visit. Find out what they have available besides books, free WIFI, or maybe even seeds. It might surprise or even inspire you.

This free art kit was available last month at the MLPL. Pretty cool hobby for someone who visited and picked up this kit!

Tell us about your local library. What cool things do they offer? How has a library inspired you?

First Canoe Paddle of 2023

The Cedar Journal May 31, 2023

For all you that have followed our blog for years, you know this is much later in the season than normal for our first canoe paddle. March, April, or at the least early May, but unheard of, is late May! Yet, here we are, the very last day of the month of May. We made a combined canoe paddle/volunteer day this morning at the Historic Garden Aalsmeer.

Sitting here right now, in the comfort of our house I still feel the arms flappy floppy from our efforts.

We started the day with strapping our nearly new Namekagon (the name of our newest canoe) onto our new for us Suzuki Ignis. This car is smaller than our old VW Caddy and the Hubby spent the weekend prior modifying and testing how this canoe/car system would work and still be legal on Dutch roads.

Waiting to leave the house early this morning.

Once at the Westeinder Lake close to the water tower ( a beach where we have launched from several times), we unloaded our gear and got right on the water.

The light, water, and sandy beach made for a good picture prior to hitting the waves.

Finally across the lake we headed into the canal towards the Aalsmeer harbor.

The early morning brought the songs of all sorts of birds in the trees and on the water. Many of the water birds had little ones learning the ropes of keeping safe. Popping up in front of the canoe and instantly disappearing with a squeak of shock when they found how close we were with the canoe. How could I not laugh?

Aalsmeer Historic Garden, Rhododendrons in full bloom today.

Once we arrived at the Historic Garden we had to get right to work!

Putting fruit trees in the ground. Good job Hubby!

Look there are more to plant!

The dozens we needed to plant this morning.

But, it doesn’t feel like work if you get to stroll through the beauty of the garden on our way to coffee break.

The bright sun doesn’t do the flower colors justice. They were breath taking this morning in the bright sunny weather.

Then into the canoe (with purchased plants🙄), and a leisurely paddle back across the lake.

Not bad for our first day of the paddling season!

Where will the winds or the waters take us next?

©️ The Cedar Journal, 2023, all tights reserved.

Walking the Floris V. Again?

The Cedar Journal May 28, 2023

Yesterday I walked a section of the Floris V Pad, again! Now, I finished the 245km hike from Amsterdam to Bergen op Zoom. I didn’t and won’t hike the entire Floris V Pad again!

AWCA Floris V Hike

The real reason (may this be a lesson to all those who share stories) is that I shared my Floris V hike story with a group of American women expats and I was asked to lead the first section of the hike through Amsterdam for a group. That was December 2022.

Learn more about the AWCA … https://awca.nl/about-us

As things go it was a bit of a rocky start on the planning side, but finally a date was set, published, and slowly people started signing up to attend.

There are about 300 American women who belong to this group in Amsterdam, with a few of us who reside outside the city but make the monthly trek into the big city for either coffee with our fellow American’s or to attend one of these many scheduled activities.

A diverse group from all sorts of backgrounds makes each get together interesting as we all have stories of how we ended up here, how long we have stayed, why we have stayed, and how varied our Dutch speaking skills have matured as we have lived here.

Yesterday, we had eleven members signed up for the hike. I mentally walked through how I could manage that number of people the night prior. Where the best places are to stop, possible bathroom breaks, places to get snacks. Planning for a group is different than if I was planning just for a hike alone.

My backpack had extra water, food, first aid kit, the layers of clothes for the Dutch weather (thank goodness the forecast didn’t include rain), and extra shoes.

Hubby, did a bit of a chuckle at the extra shoes and asked if I had ever hiked with extra shoes in my 245km trek?

Well, no! But, they are packed anyway!

Again the trip to get to the start of the trail is almost as much of an adventure as doing the hike.

I planned in detail my train schedule and arrival time,only to stand an extra 15 mins on the train platform due to some sort of train delay.

Being a long holiday weekend here in The Netherlands, the train was packed full, dumping people at the airport and picking up more luggage laden passengers heading into Amsterdam.

Disembarking, those same deer in the headlight luggage hauling passengers inched their way to the exit, while those of us who live here pushed to the front in the “we know what we are doing, get out of our way” pace.

Once outside Central Station, which that sight has never gotten old for me even after 17 years of living here, I quickly jumped to the opposite side of the street out of the crowds and headed towards our “meeting place” in front of the war memorial at the Dam Square.

The funny thing is, every tour group in the World meets at the Dam Square. Soon it was clear to me that this “meet up place” might be challenging. I didn’t know most the fellow hikers.

Once we all finally gathered (we were six out of 11 who signed up) we headed out.

Again, looking for the LAW white and red stickers that mark the trail path was a challenge (note to self, contact the national group and let them know they need some more stickers placed in a logical eye level areas).

Interested in hiking the Floris V Pad? You can get information from the following site. Floris V Pad

As with any hiking there always seems to be detours on the route. This one had a bridge over one of the canals closed and I quickly made a detour. One of the ladies on the hike pointed out that our detour took us right to the Amsterdam Memorial. This newly dedicated memorial features bricks with the names of Amsterdam citizens who were taken to and murdered in the concentration camps of WWII.

Thousands of bricks…

This was one of several walls of bricks both sides of the walls are covered with bricks in alphabetical order of the citizens who were murdered.

Read about my first Floris V hike in Amsterdam, Amsterdam

As we continued the hike towards our endpoint of Diemen. We walked along the Amstel River and enjoyed watching people out enjoying the beautiful weather. This part of Amsterdam is so different from the tourist trap of Dam Square, a true residential area filled with city gardens, house boats, benches for the locals to enjoy the river front. High end hotels (where we stopped in to admire the interior).

The interior The Amstel Hotel, Amsterdam.

When we approached the last part of the hike we watched the local rowing teams practice on the canal. A coach was riding up and down the path we were hiking yelling instructions to the rowers on the canal. Some of us wondered how many of the rowers might have had late night indulges of alcohol making the rowing a bit of a struggle. Hiking alongside we could make up any story.

I passed some poppies growing, I plucked 5 for some of my fallen buddies to toss in the canal as we made our way to the last few hundred meters.

In memory of all those who served with me who fell serving their country.

I didn’t mention to anyone in the group why I tossed the poppies or what it meant to me, a small prayer of thanks to those military members and their families on this Memorial Day weekend, who I served with in all three war zones and my 21+ years of service.

At the end of the hike we each parted ways to head back to Amsterdam or home. With experiences to share with family and friends and hopefully a new insight of how to view Amsterdam.

I did find a couple of Hummm… along this hike.

Hummm… interesting, I did leave a message, I will have to check and see if it inspired a song.😳

Hummm… hope they find what they are looking for, I have found mine!❤️😊

Sometimes We Must Take Good With Bad

The Cedar Journal May 24, 2023

In gardening we all are constantly learning from the plants we tend, sometimes they don’t like the soil, they are too wet, or to dry, too much sun or not enough, it can be frustrating sometimes!

This week was one of those garden weeks that makes me wonder if my hobby is controlling me or might send me to the crazy farm.

I had two of my most beautiful pumpkin plants bitten right in half by the murderous slugs!

Exhibit A; Pumpkin plant several weeks old with bite mark severing it from it’s roots.

If Mother Nature has a court system I want a hearing!

But, the slug buddies across town seemed to have conspired with the other murders, taking my new Echinacea plant nearly to the ground. In our back garden.

Exhibit B; Echinacea plant with signs of slug activity.

I am filing charges!

Then Mother Nature sent me this as I went into my cabinet on the back porch to get my pots to start more plants…

Disclaimer: If skeletal remains are not your thing please STOP reading… or looking…

I can’t hide this crime so I put it on display…

His after life job… watching me pot new seeds.🤣😂

So when the World seems to be going down the slow slide into the abyss, and the US government can’t get their crap together enough on a budget deal so that many of us who get paid each month can not be stressed!

Mother Nature keeps doing her thing without us humans.

So she gifted me this…

Mother Nature trying to balance out the slug problem… yup, that works for me! Thank you Mother Nature!

Or she gifts me a rare sighting…

All reminders that we need to take the Good and the Bad all in stride.

Is there anything growing where you live right now?

Do you think I might see a June pay check?

Place your comments below, we always love to hear from our loyal readers. The answer is NO, we have not been out on the water yet this year!🫤

Finally Friday!

The Cedar Journal May 19, 2023

This week we were graced here in The Netherlands with a Thursday holiday. Not a holiday when you have garden to catch up on still from three weeks of vacation and a Hubby that works on the holiday!

At least the weather felt a bit more like holiday weather with sun beating down on my face and neck as I tackled the weeds.

I finally finished this morning and now can spend the weekend relaxing.😂🤣 Anyone of you who has ever had a garden is now laughing at that last statement, very well, I will try to do less this weekend in the garden.

Here are a few photos and videos of how it looks right now. Enjoy!