Bartje

The little white boy in the window is Bartje Bartels, the main figure in some books of  Dutch writer Anne de Vries ( 1904-1964). The book dates from 1932 and describes a young boy who grows up in a poor Drenthe farm workers family. He doesn't want to abide by his fate and when his mother serves baked kidney beans and his father calls for prayer he says the famous sentence : I do not pray for brune beans"! (Ik bid nie veur bruune boonen"). This has become a famous exclamation in our country and can be used for everything you don't want to do.

Linking to "signs, signs2"

Sunday bike ride

Cycling path along the Lange Wetering in Almere Haven. At the right you can see some houseboats.

With Pollard Willows a little further on.

And the never finished castle under construction.

Linking to "Our World Tuesday"

Monday Mural

A mural at the parking of the Drenthe Museum in Assen. Students of the Classical Academy of  Fine Arts Groningen have brightened up a dull corner at the parking.

The mural consists of two Greek goddesses guarding a city gate. It is five by five meters.

Linking to "Monday Mural"

Sunny weekend

Looking out over the Gooilake.

And launching the boat for the first time this spring.

Reflection

A reflection in "Huis Marseille" a photographic museum housed in an old canal house in Amsterdam.

Your blogger couldn't resist...

Linking to "Weekend Reflections"

Warmth

With temperatures of 29C (84.2F) it was yesterday the hottest April day in history here.

 Global warming is coming closer? Sofietje doesn't mind,  she loves the warmth.

Museum gardens

Garden of the photography museum "House Marseille" in Amsterdam.

Garden of the Drenthe Museum in Assen.

Surprise

When cycling around in our neighbourhood yesterday we noticed suddenly something remarkable, those colours, could it be....?

Tulip fields just around the corner!

Incredible, we never had those fields so close by, you can see our dike in the background.

Those women were at work with sticks, maybe removing the ugly ones.

Bicycles

Parking cars along the canals in Amsterdam are slowy pushed back but now another parking problem has arisen.

An apartment building for students. Linking to "Our World Tuesday"

Monday Mural

The Drenthe Museum in Assen has an old and modern part. This is a tile tableau in the basement of the old part. I don't know exactly how old it is, but the text is in old Dutch language.

I will try to translate, it is an expression of the farmer how happy he is living here with his land and his cattle and to live here the life just as his father Jacob did.

Linking to "Monday Mural"

Bald tree

Last Sunday at the first warm day, the trees had no signs of green yet.

Drenthe peat

At the Drenthe Museum I had this delicious piece of turf ("peat"). The province of Drenthe is well known for its former peat-cutting so the restaurant serves a typically "Drents turfje" a well-filled herb cake with wallnuts, raisins and herbs.

Linking to "Weekend Reflections"

American Realism

At last I payed a visit at this exhibition I very much wanted to see. A two hour drive by car to the Drents Museum in the north kept us this cold winter from it. 

It is all about American Realism 1945-1965. Some paintings even look like pictures as this one by Stone Roberts, "The Lake in Central Park: A Late Afternoon in Early June.

Woman Reading by Will Barnet  from 1965.

I always liked the funny paintings by Norman Rockwell.

Some icons of the sixties.

Enjoying the spring weather

The season is on, open roofs in the tourist canal boats in Amsterdam

 An open boat with drinks.

A moment for yourself.

Animals

At our cycling tour last Sunday we passed these hairy goats.

And impressive Irish cattle.

I wonder how they can see anything with all those hairs.
Linking to "Our World Tuesday"