Steve & Miki [ News ]

Yes a new post, and this time only 6 months have passed!
I can't for the life of me remember what has happened in these 6 months, probably because there is one overwhelming piece of news that dominates all other

We are finally having a baby!!!

Such a small sentence but it changes everything.
It's like we have finally unlocked a new level in the game of life ;-)
I am 17 weeks pregnant today.


In other news: we have been to Crete and to the UK and Steve has a monstrous new computer and we both have new shoes :D

Ok, so we haven't blogged for a while, oh well, these things happen! So, what has happened in the world of Steve & Miki in all that time (I say in all that time, but I won't put everything in of course, but the awesome wedding of Chay and Emma deserves a mention!):

Batchelor and batchelorette party, Saturday 7th March:

Our friends Bart and Lycette are getting married on April 17th, we are really looking forward to it and we celebrated with them by joining in "suprise" batchelor and batchelorette parties. Well, it wasn't quite a suprise, but we all had a great day with some drama (read on!).


The girls went to a special place to make their own jewellery and had a high tea afterwards. Miki ended up with a nice necklace and stayed strong resisting the High Tea as she is losing weight.


The boys went skiing in a large indoor ski slope called Snow World in Zoetermeer. We had a one hour lesson, followed by an hour of free skiing and it is far harder than it looks! I had real trouble getting up to the elevator and my legs were dead after the first hour! One of the highlights was seeing the groom come down the slope, ski past the group in a semi-circle and end up landing back on the elevator!

Unfortunately one of the group had an accident in which he broke his collarbone, so it was off to the hospital in Zoetermeer for the afternoon. We had planned to meet up with the girls in the evening for a meal with everyone together at Ctaste, a restaurant in which all the staff members have a visual disability and the dining room is in complete darkness (the bride is herself blind and would no doubt have had great amusement hearing our shouts as we stumbled into our food)!

After the hospital we met up with the girls at a restaurant bar not far from Alphen and it all ended well, with everyone laughing (although I hope Michiel will be able to laugh about it at some point!).

Go-Karting, Sunday 22nd March:

I went go-karting with a group of my colleagues at a place called De Uithof in The Hague. I came second to last, but had a great afternoon with good friends. I would definately go karting again!

Model Building Fair, Saturday 28th March:

Last weekend a group of my colleagues and I went to a small model building event in Rijnsaterwoude. We usually dance at a club in Rijnsaterwoude on a Tuesday evening, so I knew where it would be and believed the newspapers that it would be a huge event. It turned out to be quite a bit smaller than we were all expecting, but it was a fun trip none the less.



Certifications

I earned two new certifications, I am now a Sun Certified Specialist, NetBeans IDE and yesterday I attained the ego busting level of Certified ScrumMaster, so do forgive me if I make a noise scraping my swollen head through the door! I feel the course name is very close to the DnD level of Dungeon Master, a rank we can all be proud of! I am quite proactive in my training, there is always something new to learn in the world of software development. I am hoping to convince Collis that UML training would be a good idea next!

So whats ahead for the next 9 months? Well to start with we will be going to UK for Easter and will be meeting up with family and friends and then we will be seeing Chay & Emma at the end of the month when they come to visit us :-D

- Steve.

Ok, so I'm a day early, but tomorrow is Miki's birthday!

Lang zal ze leven,
Lang zal ze leven,
Lang zal ze leven in de gloria,
in de gloria,
in de gloriaaaaaaa!!!

In other news, we are shortly going to England for the wedding of Chay and Emma, we are both looking forward to that as we will be seeing some other university friends there and we will be going to Alnwick to see other friends.

- Steve

I know I know, we havent written anything in ages.

In the post below we anticipated going to England for Easter, and we have. It was great and there was family and friends and shopping and snow!

We thought we were going to be able to meet Gaynors new babies, but no, she was still very pregnant.
She has since had them and they are lovely and called Summer and Harper.

We have also had Simon and Kerry visit, which was the best. We did all sorts of touristy things and caught up and it was fantastic. I hope they come visit again soon.

We also saw Kingsley again, who had adventures in Amsterdam and came to stay as well!

We've had some nice days off, this monday is the last of the free days off.
But we are counting down to our holiday in Devon at the end of the month and we have also booked the ferry and one hotel for our trip to england for Emma and Chays wedding!

It seems I have neglected to blog anything for a while.
The December highlights then! :

1) Sinterklaas with Mats - Presents ?! are there presents coming ?!


2) Capgemini christmas dinner and excursion (yeah weird I know)


3) Dec 16th new family member 1 was born - Ruben - to Miki's brother and sister-in-law! Harrah! a little brother for Mats!


Yes well a brother is one thing, but check out all these presents!!


4) Lovely Christmas at home, saw the family and the Big King.






5) New Years spent in Vlissingen with the family.
mmm appelflappen





As for January:

First, we had our garden relaid:




Secondly, Miki started a new project for the UWV.

Then new family member 2 & 3 (Dovid and Noa) where born in the last few weeks of January to Miki's cousin Vincent and his wife Thirza. Congratulations!

Caught up with Kingsley in Amsterdam, got him away from weed long enough to catch up... ;-)

We are both currently off work sick. Bummer.


Looking forward to (I am not putting a time scale to these expectations as I don't know when I will be arsed to post again ;-):

1) Arrival of new family members 4 & 5 from my cousin Gaynor (not long to go now!).
2) Easter going to England. Some nice weather wouldn't go amiss...
3) Spring holiday to Devon with family
4) Wedding of Mr Chayseff and Ms. Dawes (here's hoping for a date soon!).
5) Wedding of Miki's best friend Nathalie!
6) Kingsley and I are planning to go to the Games Day and Golden Daemon event from GW if I can just find out when it is!

Hope to blog a bit more this year! Not that I have gotten off to a very good start of course...