Rivers & Roads

Happy New Year!!! I hope everyone had a great holiday break and are enjoying the last few days of rest before real life starts again. We had a very nice Christmas here in Gent. On Christmas eve we went back to Simon's home town to celebrate with his mom's side of the family. She has 4 sister and 1 brother so it is quiet a big party! So big they rent out a local boy scouts building to accommodate all the people and the cooking that needs to be done. This year was actually on the smaller side, only about 30 people, because a few of Simon's cousins are married and have kids so they switch off going to their husbands family every year and so they did not come this year; next year there will be about 45 people! Before we had dinner the whole group went on a little walk through the woods, which was a bit muddy but still fun and one of Simon's uncles had prepared small little bon fires along the way to keep us on the path which was really nice! After the walk we enjoy some delicious Glujwein (hot wine) and then ate a giant feast with ravioli, turkey, vegetables, peaches and curly fries! For desert one of Simon's aunts is opening up a cafe in Gent and had a a bunch of different ice creams she wanted us to try to see which was the best and which she should serve in her shop, so we got to taste test about 8 different ice creams which was delicious to say the least. Once we were good and full everyone gathered around to open presents. With such a big group they do secret santa, luckily I got Simon's sister so buying my gift wasn't too difficult! I got a very nice set of lotion, shampoo, and shower gels from one of Simon's cousins and Simon got some books about vintage and second hand furniture and working attire which was perfect! After presents Simon's uncle brought out some old home video's of when Simon and his cousins were little which was very adorable to watch. There were many dance routines which reminded me of the countless Spice Girls dance numbers and magic shows I performed in my youth. We were planning on spending the night where the party was held, but it was pretty cold and everyone else decided to just drive home so we went back to Simon's parents house as well.

Simon unfortunately had to work the two days after Christmas, but after that we have had a very relaxing week here in Gent. It finally snowed which was very exciting, minus the leak in our roof above our bed and the short power outage... (Gent obviously does not know how to handle a small snow storm). For New Years some of Simon's friends from indoor soccer were having a party in his home town that we went to which was really fun! For dinner we had a style of eating and preparing food that they call Gourmet, which is different from our use of the word gourmet, where two people share a little burner with small pans and then you cook your meat right there in front of you! I had never done that before and it was really fun and tasty! After that we had a little dance party to ring in the new year.

In other news, Simon and I have decided to start a little side project (not sure if we can quite call it a business yet) of refurbishing old furniture! We have been talking about doing it for a while because we both love buying old furniture in second hand or vintage stores but our apartment can't really hold any more stuff! Also one of Simon's friends, Kasper, who is studying design wanted to go in on the project with us, so we decided to start looking for a cheap garage in Gent to rent where we can start working on furniture! We found a perfect spot kind of across town but still close to the center of Gent with lots of space for us to work and store furniture. We haven't signed the contract yet, but it should all work out and we can start moving stuff in there February 1st! We have already bought some very promising pieces for us to start working on, a few a pictured below but we have lots more that I will try and upload in the next post. With Simon having gone to school for painting and just being a generally handy guy, Kasper studying design and having good photoshop skills, and then one of Kaspers friends who I think is joining the project is studying product design and has access to laser cutters, I feel pretty confident that we can put together some nice pieces! But our goal is also to make things that are nice but affordable to young people because we see vintage stores all over the place selling beautiful furniture for very expensive and that is not what we are trying to do. We want our product to be accessible to everyone. I am very excited to have something creative to put my extra time into and hopefully turn this into something really great!  Our first name idea was Leaf, simple and something that sort of originated from wood, but we decided it did not explain what we were trying to do enough. So now we have landed on Fris, which in Dutch means Fresh, and we are sort of trying to "refresh" old furniture into something new. Below I included a few little sketches I threw together for logo ideas for Leaf, and even though that is not our name any more I would love to hear what you like or dislike about any of them to maybe point me in the right direction to try and make a logo for Fris! Having a leaf to start from was much easier and I am feeling a little stuck trying to come up with a good design for Fris.

In more exciting news, Rosy is coming to Belgium!!! (sorry rose, hope you don't mind me spilling the beans) She is coming February 15th-22nd! She is only going to be in Gent for the first half of her stay and then hope over to Ireland to see her friend Julie who is working there, but I am beyond excited to show her around Gent!

Well that is all for now, I will try to start posting more regularly again in the new year! Enjoy the photos below!

If you were not already aware, Christmas is this week! How did that happen?? For some reason it feels like it should still be a few weeks away to me. That may be because it has been surprisingly warm here in Gent, in the 50's, and that I am not in my usual Christmas setting in upstate NY! It is quite strange hearing from all of my family being together and me not being there but we are trying to keep things festive here too! This weekend I went out to the Christmas market in Gent with a few of my classe mates from Dutch class. We have a break from class from today until the 5th of January, so it was nice to hang out with everyone outside of the classroom setting. We are also planning after new years to hopefully have a potluck dinner because there is a group of about 6 of us, all from different countries (USA, Thailand, India, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Nigeria)  , so it would be fun to try a traditional recipe from everyones home!
Yesterday Simon and I took went to a fun little food festival filled with some of our favorite food trucks and then took the train to Brussels to check out the Christmas market there! It was very fun, they have lots of different light shows projected on the beautiful buildings that happen every half hour or so (I included a video of it below, I also included a longer version of the carousel video from instagram) and then of course lots of little shops and things to eat and drink. I also finally saw the famous Manneken Pis statue that Brussels is known for. If you are not familiar with it, it is just a very small statue of a little boy peeing...no one really knows why it is so famous but there are always big crowds huddled around it trying to snap a picture. On Wednesday Simon and I will drive his hometown and go to a big christmas party his family has every year which should be fun! Simon unfortunately has to work Friday and part of Saturday, but has most of the next week off. I hope everyone who is traveling gets to their destination safely and that you have a very nice and relaxing Christmas break!

Hello everyone! Sorry for such a long delay on my blog post, things have been a little slow around here. Winter is definitely starting to settle in, the sun is going down around 4:30 and we are finding it harder and harder to leave the warmth of our living room. But none the less I do have a few fun things to report! We have purchased a few new items, first of course would be Simon's new car which we finally have in our possession! He would like me to correct my previous post and state that the car is a black Mazda and is very nice indeed! This weekend we went to his parents house for a little Sint-Niklaas brunch and it was much more pleasant not having to take the train back and forth. (For those of you who don't know who Sint-Niklaas is, he is sort of the Belgian version of Santa Clause. He comes on December 6th by boat from Spain with his helper Black Pete, who has been subject to lots of racial discussion, and brings all of the nice children presents. The tradition I guess is the night before the children leave their shoe in front of the fire place with a carrot in it and wake up to presents!) Our second purchase is a wonderful new kitchen cabinet. As you may know our kitchen is quite small and there is not a lot of counter or storage space so we have been in the market for a new cabinet that could fit opposite the sink. We found the perfect vintage piece at a second hand store for only 40 euros and it fits perfectly! It really makes the kitchen so much for pleasant to use.
In other news the Gentse Winterfeesten has started! That just means the Christmas market here in gent has begun, there are little huts set up all over the center of the city some selling candy, or gloves, or handmade trinkets others selling bratwurst and hot wine. There is also a ferris wheel and ice skating! It really makes the whole city feel festive and is a good excuse to get our of the house! Also last thursday was Museum Night where all of the museums in Gent were open free to the public from 6pm-1am. We walked to a few places close to your apartment, first to the old fish mine that is now a restaurant and had some nice pieces in it. Then we headed over to the Design Museum which had a great exhibition all about lights. The museum itself is a beautiful old building from the 18th century with a modern addition. In the first floor there are all these spectacular drawing rooms filled with authentic floors, walls and furniture and then for this show they have this huge modern lights or chandeliers which really creates an interesting juxtaposition.
Dutch class is still going well, we recently had our first test in level two and received 17.5/20. We are now starting to learn the past tense which is pretty tricky with lots of exceptions! I am trying to force myself to practice using Dutch more with Simon but it is difficult because we are so used to using english at this point. I have also started up a small knitting project. I figured I needed to have a nice indoor activity to keep my fingers busy in this cold weather. I used the guidance of a lovely youtube video to teach myself how to cast on and now I am on my way to making a semi-attractive scarf! I hope everyone is staying warm where ever you are! Happy Sint-Niklaas!