Fire!

Oh, the luxury...

Visitors

Claude and Nicky came around for a drink in the Stijlkamer.

Red tape, herring, eel and bakfiets.

Almost a week after moving, I had a day off to do odd jobs, such as changing my parking permit to the new address and picking up chairs.
Once at the out-of-town office of parking permits, a permit was denied because apparently we registered at the wrong address! I sped back into town and queued at town hall. It turned out the registry office and town hall use different systems. One calls the four apartments 125-I to -IV, the other 125H, 125-O, 125a and 125-I (Dutch logic for you). Anyhow, I had to reregister and retuned to the permit office to obtain my parking permit. Hours of queueing.
The second job was picking up a rental bakfiets to transport my grandparents' 40-odd year-old Artifort chairs that had been reupholstered to a slightly more grown-up colour than the purple they were reupholstered in 8 years ago for the Pax. Let me tell you: driving a bakfiets is not an easy job! The rather odd gear system allows forward cycling as fast as backward cycling. In order to slow down, one had to grab a ball between one's legs and yank it.

Anyhow, two jobs done. In order to reward myself, I got an eel sandwich and a herring sandwich. Verrukkelijk!

First day in the new house

Moving day

Today we are supposed to move. However, the work on the house is not finished. Marvel at our downstairs! Undaunted, we proceed anyway.

Antwerp express

We hired a van and a lift to bring furniture from Antwerp to Amsterdam for reupholstery. What a kerfuffle. At least the sun was shining!

Floating sofa

In pouring rain I brought the sofa to the new house, using the Stingray (a.k.a. Freiheit). Thanks for your help, Jan B!

Meanwhile the renovation is progressing steadily.

Kitchen in progress

Mark Verhoeven placed the kitchen units. The floor is 10cm lower at one end of the room, so it will be hard to get the whole structure level.

Lamps

Being inflicted with a lamp fetish has had its consequences. Take a look!

The rising sun - bought online.

3 lights bought at an Antwerp furniture store that was closing down in 2002 - these were their own ceiling lights. 3 euros a piece!

Raak wall lights, bought online.

Chandelier, bought at a vintage shop in Zeeuws-Vlaanderen.

That same light, with a mirror found in the derelict apartment upstairs from my flat in Antwerp, back in 1995.

This Raak light was bought online - my partents bought the same light in 1972.

Kitchen in progress

Mr A and I went to check on the progress of our kitchen, being built by Mark Verhoeven in IJmuiden.

He had told us his workshop was turning green!

Dutch customer service

Mr A and I want the kind of gas fires in the two chimneys that can be operated by remote control.
So I wrote to Jaspers, a local business with a good reputation, sending them photos and measurements, asking them if they could send someone around for an estimate.
They replied we needed to come to their shop.
So off we went, on our bikes, to the shop. We told the staff what we were looking for, only to be told 'dat wordt heel moeilijk' - that's going to be very difficult. She advised us to choose a fire and build the chimney around it (sounding as if she thought: 'that's what normal people do'). I stressed we bought an old house with existing marble chimneys. In that case, she said, I could make an appointment for an assessment by one of their experts.
My comment, that that was exactly what I had asked for in the first place, was ignored. The 'appointment' was 'somewhere between 1pm and 3pm'.
You can't hear me, but I am screaming.

Meanwhile, our Estonian, Ukrainian and Moldovan builders are doing excellent work, putting up lamps, mirrors, laying a floor, installing outside sockets.
You can't see me, but I am smiling.

And contemplating emigration.

Table!

Today our custom-made (yes, we are posh) marble table arrived. Trevor likes it so we're happy.

Chandelier

Today we went to the house to hang out and admire the chandelier we got from my cousin Jeanine.
The word Chandelier appeared in the English language in the late 14th Century, directly from the 12th Century Old French world Chandelier this was a new spelling of the earlier 10th Century French word Chandelabre which in turn comes from Latin Candelbrumfrom the Latin Candela meaning candle.


Whatever!

Splendid!

Greenery on the terrace

My father gave me some money to buy something for the new house. We went to the garden centre, bought loads of plants and put it all in place so I can show the photos to my father while he can still see them.

New furniture

Today the table and chairs were delivered. Waiting for the delivery provided an opportunity to take a few snapshots. Gradually the place is taking shape!

Furniture hunt

Mr A. and I went to the Westfriese Beurs in hoorn. It's a huge shed full of second hand furniture. We found a dining table with four chairs and an armchair for the 'stijlkamer'.

Trevor

Trevor has already found his favourite place - in the 'stijlkamer'.

Location

The house used to face the sea (Zuiderzee), as you can see on the map (at bottom tip is where the house is located). When a new train station was built on an island right in front of it, the Oosterdok was created, blocking the sea view. Later the Afsluitdijk (Close Off Dike) was built (in the 1930s) in the north of the country, effectively turning the Zuiderzee into a body of freshwater, fed bij the IJssel, a branch of the Rhine.
Later the street changed its name from Buitenkant (Outside) to Prins Hendrikkade (Prince henry Quay).
In 2002 I lived on a houseboat on the Binnenkant (Inside), just 50 metres away.