HIGHLIGHTS:

• meeting Cara (& Fam)
• seeing another 7.5 month old in action
• meeting Barbara
• taking classes with Karen Burniston
• running through the streets of Egmond looking for a pizza place with an egyptian theme
• having Sven and Georgia pick me up after classes (nothing like not seeing your babes after a short absence to make the reunion that much sweeter)
• hearing all the ladies praise my darling baby
• being amidst 100's of other scrappers - all just as crazy about the hobby (lifestyle) as me

LOWLIGHTS

• when my keycard was deactivated and we were locked out of our room during Georgia's lunch, tired hungry baby, no food...
• having our dinner vouchers turned down on Sunday just because they 'were only for saturday'
• Cara leaving Sunday afternoon
• my KI Memories class (now honestly, who uses photoboxes anymore? don't we all store our photos on CD's now?!)
• the food
• being reminded once again, that CK does not rule the world and having won their biggest contest doesn't guarantee recognition in all scrapping circles of the world.

Friday

Left at 4:45am on Friday. Yup, I was up at 2am in order to get myself ready and make sure Sven was out of bed by 3am. Forgot to figure in extra time for Georgia though and was feeding her at 4 (which is when we wanted to leave). Got as far as the first roundabout before realizing I'd forgotten passports & Sven had forgotten keys. Headed back home, grabbed missing items, back in the car, back to the roundabout, realize I'd grabbed Georgia's American Passport. Left it, thankfujlly never eeded it.

We made our first stop at a gas station somewhere along the road. Took Georgia up to the bathroom in the Rasthof thinking I could change her on a table instead of my lap. Surprise, German Rasthof(s) are not baby-friendly. I had to change her on the sink, spread the pad over the garbage hole and was so irriated by the unfriendliness, that I tossed her very stinky diaper right there in the garbage and thumbed my nose at the whole establishment.

Second stop noonish for lunch. I had heated a jar of carrots and potatoes that morning and stuffed them in the thinsulate thermos to keep warm. They were cold. G didn't care, she was hungry and proceeded to gobble down the whole (cold) jar of carrots without flinching. One last stop in Holland for gas and we got mixed up on directions one time before finally arriving at Hotel Zuiderduin sometime after 3pm. Also had one driving mishap due to the fact that Sven (who didn't want to drive all night, yet only slept one hour before we took off) nodded off at the wheel and the car drifted semi-slowly to the right before my third (!!!) yell caught his attention. Had no idea where the hotel was, so we drove around Egmond until we found it (thankfully, Egmond's not too big).

Checked-in. Registered. Headed up to our room and in the hallway, a couple women pass us by and one says something about the family...they are almost out the door of the hall when she suddenly turns around and says: WHO ARE YOU? Turns out, she's a blog reader (hi Marilyn) and after running me down without telling me HER name, she took off again. She wasn't the last to recognize Georgia...

Looked around and tried to find Cara (no luck). Sven fell asleep in the room so I took a fussy. Georgia out to bring up more luggage. Loaded down with Georgia in the Björn, and 3 pieces of luggage, I tried to catch the elevator up to the 4th floor. I pushed the button on level 0, the elevator came down filled with people who had gotten in on floor 1 and wanted to go up. Two Dutch women joined me with their luggage on Level 0 and watched the elevator come down and go back up without us twice more. Then the younger of the two women got frustrated and went upstairs and brought the elevator DOWN to us. Why is this story important? Because I ended up having my Urban Lifestyle Album Class with her later that evening!

No dinner because we didn't have vouchers, G needed to go to bed and I needed to get her down before my first workshop at 8:30pm.

Workshop starts on time. I'm down earlyish and see the gal from the elevator. She asks if I want to sit with her, I acquiesce (I don't know how to say no) even though I was still on the lookout for Cara (who had this class as well). Daniela, & I sit near the front and chat a bit. About three mins before class starts, I see Cara running down the hall, boys in tow. They had only just arrived due to bad traffic!

Meeting Cara was awesome. I think it needs a blog entry all to itself, or maybe it isn't for the blog because she'll read me being all cheesy and sentimental about it and then I'll feel like a dork. Anyway, I felt a total instant connection with her and you'd never have known that it was our first time to meet. And what kind of scrappers are we anyway, that we only had ONE photo taken together and it was a stiff WS photo. URG!!!!!!!!!! (I'd love to share it, but it has to wait, it's still in RAW format on Cara's camera!

The workshop was so-so at first. I didn't know what to expect, I think I was more excited about meeting Cara and I that our two teachers (Emily Waters & Liz Eaton) were beyond exhausted due to jetlag (flying from Arizona to Europe isn't much easier than flying from Seattle!) But the STUFF we got. AMAZING.

Went out to dinner with Cara and family after class, only to find out that all the restarants close their kitchens at 9pm! I was wearing flipflops and a t-shirt...it was freezing and so windy I nearly got my flipflops blown off my feet! Matthieu leant me his jacket and we trudged on. He finally went up to some people who had just left a restaurant and asked them for help. They were sooo nice and took us in and we got fed. yum. Yes, I left Sven in the room with Georgia, didn't even bother to wake them. When I got back, he had not MOVED from where I left them both before my class!

Saturday

7am breakfast with Sven and G., and then off to class at 8am. A Scrapworks class, this one with Cara. Not an exciting class. It was just a layout, a 12x12 layout using products I'd never have bought in a size I don't scrap and with no new or interesting techniques. BUT, it was with Cara and that made it fun.

Then my first class with Karen B. and meeting up with Barbara. Karen (whom I'd been bugging over Email a few weeks prior) was a total sweetheart and despite not knowing who I am, talked and chatted with me while getting her class ready. Barbara is adorable (and she'll probably snort when she reads this). Tiny cute little thing, and she's got Georgie in her planner. Made me laugh.

Karen's class was amazing - that woman is brilliant. The things she created out of transparancies! How does she come up with this stuff? We didn't have time to finish, but we got all the techniques done, and the cool thing about them is that they can be used again and again in different projects, layouts, cards etc.

After Karen's class I had my Van Gogh class with Cara and Sara. Totally disapointed in that class. There was no project, we just learned different painting techniques. It would have been more fun to do them on an actual layout. Oh well. Now I know how to dry brush and stipple and use foam stamps (I have a ton of those from Erin that I've never used...now i know how!).

Lunch and a break before my Think Pink class with Emily and Liz. LOVED that class. Such a cool idea. I'm not sharing. I want to use this one as a gift later on...HS album class part 2 right after Think Pink. We learned how to use masks and modeling paste (does modelling paste wash out of BRAND NEW PANTS?!) never used modeling paste before. Never wanted to - too messy...and where do ou find modeling paste in Germany? someone tell me please - and what is it called? During the modeling paste part of the class, Liz was helping our half of the class and she got to chatting with Cara and me (she has my blog address, but I'm going to trust that it got lost on the way back to America and that she'll never see this...). She's really nice, though she came across pretty stand-offish at first. She asked how Cara and I met and was surprised when we said we'd only just met for the first time.

Took Cara with to meet G and eventually M showed up with J and P so we got to put the little ones together (such cuties).

I was done for the day, but Cara had tons of classes all night. We were going to have dinner together and ran into Emily and Liz just in front of the restaurant, they were eating pizza. told us how yummy it was, where to find it and so on a whim, we had to have it too. Cara had a WS and no time really for pizza, but we ran out anyway. By the time we found the place, got our pizza and got back to the hotel, she had to go to class (Think Pink) and so I took her pizza and brought it back down to her after class. She came out to tell me they were running over, i went back in with her and we got pics with Emily and Liz.

Raffle that night - no win for me (or Cara). and that brings us to

Sunday.

Was (for me) an unorganized mess. I loved Scrap-a-ganza but it played a number on my patience and gave me a few panic attacks. I had four workshops on Sunday (not all good), the majority that afternoon. In the morning, we had breakfast with Cara and her fam and then Cara and I had our last album class with Emily. We'd planned to spend the morning after that doing make and takes and shopping, but the make and takes weren't organized very well and we only managed one. Cara shopped until she was late to meet Matthieu for lunch and we had an almost-tearful goodbye (yes, I nearly cried).

Sven came by and we went to see about getting him a Lunch Voucher. Reception turned us away and sent us to the Scrap-a-ganza registration desk. They said they couldn't really help us but if we promised not to tell, they'd give us a lunch voucher. She then took a Refreshment Voucher, crossed it out and wrote 'lunch' on it. Okay, I thought that'd be just fine, so we headed upstairs to our room to get Georgia's lunch before going on into the restaurant. Get to our room, loaded down with bags and cameras and babies only to find out that our keycard had been deactivated. I panicked quietly. Left Sven with Georgia upstairs and ran down to the SAG desk. She told me to relax, go to Reception and make sure it wasn't a mix-up and if there was a problem, to send them back to SAG. Back to reception. Had a really nice gal that got things all fixed up, card was reactivated, we were in the system for another night, it was all good. Whew, panic attack was over and I'd gotten through it with tears behind, not in front of my eyes.

Ready to go, head back down to the restuarant for lunch with our two vouchers (one from Cara, thanks!) and the specially written-on-one from Heidi. We get to the door, the guy looks at it and says: NO WAY, he cannot accept that one (which I totally understand now, anyone could have just crossed off a refreshment voucher and written lunch, but i was still a bit tired from the whole room-mess and not thinking straight at the time) and was about to send us packing when I hear behind me "what's the problem?" Standing behind us were Emily Waters and Liz Eaton and Liz was awesome and gave us an extra lunch voucher that she had. Next disaster averted.

I think the wind had gone out of my sails after Cara left though, and the lunch/room messes didn't help. I did a make and take by myself after lunch and then went on to my bazzill workshop (was totally looking forward to that one because Cara had said that they were really nice, and she'd done quite a fun project). The class was fun, the project was cool (not colors I'd ever, ever, ever choose myself) and I sat right behind a certain Marilyn who proceeded to crack me up the whole time.

Went from Bazzill to KI Memories and was (although I'd been warned) quite disappointed. The class was in Dutch. It was not a mini album, it was not learning techniques, it was not learning how to use a product in a cool way...It was decorating a photobox. Yes, a box to keep photos in, in this digital day and age...Product was the Green Color Theory (I would have totally preferred purple) and it wasn't a style I really cared for. Add to that the Dutch and the difficulty she had translating in English and it was mostly one big disappointment.

Thankfully, I ended my SAG WS experience with one of Karen Burniston's classes. Meant to sit with a Dutch girl I had met online a week ago and a nice German gal I had only just met and didn't really know, but a very pushy Dutch woman just sat right down next to me without asking whether the seat was free and that was that. The class was awesome (Karen is an awesome teacher). We learned how to make a cool pop-up (where does she come up with these ideas`?!). My only complaint, and this is just a general one, why does every layout WS have you do 12x12 layouts? What about us 8.5 x 11 scrappers?! Karen's class: VERY cool. Karen: totally awesome and hilarious. I had the German gal (I think her name was Katrin) take a picture of Karen and me. What can I say? Obviously I have not lost those baby pounds, I SWEAR I didn't used to be that fat. AND it was the last class of the whole event, I was tired. Everyone was tired. What I don't understand is why my face looks like a tomato in that picture. Am I really that red? So I did a whole lot of photoshopping to fix this photo up and nothing worked, so I added special effects.

The evening: BOMBED.

We had a dinner voucher from the night before, as well as Cara's unused Dinner Voucher. So we thought we were good. Headed to the restaurant, and WHAM. They cannot accept unused dinner vouchers, they were ONLY for the night before. Great. Glad someone told us that. totally wishing we hadn't gotten that yummy pizza the night before. Georgia's tired, I'm exhausted, Sven's frustrated...we go back to the room, get Georgia in bed and eat the car snacks (pringles, pretzels chocolate rice cakes...) for dinner and then both fall asleep before 11pm...

Daily Earworm: "...Bumi, bumi, bumi bumi brum brum brum!"

*The following account of Amsterdam was written on Monday, the 22nd of May.*

Sitting in a hotel room in Amsterdam, watching "As Good as it Gets" (in English with Dutch subtitles) in the semi dark while Georgia tosses and turns because we forgot the static-maker and she's beyond exhausted...Amsterdam so has better TV, they get the major German channels (except Pro7, which sucks because The 4400 is on tonight) and they have Dutch channels which have both Dutch shows and English shows with Dutch subtitles, why can't Germany do that? And for that matter, Grey's Anatomy is coming on (Season 2!) tomorrow in Holland, IN ENGLISH!

Why are we in Amsterdam anyway? Because someone hasn't quite gotten it into his brain that we can no longer travel the way we used to, not with a 7-month old baby - you know, walking every last inch of a foreign city, being on our feet ALL DAY, missing meals and coming back to the hotel exhausted? Yah.

We drove in this morning, checked in at "The Tulip Inn", a hotel just outside the city-center, fed Georgia lunch and then hopped on a bus to the Centraal station. I had 5 goals for Amsterdam: take a boat tour, see a heron, see the 1-meter-wide House and the Anne Frank House and NOT end up in the Redlight District. We managed 4 of those.

We took a Gracht-Fahrt around the city first thing, just walked to the nearest (and first) boat tour we found and got in. Perfect timing, it started raining as soon as we were inside. G was a goner before we even started the trip (I now know that she was coming down with her cold, so she was allowed her fussing). She was exhausted, sat in Sven's lap and fussed. So I took her and for a while she was entertained by the men sitting behind us who gave her silly grins (she is such a flirt). Eventually though, I had to pack her back in the björn and walk up and down the boat (therefore missing some of the tour) until she fell asleep.

Got off the boat after an hour and looked for food first thing. Amsterdam (a city I have never wanted to visit, ever because I was afraid of wandering around and ending up in the Red-Light District on accident - something anyone who has ever travelled with Sven would understand as he just goes and always ends up on sketchy side sreets before we get to where we're going - or walking into a Coffee House that I don't really want to be in...) is vegetarian friendly. The first thing we saw when we got off the boat was NOT a hot-dog stand or a Döner Stand, it was a Falafel Stand - yum! Then we basically walked the tour we had just taken on the boat so we could get better pictures (which I haven't seen because as I mentioned above, I am sitting in the Hotel Room).

Georgia, who had napped like a dead log on the boat and in the Falafel place woke up as soon as we hit the streets, thanks to the insane wind, and eventually started fussing. We headed back to the hotel at 4:30pm where G got something to eat and chatted on the bed for a while before spiralling down into an exhausted hysteria. She was in bed and being nursed to sleep by 7pm exactly. Poor thing - she'd honestly spent the day in between bouts of exhausted hysteria and catnaps.

*back to the present*

We missed the 1-meter House, we missed the Redlight District, which I couldn't even find quickly on a map to make sure we avoided it, we saw the Anne Frank House from the boat, but didn't have time to go in (def. a reason to go back to Amesterdam, despite my lack of love for the city), saw a couple of Herons hanging out along the canals, and took a boat tour. Really, for a rushed one-day trip to the city with a baby, not bad. If you click on the teaser picture above, you'll go to my Amsterdam Set at Flickr. Just a few gems...

And now: The amazingly witty and talented Karen Burniston (if you haven't read her blog, go there now, she'll have you in tears, she's so funny) ends each of her blog posts with a quote from the Princess Bride. Now, I am not nearly as witty or anywhere near as brilliant as Karen is (just wait until you see what she had us do at SAG) but I love her quotes, they are the perfect way to end a post. So I'm copying her - hey, copying is a form of flattery, right? I am not giving you a movie quote though, oh no. I am going to give you my daily earworm. What is an earworm you ask? It is what the German's say when they have an annoying song snippet stuck in their head, and let me tell you, I've had a constant earworm for the past 7 months! It's about time I shared them with you...

Daily Earworm: "They're always in the way, the cow eats them for hay, mother eats them in her sleep, she thinks she's eating shredded wheat, they're always in the way!"

We are home. Got in earlyish this afternoon because I insisted on leaving early this morning and not staying for lunch (as we always have in the past). I have tons to tell, pics to share, stories and just general fun because we've been busy since the 19th with scrapping, site-seeing and parades...But for now, a little sneak peek.

Georgia chilling on one of the couches at Hotel Zuiderduin. This was Sunday, after Cara had left and before I started my onslaught of afternoon workshops. I think I might have checked out to do a quick make and take (they were few and far between) and left G sitting on the couch and Sven with the camera becuase I came back to this.

Oh man, I want to go on and on about SAG - but I did sit down in the hotel room in Amsterdam on Monday evening and write up a huge loooooooooooong account of the event on Sven's laptop. I just need him to fire it up and get the .txt file off there for me so I can translate it into blogese.

But for now, I am going to watch the 4400 that we missed on Monday so that I'm up-to-date tomorrow when the next episode airs. Be watching for updates, depending on how needy G is now that we're home and things need to get back to normal, I might get them up quickly...oh, and I'm also waiting on some (hopefully) fun photos from Cara that she accidentally shot in RAW. So that might take a bit - just talked with her and M is converting them right now, so as soon as they come through, I will be able to really talk my head off on a topic that has been exhausted. But hey, I'm coming to the talk-about-it party a week late!

***well, so much for my evening of the 4400, somehow I managed to record the show without sound. I am very irked and irritated and bummed. That's two hours in a row of missed material of a show that relies on each episode to build up to the next. I'm going to be lost tomorrow. You know, it's like missing an episode or two of LOST (when is season 2 coming to germany anyway?) and then trying to catch back up again. It's do-able, but not much fun. So I've been editing photos and sulking all evening. Getting tired too. and am surrounded by a mess that is my unpacking...maybe I'll go bother a very grumpy Sven and make him get my file off his laptop...***

There was this thing I never could like about babies, absolutely hated it in fact: crumbs. Babies, toddlers, little kids leave crumbs ALL OVER THE PLACE. Now, I have a very high dirt tolerance (which is strange, coming from my family and my mom's spotless house) but I don't like crumbs. Not in my bed, not in my living room or in my couch. So I always steered far away from crumb-covered kids. Oh, how our lives change:

I have nothing to say for myself except: She was screaming bloody murder through pure exhaustion but wouldn't sleep, her teeth hurt and she's constipated. In despair, I grabbed a Zwieback, broke it in half and handed it to her. She stared at it and her sobs slowly desisted. She proceeded to gnaw on it for a good half an hour, sometimes sticking it in my face (or even mouth), sometimes using it to paint lovely gooey zwieback pictures on the pillow I was seated on, and sometimes maybe swallowing some, though most of it landed on her face, hands, legs, blanket and floor.

The reason Georgia was so exhausted was due to the Krabbelgruppe today. She did brilliantly up until 11 (about two hours after we'd started and two hours after her regularly scheduled nap) when she started wailing and wouldn't stop until I packed her in the Baby Björn to go. The group was insane today, everyone was there. That hasn't happened since the first or second time I visited, months ago. Georgia is now the age that all the others were when we started. I have to continually remind myself of that when I see her sitting there all by herself while the others crawl and scooch around her! She was quite friendly to the others today, lovingly pulling on their hair and letting them pat her none-too-gently on the face. When we sat them all together for a group photo, she proceeded to pet Fabian and tried to grab his hair. Fabian however, has no more fuzz on his head than she does, so it was all to no avail.

Tomorrow we are going to the doctor. No, no chickenpox, no colds, infections, nothing like that, just a skin problem, possibly (though I do hope not) eczema. We'll find out tomorrow I guess. Poor baby has red scales all over her back and arms and it's popping up under her chin as well.

I think that's it. I've been scrapping like crazy, enjoying the time I can scrap while sitting across from Georgia and she can't crawl into the middle of my stuff and crumple papers or (heaven forbid) grab my exacto knife!! Good Night!