Some Fun In Geertruidenberg, NL

Our past Sunday started out when we went to see Astrid's son Jeroen play tennis in Raamsdonkveer, 22 km south of us.

The resident heron at the canal by our parking garage paid no attention to us as we left.

But Jeroen did once we arrived.  

He's been playing tennis since age 4 and is on a club team that plays national competitions.

I love the guy and always tell him I like his form (he turns 27 in August).

Because Geertruidenberg is just around the corner from Raamsdonkveer,

we had already decided to visit it after watching Jeroen play.

Geertruidenberg is the oldest city, in what used to be Holland county, to receive city rights, in 1213.

It's not the oldest city in Holland/the Netherlands, which is sometimes confusing.

Regardless, at 802 years, that's old.

You know how much I love the architecture and doo-dads of these old city centers.

You, too, could have your photo taken in the stocks claiming 802 jaar stadsrecht.

There's usually a big church in every Dutch city center.

This one is the Oude Sint Geertruidskerk, or Gertrude's Church.

The city itself is named after Gertrude of Nivelles (top-right above)

We were only there for half an hour or so, walking around city center.

Lucky for me, I found my gable-stone treasures.

Look how old some of them are.

We even found this make-shift stone that is a combination of 5 stones.

The mother (center) and her 4 kids (corners) made this for her husband's 50th birthday.

How fun is that!

Speaking of fun, if you can't take a joke, right?!

The owner was bringing stuff back from his weekend flea market.

And I got my fix of weathervanes, coming and going!

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Now, switch gears to my last post about our Open Harbor Day and the goodies we bought.

What I didn't mention was that Astrid found an antique koffie grinder at our flea market.

Neither one of us had ever told each other that we'd love to have one in our home one day.

Well, she found a beauty and completely took it apart, cleaned years of kitchen grease off its internal parts, stripped the paint and then repainted it.  I hate that I wasn't fast enough on my feet to take a photo of what it looked like before.  But at least this is during the clean-up...

...and after, now hanging on our living room wall.  We love the Delft green...and the windmill!

She even put koffie beans in it to grind up, showing its authenticity.  :)

(And did you notice the handy "tool" she used to catch the drilling powder?!)

In case you need a finale, how's this from Tuesday when we had a rare thunderstorm here.

I stood at our front door, looking across the courtyard of our senior complex at 8:45 p.m.

You have no idea how much I miss good thunderstorms (growing up in Michigan)! 

And so it is, another week in the life of a Gemini (May 21-June 21).
I'm officially in celebration mode of my soon-to-come BIG 7-0.