Backyard Bits-n-Bobs

In America, of course, we say bits-n-pieces.  But don't you just LOVE the British bits-n-bobs!

Anyway....

Thanks to our Dutch friend, Janny, we've already had two fun outings this new year not far from home, one weekend after the other.

First, we drove to pick Janny up to go see the Leather Museum (De Looierij) in Dongen, 30 km. from home.  It's a museum about the history of tanning and the leather-making process, dating from the 1890's.  Dongen happened to be the home of a profitable leather industry in the Netherlands, back in the day.

Too bad we didn't know we could take photos until our visit was almost over.

But here are a few pics I snapped at the end, most of which are of the times, 

not of the leather-making process.  Oh well.

HOWEVER...not to be disappointed...a block or so away was this church with its half-ruins.

This is the Oudekerk (Old Church) from the 15th century.

Originally Roman Catholic, it was "confiscated" by the Reformed Protestants in 1648.

During a storm in 1928, the roof of the nave caved in and has remained a ruin since then.

I don't know if they still hold church services there but they do have a Facebook page!

Can you imagine getting married in those ruins on a sunny, gorgeous day?

We ate lunch there in Dongen where Astrid and I had our favorites:

latte macchiatos and uitsmijters!

The three vanes on the right are the ones we saw that day.

The bottom-right is apropos, of a leather tanner.

And the bear is from the home of someone whose last name is Bear (in English).

Thanks to Janny for scouting out my first bear vane ever!

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

That was the weekend of January 14th, the day my brother, Nelson, turned 75 (since we're talking about bits-n-bobs)!

During that weekend, Janny told us about a vacated swimming pool in Oosterhout, 29 km from home, not far from where we were in Dongen.  Without even thinking about it, we went to see it the following weekend (which happens to be last Saturday).

Like I said, it's a vacated swimming pool, but did I mention...with 18,000+ art tiles!

Who thinks up these things?!

All I could think about was how my little camera could pick up details from 1200 mm away.

But first, I wanted to see the forest before zeroing in on the trees.

Some of the sections had multiple tiles in their themes.

Some were grids of only 9 tiles, following a theme.

"We are all angels with one wing.  We have each other to embrace in order to fly."

(How wonderful is that!)

This was one of my favorites of the multiple tiles.  :)

Then, from individual tiles, here, there and everywhere, I picked out my own themes.

This one for me is everything Dutch.

There were body parts lying around.  HA.

And animals, birds, insects and fishy things.

Some things actually reminded me of some of you who frequent here...

like Ruth's sumac in Michigan, and Robin's cactus in Arizona.

We're everywhere, aren't we.

But did I expect this?????????  NO!

And that reminds me of the Dutch response to Trump on YouTube, for those who haven't seen it yet:

It hit me after seeing this that one of the reasons why I fell in love with Astrid is
because of her humor, not connecting that it's DUTCH humor.  OMG.  It's true.

But back to the swimming pool...so many bits-n-bobs.

And when I went down to the "water's edge," I was able to see the 3-D effect on some of the tiles.
Not all were ceramic tiles.  Most were paper.  But what an effect.

THANK YOU to Janny who gave us the shout-out to these two outings in January.
What a great visual start to this new year!