Half summer, half spring outfit. I combined the pink jacket with cream trousers and boots this time. It was fickle weather (again), so I didn’t choose a full summer outfit.

At first, I wore my blue glass earrings plus the blue bracelet. Then I also added the blue feathery thing and knew immediately: too matchy matchy. After I added the green feathery thing, I changed the monochrome blue earrings for these green/blue oily looking ones. Much better.

Below: Close-up of the earrings.

This time the backdrop was a little square in The Hague. I used to work in an office at this square when I was about 24. It is called Van Hoytemaplein and it is a posh area. The myth was that you would buy big fluffy lightweight cookies from the Van Hoytema bakery, keep the paper bag they came in and buy heavy butter or sugar cookies from a cheap bakery and put them in the Van Hoytema bag. Then when the guests had arrived, the hostess would come in with the paper bag, making sure everybody sees the name on it, put the cookies on a tray, saying: “Oh, I was so busy, I didn’t even had time to present the cookies properly”. Snobbery at its peak.

Below: We started at this gorgeous flower shop.

It goes without saying that we considered this a perfect backdrop for an outfit photo (see the first photo above).

Below: The parasol skimmed my head. Look at those peonies.

Below: In the little park of the square, I demonstrated to Marjolein what my new sitting down pose was, with the hand slightly touching my face. I am laughing at myself.

Below: There was a commemorative statue for Theo van Hoytema, who clearly lived from 1863 to 1917. I thought it was a poor statue. He deserved better. After I googled the photo, I found out that a big part of the commemorative statue got lost in World War 2. Theo van Hoytema was an artist, an illustrator, lithographer and graphic designer and he lived in The Hague.

Below: Using the statue for a photo. I have to stop the hand-to-face trick. It is already becoming tedious.

Below: Looking from the little park into the Van Hoytemastreet, it makes for a lovely picture with all those trees.

Below: Yes, perfect backdrop. When I first featured this pink jacket on the blog, I announced you would see it again the way I am featuring it now. Just needed slightly warmer weather than the beginning of May.

Below: Relaxed pose. Doesn’t it clash wonderfully? The pink with the red. Killer combination.

Below: Time to take a photo of Marjolein, wearing her favourite colour. Purple is her favourite and this is lilac. Goes really well with white and brown.

Below: Her jacket has a cute back. Trousers are fab too.

Below: It was time for coffee and lunch. We chose bakery Van Maanen and would have loved to sit in their little backyard but rain was predicted and we had already felt a few drops. It didn’t rain, after all.

As we left though, the rain came down. I said to her: “We haven’t got any houses or building photos for the readers. Marjolein directed me to a supermarket in a beautiful building which first used to be a sports park and later it became a place for horse trading. Now it is a supermarket. How bizarre.

Below: We waited in the car for the rain to stop before we started taking photos of the supermarket. Through the car window I took a photo of these houses. I bet that the white part of the houses is a renovated part. Poorly renovated I might add. The shops underneath the houses are not in the photo (not worth it).

Below: It stopped raining and although it was very cloudy, we dared to leave the car. This is the sports park building / horse-trading place / supermarket.

Below: At the front the sign of the horse trading business by John Mayer Washington (Jack) is still there. And as you can see, someone lives in that building too (first floor).

Below: We did see a girl going through this door which is in the hall of the building. She was clearly living there.

Below: In the hall we saw the original destination of the building ‘Het Sportgebouw’ (The Sports building) from 1896.

Below: And what about this mosaic floor! Quite lavish for a sports building.

Below: This image of a cycling event held here shows that a big field was part of the sports park. It was for horse racing, cycling and athletics.

Below: We took some photos of the building now. Rather boring.

Below: Like the mosaic floor, quite fancy. Beautiful bricks.

Below: And in 2026 it is a supermarket with screaming advertising. It makes me sad. On the other hand, it is great to do your shopping in such a building. And now it is for all and not for just a few wealthy people.

Below: This supermarket is different from other supermarkets in that they offer seating on the void you see across the market. You can eat and drink whatever you have bought in the supermarket. I have never seen that concept before.

Something quite different from the usual lovely old houses, isn’t it? Well, that is what rain does to you. We were just grateful that we got the outfit documented without rain.

What happened in my life this week

Very busy week and oh gosh, doing the posture exercises. They are still weird but I am diligently following the instructions. It takes at least an hour every day. Sometimes an hour and a half. And you have to do it every day which is a bit of a challenge.

Saturday was the photo shoot for this post, Sunday there was a district event, a walk through the neighbourhood with explanation. There were about 50 people participating.

Monday Marijke and I visited Marianne. The rest of the BVA girls couldn’t make it. See our smiling faces below.

Tuesday Janna and I saw the inside of a grand old house in Amsterdam, House Willet-Holthuysen, with lunch afterwards. Happy day. Below: Janna looking into a beautiful old mirror.

On Wednesday Arian and I met again, in Utrecht this time. Weather forecast was terrible. As I was waiting for Arian to arrive at Utrecht railway station, the announcement came that lightning had struck and there would be no trains going back to Amsterdam until…they didn’t know. Oh nice. I decided not to worry about it and see how the situation would be at 16.00 hrs. (They ran again at 4 o’clock; good old Dutch Railway.)

Below: I decided not to take photos for a blog post as it would be raining all day. Here I am in jeans and (new) silver trainers.

Below: And here is sweet Arian. She was my colleague for 20 years, now friend.

We managed quite well with the weather, staying in restaurants when the rain came down and walking through Utrecht when the sun came out.

Below: At one time not only rain came down, but hailstones as well. In June! Such a weather fickle country. We took shelter for 5 minutes and the sun came out again.

Below: With the sun out, Utrecht is lovely.

Below: Street leading to the Dom church of Utrecht. It almost looks like Italy if it wasn’t for the wet street.

Below: For your enjoyment, a fine house in Utrecht.

Thursday was granddaughters’ day. And of course, to help Nicky with folding the laundry etc. and giving her time to go and do her shopping. The girls are so used to grandma that it is no problem. Sometimes I am even the favourite haha.

Ron came home that day with the photo below of a strange man (yes, it is a man) who is taking his old “male chicken” (trying to avoid the UK word for that 🤣) for an outing on the bike. The plastic lid attached to the basket covers the animal so he cannot jump out. Strange thing, only in Amsterdam.

Friday, a coffee date was cancelled and I could finally do some chores like taking clothes to the tailor, picking up parcels etc.

It was a hectic week, especially with the posture exercises and the pelvic floor exercises. Pffff…the things you do to keep yourself healthy and fit while ageing.

Greetje