Just a Bit of History

History recalls that Mother and I had a lot of things to carry when we were in Amsterdam. (Mother got a little carried away with all the neat stuff at second hand stores in Belgium.)

I will never again let mother take 3 very large paintings home from anywhere outside a 500 mile radius.

We wrapped the paintings in a blanket, tied it together with twine and taped a handle on.

And with that handle we carried the blasted old paintings around Amsterdam for what felt like 10 hours trying to find a hotel, not to mention on and off trains for another 4 hours.

And while the largest of the 3 paintings is hanging prettily in mother's room over a blue bed frame, which she is very proud of,

the smallest one is looking quite nice hanging over an old bookshelf, which has a very sad and touching story, full of old books, that I can assure you have quite the stories themselves, which incidentally ARE history books.

And the medium sized one is resting stately on a old easel. I don't know where we got the easel but I know we didn't go to a normal store to buy it normally like normal people. Sitting atop the easel, is an old straw hat, yellow with age, wrapped around this hat is a faded green scarf, which undoubtedly came from old Grama Ose's attic. Under the easel is a old Redwing pot. Do you know what's in the pot? Old pottery about 1000 years old that mother picked up on one of her trips to Turkey! And I fear mother would not like it if I told you where she got the wardrobe sitting behind the painting sitting on the easel over a pot with a hat on top.

I just don't see why we went to all that work for 3 old paintings.

Enjoy the Netherlands news after a bit of history.