Tomorrow morning we're leaving for the Dominican Republic where we'll celebrate Christmas and New Year's Eve. It's going to be a great vacation and I'm really looking forward to it.

Yesterday evening and today we've done a lot of preparations -- shopping, laundry, last minute things etc, and now we still need to pack our bags. Our flight is at 6.10 am tomorrow.

Our good friend Marjolein today successfully defended her dissertation, and now has her Ph. D.

The ceremony was in the Agnieten chapel in downtown Amsterdam. Jerry and Gerlof were her paranimfs.

Well deserved, after lots of hard work: many congratulations from both of us!

Saturday afternoon we went to a surprise party for Angelo, who celebrated his 30th birthday.

Chris had organized a party for him at noon in the International House with food, drinks and music and we had a good time. It was nice to chat with everybody again.

We went home for 1,5 hour and prepared for the Christmas party of the Duke Economics department. It was in George's Garage, and they did a pretty decent job of feeding the 250 people or so at the party. We had a really nice evening there, and spoke to quite a few people. A lot of our friends are leaving for their home countries with the holidays, many are leaving this week already.

On Schiphol airport there were both Sinterklaas and Christmas decorations.

The Christmas ornaments in this tree are in Delftware style.

After a very short stay in Middenmeer, I'm on my way back home!

In the morning we went for some shopping, and in thirty minutes my parents will bring me to Hoorn station. I'll make a brief stop in Amsterdam, and my flight leaves at 7.00 am tomorrow morning.

Today Ettie and Gerben got married! It was a beautiful day, in Leeuwarden in De Koperen Tuin.

It was a small but nice group and we all had a good time.

I took lots of pictures (Linda brought a Canon 350 that I could borrow!) and they came out nicely.

Today at 11.30 am I landed at Amsterdam Schiphol airport. The flights from Raleigh to Gatwick and from there to Amsterdam went smoothly, although I didn't get as much sleep as I wanted.

My parents picked my up at the airport, it was very nice to see them again. At home we prepared some last minute things for the wedding tomorrow. Jaap and I went to do some shopping in Middenmeer, it's always nice to walk through town and see so many familiar faces.

It's 6.30 pm now in the Netherlands, and I'm about ready to go to sleep.

I'm on my way to Holland to attend Ettie's wedding!

Tonight at 6.45 pm is my flight from RDU to London Gatwick. For the first time in a long time I'm traveling without a laptop. I'll arrive in Amsterdam Thursday late morning local time.

The holiday season seems to have started and every day of the week we had baked cookies or cakes at work. This time of the year inspires people to bake delicious things, apparently. Next Thursday its Thanksgiving.

When I was left from work I tried a few radio stations looking for some music. When I switched on 93.9 Kiss FM, there was a very pleasant surprise: Christmas music has started! On the way from work I hummed and sang along with all those familiar songs. Last year the Christmas music started a bit earlier, on what was then called Sunny FM.