WHOOHOOOO!!! I'm so proud of myself!

I just went to the gym and there checked my progress so far.

Since I started there I lost nearly 20 kilos and almost 10% of bodyfat!!!

I only need 6% to reach an nice "average" of 32%

That's totally awesome! 

And I did it all myself!!! whoohooooo!!!

I got a GREAT and inspiring message from Bill Jensen!

I send him the blog I wrote about the simplicity lecture I had at my work.

Irene:

Thank you so much!

My goals were obviously focused on how to help
you and others at work.
But as you keenly observed, I also had a higher-level definition of success...touching people like you in a way that helps all of us focus on things beyond work...

That maintaining NICE in one’s total life also yields great results at work.

Thanks again,
Bill J

Wow! that's so nice of him!

He obviously mastered the technique of managing e-mails because he send one back right away! (and I just cleared my mailbox for the first time this year!)

I hope this simplicity lifestyle really becomes a way I can improve my life at work.

To NICE my life for sure!

I just returned from hiking in Norway for three weeks together with my boyfriend.

It was such an AMAZING trip!

It’s incredible how free we felt together in nature!

It is also amazing when there is nobody in sight for miles and miles for sure, how much time you end up spending naked! Haha!

I cherish one day in the first week when I had bathed in the lake and was lying naked in the grass enjoying the sun. Looking through the grass straws to my boyfriend trying to chase of the mosquitoes.

I smiled because I knew I was truly happy!

I knew for sure we together were going to make this a TRIP OF A LIFETIME!!!

I have terrible news!!

My dear cat Frits which I had for 5 years and I loved so much died yesterday

He fell from a 4th floor balcony and probably hit his head on the way down!

I'm so devastated about this!

I miss him already!

Haha!!! Sorry just kidding!

Here it is for real!

At my work we had a nice lecture from Bill Jensen about simplicity.
(No! not the electronics kind but the work kind)

It was about how you should manage your time at work.
Basically he said:
DO LESS!!!
Filter all the crap you receive trough phone and email and try to perfect the art of work not done.
Work you shouldn't do or doesn't need to be done.

Every hour of meetings, calling and reading mails is only 5 minutes for you!
Of 325 pages of info only 5 you NEED!
Ask yourself what is in it for me!

Prevent information overload.
Every 550 days mails, texts and messages DOUBLES!
So pay attention during meetings!
(don't check phone and mails)
2 to 4 hours are wasted on communication
This also about respect!
Treat your collegues like you would want to be treated!

Nothing is getting simpler without someone saying it!
Find the guts!
There are only 1440 minutes a day!
You don't get any more!!!

Interesting right?
If you want to know more?
Check out Bill Jensen's Simplicity survival handbook

And for tips on his website

OK this is going to be my first organice your agenda item ever!
I'm not the best on that subject!! Hehehe

OK my tip is.... Set all your alarms!!!
I forgot this morning!
(and was terribly late! Oops!)

Maybe you remember my blog from last week about the skin burn?

My sister (who is a doctor) saw my wound yesterday and got really angry with me! (I didn’t have it covered up and the crust was starting to peel off)

She said that if a burn is bigger than an old quarter coin (about 20mm) then you have to take extra care of it! And if it’s bigger than a 2 euro coin then you should go see a doctor! Well it was just slightly smaller than that!

My sister put some aloe vera burn relief gel on it and covered the wound with special burn bandage so it wouldn’t stick on the wound and it wouldn’t be infected. And she gave me a prescription for silversulfadiazine which is a disinfecting cream to prevent infections on open wounds like burns and to prevent scarring. And I should keep it covered up!

So therefore this update! DON’T BE A FOOL LIKE ME!

Check out burns properly! and if you have doubts?

GO SEE A DOCTOR!

The day before yesterday I burnt myself during cooking.

I spilled some carrots next to my wok and tried to grab them, when reaching over I accidentally burnt myself to the pan and in reflex I pulled my hand UP (which was more towards the pan!!! Aahhhhh AUW!)

While being busy trying not to waste my meal I kind of finished with the start of the vegetables etc. Cleaned something up and THEN I started to cool my hand!

Dumbdumbdumb!

I should have stopped whatever I was doing and started to cool right away! Now it ended up hurting all the rest of the evening! I had icecubes on my hand all evening until I put a bandage on it, so I wouldn’t hurt or damage it during my sleep. Which was great! When I put the bandage on it was better instantly!

So now I have a big red spot on my hand and it still kind of hurts a little.

So but what should I have done? I looked it up and I didn’t do everything totally wrong, thank goodness:

During the process of providing first aid burn treatment, the aim must be to cool the burn, provide relief from pain, and cover the burn. Cover the burn with abundant amount of cold liquid. Do not use ice or iced water as the burn may take a longer time to heal. Dress the burn with a sterile pad or bandage. Applying oils, creams and sprays on the burn may add to the risk of infection.

OK so the icecubes weren’t a good idea! Oops! I absolutely didn’t know that! And thank goodness my boyfriend stopped me from smearing cream on it! The bandage was OK and it helped really well!

So all in all I cooled too much, too late but the rest was fortunately OK

Doing a first aid course might be something we should all do! So we all know how to treat our clumsy accidents as well as the really serious ones!

Though twitter I’ve met some other fashionlovers!

One of them is my fashionfriend Robin, He works for the menswear fashionbrand NÕN by KIM, and through him I was able to get a ticket for the Amsterdam Fashion week show on saturday!

This was my first time I went to a catwalkshow that was part of the official program and it was awesome!

I loved the collection!

The pants and jackets were quite sharp looking but the colors and materials made it more casual. I loved the detailing in some of the blouses, shirts and sweaters. I was constantly thinking:  would I buy this for my boyfriend? I think the answers were quite a lot of yeses for sure!

After the show I talked to designer Kim Bakker to congratulate her on her new collection. To stay in line with the green fashion spirit of the day before I asked her what is her brands position towards sustainability?

And her first answer really surprised me!

She said that most of all she tries to make the style sustainable, so you don’t need to buy new looks every season but you can keep your clothes from older seasons and combine them with the new ones.

Of course! that makes sense!

It’s great to have clothes that have a style and quality that you can wear for many years!

I also asked her about the materials she used.

She said she uses recycled cotton and a cotton-like fiber called Kapok, and even her friends HAIR! (For the accessories during the show)

She tries to watch for good fabrics and materials but also said that it is quite hard to find good ones because there is a lot less choice and a lot less available.

Well, I hope she continues on this path! It would be great to have a good sustainable menswear fashion brand around!

My boyfriend is always complaining there isn’t much choice for men. So this could be something for him for sure!

Check out the video of the show below and photos on the forum.

Today is Mandela day!

At the London celebrations of Nelson Mandela’s 90th birthday at Hyde park in June 2008, Mandela said: : “It is time for the next generations to continue our struggle against social injustice and for the rights of humanity. It is in your hands.”

After this it was decided to celebrate his birthday every year with a day dedicated to his life’s work to ensure that his legacy continues forever.

So what is Mandela day?

• Mandela Day is an annual celebration of Nelson Mandela’s life and a global call to action for people to recognize their individual ability to make an imprint and change the world around them.
• Mandela Day has been created to inspire people from every cor ner of the world to embrace the values that have embodied Nelson Mandela’s life – democracy; equality; reconciliation; diversity; responsibility; respect and freedom – for these are the values of Nelson Mandela and they are his legacy to the world.
• Mandela Day aims to showcase the work of the Nelson Mandela charitable organisations (Nelson Mandela Foundation; Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund; Mandela Rhodes Foundation) and raise monies to support their continuing work.
• By connecting people with ways to act on Nelson Mandela’s values, it aims to empower every individual to make an imprint on the world.
• The Mandela Day campaign message is simple: Nelson Mandela has given 67 years of his life fighting for the rights of humanity. All they are asking is that everyone gives 67 minutes of their time, whether it’s supporting your chosen charity or serving your local community.
• Mandela Day is a global social movement – an umbrella idea – that does not discriminate, it’s open and lets in and embraces every organization that does good, whilst enabling people to serve their community and improve their lives.
• The Mandela Day brand icon represents Mr Mandela’s hand and the passing of the torch to each of us and our individual ability to make an imprint on the world.
• Mandela Day is not a holiday – it is a day for all of us to opt in and show that we can all make an impact.

(source)

I think Mandela is such an inspirational person!

Sometimes I feel: how can we change? How can I make a change? And whenever I think of Mandela, I think WOW! He really did it! He made such a big change, not only for himself, but for the entire world!

Hopefully people will continue feeling inspired by him and really pick up the torch from him and try to make an imprint on the world!

I‘ve put 67 ways to change your world on the forum, so everyday can be a Mandela day!

It really is in your hands!

After the launch of the Green Fashion Competition there was a presentation of RANGAKU, a collection by Kentroy Yearwood.

This designer is previously known for helping to pioneer the green movement in fashion, and now continues to explore new and innovative ways of working with organic materials, natural dying and finishing techniques and igniting progressive design.

Well it sure looked AMAZING

I think a lot of people might have been positively surprised to see a fully green fashion show that looked so gorgeous!

There seems to be no reason not to go GREEN anymore!

Check out the pictures on the forum and see for yourself!

Friday was the launch of the Green Fashion Competition

After speeches of Henk de Jong of the Dutch ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality (LNV) and Lonneke Engel as an ambassador of the competition and member of the jury, the competition was officially launched.

Everybody can join the competition!

In the first round 40 contestants/teams are selected. Then all contestants are invited to participate in two workshops (themes are creation and business) that will support their submissions for the competition.

Then the participants are required to submit a business plan and two designs

• The business plan for The Green Fashion Competition must explain what your idea for a business venture is, how it contributes to sustaining biodiversity and how you aim to implement it.
• The designs must represent your signature look and business plan and can consist of sketches, patterns, drawings, photos, samples etc.

Next round 8 contestants/teams are rewarded with a cash prize to be used for fabrication and production of the outfits. Those 8 contestants are to deliver their adapted business plan and fully fabricated designs

Then the final step is a fashion show during fashion week in which your designs will be shown during the 14th edition of Amsterdam International Fashion Week (24-31 January 2011).

Then the winners will be announced and a first prize of €25.000 and second prize of €15.000 will be awarded for the most promising fashion entrepreneurs.

I hope this competition will be a great success! And contributes to more awareness in the fashion industry.

Hopefully soon all shows during fashion week are GREEN!

This week it’s Amsterdam International Fashion Week (AIFW). All week all through Amsterdam there are many events and shows, some of them are open for the public but most of the fashion shows are by invitation only.

If you follow me on twitter, then you’ll know that I am such a fashion junky!

I always check all the fashion shows in New York, London, Milan and definitely in Paris! I watch them all on my style.com iPhone app. And load all the pretty ones on my twitterpage.

A few weeks ago Lonneke surprised me with an invitation for a fashion show in Amsterdam. She got invited to Ready to Fish_, a brand by Ilja Visser. Since Lonneke is still in New York she couldn’t come to the show herself and asked if I could come instead! (JEEEE thanks LONN!!!)

Well, Yesterday was the show, and it was absolutely FAB!!!

The models came from stairs down to the catwalk. And guess where I was sitting!!! Right NEXT to bottom of the stairs! So I had the absolute most fabulous view ever!

All the clothes were very light and flowy with supercute tailoring. I totally fell in love with this stained marble-like light brown silk fabric they used for jackets, pants and dresses. Overall the whole look was perfect for summer, it looked very feminine and HOT!

Check out my pictures on the forum

Next show I will go to is on Friday, then will be the launch of the Green Fashion Competition, of which Lonneke will be the ambassador and member of the jury. After the launch there is a show of a sustainable collection by Kentroy Yearwood for RANGAKU.

Can’t wait to see that!!!

Reading back the blogs from the past week, my eyes fell on the re-usable bottle blog from Lonneke and the Toxins blog from Anne-Marie.

I have to admit that I drink from old waterbottles ALL THE TIME!

I do always hate how you are unable to wash them and I felt a little guilty about switching them regularly because of that. Never ever did I hear about BPA before!

So I decided to find a replacement. And I found a PERFECT one!

I just bought two bottles from jointhepipe, this is a project from two Dutch designers that were shocked about how much water is wasted on one half of the world while the other half doesn’t have enough water!

They wanted to build a huge waterpipe to send the water there! Well, that was of course not quite possible, so they started a social tap water community.

They created bottles that resembled water pipe elements that could be cleaned easily and could be used for a lifetime! They would sell the bottles to the members of the community and use the money to fund water projects in Africa and Asia. They asked everybody to join the community and in April during earth month Aveda Benelux invited everybody to buy the bottles during the walk for water to buy another 6 waterpumps in Congo.

Since the start 722 people have joined the community, 3473 bottles were sold and 6 pumps were build. And over 10.000 people that didn’t have water now do have water to drink!

Isn’t that amazing!!

I’ll enjoy drinking my tapwater from now on for sure!!!

Well one of the things my father introduced me to was to do fundraisers for the Red Cross. He was once in the board of the Red Cross of Eindhoven and he was responsible for the fundings. He changed a lot of ways to try and get people to donate money.

One of them was the fundraising heist! It would work like this:

• Create a group of enthusiastic people
• Use the Red Cross van they use to transport immobile people
• Then go to the neighborhoods where there are no collection volunteers
• Then all step out the van and each take a few streets
• And ring all the doorbells and ask the people if they have a small contribution for your charity

I helped many years because I thought this made it a lot of fun.

Since my father isn’t on the board anymore I didn’t join the fundraisers anymore.

And that was kinda shame.]]>

So I decided to volunteer again this year together with my boyfriend. So last week during fundraising week we walked around our neighborhood all evening and rang every doorbell.

My boyfriend had never done it before I introduced it to him and I am pleased to say that he really enjoyed it!

If you have never tried it before, then please do it at least once. You’ll love it!

It’s not a lot of work, only takes a few hours of your time and is worth so much for each charity organization! Not just raising the money but also to give the organization a face people could relate to.

Next year I’m doing it again!

I’m so proud!

My father has always been in commissions and organizations trying to help them in whichever way he could, either create more fundings or improving working together etc.etc.

Because of all this, last year he received a huge honor to be knighted by the Queen of the Netherland in the order of Orange-Nassau

I think this has been so far the best day of my life!! (I always joke I won’t top it until I get married or have babies) It was such an amazing day!

A lot of the charity work he did was for churches or Catholic organizations. I don’t even know any better than that my father would always go to church in the weekends to help. Me and my sisters would often help counting the church fundraisers. So much fun to make stacks of 5 cents coins, 10 cents coins, quarters, guilders and rijksdaalders.

But not only practical help:

He was in a commission to try and merge 6 churches that were in the same region. He has been in the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul (an international Catholic voluntary organization dedicated to tackling poverty and disadvantage by providing direct practical assistance to anyone in need), and he was a member of the board of the museum for Religious art in Uden

And now last week my father was honored AGAIN!!!

He was appointed as knight of the order of Saint-Sylvester! This is one of five Orders of Knighthood awarded directly by the Pope

You can imagine that I’m extremely proud of my father! He is a true inspiration for me, and really taught me to spend my time as generously as much as I can.(like helping Lonneke for Organiceyourlife)

Funny thing about this order is that now he could wear a special suit and saber and could let his horse drink from the fountains on Saint Peter's square. My parents already planned to go to Rome this fall. I think I have to arrange a hobby horse for him now!!!

Yesterday I celebrated my birthday!

And of course that celebration comes with some stress, of cleaning and decorating my apartment with ribbons and balloons, making sure there were enough drinks and food, and hoping everyone was gonna enjoy themselves!

Not only was it my birthday, the Dutch National Team played their first match against Denmark. They won! So it was a double celebration!

I thought to add to the fun to prepare all the food and drinks in orange, as it is the national color of Holland! Maybe with a bit of cheating with red white and blue colors of the flag, I managed to make mostly orange food. And it tasted good too! I also decorated my place all in orange with some red, white and blue flags!

I had shrimps and "whiskey cocktailsauce" which is an orange colored sauce, and I made orange pumpkin mini pies. I also made orange peppersoup ( delish!) which was easy to make, and I made orange pasta, with orange sauce! Big Hit! I wish I took a picture of that. Instead I made a picture of the snacks.... which were also orange.

Maybe for coming games, you can also cook for your friends in your countries' colors?

Funny thing is that usually the person whose birthday it is, is mostly catering to others, and missing out on fun! Well this time I could enjoy, as I prepared everything beforehand. That's the secret of a good party: thinking ahead, planning and preparation!

Also, make sure you invite all your really good friends. Don't just invite people because you are afraid that not many people  will show up. Trust me it is better when you are hanging out with the people you like, no matter how many of them show up! And I was happy as most of my dear friends were there....And also Maruja and Irene who are contributors to OYL! Maruja and I go way back, and has seen a lot of birthdays... I think this one was one of my favorites!

And gifts... I never ask for gifts, I just want fun and happiness on my birthday! But my friends know what to give me.... Little things that are useful in my house! I will write a blog in the future about possible gifts you can give people that don't cost much, but do a lot.

Well, that was it.... going to clean up the mess from yesterday now!

If you have any stories of parties you organized, you want to share with us, don't hesitate and leave them in the Community, by clicking on the link below!

Happy Birthday Lonneke!!!

Have a nice day today!

It was great meeting you this year! and I hope next year together we can make all our organiceyourlife-dreams come true!

kissssss

Irene

After reading my last blog you might wonder: who actually won?

Well I didn’t forget, honestly! It was just such a great film that it was worth its very own blogpost.

The winner of the Golden Strawberry DEFF best green film award was:

DIVE

A film by Jeremy Seifert

This film is about that supermarkets and grocery stores are massively filling their dumpsters with food. Not rotten, spoiled food, but billions of pounds of good, edible food. They throw it away because the expiration date is nearing.

The film is about a group of friends that “dumpster dive” in the back alleys of the grocery stores and dive through all the garbage and not only find great food but also an ugly truth about waste in America. Why aren’t the stores giving the food to the people who need it? The group of friends no longer spend money on groceries and probably haven’t eaten this well ever before!

The power of the film lies in its ability to motivate: Will you ask your grocery store manager what is done with their waste?

It might just be that you will end up in a dumpster yourself!

Sunday last week I went to the Dutch Environmental Film Festival Awards.

It was the last day of the film festival and as it turned out, the film festival had been a great success! Lots of people came to the theatres and the parties in Amsterdam and Rotterdam and the films got a great response from the audiences. This film festival was to give people a positive feeling about what they can do for a better environment instead of just telling them how bad everything is and make everybody feel bad.

Well organiceyourlife couldn’t agree more about that! In our blogs here we are also always trying to be positive and NICE and trying to give you tips and advice about a better youniverse

I thought it was a great honor to be at the awards. The whole evening was just so incredi bly nice!

It started with a strawberry cocktail and after some mingling we were invited to sit down on rows of long tables where we would get some amazing food and wines from the Dutch Youth Food Movement. This is an organization of students, cooks, farmers, food producers, fishermen etc that together try to promote the slow-food movement; which basically meant that all food we ate was all locally produced. And it was delicious! I had never eaten parelgort before but that was like Dutch Risotto! During the meal we were shown some videos of the festival, and some trailers of the different films that were played during the festival.

Halfway during the meal everybody had to change seats with the one sitting behind you. So this way I got to speak to many more people! I talked to a woman from Oxfam Novib, a man from one of my favorite TV shows “de keuringsdienst van waarde” (about what is really in your food), to a trendwatcher, a woman from an organization called the club van 30 (about creating solutions for sustainability) and at the bathroom I was talking to a girl and told her I was from organiceyourlife and she knew the website! She told her colleague immediately that I was from OYL! That was really awesome!

I had never met anyone that knew and liked the website before! So that made me really proud!

The girls were from Veggie in Pumps, which is an organization that promotes ecofabulousness: a lifestyle that is about awareness, sustainability, beauty, environment, animal-care, fashion and passion.

After meeting all these people I felt really inspired and enthusiastic. I got a lot of new ideas for organiceyourlife events. And hopefully they will turn out to be just as nice and that I can find people to work with just like the ones I met this evening!

Tomorrow is the start of the World Cup in South Africa.

Are you all also so EXCITED!

I totally am!

Too bad the first game in which Holland is playing is during working hours, but yesterday we had some great news that the WHOLE building is allowed to watch the game on giant screens in the lunch restaurant.

YAY!!! Can’t wait to wear some orange!!! (Dutch team color)

Good thing about this World Cup is that the whole tournament is dedicated to the 1GOAL campaign. This campaign is based on that during the world cup games you don’t only cheer for your country and your team but also together for 1 goal:

Together support the footballers and call on all world leaders to do their part to ensure every child can go to school. To see action at the world cup and bey ond !

Story behind this campaign is:

In 2000, 164 world governments came together to create the Education for All goals, 189 governments also created the United Nations Millennium Development Goals. Two of the eight goals involve ending poverty through education:

• To ensure that all boys and girls complete primary schooling by 2015
• To ensure that girls have the opportunity for education at all levels by 2015.

They promised to make sure there was enough money and that the policies were in place to make it a reality. Since then many countries have abolished school fees, spending was increased by $4 billion and an extra 40 million children are now going to school.

Yet progress is not fast enough. With business ‘as usual’ over 50 million children will still be without an education in 2015

1GOAL is an initiative of the football strand of the Class of 2015 and is run by the Global Campaign for Education to mobilize support to hold world leaders to these promises for 2015.

On October 6th 2009, the 1GOAL campaign was officially launched among others led by the 2010 FIFA World Cup host, South Africa President Jacob Zuma, Her Majesty Rania Al-Abdullah, Queen of Jordan, President of Ghana John Atta Mills, UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, President of Spain, Jan Peter Balkenende, Prime Minister of the Netherlands, Kevin Rudd, Prime Minister of Australia, Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, Ban Ki-Moon, the UN Secretary General and Sepp Blatter, the FIFA President.

Tonight the campaign and start of the world cup is celebrated by a huge concert. The world’s biggest superstars will come together live on www.worldcup.vevo.com  from Soweto/Johannesburg, South Africa for the FIFA WORLD CUP™ KICK–OFF CELEBRATION CONCERT. Watch once in a lifetime performances from Alicia Keys, Amadou & Mariam, Angélique Kidjo, Black Eyed Peas, BLK JKS, John Legend, Juanes, Shakira, The Parlotones, Tinariwen, Vieux Farka Touré and Vusi Mahlasela,

I think this is such a great initiative!

For the next few weeks all eyes are on South Africa. It would be great if people everywhere would learn more about the importance of education for everybody and see how this isn’t just a competition between countries but also a way to unite with each others!

So let’s all cheer together! That way we will all win!

p.s. I wanted to add a video about the launch of the campaign: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gW9JBDF3C1c

but Shakira's song made me listen to it 6 times in a row so far and really gives me the party-football mood

I LOVE world cups! They're so much FUN!!!

At 21^st of June there will be a hilarious parade in Scheveningen, the Netherlands. Following the example in New York this year a Dutch organization will start a new fun tradition of hosting an annual Mermaid parade!

On this first day of summer the participants of the parade will not only dress up as mermaids, but also as pirates, sharks, squids, whales, starfish, SpongeBob’s or  even as seaweed!

During the parade there will also be a contest for the most beautiful mermaid of Europe and after the parade there will be a mermaid race. Everybody has to run to the water and dive in and run back. Winner of this will be the fastest mermaid of Europe.

This all seems like great fun to me and I’m sure it will be!

But fun is not the only reason! This all is as a positive and fun demonstration for cleaner water and cleaner oceans.

Pollution of the ocean couldn’t be a more current topic and all benefits of this year’s parade will be donated to NWF’s Gulf Oil Spill Restoration Fund to help cleaning of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Yesterday I went to such a nice workshop!

My sister Agatha really likes to bake stuff, from cookies to pies to cupcakes.

And they always look and taste extra fun! They either have Hello kitty shapes or bright pink icing or glitter, harts or stars sparkles on them!

They are fun to watch and a party to eat (and a dental nightmare haha!)

She loves to make them, and I love to eat them! Perfect!

Well she asked me and some friends to join her on a princess-cake workshop. I immediately said YES! Of course that seemed super fun! No idea what it was, but hey it’d be fun anyway.

We went with four girls and we all had in mind what we were going to make.

• My sister was going to make a lady GAGA dress
• Susan was going to make a mermaid
• Nathalie was going to make a Sisi ballgown
• and I was going to make a Dior haute couture spring 2010 dress

In the end all four looked absolutely FAB!!! It’s a shame to cut them!

Hopefully they will taste as good as they look!

Check the forum for pictures!

Yesterday I went to a fashionshow of my old classmate Eva Anna Hekking. She has her own fashion-accessories label called EAH!

What once started out as her graduation project has developed into a great fashion label full of colorful bags, necklaces and dresses. All her pieces are always one of a kinds and that makes them super exclusive, unique and fun. (but also quite expensive)

I am the proud owner of two necklaces and one bracelet (not all bought! thank goodness!) and as a real bagjunky I always wanted to buy one of her bags, but was never able to afford. So I was very eager to see what she came up with this time!

This collection she made exclusively for Sarlini, which is an accessory brand with lots of shops and points of sale throughout Europe. This makes her designs more commercial and also better affordable. I didn’t know what to expect and hoped that the collection would still be very EAH! even though they are not exclusive or unique anymore.

And I got my wish! The show was absolutely AMAZING!!!

All the dresses, necklaces, scarves and of course bags were very EAH! even her most iconic fake fur bags looked so amazing! I wanted EVERYTHING!!! (Addict!)

The fake fur bags were designed a few years ago by Eva as a positive protest against fur. They look and feel like fur but have FAKE written on the transparent laser cut handles attached to them. No way they would look real anymore! Wearing them is a statement against fur! (and looking good while doing it!) These bags were an instant hit and probably her greatest success to date!

The bags and all the other accessories will be available in shops in September and I can’t wait! !

That grey fake fur bag with pink transparent handles is soon to be MINE!!! Hihihi!!!

Congratulations Eva! It was a GREAT success!

OK summer is still on my mind! (Although the sun is gone again)

I hope this weekend the weather will be better again, and I really feel like having a BBQ then! I’m no vegetarian but using only (biological) meat on the BBQ I think is absolute nonsense! There are so many delicious recipes for a vegetarian BBQ you can try! No need to have a complete meatfest!

Here are some tips for you to try:

• Create nice kebabs from colored vegetables; add some potatoes and or tofu.
• Grill some eggplant or Zucchini.
• Use a smaller mazed roster for the BBQ or use a fishbasket to clamp the vegetables in between.
• Put some fresh herbs and vegetables in some wrapped up tinfoil, add some stock, white wine, oil or orange juice before you close them.
• Regularly sprinkle some herbs in the coals for a nice aroma.
• Freeze and defrost tofu, squeeze them out and then they will absorb marinades easier.
• Pre-boil the harder types of vegetables (like (potatoes, carrots, broccoli or cauliflower) and marinade them.

Some examples for marinades:

• Soy-sauce · nutmeg · lemonjuice · cayenne-pepper · fresh Basil · olive-oil
• Apple juice · salt · black pepper · basil-vinegar · olive-oil · ginger
• Worcestersauce · tarragon-vinegar · salt · pear juice
• Pine-apple juice · sweet paprika · salt · basil-vinegar · sunflower-oil · ginger
• Orange juice · maple-syrup · orange zest · tarragon-vinegar · olive-oil · salt · coriander · cayenne-pepper
• Mustard · ginger · maple-syrup · soy-sauce · olive-oil · basil-vinegar · salt · black pepper

As a dessert you can grill fruit!

• Create kebabs from different fruits
• Grill pine-apple or apples directly on the grill
• Or cut open a banana and fill it up with chocolate
• Add some ice-cream

Enjoy! Hhhmmmm!

Do you have any more tips? Please share them on the forum!

OK if you read my last blog, then next step is…

wear sunscreen!

Sunlight contains two types of UV rays: UVA and UVB

B is the good kind which you want lots and lots of, because it helps you create Vitamin-D. And A is the bad kind because it penetrates your skin and can create skin damage, aging and could even result in skincancer!

So a good protection is vital!

There are two types of filters used in sunscreen: Mineral or chemical filters.

Mineral filters create a reflective layer on your skin with Zinc-oxide or Titanium-dioxide particles. It reflects the sunlight to not reach the skin. Benefit of this is that in high concentrations they can block the sunlight totally, it is not absorbed by the skin and therefore has less chance of creating allergic reactions and are photostable. (it works all day without loss of protection) Less positive is that they leave a white layer on your skin, they are thicker, greasier and harder to smear. Also they can block your pores. So this type of sunblock is less appropriate for dark skintypes and greasy or break-out skin types.

A chemical filter works quite differently. It penetrates the skin and there absorbs the UV rays. It doesn’t create a white layer on your skin and can be used in lighter creams, sprays or oils. That’s why they are a better option for greasier skin types and are often used in daycreams. Less positive is that they usually don’t block all UVA rays and most of them are not photostable, so re-applying is a must!

When I go on a beach vacation I make sure I use the mineral type of filter at least at the start of the vacation. I think it is easy because you only have to apply once, and you are sure you are protected all day long. But creating a nice tan, using this one, doesn’t work that well for me. So usually after a few days I switch to a different one when I feel that my skin has had time to adjust to the sunlight. But then I really have to be careful not to get sunburnt!

Most sunscreens have both types of filters at the same time. Just check the label or ingredients so you are sure you know which type of filter you are using.

Once every year an amazing woman called Ilyana comes from Bulgaria to the Netherlands for a few weeks. Ilyana visits her sister who lives here and while she stays she goes to many houses to work as a cleaning lady.

She is actually not a cleaning lady in Bulgaria at all, but works at an office and her husband is a veterinarian. But coming here and work for 6 weeks gives her that extra bit of spendingmoney she can use the whole year.

The first time she came she saved up for buying a car, a few years later she used the money for her daughters wedding and now since last year she has become a grandmother.

Every year when my mother hears Ilyana is back in town she always immediately lets Ilyana come to clean once every week. After that her house is SUPERCLEAN!

My mother always calls her the white tornado because of that! Haha

So when I heard she was back again I asked my mother if she could arrange Ilyana to come to my house once too! So on the day before I went on holiday Ilyana the white tornado came to my house and I think she cleaned every single spot in my livingroom, kitchen, toilet and bathroom and vacuumed the bedrooms!!!

AMAZING!!!

It was so great too leave your home for two weeks knowing that it will be clean when you return!

And it really was!!

I was so happy I could just unpack, do some laundry, take a shower, and go to bed!!!

To me, this was a very good example of orgaNICE your HOME!

And worth every penny!

Last Saturday I went to a concert of Lady GAGA! It was absolutely amazing!!!

I think it was the most wonderful concert I have been to ever!!!

What I liked most about it is that I had a GREAT view from the left of the stage about 20 meters away. But also because the stage was higher than the people, and that she moved up and down on different levels. There was a car that turned into a piano and giant screens and monsters on stage. And lots and lots of great dancers!

And her clothes of course!

She wore a different outfit on EVERY song!! Sometimes only by adding a headpiece and removing a cape and vice-versa. But also sometimes by complete dresschanges, up to 15 times!!! One of her dresses even MOVED!! When I saw that I couldn’t believe my eyes and my jaw completely dropped!!! (That happened more that once!!!)

During the concert she was talking about that she had just returned from New York and had sung for a rainforest benefit, she was so happy to have sung with Sting, Elton John, Blondie and Bruce Springsteen. She sang a little bit of the song “stand by me” she sang with Sting. The audience liked it so much she made the band play it in full!

She had also heard about the plane tragedy that had happened in Libya where 70 Dutch people had died during a crash and a 9-year-old boy was the sole survivor. She sang a song dedicated to him.

While doing that a lot of people in the audience showed her harts they had cut out which said GAGA love and she was so moved by it that I think she started to cry!

She said you shouldn’t love her but love yourself!

That was the message of this concert

• FREE YOURSELF!!!
• BE YOURSELF!!!
• LOVE YOURSELF!!!

She said this was a party where all the freaks were kept outside haha. It had a great effect on everybody. And it was great to see the newest pop sensation was so full of spirit.

It was a great evening! And I enjoyed every second of it!

I loved seeing all the people dressed up like her.

I didn’t think that anyone would ever dress up as their idols ever again. Not since everybody dressed up like Michael Jackson and Madonna have I seen this happen ever before.

Those were my favourite artists growing up and it seems amazing to me that maybe my children later will be fans of Lady GAGA just like I was of Michael and Madonna when I grew up!

and who knows? maybe 25 years from now when GAGA turns 50 we will both still like it???

I just heard really good and fun news on the radio!

This year the glass house of 3FM’s Christmas charity event for Red Cross will be in:

EINHOVEN!

Every year the Dutch radio station 3FM organizes an event in the week before Christmas.

3 DJ’s lock themselves up in a glass house where all their movements can be followed for a week and in which they have to make radio shows 24 hours a day while they do not eat! (Only juices)

All listeners can “buy” songs the DJ’s will play on the radio; you can choose yourself what song and how much money you want to donate for it.

Also there are lots of other ways to donate money like auctions or sponsorships, this all to raise money for several goals of the Red Cross foundation. Last year it was for buying Mosquito nets against Malaria.

And ever since it started it has been a HUGE success!

Last year they raised 7.113.447 EURO!

Also in other countries like Belgium, Sweden and Switzerland have started events like these, always with the same theme and charity goal in every country.

I’m so glad I’m not planning to go to my boyfriend’s parents in Switzerland for Christmas this year, so I can enjoy all the events that are here in the middle of Eindhoven. Lots of people come to the house and so many events are organized to raise money.

I’m sure it will be a lot of fun!

Can’t wait!

Maybe this is a good event for organiceyourlife to participate?

Anybody has any suggestions how we can raise money to support the Red Cross?

Please visit the forum and let us know!

A week ago I returned from a vacation in Zwitserland.

My boyfriend’s parents live near Montreux and have a beautiful view of the lake of Geneva. We try to go and visit them regularly and from there take trips to Vevey, Montreux, Lausanne or Geneva together.

The last few times we went in the December month to visit them for Christmas. My boyfriend’s parents then always like to take walks on the mountains. They are really good at it and go up so much faster than I could ever! I’m not used to climbing mountains, let alone in the snow! (No practicing that in NL!) So for me this is always very difficult.

This time we decided to take a little longer visit in April and from there take a nice trip somewhere. Because we wanted to do something different then taking walks and visiting the cities nearby, we decided to take a biketrip AROUND the lake of Geneva! 

In Switzerland they call this a tour de Lac (lake of Geneva is called Lac Léman in French).

It was my first time on a camping vacation ever!

I never did that with my parents. (my dad would never!) And since then I never did it myself either.

But we had the BEST time together! Being with just the two of us was so fun and romantic.

In Switzerland there was a bike-route all the way up to Geneva that went through all the little villages, past lovely castles and through the fields and we saw lots of cows, goats, birds and flowers (it went even past a tulip festival! So amazing!).

And the view across Lake Geneva of course! It was always spectacular!

We met so many nice people and the weather was so incredibly nice. All this made us feel very lucky!

Please read my full report of our 250KM biketrip on the forum which I promised to post there to my parents, sisters, friends and Lonneke too of course!

Yesterday for mother’s day me and my mother went to Amsterdam together. We wanted to go to a quite new museum in Amsterdam called the Hermitage.

As you may (or may not) know the Hermitage in Russia is one of the BIGGEST museums in the world. With a lot of very important pieces of art! The Hermitage in Amsterdam is linked to this museum in Russia and is able to exhibit these wonderfull pieces too.

Right now there is a exhibition called “from Mattisse to Malevich”

It’s like a tour through art history from the painters that were inspired by van Gogh, Cézanne and Gauguin and started to paint not only nature but painted for the art of painting itself.

That resulted in:

• Flat surfaces and no perspective and bright colors like in Matisse paintings
• in more abstract kubism (but still recognizable images) like Picasso
• or more emotional like Kandinsky.

The paintings were in more wild brushstrokes and bright colors. The movement itself was called fauvism (fauve = wild in French)

A few weeks ago I saw on TV a VERY proud museum director that went to St Petersburg in Russia and was able to borrow Matisse’s “Dance” from the Russian Hermitage.(The painting voted as most important painting of the 20^th century, because it is seen as the start of modern art) They had help from KLM (Dutch royal airlines) which send the biggest airplane that has ever landed in st. Petersburg before, to be able to send this HUGE painting to the Netherlands.

Immediately I texted my mother to ask her when will we go???

Yesterday was the last day that “Dance” was able for sighting and this painting will be send back to Russia early. So we were happy to be in time to see it!

But although this was the most important painting (and the biggest), I think that without this painting the exhibition is still very much worth the visit. I found it amazing to be able to see all these masterpieces all in one museum and it took me at least three hours to see them all

But not only that!

There was a complete story in the order of the paintings you had to watch them. It starts with Matisse, follows the complete story of him, Picasso, Kandinsky and other famous painters of that age like Van Dongen, De Vlaminck, Derain, Marquet etc. and ends with a painting of Malevich which is a painted black square on a white surface.

This is where the realism completely ends and abstract art starts!

Hopefully there will be an amazing exhibition like this one about that age too!

Then I’m sure I will visit it again!

Oh I'm so happy it's strawberry season again!

I just bought a whole carton of Dutch strawberries (those are the best!) on the market during my lunchbreak!

I promised myself to eat them all before I go home!

DELICIOUS!!!

My sister Agatha starts a new job today!

She got a job as a make-up artist for M·A·C cosmetics!

She is going to work in a new M·A·C store here in Eindhoven which will be the only one in the south of the Netherlands.

She is so thrilled and couldn’t wait to start working for this world class professional make-up label.

Since I’m no make-up artist and there was no store nearby, I own nothing of M·A·C cosmetics, and I know absolutely zero about them.

I decided to look them up and see if they are an interesting company to write about for this blog.

Well that’s definitely the case!

On their site I found out about M·A·C VIVA GLAM lipstick.

It’s a project of M·A·C that they release a few new colors of lipstick every year of which all proceeds go to the M·A·C-AIDS fund.

What a great initiative!

On their site it says that to date they have raised over 160 million US Dollar and that the M·A·C-AIDS fund is the heart and soul of the company, with its employees giving their time, energy and talent to help those affected by HIV/AIDS worldwide.

This year no one other then Lady GAGA and Cindy Lauper are the celebrity spokespeople for the VIVA GLAM lipsticks.

Please take a look at the video below in which they explain this year’s campaign and show their commitment to the cause.

I hope my sister will have a great time working for such a GREAT company, and that this is just another step into following her dreams!

I found this new drink that is absolutely DELICIOUS!
Called Crystal Clear SHINE.
Usually Crystal Clear has only fruit flavored waters.
But this time it’s more than fruit flavor.
SHINE is a drink with spring-water, B-vitamins, Aloe Vera and has practically no calories.
All ingredients to help you live healthy and look shiny!

There are two types of bottles:
A green one which has an Apple-Jasmine flavor.
And a pink one with a Cranberry-elderberryblossom flavor.

My favorite is the pink one.
It has my two favorite flavors! (Have I mentioned my cranberry love before??? Hihi)

I’m not sure if it’s available in the US but if you happen to come across these bottles, don’t hesitate to try one.

I saw this great event coming up!
From 13th till 16th of May there will be a rally from Rotterdam until Rome.
Everybody can join!
Only rule is =
You have to drive on deep-fry oil given to you!

That sounds hilarious!

Only first tank is given to you by the organization.
On every tank a Diesel car could run about 300 till 400 kilometers.
After that you have to ask snackbars, hotels or restaurants for their waste of oil.

Purpose of this rally is to give attention to alternatives for fuel, and to raise money for charity.
And to have lots of fun I’m sure!
Can you imagine how those cars would SMELL!
Or the faces of the snackbar owners (thinking the drivers are crazy, hahaha).

I always thought that having a personal trainer wasn’t something anybody would or could do!
I thought you needed a really big bank account to be able to afford that!
And why would you need it??

But…
I’m fortunate to have a job that almost completely pays for my sportsclub membership, which is located really close to where I work.
It only cost me 10 Euro’s of my salary before taxes!
So it’s actually only 6 Euros a month!
CHEAP!!!!
So of course I took a membership there.
It’s a great sportsclub that has a really good program in supporting you to get started, they create a whole profile for you and they help you choose which gymtools you want to use.
And every 6 weeks you can do a check-up where they check your improvement.
Really great and I’m happy to sport there.

But a while ago for my birthday they gave me a present.
I could choose between:
- 15 minutes on a tanning bed = nahhhh don’t need that.
- A haircut = my sister is a hairdresser, so don’t need that either.
- Or a free lesson from a personal trainer = Well that sounded really good!
So I took the personal trainer lesson
And it was GREAT!!!
I took it on Thursday and I think I could walk normally again on Sunday!!!

Since the sportsclub membership doesn’t cost me much.
I decided to take personal trainer lessons once every month
They cost 20 euro’s which isn’t very much at all!

And it works GREAT!
Doing this once a month gives such a boost to my shape!
All the muscles that need extra attention really get a workout!
I usually don’t really have the discipline for doing many crunches, but with the teacher joining you, you need to keep up!
I enjoy it too, the teacher is really nice, and we usually end up talking about holidays or music, during the short times I get to regain my breath.

I’m actually thinking about taking it twice a month!

Every year it is guessing which will be the next great big summer hit.

All it takes is just a beat that sticks in your head, lyrics that can be hummed while driving to your holiday destination, and which makes you do a silly dance you can do after lots of drinks?

According to the radio in NL the next big summerhit will be “Alors on danse” from Stromae
I thought it was so unusual that it was worth blogging about.
First of all it is in FRENCH!
But it wouldn’t be the first summersong in a language no-one understands (remember the ketchup song? Or Dragostea din tei?).

I wonder if they are right.
A little bit early in the year to say already isn’t it?

What is your favorite song so far?
Please let me know in the forum?

All winter cows are inside.

In spring when they finally go outside again they dance of joy in the fields.

That seems like superfun to me!
If you have a chance, grab your kids, nieces or nephews and take a look at these dancing cows at an organic farmer near you!

Tuesday I went to a concert of the band of Pancho Amat.
He is a famous guitar player from Cuba and he and his band performed typical Cuban Son music.

I’m so crazy about this music.
I totally love it!

A few years ago I travelled through Cuba for one month.
I saved up for a very long time to have an amazing trip on my own.
I joined a group tour which travelled through Cuba for 18 days.
And at the end everybody else went back home and I stayed in a beach resort for another 5 days in Varadero and then another 5 days in Havana before I went home.
It was truly the best trip I have ever taken!
It had everything I liked:
Culture, lots of history, beautiful nature, blue oceans, nice people, cocktails, dancing, music and of course SUNSHINE!

I remember arriving the first night so well!
I had just arrived from the airport, checked into the hotel, had some food and then with a few people went out to the Malecon (the boulevard in Havana) and sat down for some drinks.
Immediately people came up to us and started to make music.
I was so happy I finally arrived so far away from home.
The furthest away I have ever been!
I saved up for so long, listening to the music and reading books about Cuba, that being there was just thrilling!
But realizing that everything what I read about the music was actually TRUE! (That they make it on every corner and wherever you looked) was AMAZING!!!!
Couldn’t stop smiling!!
Later I realized that this was the worst band we saw on the whole trip!
But at the time it was simply the best I had ever heard!!!

So Tuesday at the concert, everything came back to me.
The whole trip flashed before my eyes.
It was amazing!

Now I definitely know for sure I will go back again one day
I <3 Cuba!!!

Maybe you’ve seen in the news about the Chinese ship that has banked on the Great Barrier Reef.
Already tons of oil has been spilled in the ocean, but help-organisations rushed to the site and have removed the oil from the sea by chemicals.
Now they are pumping the ship empty so no more oil will spill in the ocean
So much effort is being done to keep the environmental impact as low as possible.

Therefore I thought this would be a good moment to explain more about the Great Barrier Reef and why its existence is of great value for the earth.

The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest reef system composed of over 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands stretching for over 2,600 kilometers (1,600 mi) over an area of approximately 344,400 square kilometers (133,000 sq mi). The reef is located in the Coral Sea, off the coast of Queensland in northeast Australia.
The Great Barrier Reef can be seen from outer space and is the world's biggest single structure made by living organisms.
This reef was selected as a World Heritage Site in 1981. CNN labeled it one of the seven natural wonders of the world.

Great Barrier Reef supports a diversity of life, including many vulnerable or endangered species, some of which may be endemic to the reef system
There are an estimated 1,900 species of fish, approximately 350 species of hard-reef-building corals, more than 4,000 mollusk species, and over 400 species of sponge. In addition, these reefs harbor important nesting sites for numerous seabird species.
Found within this ecosystem are unique habitats and breeding sites for the largest populations of Dugongs, and Saltwater crocodiles.
Also found are Green sea turtles, Flatback turtles, Hawksbill sea turtles, Leatherback sea turtles, and Olive ridley turtles.

Other species of interest include the Greater crested tern, Black cod, Humpback whale, Minke whale, Killer whale, Bottlenose dolphin, Irrawaddy river dolphin, Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin, and the Spinner dolphin.

A large part of the reef is protected by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, which helps to limit the impact of human use, such as fishing and tourism. Other environmental pressures on the reef and its ecosystem include runoff, climate change accompanied by mass coral bleaching, and cyclic population outbreaks of the crown-of-thorns starfish.
The Great Barrier Reef has long been known to and used by the Aboriginal Australian and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and is an important part of local groups' cultures and spirituality.

So much life on one place!
It’s sure that this place is really special!

Source: Wikipedia and National Geographic

OK, I’m officially a mascara junky!
Some people have a zillion types of lipglosses, eyeshadows or nailpolishes.
But for me #1 is mascara!
I ALWAYS wear it!
Won’t go out the door without it!
I think it began when I started to wear less make-up then in high-school or during my studies.
(Done with the black-black smokey-eyes look when I started to work)

On the days I would forget to put mascara on then people would always ask me if I was sleepy or told me I looked tired.
Apparently mascara makes me look awake!

So ever since then I always wear mascara.
And yesterday, when I just casually walked into a department store during my lunchbreak, it took me about 30 seconds to try and buy the new mascara EXTASE from DIOR!
I immediately loved it!
The new type of brush worked amazing!

I think every woman probably has something of a must have beauty item
What is yours?
What is your addiction??
Go to the forum and let me know!

Last week I asked on the forum if anyone knew a good handcream.
Since the cold this winter, I’ve had the worst dry hands ever!!
And nothing seemed to work.
My hands would itch all the time, and sometimes started to bleed too!!

Tajna was so nice to give me a good tip.
She recommended Sheabutter, and to put a lot on my hands before going to bed.
(Thanks Tajna!)

I decided to search for sheabutter in the bodyshop.
(I figured they must have it, since they have so many bodybutters, seemed logical to me)
And I was right they had a whole line of sheabutter products.
They had bodybutter, douchelotion, bodyscrub etc.etc.

So many choices so I decided to ask for some advice in the store what to take.
And there the girl gave me an even better tip!
Hemp Hand Protector!
For extremely dry skin.
She also advised me to buy these bio-cotton gloves so I could put a nice thick layer on my hands before going to bed.
(That seemed familiar to the tip from the forum!)
So I bought the cream and the gloves and tried it last night.
My boyfriend made so much fun of me wearing my white gloves, hahaha!
But I didn’t care because I was sure it was going to work.
And this morning the result was indeed a lot of improvement!
So happy about that!!
Tonight again! And tomorrow, the day after that, and then, and then…
Until my hands are supersoft!
oh can’t wait!

A good tip for everybody!
Always take a minishopper wherever you go.
This has saved me so much money and plastic!

A minishopper is a quite large sized strong bag made of fabric.
It folds up easily into a little package that fits in a little wrapper.
Which is really handy to take with you. (See picture)
I always have one in my bag.
So whenever I go to the grocery store, the market or shops, I use that bag instead of having to buy a plastic bag or getting one automatically from the cashiers.

It only cost me 1 Euro, so that was a really good investment!

--------------
Update:
I found some places online to buy them!
Check the forum for more info.

As you maybe have read in my bio I really like making stuff.
I’m really an arts & crafts girl.

That’s why I can really appreciate handmade materials and designs. For me that adds so much value and extra quality!

That’s why I was super happy to have found this tiny shop in Eindhoven where they sell handmade jewelry made entirely out of GLASS!

So incredible!

The jewels are designed by my old classmate Jannita van den Haak from the Design Academy. She has her own brand of handmade jewels like necklaces and bracelets etc. called Jannissima. Funny thing about that is that the first time I went to the shop I got so enthusiastic that I went back home and searched for their website online. I immediately recognized Jannita!

So then the next day I went back and bought the one golden heart long necklace I fell in love with the previous day!
It’s one with solid black glass beads and a big glass bead in the shape of a hart which is gold plated (and GORGEOUS!)

I really love it!

This was a perfect buy in every way. I bought something superpretty I totally love for myself, and at the same time I helped someone I know with her starting business.

Now I’m saving up for either a lady Josephine or Miss Printemps long necklace. Totally love those too! (ADDICT! hihi)

Today CERN has reached a HUGE milestone!
CERN is the European Organization for Nuclear Research (Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire) and is the world largest particle physics laboratory situated near Geneva on the French-Swiss border.

CERN's main function is to provide the particle accelerators and other infrastructure needed for high-energy physics research.
It is noted for being the birthplace of the World Wide Web!

Most of the activities at CERN for the past years were towards building a new collider, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and the experiments for studying the smallest known particles in the universe.
The LHC tunnel is located 100 metres underground, and six experiments (CMS, ATLAS, LHCb, TOTEM, LHC-forward and ALICE) run on the collider; each of them will study particle collisions from a different point of view, and with different technologies.
Construction for these experiments required an extraordinary engineering effort. Just as an example, a special crane had to be rented from Belgium in order to lower pieces of the CMS detector into its underground cavern, since each piece weighed nearly 2,000 tons.

Today they have succeeded in creating a collision of two beams of protons at the speed of 7 tera electron volts, their biggest energy record to date.
The impact has created an explosion of new particles; these particles will be researched thoroughly in the future.
And there is enough data to choose from since the machine continues to run perfectly.
This is the start of total new world of physics!
And who knows what this all could lead to!
The fundamental building blocks of all things have a whole new dimension.

Very exciting times! (sometimes it’s so cool to live in these times, it seems like endless possibilities are possible!)
As my physics teacher would end all tests.
PHYSICS IS FUN!!!
(ehhmmm didn’t agree at the time though! hahaha)

See the links for a live webcast directly from CERN. (only today)

I’m still going strong on my health food diet.
(Lost almost 4KG!!!!)

But I found a good alternative for when I’d like something sweet.
DRIED CRANBERRIES!!!
Hhhmmmm!!!
They’re like raisins, but only better!
It’s like eating a piece of candy, only this time it’s good for me.

Check out the forum for more about my quest to become a lot healthier!

Today international think-tank Ethisphere Institute released a list of 2010 World’s Most Ethical Companies.
They’ve made these lists since 2007, and they plan to continue to make one every year.

Creating this years’ list they kept an eye on innovation, health, safety, sustainability, control and respect.
And also important is whether the company is in their branch is a leading company, so it can create a good example for other companies to follow.

For this years’ edition about 3000 companies were researched.
For cosmetics the only company that got selected to be on the list was L’Oréal.
The brand was given this honor because of their Code of Business Ethics (2000) and appointing an ethics director in 2007 assigned to these tasks, and they are a world market leader.

Other famous brands are NIKE, GAP, Starbucks, Mattel, IKEA, Philips and Rabobank.

Check out the full list of companies on the website of Ethisphere.
Too bad there isn’t an explanation per company why they were added onto the list, it made me very curious about them.

I found these cute bracelets online today.
They are from this unique jewelry brand called JUST J.
Their dream was to create something good and positive and to help other people.

Their bracelets and necklaces are made from round symbols in different sizes that can be worn on colorful ribbons around your wrist, neck or ankle.
Each symbol has its own meaning and should help you to have a positive look at life.
The symbols stand for LOVE, JOY, SHINE, SPARKLE, GRATEFUL, FREE, FEARLESS, TURNAROUND and INNERPEACE.
All symbols are available in silver or in combination with 18K yellow, pink and white gold and diamonds

Not only would this make a very nice personal gift, but would actually be good for others as well.
JUST J donates a percentage of their profit to the JUST J Foundation. This non-profit organization is dedicated to helping disadvantaged people and children in need. The foundation’s main goal is to contribute to poverty reduction.

And JUST J strives to know the origins of all the materials they use in their designs and know that the mining companies are committed to the highest standards of social en environmental responsibility, and JUST J favours fair trade

This all made them a member of the responsible jewellery council (RJC).
Check out the links below to find out more about this.

Aussiebum has created a new line of male eco-friendly underwear.
Made out of the weave of the bark from the bananatree and soft organic cotton.

To be precise:
27% banana fibre, 64% cotton and 9% lycra
The bananafibre makes it very lightweight but also very absorbent.
If you would add more banana it would become too squishy.

So now every man can have a good banana in their underpants!
Hahaha! (sorry couldn’t resist making a joke about it)

Today I heard from a colleague about an action of Greenpeace
They are trying to move Nestlé to stop buying palm oil from manufacturers that destroy rainforest in Indonesia.
This is very threatening for the livelihoods of the local people and push Orangutans towards EXTINCTION!

After the first actions, where they asked people to send letters to Nestlé asking them to stop using palm oil from Sinar Mas (the manufacturer), there has been quite some success!
The promovideo has been watched 100.000 times and the mails send 10.000’s of times.
That same day Nestlé announced to break all contact with Sinar Mas!
That’s GREAT! (Very surprising to me, Nestlé is definitely not fair trade and doesn’t seem to have plans to become it, but hopefully that’s changing now)
But it’s only a first step.
They still use the same palm oil by buying it from other traders.
To save the Orangutans and the rainforest there is more to be done!

So if you agree, please go to their website and support this Greenpeace action.

(Be careful watching this video, it made me gross out totally and is not suitable for small children!!!)

Sometimes it’s nice to remember your loved ones that have passed away.
You can by looking at photos of videos.
But what I like to do is remembering them by different experiences.

Like for instance:
My grandmother ALWAYS had Anta-Flu cough drops in her pockets.
So now whenever I eat those, I think of her.
And then I try to remember what she was like.
But not only that
She died when I was eleven years old.
So thinking back is also thinking of everything of those times:
How I was when I was little (jumpy, naughty, funny and cute (of course!)
How her house looked like.
All the family that would always be there. (What they looked like back then)
My aunt Riet. (lived there too, she died almost ten years ago too)
The cats. (that would always hide behind the curtains).
The dog. (I never owned a dog, so it was always nice to play with this one)

Sometimes I imagine if she would have lived longer would she have taught me how to knit?
You could see her with needles all the time! (and cigarettes too by the way)
She made babysocks for all her (grand-) children and whatever else she could.
And lovely knitted puppets for everybody.
She made me and my older sister puppets that looked just like us! (blond and brunette)

My sister Agatha was her youngest grandchild and was named after her.
It’s an old fashioned name but knowing where it comes from makes her wear it with pride.
(And she wears it well!)

Last year I arranged a party for my grandmothers’ hundredth birthday.
It became one big family reunion.
It was a great day where we put some flowers on her grave and then back home spend the whole afternoon catching up.

Everybody recognized the Anta-Flu cough drops I put on the table immediately!
And everybody took one to remember her!

Surprise your loved one sometimes with sending them a lovesong.
It only takes a short time.
But it’s sure worth it!

I really love Cheryl Cole’s song 3 words.
It always makes me smile when I hear the lyrics and think of my own love.

This Friday it’s national Pancake Day in the Netherlands!

What a nice idea!
I really love pancakes!

My favorites are pancakes with cheese.
But since I’m still on a healthfood diet …
I think I better keep them without layers of cheese and tons of sugar or syrups.

But… I think I could still eat pancakes!
They have carbohydrates, but only few are sugars.

This time I will make biological wholewheat ones with apples and cinnamon.
Delicious!!!

Spanish actor Antonio Banderas is appointed as a new Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Development programme (UNDP).
He will focus on poverty and will push for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals to halve world poverty compared to 2000.

“Poverty robs us of our potential as a people, preventing us from being all that we can be,” Antonio Banderas said.

The millennium goals are 8 globally agreed targets with a 2015 deadline

Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
- Halve the proportion of people living on less than $1 a day
- Achieve Employment for Women, Men, and Young People
- Halve the proportion of people who suffer from hunger

Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education
- all children can complete a full course of primary schooling, girls and boys

Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women
- Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education preferably by 2005
- All men and women have the same rights by 2015

Goal 4: Reduce child mortality
- Reduce by two-thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the under-five mortality rate

Goal 5: Improve maternal health
- Reduce by three quarters, between 1990 and 2015, the maternal mortality ratio
- Achieve, by 2015, universal access to reproductive health

Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases
- Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS
- Achieve, by 2010, universal access to treatment for HIV/AIDS for all those who need it
- Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases

Goal 7: Ensure environmenta

l sustainability
- Integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes; reverse loss of environmental resources
- Reduce biodiversity loss, achieving, by 2010, a significant reduction in the rate of loss
- Halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation
- By 2020, to have achieved a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum-dwellers

Goal 8: Develop a global partnership for development
- Develop further an open, rule-based, predictable, non-discriminatory trading and financial system
- Address the Special Needs of the Least Developed Countries
- Address the special needs of landlocked developing countries and small island developing States
- Deal comprehensively with the debt problems of developing countries through national and international measures in order to make debt sustainable in the long term

With only less than five years to go there is still a lot of work that needs to be done!

Let’s all wish Antonio Banderas good luck in his new role.

This Saturday 27th of March it’s Earth Hour.

People around the world will turn off their lights for one hour at 20.30h (local time zones), to show their concerns about the environment.

What started as a local initiative of WWF in Sydney in 2007 has become a worldwide event and last year almost a billion people and 88 countries joined this event.
This year already a 100 countries have committed to join and will turn off the lights of prominent buildings or landscapes.

I think this is a great idea which hopefully has a great impact!
I already signed up!
'See you' in the dark on the 27th!

Ok this makes it official.
I’m going on a DIET!!

Not some fancy programs or hyped superplans.
This time I’m going to eat HEALTHY!

Promises I made to myself:
I will…
…eat low-fat,
…eat no sugar,
…spread my food more across the day (instead of stuffing my face two or three times a day),
…never ever skip breakfast,
…drink lots of water (one big glass before I eat) and try to reach 3 liters a day,
…eat lots of proteins, vegetables and fibers,
…chew my food more thoroughly,
…only take a bite if my mouth is empty (haha that means I have to pay attention to what I eat),
…eat all the stuff I allow myself when I feel hungry (mental check if I’m really hungry or just bored),

So this should get me a little bit healthier!
(ok,ok, a LOT!! ---- > not in denial!!!)

This blog should keep me focused and committed!
I will write some more in the future about stuff I find about different foods or mental tips etc. that help me in my quest.

Yesterday there was some good news here in Noord-Brabant (south of the Netherlands).
The plans to create megastables for the meat industry are definitely over.

There were plans to approve the meat industry to grow larger and larger again and again ( the name MEGA says enough right?).
This has serious consequences for the animals, the people and nature.
With so many animals stuffed together there are many risk for illnesses, viruses, parasites and bacteria.
These could eventually spread onto humans (remember swine flu?).

Also there is a huge and still increasing use of antibiotics, which causes the animals to become resistant, which increases the risks of creating even more illnesses that could transfer onto humans.

What’s also very damaging for the surroundings is the amount of fine particles in the air (coming from intensive stockbreeding)
Which causes many respiratory problems and even early death.

Of course there is a huge overload on manure coming from these megastables, which is terribly bad for the soil, the water and the air

And then I didn’t even mention how it’s like for the animals themselves, this is of course not pleasant for them at all!

There were plans to create many of these megastables here in Noord-Brabant.
As a response to that a lot of people have grouped together to create one big citizens initiative, in which they show their protest to the Provinciale Staten van Noord-Brabant. (the local government).
And it turned out to be very successful!
No one other than 33.000 people has signed their petition (including me), which was enough to put it on their agenda.
And thus yesterday they decided that no megastable will be approved and that all license applications are declared invalid.

This shows once again that everybody can help in creating a better environment and that this can actually have a successful effect!

Now there are also plans to have this taken national so none of these megastables will come anywhere in the Netherlands.
Hopefully this will work just as successfully as this has turned out
(next step worldwide?)

This week I went to a sauna.
I've been very busy lately, and was very tired.
That's why I thought it was time to relax!!!
Sauna always gives me such a feeling of wellness.
I love to dip in the bubblebaths or swimmingpools, or warm up in the steamroom or calendarium.
But what I like most is just the "regular" sauna (no infrared, music or colours)
And it's also really good for you!

During a saunabath your temerature raises up to 39 °C /102 °F.
Your body responces to that by sweating.
Purpose of the sweating is to cool down the bodytemperature again, by transporting the heat out of you.
This has several positive results:
Because of the heat followed by the cool baths afterwards, the muscles relax, the bloodpressure loweres, and the bloodcirculation, digestion and respiration improve.
Sauna is also good for your skin and slows down the aging process.
During the heat the bloodvessels enlarge and improve bloodcirculation.
After cooling, the vessels become smaller again, which sort of train them.
and it also improves the structure of very dry skin (by soaking in the water and activation of the sweatcells).

So don't wait untill you go on your next holiday to a luxury Spa hotel, but take a sauna in any day-Spa nearby sometimes
YOU'LL LOVE IT!!!

My boyfriend introduced me to this amazing website called the hungersite.
It’s a website that enables you to donate money or food etc. to different causes just by clicking on a button!
And it’s free!
You can click on the donate buttons on each different tab as many times as you like.
Right now there are 6 different tabs: (and they keep getting more)
-Hunger
-Breast Cancer
-Child Health
-Literacy
-Rainforest
-Animal Rescue
I try to go to this website every day.
And my boyfriend has it as his homepage so that makes it even easier.
They’re just little donations each time
But all little bits together make one big one!

As most of you know LED is a great way to create high impact lighting, but with a very low impact on the earth and its environment.
I was thinking that it’s time for a news item about LED that’s not just about sustainability
But also how LED could also be amazing and FUN!

For Michael Jackson’s THIS IS IT- tour, they asked designer Zaldy to create costumes to be worn during the different performances.
He wanted to create a costume for Billie Jean that would light up just like the sidewalk did in that famous video.
Together with Lumalive they created a brilliantly cool and fun costume that would light up the socks, the sidestripes on the suit and of course the GLOVE!
The costume was designed to light up to the rhythm of the song and be synchronized with the choreography.
Check out the video below to see this amazing piece of technology!
(unfortunately I could only find one video that’s partly in Dutch)

I checked out the website of Lumalive and they are a company that creates LED solutions on fabrics.
That looks really very cool indeed!
I wonder when we will see more of this in the future, imagine just being able to buy shirts like those in your favourite stores!
I’ll definitely keep it in mind for future Organice Your Life™ events!!!

My sister Agatha cut my hair this weekend.
I was so sick of it, my hair was getting way too long.
It was really flat and boring!
If I would sit down at my desk, my hair would get stuck between my back and the chair!
Or when I would put my bag on across my shoulders then my hair would get stuck between the strap and my back.
Just a few examples of how I was annoyed by it.
And it was also really heavy, and the bottom was really damaged and could break too easily.
So time for change!
She cut off about a quarter of the length until a few inches over my shoulders, and made it look a lot more spicy then before.

What she also did was dye my hair with this new professional hair colour from L’Oreal called INOA.
It’s not based on ammonia but has a new revolutionary oil basis.
This makes it odourless and is better for your scalp and hair.
What’s also great about it is that you only need two small tubes of dye and that makes it really easy to mix two different colours.
I choose one of the warm browns and one of the coppers and now my hair looks really shiny brown-reddish.

Now I feel really light, shiny, new and ready for spring and summer!
Such a great thing to do, just cut and dye your hair and it gives you such a boost of change and energy!

It’s Friday afternoon and I was discussing my plans for the weekend with my colleagues.

Somehow we landed on the subject of beer.
And it reminded me of the most interesting beer I ever drank.

MONGOZO beer!

I was at a summer-festival last year and there was this stand of interesting looking drinks.
Served in half a coconut!
Apparently they were beer with five different exotic flavors:
Coconut, Quinua, Palmnut, Mango and Banana.

My favourite was Quinua flavored.
Maybe you can imagine how pleased I was walking and dancing around with my delicious beer in a coconut.
I felt on a summer holiday although it was raining almost all day!

As it turns out while looking at their website, there is a really interesting story behind these beers!

"Mongozo means ‘to your health' in the native language of Henrique Kabia, one of the founders of Mongozo beer.
The language is that of the Chokwe people who live scattered throughout Angola, Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
It is the Chokwe women who have been brewing the beer for their people for more than two centuries.
Before they started brewing beer, they used to make wine using palm nuts. It was one of Henrique Kabia's distant great-grandmothers who was responsible for bringing about a great change in the eighteenth century: instead of making palm wine she began making palm beer.
Over the course of the centuries her secret recipe was handed down from mother to daughter. Henrique's mother brewed palm nut

beer too, but had no daughters. She therefore decided to break with tradition and initiate her son into the mysteries of brewing beer.

That same recipe was Henrique's only possession when, in 1993, he arrived in the Netherlands as a refugee. The recipe formed the basis for a new and exotic beer line, with which a whole new dimension was added to the European beer tradition.

The five Mongozo flavors unite the ingredients, recipes and drinking traditions from corners of the world as diverse as Ghana, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Costa Rica and Brazil.

Four of the five exotic Mongozo beer bear the Max Havelaar/Fairtrade logo.
And Mongozo also uses many organically certified ingredients in its beers."

I think that makes this beer taste even better!

(source: mongozo.com)

This afternoon I was enjoying an EAT NATURAL bar with brazil nuts, sultanas, almonds and hazelnuts.

These are delicious fruit and nut bars that are made from all natural ingredients, no artificial flavours, colours or preservatives, they are gluten free and they are all OK for vegetarians!

I like to eat them on the afternoons when I plan to go to the gym after work, so I’ll have some energy for it.
Because I liked them so much I checked the international website so I could write a blog about Eat Natural.

But there I saw that they have more products on the UK website than on the Dutch website!

They have:
-Bars (more flavors)
-Lunchies for kids
-Nutmix
And… BREAKFAST!!!
When I saw the bags for breakfast cereal I immediately became insanely jealous!
They looked super jummie!

They have 4 different flavors:
#1= with...crunchy toastcrumbs hazelnuts almonds oats and honey
#2= with...toasted oats cape gooseberries and pecans
#3= with...toasted buckwheat pumpkin seeds raisins and mango
#4= with...raisins almonds mixed seeds and crispy rice

I can’t wait to try them!
Hopefully they will be available in the Netherlands soon.

TODAY IS INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY!

Every year on March 8 it’s international women’s day
The first international woman’s day was declared by Clara Zetkin at the international woman’s convention in Copenhagen in 1910. Reason for this was the massive strike on the 8th of March in 1908: 15,000 women marched through New York City demanding shorter hours, better pay and voting rights.

After that, every year on March 8th, people in several countries would hold marches and conferences about women’s issues.
Unfortunately the 1st world war ended this custom.

With the feminist movements of the sixties the interest in the Women’s day returned and in a lot of socialist countries like China, Armenia, Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Macedonia, Mongolia, Uzbekistan and Vietnam it’s an official holiday and has a status equal to mother’s day.

Throughout the world there are many events today:

One of them is tonight’s premiere of the movie Desert Flower in Amsterdam
This movie is based on the biography of internationally famous supermodel Waris Dirie.

In this book she tells her story from being born into a nomad family in Somalia, about being circumcized at only 5 years old! How she escaped her family when she was to marry a very old man, and eventually moved to London and that's where she, while working as a cleaning lady in Mc Donalds, was discovered as a model.

Waris Dirie became an UN ambassador for the abolition of female genital mutilation, and since then raised her own foundation (www.waris-dirie-foundation.com)

I’ve read her book a few years ago and it moved me very much! Seeing this movie will definitely be on my list for things to do this month!


by Irene Dirks