Try baking!

We have friends and family living all around the world. In Hong Kong, the United States, Britain, South Africa, Brazil, Norway, Spain, Qatar and Canada to name just a few locations. The great thing is that it gives us a good excuse to visit them whenever we have the chance and get to know some exciting places. It also means we don't get to see our loved ones as much as we would like.

My cousin Miriam for example lives in Toronto, Canada. She is such a great person and I would love to see her more. Last year she came over here to attend the Yad Vashem ceremony for our grandmother. She stayed with us for a couple of days. And although we have not seen each other that much over the years, it felt very familiar. Literally! We talked for hours, both keen to catch up on both sides of the family gossip. And just catching up in general.

She told me she likes baking when she needs cheering up a bit. The whole process of measuring, mixing and baking helps take her mind of things. And if that alone is not enough to make one feel better already, there is the sweet result at the end. A garantueed recipe to cheer any person up. And friends and family will love it too. I wholeheartedly agreed with her!

Fortunately the baking occasion today was a happy one! I decided to bake Jonny something to take to work for his birthday tomorrow. Muffins as per his request (it was between muffins and cake). On the above picture you can see the result. They look a bit lobsided, but if past experiences are anything to go by, that won't make a difference to the taste!

I also got Jonny some 'Happy Birthday' napkins to go with it, so now I am just hoping it will entice his colleagues to sing for him. As it happens I am slightly tone deaf, so I'll give it a miss this year....

The colourfull paper cups are from the Danish brand Rice by the way.

Griddup!

I don't really do carnaval. I am not keen on the big crowds, I don't like the dancing and I'll prefer a glass of nice wine to copious amounts of beer anytime, thanks. As a result I miss out on the fancy costumes that go with it.

My sister recently moved to 'south of the rivers', or the catholic part of the Netherlands. It is also known as the more exuberant part of the Netherlands. They talk softer, the food is nicer and they like a good party. There is no real escaping from carnaval there. Especially when you are three years old and all your class mates celebrate it.

My niece Julia will attend the festivities in her new frog costume. She does not look too happy in the picture, but that might have to do with the timing of the Kodak moment: she was sat on the potty (original picture cropped!). However, she does look really cute as a frog! One would almost be tempted, but I think we will just stick to celebrating Pancake Day this year...

Bathroom almost complete

Yesterday, Flo and I actually managed to spend some time on the house! We did have a lot of incentive though, since, after about a four month wait, our medicine cabinet finally arrived! If that wasn't enough, the pair of wall lights we ordered before Christmas also arrived last week, so we were very enthusiastic to have some spare time to get them all installed in the bathroom.

And here they are!


The lights are designed to look like coffee cups, with little hanging tea spoons that can be used to switch the lights off and on... they make waking up in the morning that little bit more bearable, subliminally instilling thoughts of café latte to wake the weary mind.

I find the large cross medicine cabinet quite amusing and it adds a nice streak of colour to the bathroom.

We're just waiting for one more item in the bathroom and then there's only the painting left! That will likely wait 'til the summer though...

Back by popular demand

We never meant to leave you for this long, dear readers, our only excuse is that we have been very busy. Busy living the adventures that this blog is named after and so little time to write about them. But of course, a blog requires commitment and requests for updates have been steadily pooring in. This one is especially for Kata and Pobb!

Enough to write about: a wedding, another wedding, a trip to London, meeting old friends, making new friends, writing my thesis, trying to finish the house, but mostly working and working some more. Both Jonny and I have been making long hours at work. I work for a publishing company and we are about to launch the Netherlands' first free special interest newspaper. Next month. And there is still a lot of work to do.

It is a new thing for the company and a new thing for me. And apart from actually launching the product, our department is also to set the example for the future way projects are managed. Last week we were kindly invited to have lunch with the CEO and discuss progress. To put that in context, I have around 3500 colleagues. With expectations cranked up as high as the volume knob will go, I have to say I did feel a little intimidated.

I do think that we managed to convince him that all preparations are going according to plan and that next month there will actually be a product that we can be proud of. So there you go. We just need to do it now.

Gent's a Go

Yesterday afternoon Flo and I headed off to Gent's University Hospital for our scheduled appointment with the fertility clinic. The journey turned out to be quite treacherous, since we're currently suffering from heavy rain and strong winds in the Netherlands, so driving conditions were pretty tricky!

After giving our history and medical background to the trainee doctor, we had a good, long chat with the fertility doctor. She was very frank with us. She said that, taking account of all the information that she has, she is inclined to agree with the opionion of the doctors at Voorburg that our chances of success are less than average. However, she went on to say that we're still young and we have time on our side and that she would not recommend stopping at this point unless we either can't afford to continue or don't wish to subject ourselves to further stress that is inevitable with the treatment.

She agreed that Flo appears to be what is referred to as a "poor responder" to hormone stimulation. In order to have a reasonable chance (30-40%) of the treatment being successful, Flo needs to produce about eight eggs during the treatment cycle. Since Flo only seems to be producing about four or five, this straight away reduces the chance of success. However, given that we have been successful in the past up to placing the eggs back, she thinks it is worth continuing.

In Belgium, it's standard practice to have six fertility treatments sponsored by the government, giving an overall rate of success of over 90%. In the Netherlands, the government only sponsors three attempts, giving an overall success rate of around 80%. This alone gives the Belgians a much more positive outlook on fertility treatment and they are far more willing to continue treatment for longer. As a result, the Belgian hospitals are far more relaxed about success rates and are not phased by league tables (showing which are the most "successful" fertility clinics in the country).

The doctor thought that our chances of success were around 20%. However, after the trainee doctor examined Flo with an ultrasound scan, around seven or eight follicles could clearly be seen (along with another small cyst on the left side), which was encouraging so early in her cycle. So it appears that Flo's fertility cycle is a little bit tempremental, peaking and troughing. Therefore, the timing of the treatment could well be critical and so it will likely be worth us waiting until Flo appears to be in a peak before starting an ICSI treatment.

The Belgian doctor advised that, given that Flo does not respond well to stimulation, there is very little risk of her hyper-stimulating. She therefore advised using the full dose of hormones and very small doses of down regulating drugs. Interestingly, she was very suprised that our last treatment was cancelled by the clinic, since, given that it was obvious that Flo was a poor responder, it would have been worth continuing the treatment for another week since delayed responses are often observed in women with conditions similar to Flo.

So, the bottom line is that they'd be more than happy to treat us in Gent. However, it's quite a drive, so it would be easier on us if we could at least have some of the ultrasounds done at a local hospital. Ideally though, we'd prefer to continue treatment at Voorburg. With the additional insight and confidence that they've given us at Gent, we're looking forward to returning to Voorburg to see if they propose continuing with us and to see if they are prepared to be flexible with the treatment that they offer us. It's strange, but, given the experiences that we've had and from talking with a few informed people, we seem to have formulated our own idea of what treatment we want. Unfortunately, doctors don't like being told what to do and don't like their conclusions being questioned... least of all by their patients!

Well... let's see what they have to say when we return to Voorburg next month. At the very least, we now have a plan B. Personally, I'm now much more confident and enthusiastic about continuing to chase our objective to have our own child.

We finished the day with a nice meal at Grade, a restaurant featured in one of Flo's magazines. The food wasn't anything special, but the ambience was nice and the company was excellent! It gave us time to unwind and debrief one another of the day's events.