February 4, 2016

the hammels visit amsterdam!!

we just had some of our besties from california visit here in amsterdam!
we have missed them so much and loved getting to reunite in europe.
it’s been seven months of glitchy facetime calls and catch up emails, so it
was great to have time together. they are such good friends for booking a
trip all the way over to see us, and now this week we are meeting them in
ireland for a little more fun before they head back to the states! these two
are such solid friends who just get it. you know those kind of friends?

we filled the weekend with catching up, talking for hours on end, getting
drenched in rain, museum-ing, EATING, being spontaneous, staying
up way too late having slumber parties, watching new girl with all of
us laying on the bed, laughing our heads off, and just being together!
we truly love these two. here are some pictures from the weekend together:
tom flew in a day earlier than tammi, and chase was on his way back
from a business trip in switzerland…so they reunited at the amsterdam
airport! they are the best of friends so i loved getting this picture ^^
while i waited for them to get into the city, i headed to grab
some celebratory pizza at our new favorite spot, mastino!
the PARMA pizza is my go-to (i could cry while eating it)
the ham + parma is sliced fresh in front of you. i added up a spicy
sausage pizza for the boys, & the nutella DESSERT pizza of course.
i made it back just in time for the hungry boys to arrive from the airport.we had a great night with jet-lagged tom before tammi
arrived the next day and the real party started!

if you visit, i promise to have a tin of stroopwafels waiting for you.
^^ dream team! what is better than airport reunions?proof of what great friends t&t are ^^ they brought us almost
an entire suitcase full of american treats, normal deodorant, and
things we miss! (annie’s mac & cheese is near the top of that list- haha)
we took them to all of our favorite spots ^^ starting with dr. blend.
tammi is the most enthusiastic and happy person i know, and every place
we walked she literally would say “oh my goodness look how pretty this is!”
“look at this, wow look at that!” haha, it made us love this city even more
and many photo stops happened along the way as we walked around ^^
(thanks patient husbands)
tammi and i sent the boys on their own adventure while
we had a window shopping spree in the 9 streets area.
mint tea, pretty window dressings, & chatting included. ^^

the hot chocolate connoisseurs ^^
^^ we made sure to get some classic street food:
dutch dogs + warm, fresh, gooey stroopwafels.

chase waited in the rain early in the morning and got us all into the anne
frank museum. he was first in line and saved us from waiting for hours!
it’s such a sobering museum but it also leaves you feeling inspired
and hopeful by this amazing little girl and her words. i love the
quote up above at the end of the museum which says, “all of
her would-haves are our opportunities.” it is so true and going
through her house and hiding place + reading journal excerpts
makes you want to live and appreciate being able to live life, be
free to enjoy the fresh air, and experience the things she never did.
i love all of the photographs in the museum. there are darling
pictures of anne, and ^^ this capture of her father otto back in
the home all alone after the war ended is so sad but so powerful.
we strolled the bloemenmarkt to perk up before lunch ^^

we all bought a few little trinkets along the way!
(and by that i mean the girls bought little trinkets :)
we couldn’t help ourselves with some dutch christmas ornaments on sale.all of that flower shopping worked up our appetites, so we headed
to foodhallen where the food stands + options are endless! the
boys went for huge burgers at the butcher while tam and i split
some different things from a few stands we wanted to try. ^^ so many choices! we love a good food hall.
the boys proceeded to get the “best crepe they have had in their life…” ha ^^
after getting drenched in another burst of rain, we ran back to our place
to shower, change, put clothes in the dryer, and maybe catch a little::siesta :) these jet-lagged travelers were being troopers
and we all deserved a little rest in the middle of the day! ^^
we got our energy back for more strolling in newly dry & warm clothes…
^^ and some solid photo-bombing by tom (one of his many talents).

another day we visited the van gogh museum since tom is
an art history lover. this is my favorite one, and tom approved!after this museum it’s a must to walk around museumplein
and take a classic picture at the “iamsterdam” sign.
so convenient that we all have initials right in the sign!

we failed at a few selfie attempts as you can see..still haven’t given
in to the selfie stick but i will admit, it would have helped in this case!sometimes i love outtake pictures the most ^^we went on a canal cruise when it started to sprinkle rain.
luckily the boat was covered! these can be a little bit
long (90 minutes) but i love seeing the city from the
water and learning new facts / history each time.

cold canal cruisers ^^on our final night together we went out to
the most magical dinner over the canal ^^
we reserved our favorite italian spot in
the city: casa di david. buon appetito!dinner with these two darlings is always a treat ^^
we had the greatest (4 hour) meal & left the restaurant
at 11:30 PM! we’re becoming true europeans i guess ;)
we all split some amazing appetizers – i ordered the
prosciutto con mozzarella di bufala (one of our favorite
things) only to find out t&t had never tried it before!
our time in naples this summer made us even more
obsessed with fresh buffalo mozzarella so i was so
happy to introduce them to one of the best foods ever!
bringing cheese into each other’s life = what friends are for ;)
^^ chase’s amazing homemade lasagna.
you can see how seriously tom took his pizza ^^
during this dinner we all kept saying – “look at us! what if we
had seen this sight at this time a year ago? we wouldn’t have
believed all four of us were together in europe. what a dream!”
it was such a special dinner we will remember forever.
but wait! let’s not forget the perfect ending to it ^^
a full dessert platter to share between us all.
i loved every single dessert, but the tiramisu couldn’t be beat in my mind. ^^
we got home at midnight, yet still cuddled up on the
sofa bed to watch our favorite show new girl together.
we were laughing so hard, maybe because of being delirious.
it was our last night together so we couldn’t go to bed too early!
the morning before they flew out we bundled up and strolled
our neighborhood in search of brunch. funny story: after being
met with hour-long wait times at a few places, we decided to
just go to the grocery store and grab fresh croissants, yogurt,
and juice. it was a few euro and ended up being even more fun!
it also gave us time to take some good pictures since the sun came out...like this one above ^^ a keeper for sure!love this crew. we are hoping to move back to the
bay just so we can be close by again!^^ chase’s face shows how we felt about dropping them at the train back to the airport…
luckily we’ve planned some fun in dublin this week, so it’s not goodbye for too long!