A birthday celebration for Lew in Amsterdam

On the weekend of April 30th-May 4th we went to Amsterdam to meet up with my friend Laura and a few of her friends from Munich. It was a birthday celebration for Laura- she just celebrated the big 3-0. Hopefully she doesn't mind me saying that! But she did mention all of the things that we have been through in the past decade and it got me thinking... A lot can happen in 10 years!! My 30th birthday is coming up in a couple of months and it’s fun to think of all of the things I have accomplished in the past ten years. I digress...

Old Gouda... mmm

So Amsterdam! We arrived on Friday and spent the afternoon with our friends Dan and Stephna who recently moved there for work. We then met up with Laura for some amazing Thai food at the Bird in the Chinese quarter. Wow, it was amazing! Josh had a red coconut curry and I actually liked it! Typically I don't like curry, but this was so good. I'd love to bring Julia there to see if they really have authentic Thai food :)

Pickled herring

going for it...

uhhh...

Friday was pretty low key, and so was Saturday. The weather on Saturday was cold and a little rainy, so we decided to hit up the Albert Cuyp Street Market where the boys tried the pickled herring.  Dan wasn't sure what he thought of the pickled herring... I think he's still trying to decide if he likes it. The quote of the day, “show me your waffles!" Later on during the weekend that quote took on a whole new meaning, lol. Josh wanted a picture of the waffles we purchased at the market and that was how he got Dan and Stephna's attention. And by the way, the waffles are delicious!!

"Show me your waffles!!"

Brouwerij 'T Ij

After the market we made our way over to a brewery in a windmill called Brouwerij 'T Ij where we ate some terrible beer cheese, and the others enjoyed some good Dutch beer. Eventually we met up with Laura and her friends for drinks at a really cool little pub called the Aren's Nest. It was a fun little spot to try some great Dutch beer. They even had some 0% alcohol beer for me- Bonus! For dinner we found a great Argentinian restaurant and I had the best steak I've found in Europe! No joke! It was sooo good, even though they had to cook it all the way through for the preggo lady... Even Josh approved. The restaurant was called Manzano and is on Rosengracht in the Jordaan neighborhood of Amsterdam. If you make it to Amsterdam and are craving a good steak, I would recommend this place!





Birthday beer at the Aren's Nest- they had 0% alcohol beer!! :)



Captain Dan!

Sunday the weather cleared up and even the sun came out! It warmed up a little bit which was perfect because we had plans to go out on the canals for the afternoon. Dan and Stephna rented a boat and we toured around the canals for a few hours. It was so much fun! Forget doing the guided tours of the canals when in Amsterdam (unless you want to know exactly where all of the historical buildings are). Rent a boat. It was only 50 euros per hour for ten people. Talk about a good deal!





my favorite canal of the day- there were so many flowering
trees, it was beautiful

Amsterdams version of Tower Bridge

Monday was crazy!! It was Queens Day and city came out to party!! Tuesday was great too- Josh and I went out to the Keukenhof Gardens. We have a lot of pictures from Monday and Tuesday so I'll do separate posts for them. Stay tuned...



I think they were testing this one for Queens Day