Ruby in the Sky

I’m the first to acknowledge, my life is pretty boring. I get up in the morning, get ready for school, sleep through some lessons, go back home, go to some activity of sorts or watch some series, if I’m lucky get something done for my homework, eat, watch some tv, get ready for bed, sleep, and the circle is repeated. Like I said, pretty boring. Not exactly something you could make an “a day in the life” post about. BUT this week, I had my spring break and, although it’s not Hollywood movie material, I had a pretty fun, busy week, so I decided this would be the time to give you a false impression of what the life of Ruby is like. Enjoy!

sunday

If I were playing fair in this game of showing of my awesome life, I wouldn’t have included sunday. But sunday’s funday, and to be honest, my monday wasn’t that glamorous. Sunday however, was great. I headed out for quidditch practice at the park (the last before the big event… drumroll…), and it was beautiful sunny weather. After practice I went straigt to my friend Sanne’s house to have a Jane Austen marathon. I gotta say, I prefer the adaptation-movies and the original books, but it was nice to have seen them all, and I had a delicous pumpkin tajine which I need to try and replicate asap!

monday

Monday was a day of studying and room decoration. I bought some new lanterns for my room a while back, but I never got around to install them, so this day seemed like as good a day as any to fix it. I had to construct them myself, which was harder than I’d care to admit, but eventually, it worked out and I think they look adorable on my noticeboard!

tuesday

On tuesday, my mom invited me to walk with her. We walked all the way from the Central Station to the Albert Cuyp market, and back again. On our way over, we stopped at Greenwoods, a cute little english tea room that has existed forever and was really close to our house when I was little, but I only discovered for myself a few weeks back – if you ever visit Amsterdam, go to Greenwoods. Make a reservation first though. I had a lovely big cup of soy chai tea, and a “slice” of apple pie. Now, when I say slice, I mean 1/4 of the whole pie, because that’s how much you get for your money. Okay, done promoting Greenwoods now, I’m just very much in love with the place.

At the market, I bought a tea can and a small cup, along with some tea leaves of different kinds. My mom also took some pictures of me while we were at it, but (I’m sorry mom, I still love you), snapping photos isn’t really her strong suit. Luckily, there were a couple of nice ones in there!

In the evening, my parents and I went to see Kingsman, the new secret-agency action movie with Colin Firth, and, despite it’s gross moments, I loved it. It was also my only “achievement” as a 16 y/o, since going to certain movies is the only new thing I can do with reaching this age. After the movie, we went for dinner at Bern, a restaurant/cafe that’s been serving pretty much the same ever since it opened up: Cheese fondue and steak, if I’m correct. Given their long history with both and my being-vegetarian, I can safely tell you that the fondue was great.

wednesday

Halfway through the week, my dad and I paid a visit to IKEA with the intent to buy some better knives to use at home. This mission failed, unfortunately, so we’ll have to go back soon, but a trip to IKEA is always sort of nice anyway, and I did bring home some new pillows to go with my little lights. Later in the day I had to go to work, and after that I was pretty tired, so I had an easy night in.

thursday

Thursday would be the last normal day of my vacation, and also my last chance to see the Rothko exhibit in The Hague, so that’s where we went. Unfortunately, all the rooms were so crowded that the art didn’t really move me, as it is supposed to. I did however see a beautiful picture of how the works would’ve looked in their intended place in a chapel, and the other exhibit across the hall, called romantic fashion, was definitely my piece of cake. The rooms referred to Pride & Prejudice and other stories of their time, can you blame me?! 



After the exhibits, we went for lunch at a chinese dim sum restaurant we’d eaten before, and it was delicious. I never used to go for vegetarian Chinese food, and now that I’m in a way forced to, I find out about all these amazingly tasty things, like mini-springrolls (don’t look at me like that, I never wanted to eat what I didn’t know!) and rice-pancakes. 



 When we got back to Amsterdam, I had to do myself the favor of stopping by the new Topshop. I will have to save before I can actually do a spree there, but I’m so glad they finally landed their own store, because I love the brand. After that, I bought some ingredients to bake a vegan chocolate fudge cake for my team… which failed epically. The whole consistency wouldn’t go solid and the result was a caramel layer on the bottom of the oven that to date I haven’t completely managed to get rid of. Oh well…

friday

A day of prep. At 4 p.m. I was ready to go, and we left for Antwerp. There we got together with our team, the amazing and utterly adorable North Sea Nargles, did some groceries, and went for dinner at a cheap but delicous Italian place near the city-centre. We had some speeches, discussed some tactics and went in for a way too short night’s sleep…

saturday

Ah, the mother of all days. If there’s any way to make yourself feel more tired after a holiday than you were before, it’s a quidditch tournament. try standing up pretty much constantly from 8.30 to 8.30 and you’ll catch my drift. The tournament was extremely heavy, included many injuries and lost matches, but also 10 times as many hugs and great bonding moments, on the team, as well as in the Benelux quidditch community. I was completely exhausted when I got home, and sunday was spent in pain and hug-withdrawals, but it was worth every second. And that’s how I started my important exam-week: drained, but happy.

how did you spend your spring break, or how would you?

Love, Ruby