Thoughts:
My last post regarding our 3 week vacation raised a question. How many vacation days do you have in a year?
In Holland everyone who works has a right to 20 vacation days a year. But most companies have more days as they are part of the employment benefits. My company has 32 days (I get 29 days because I work 36 hours a week instead of 40), I believe R. has about the same amount of days. We always have 3 weeks vacation during Summer, just like most of our colleagues.
Lori asked if everyone takes the same 3 weeks. Some factories close for 3 weeks because that’s cheaper for the company than if everybody took different weeks. My company is flexible, everybody goes on different times but most during July and August because of the school holidays.
About the sign on the photo with the Wrap Tex Mex. Helen asked if there isn’t a Dutch word for it. There isn’t, we use a lot of English words in our language because they are hard to translate to Dutch.
Everything on TV that’s not Dutch has subtitles here so we hear a lot of English on TV. In other European countries like Germany and Italy they dub everything which is awful because the voices that dub look alike and it could be that Meredith from Grey’s and Addison from Private Practice has the same voice LOL.
Exercise:
Yesterday I wanted to do something as I hadn’t run or did anything else since Monday. I spend the morning on cleaning my house and did want to keep my run easy. So I took Bella with me and she did great. We did run-walk-run intervals so she (and I) could walk a bit between the run intervals. It wasn’t the fastest run but it was fun to take her.
Stats:
Weather: dry, little wind, 20C (68 degrees)
Distance: 4 K / 2.5 miles
Time: 00:28:59
Average time: 7:15 /km
Average speed: 8.3 km/hour
Last song on Ipod before finish: The Freestylers – Push up
365 days photo challenge 2011
Day 127 – Saturday May 7
Flowers for my Mom.
Day 128 – Sunday May 8
Someone is enjoying the sunshine.
Day 129 – Monday May 9
Rhodondendrons.
Day 130 – Tuesday May 10
Bella got a new toy
Day 131 – Wednesday May 11
At the movies
Day 132 – Thursday May 12
Children of the local basketball club in training.
Day 133 – Friday May 13
Our house seen from the back of the garden.
Fran wants to be a healthy girl! 
Europeans have it right when it comes to holiday time. In the States, it’s really awful–my first job out of college I remember havign only one week the first year. Thankfully, my husband works for a Finnish company so he has loads of holiday time!
Love all your pictures, especially Bella playing football!
Bella looks like a circus dog with her ball!
My son, who just got a job with a European company (Ericsson), gets 3 weeks of vacation right from the start – very unusual for the U.S., but it has to be because of where they are based. Nice for him!
Those country wide holidays are great. In Canada, we are eligible for two weeks per year unpaid. The first benefit offered at pretty much any company is paid vacation days but it is entirely up to the company what they decide to offer.
I can’t believe how beautiful it is over there at this time of year. May has been so erratic here. It actually briefly SNOWED yesterday. Gaaah!
3 weeks of vacation would be so wonderful! I takes a long time for most employees to work up to earning 3 weeks a year if you get paid time off at all. I am an independent contractor, so I do not get paid if I take a day off.
Those rhododendrons are beautiful. I really wish we had enough property to have plants that big. Some day.
Bella is so cute with her ball – it is almost as big as she is!
I get 20 vacation days a year and it’s flexible enough. I know that Dutch people speak English language very well.
Have a nice weekend, Fran!
Great pictures. The flowers you got for your mother are just gorgeous!!!
3 weeks … that is so sweet. must really be nice
I lived in Madrid, and a lot of places just close in August for a couple of weeks. Many people take good chunks of their vacation time then. At my current academic job in the US, I actually don’t get paid for the summer unless I teach summer classes (though I take my pay divided across the whole year instead of just the nine months of pay), so it makes for some nice flexibility. However, if I want to get ahead in my career or get a permanent post I need to publish and work on research for conference presentations, so I am going to try to devote close to 40 hours most weeks to working on that over the summer.
The house on the waterfront sounds like a wonderful place to vacation! And how great that Bella ran with you!
I think Europe has the right idea around vacation days!! I only get 10 days per year. It’s really not enough, espeically considering that our family does not live close to us, so most of our vacation days go toward visiting family.
I love the flowers for your mom!
One of the reasons I like teaching is that I have more vacation time. (I had two weeks a year for years.)
Glad you had an enjoyable run with Bella!
Happy Weekend!
So when is your birthday???
I loved the pictures of your house and the kids at basketball practice! I think I’ll post about selling our house and post some pictures of it! I’m a little sad to think of moving but it’s for the best. Your house is wonderful, I love the bricks.
What are you going to do for your big day? How old will you be?
Many beautiful pictures, thanks for sharing.
Bella is lovely and a very good mate for your workouts.
I have 35 days of vacation per year. My wife, as every teacher, has 2 months in summer, 1 week in easter and 2 weeks in Xmas time (lucky her twice: for the vacations and for…..the hubby)!
A lot of US companies start with just one week per year – and you have to work a whole year before you can take that week off. Where I work that is the case. After 3 years employment we get two weeks and after 5 years we get three weeks. By “week” I mean 5 days or 40 hours. So, it took me 5 years to get to 15 days/120 hours vacation time. My husband has been in the same job for 28 years and now gets 6 weeks a year – but he started with 12 days per year (vs. the 5 I started with). I’ve always thought Europeans had the right idea about vacations!
Love seeing your photo’s from this week….
I miss going to a movie house…so whenever I go home I make sure to go there…as you said…here all movies are dubbed into German!
Good morning Fran,
It was so good to see a comment from you! I am still really having a hard time finding the proper amount of time to put into blogging. I feel so guilty…I miss reading your posts. I need to go back and play catch up.
This is a lovely post. I enjoyed reading about your week. Fun pictures of Bella and I love the pictures of your house and gorgeous flowers:)
Enjoy the rest of your weekend Fran! Hugs!
How nice that you get a lot of holidays. I get a lot too but not everyone in our country does. Perhaps someday you and Bella will race together.
3 weeks a year would be great. I get 17 days plus 4 sick days, but I accure it so I can stack it up…like right now I have 108 hours of vacation pay and 4 days of vacation.
That is one thing Americans could really learn from Europeans–take vacation! It’s healthy for you. That is so nice that you and R. take 3 weeks together each summer. 🙂 I always have time off in the summer because I’m a teacher, but Nate doesn’t and can’t take time away with me. Oh well….perhaps we should move to the Netherlands! Maybe that pretty house with the rhododendron bushes is available. Ha.
He.He.He… I love the Netherlands. We get 10 weeks a year (we’re in education). But if we were in the States we would get 3 months off in the summer (but not get paid for them).
Leiden is a VERY nice half, I would highly recommended. It goes through very beautiful places and is relatively flat. Obviously, I can’t say if it would have been better organized than Utrecht had it been as warm. But the run itself was much prettier I’ll post the race report once I have a few pictures. Have a nice evening!
I don’t want to talk about vacation days. Since moving here, I have lost them all – by “all”, I mean the glorious 6 weeks that I had in Switzerland. Anyway, when we were living in Italy, of course everything was dubbed, which was weird, but it forced me to learn Italian very quickly. In Switzerland, there are quite a few dubbed programmes, but you have the option to switch the sound to original language – not all but some. We had a satellite, so it did not affect us so much. Here in the US, it is strange not to see any European programmes on tele – unless you consider Gordon Ramsey a successful “European” import!
In South Africa, you have 15 working days of leave and if you work for the state, you can get as much as 25 working days.
Reading through all the comments of all the different parts of the world and their leave, it makes me rather grateful for what we get here. I always thought that we get too few days of leave but now I see we get enough actually. It’s just with kids, one’s leave can get depleted quickly. Here in SA you only get 3 Family responsibility leave days for things like sick children or funerals. Thereafter it is deducted from you annual leave and then 15 working days are not enough 😦
I love the pictures that you have posted. I so want to go and see a movie again with hubby. It’s my favorite thing to do.
love bella and the ball
we normally get 2 weeks vacation and as you work up the years you get more. Although at my present job, I’m lucky to get a sunday off, those kids are slave drivers 😉
loved all your photos Fran, always look forward to your recaps!
One of the things I love most about my job is that I can take as much vacation time as I like. I get paid for about 3 weeks worth of time … but I am “allowed” to take off as many days as I want. Usually we split it up by making alot of 3-4 day weekends. Sometimes I’ll take a week here, or two weeks there. Though there has been some years where I’ll take 2 weeks in the spring, then another 2 weeks in summer, plus some extra long weekends, and maybe another week throughout the year. I may not get paid for it, but I love having the flexibility to be able to go when and as often as I want.
Wow…I love to have that many vacation days. We get 5 day after working for a year, 10 days after working for 2 years…and then after 5 years we get 15 days per year. There are no increases after that.
Those flowers are beautiful!!!!!!!!!
It’s nice that your country allows for so much vacation time. I have a decent amount of vacation but I have never taken 3 weeks at one time before. I think the longest trip I took was 12 days.
It’s great that Bella was able to run with you! I have tried to take Delilah running but she’s quite slow and doesn’t always want to run (she prefers sniffing). I have done a 2 mile fun run race with her twice that she likes. They aren’t having it this year though.