I will admit it: the last couple of months are a blur. Between the wedding, honeymoon, ear surgery, trip to vail to meet Ansley, and interviews, we are finally in Amsterdam! We landed and hit the ground running.

For those of you reading who may be thinking, “Why are Bryan and Hilary in Amsterdam?”

Good question.

Bryan is doing a secondment rotation with PwC, and working in the PwC Amsterdam office for a couple of years. He told me on our first date he would move to Europe one day, and here we are!

Updates:

We found a lovely apartment in the “De Pijp” neighborhood of the city, overlooking a beautiful park, called Sarphartipark! We move into the apartment tomorrow, and could not be more thrilled! Plenty of space for visitors.

As the primary form of transportation in Amsterdam, bikes are everywhere. Naturally, we needed to purchase bikes immediately. So, we did the second day. I am already on my second bike…yikes. Another lesson I learned is to lock my bike well and use two locks. Ugh. Thankfully my new bike is purple-Go Dins’! The owner thought I was obsessed with purple. When I returned to pick it up, he added a purple lock and bell. See pic below!

Bryan and I already took our first trip to Bruges, Belgium over the weekend. We had a wonderful time exploring the medieval city–with its beautiful architecture and dynamic culture. Exploring the city was effortless and our little bed and breakfast was so adorable.

Red, tiny, euro. Our new vehicle is the very best, and we love it. We drove to Bruges as our first trip with the car. The way there was filled with fights about navigating with a delayed phone GPS, and the way back was filled with singing and laughing. We figured out the Dutch car GPS. Hooray!

Bryan is excited because the car is a stick shift.

I am excited because it means I do not have to drive.

All in all, we love the charming, wet city so far. I am learning how to be patient, laugh through the mistakes, navigate with a paper map, be bold in making friends, and much much more.