Andrea Mulder-Slater

by Andrea Mulder-Slater Minimalism is hard. And yet, it’s all the rage. I mean, everybody’s either doing it, or thinking about doing it. This includes dyed-in-the-wool hoarders, forward-thinking hamsters, and anyone who lives in a tiny house. Even I’ve ( almost) embraced the trend. For example, I know people who have watched Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things on Netflix and I own The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up . I’ve also held all of my belongings and waited for them to bring me joy. (And let me just say, Marie Kondo, that’s a lot of pressure to put on a pair of 99 cent socks rescued from the depths of the last chance sale bin at Old Navy.)

by Andrea Mulder-Slater The hour-long drive home from the hospital where my daughter was born was fraught with danger. First, there was my perineum (if you have to ask, you just don’t get it). Then, there was the night sky, which meant that for the first time since her birth, I was unable to keep constant watch over my infant. The bumpy road and unfamiliar sounds and smells led to the overwhelming realization that I was in need of another painkiller and had exactly zero experience keeping a miniature human being alive.

by Andrea Mulder-Slater I'm a Dutch girl. And so, when my editor at The Yummy Mummy Club recently asked if I would share my feelings on a Washington Post article suggesting that my people (specifically Dutch moms) are the most relaxed in the world. I did, and here's how it went... I’m five years-old and I’m in a small a town in northeastern Netherlands, visiting family with my parents.  It’s late afternoon and some neighbourhood kids are riding bicycles on the paths that run beside my aunt’s house. I ask my uncle if he has any spare fietsen (bikes) in the schuur (shed) behind his garden. He does, but they are all too large, except for one that – if modified – should do the trick. He and my father make some adjustments while my mother and her sister enjoy a relaxing cup of tea. Moments later, I pedal past the house, sitting on a bed pillow strapped to the seat post of a too-large Dutch bike. You can read the rest (and I hope you do) at:  http://www.yummymummyclub...

by Andrea Mulder-Slater We were visiting Volendam - a town of around 23,000 - where wooden shoe makers and cheese factories abound. It’s pretty touristy with a good amount of shops selling typical cookie-cutter Dutch knick-knacks like miniature wooden shoes, tiny windmills, carved tulips and ceramic cows that spit koffie melk through their open mouths. As we sat in the back of an open-air café/bar, eating kibbling and drinking koffie, we watched as several tour boats emptied out on the waterfront, delivering eager bodies into the tiny maze-like streets. Later on, our food finished, Geoff wandered and Jan shopped while I stood with the 4 year old admiring the big brown boats. That’s when I noticed a Japanese couple taking turns snapping photographs of one another standing in front of the picturesque harbour. Because I’m a nice girl with poor instincts, I offered to take a picture of the two of them together, using their camera. They looked at me, confused. If not slightl...

by Andrea Mulder-Slater I have a pretty terrific imagination, and by that I mean I can be a wee bit paranoid. It is this innate bent towards suspicion that recently drove me to convince my entire family that we were being followed while visiting a small town in The Netherlands. It all began when, while exiting a shoe store, I passed two smartly dressed men wandering through the narrow streets. I’m a visual person. I notice things. No more than 10 minutes later, I walked into a clothing shop to look at jackets. There again, were the men. The cheese shop, the bakery, the electronics store. The men. At first, I chalked it up to coincidence. But later, when I spotted them right beside my mother, my 4-year-old and I in the supermarket, I began to feel nervous. No, that’s not true. I FREAKED THE F*#K OUT. Me : Psssst . My mother (intrigued): What?! Me :  Don’t look now but I think those men are following us. Mom (believing me immediately): Okay, where are they? Me...

by Andrea Mulder-Slater Geoff, Jan, the 4 year old and I are visiting Holland. It’s the birthplace of both of my parents… a country where everything feels familiar, and most every face I see, is like looking in a mirror. It’s a country where my possibly abnormal devotion to all things black and brown makes perfect sense. Also, you can buy croquettes from vending machines. Croquettes! The shopkeepers address me in Dutch. I nod for a while before realizing I only understand half of what they say, and can only reply in English. I smile and tell them so. They say,   “But you look so Dutch!” It’s a compliment, I think. Which was not so much the case when a boy named Dave used to call me “Dutchie” in high school. Of course, he also called me “Inga, from Sweden”. And sometimes: “that cute but dopey girl”. On second thought, maybe he was flirting with me. I was never very good at picking up on signals, mostly because I was usually too tired to think straight. The thing is...

by Andrea Mulder-Slater We are moving soon and so, the cleanup has begun. As I was sorting through some of my daughter's toys yesterday, I came across one I had forgotten about. It was covered in dust bunnies - after having lived under the bed for quite some time - but it still looked perky as ever... Geoff, Jan, the littlest one and I were at a train station somewhere in The Netherlands, waiting for the next ride to Assen, where we were heading to visit the house where my father spent his early childhood. My d aughter wasn't yet two years old and this was to be the first train ride of her life (well, the second - if you count the trip from the airport to our rental home - but that was after an eight hour red eye flight and at that point, she thought we were all sitting on a fast moving sofa). For our daylong excursion, we had snacks, stickers and paper, her “baby” and her “lowdee.”  Still, to help keep my little girl occupied, I thought I might grab a little...