During the morning, Margreet snapped a little. After her daily work, she had sat down in her rocking chair for a while with a glass of tea. She stared ahead a bit, looking at the bare wall, where she might embroider a tapestry. She saw a picture before her of a teenage girl sitting in front of an easel, painting.

She frowned: what an unusual picture for a tapestry. She actually didn't feel that she would be able to make something like that. Actually, she preferred to make something that would give an impression of atmosphere, without being a specific drawing. She had already thought of a color mixture, an interplay of colors. She just didn't know how yet...

She put her empty glass on the table, thinking she wanted to knit, but decided just not to do anything for a while. Rocking quietly, she stared at the empty wall again, her hands crossed on her belly. She hoped she would get a clearer picture for the tapestry, but instead the picture of the painting girl intruded on her again. The picture was clearer now. She barely looked like a teenager, maybe eleven, had blond wavy hair that she had tied together in a casual ponytail. She had a brush in her hands and tilted her head as she looked at her work. Margreet saw the painting she was working on, but only saw the girl from behind. At that moment she seemed to come to life. She turned her head and looked at her. A shock went through Margreet. That girl, she knew her, even though she had never seen her before. Her eyes, they were so familiar, those were Huibs eyes, just as beautifully bright blue, such a similar look. Huib could also look so dreamy, like he did this morning when he drank his coffee. How special!

Who was that girl? While the image disappeared, Margreet wondered how she got that picture and what it meant. Suddenly she became aware that she had begun quietly stroking her belly with her hands. Her thoughts flew to this morning, that she had felt a little dizzy and nauseous. Only yesterday she had told Huib that she loved to start the day in peace with a mug of coffee. And this morning she could barely stand the smell!

At that moment it came to her with a shock: I am pregnant! That teenage girl... that's the baby growing inside me! We will have a daughter, a girl, and she will love painting, she will live to paint!

The impressions were so overwhelming that she jumped up, way too fast, forcing herself to grab onto the mantelpiece to keep herself from falling through a fit of dizziness. This, this she had to share with Huib! Or would she race to the drugstore to get a pregnancy test? No, she just wanted to tell him, and see what Huib thought of it, if he wanted a test anyway....

.

She rushed into the barn. "Huib, Huib, listen up!"

Huib looked at her in surprise, but didn't get a chance to ask what was going on.

"I was just sitting quietly in the rocking chair, and then..." Despite being completely ecstatic with joy, she was able to tell step by step what had happened. She concluded her story by swinging her arms around his neck and giving him an intimate kiss which he only gladly reciprocated.

"How wonderful Margreet, how happy I am about this!"

"Yes? Really? Don't you think it's too soon? We're not even married yet, I've only just moved in with you, we..."

"It's wonderful Margreet, it really is! I'm so happy with it, and I love it that you received that picture like that! Wait, I want to show you something."

He picked up the sketch from the dresser and put it on the workbench. "How does this look to you?"

Margreet blinked her eyes for a moment. The transition from their joy over her pregnancy to a working drawing of a dresser was as great as it was incomprehensible! Until Huib enthusiastically started telling her how high this cabinet would be and what could be stored in that open section. When he asked if she liked it or wanted it to be different, it dawned on her that they were still working on the theme of pregnancy!

"I like it, yes, simple, nice, those open compartments..." She looked at him questioningly: "How on earth did you come up with the idea of making a sketch of a dresser?"

Huib laughed and pulled her into his arms as he continued to look at her, "You were dizzy and lousy, didn't want coffee. I sensed restlessness in myself, that you might be sick. And then suddenly this impression came like a bolt of lightning: she is pregnant! I was so happy! And when we were having coffee and tea before breakfast, I was dreaming, remember?" Margreet nodded. Huib told about the picture he had gotten of a girl on a swing, a little dreamer. He also told that Annerieke had known, and that they had been happy about it together. And he shared his idea about the paint.

"That looks wonderful, I think that will be a really nice color, not striking, but delicate, so that it wouldn't detract from all the things that are more important to stand out." Margreet could totally relate to the plans Huib had come up with so far.

"How special all of this is, how incredibly beautiful! So Annerieke knew it too! I don't think I need a pregnancy test anymore..."

"No, I don't think so either. Your period will stay away soon, then you have another sign that it is true. But should you still have doubts after that, just buy a test, no problem right? On another note: I was thinking about the walls of the nursery. They are so bare. I think we should put a wardrobe against one wall, on the left maybe, for clothes and other stuff. And maybe a toy chest or a cabinet, or some shelves on the wall. But where I had thought of the dresser, on the other side, that leaves the wall pretty bare. Would you like to embroider a tapestry for that, too?"

"I don't know, on the one hand I would, but then it would have to be something with cute little figures, so that it would also be attractive to the baby when she grows up. For the tapestry in the room, I had something abstract in mind, a mixture of colors, a play of colors. I don't think I can see myself embroidering something concrete, but I'll think about it in any case. And that dresser, I was suddenly reminded of that, would you like to make those knobs on the drawers there too? Danielle also has gemstones in light purple shades. Do you like that?"

"In fact, I was already planning something like that. I had wanted to keep that whole dresser and paint as a surprise for you, but in retrospect I think it's much more fun to be working on it together and feel that we both like it. And that wall decoration will come, we can't do everything at once anyway. What is more important, I now suddenly think, is that we are going to start with that extension, a washing and drying room, and a shed. I'll ask Simon, Simon van Dam. He was my father's best friend, and he works in construction. Great guy, he'll be thrilled to help us with that extension."

Margreet enjoyed his enthusiasm: "Just do that! But first let's have coffee at Annerieke's. Shall we tell our news right away? Also to Sjaak and Lisa?"

"Well, let's do that. It's great news, I'm sure they'll be happy about it!

Embraced, they walked to the guesthouse, to the kitchen.

"Ah, there you are!" Annerieke immediately grabbed the coffee pot and poured their mugs full.

"Thank you Mom, but first I want to tell you something. Do you see this wonderful woman here? She's going to be a mom next summer! And with that, she's going to make sure I become a daddy!"

The reactions were overwhelming. Both Huib and Margreet were hugged and congratulated.

"So that's why you were eating so laboriously this morning..." Lisa concluded.

"Yes, I felt really lousy, thought I was getting the flu, or that I was lousy because of my parents' behavior. But so it wasn't." She told how she had found out she was pregnant, with a girl, a girl who will love painting. "And swinging!" Huib supplemented, to which he told how he had discovered what was going on even before breakfast.

Lisa sighed, "How wonderful this is, that you get such strong impressions. I long for more of that, much more! I had it for a moment yesterday too, something new came in, and I was so sure... well, so I want a lot more of that!" She blushed, shocked that she had almost revealed what she had experienced between Sjaak and herself yesterday. Fortunately the others chattered on about the baby Huib and Margreet were expecting, about the nursery, the furnishings.

Lisa did not notice that Sjaak next to her had been looking at her attentively. Her discovery of yesterday and a quick blush on her cheeks... had she felt their soul-connection? It would be nice, then she would be able to recognize his love for her as something that 'clicked'. Sjaak called himself to order and re-interfered the conversation about the pregnancy.

"When the time comes for you to build, I want to help you again in my free hours. I remember well, how wonderful it was to build together, your house, and then my little house. When your addition is finished, we should go ahead and build on my house. We stopped at that point, I thought it was fine. But now that I've lived there longer, I do long for a floor on top, finally a bathroom."

"Don't you have a bathroom yet?" asked Lisa in surprise. "Where do you shower then?"

"Usually I don't shower, you can also wash at a sink. I have a kind of utility room with a sink, which works fine too in itself, but I'm actually getting ready to turn it into a full house."

"Will be fine, Sjaak," Huib said, "I hope to speak to Simon very soon, shall I bring your proposal along then? If he has time, we'll just work one after the other."

"Good plan! In the meantime I'll think about that second floor..."

"Add an attic right away, and you'll be done."

Sjaak looked a little doubtful. He didn't want to admit that he himself didn't need a bathroom and a separate bedroom, but if he and Lisa were to have a relationship in the future, he would be happy to give her that space. If he were to cave in right now about an attic, it might get noticed. Suddenly he thought of something: "Maybe I'll do that, put an attic on it. That would keep the worst of the heat out of the bedroom floor in the summer. And in the winter maybe the cold, I'm sure." Silently he complimented himself on his clever move. No one would look for anything behind it.

With that, however, he had counted beyond Huib. After all, Huib knew about their soul-connection. He smiled: Lisa would get a nice house when it would come to that!

To chapter 80. Garden center

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