New Year's

We were up in Trysil again this year for New Year's. We spent almost a week up at the house with the family skiing. The snow was nice and we had some beautiful sunny days as well. It was a bit cold at times, but that is pretty normal for Trysil. We had wonderful as always and enjoyed playing a lot of games. For the actual New Years eve it was Christer, Ingvor, Sven and I. We had a nice dinner and then waited for mid-night.

At the designated time there were a ton of fireworks. I was amazed yet again on how many fireworks there were. They just keep going and going. We toasted the event with champagne. We got up early the next morning for another quick run on the slopes. The fun part about this time of year is that it is still pretty dark in the morning. So if you want to get the first run and leave the house at 8:45am, it's a bit hard to see still. But they do have lights on some of the slopes so it does make it better. There is something great though about being the first ones out on the beautiful snow in the low morning light. Happy New Years!!

Juldagen (christmas day)

Christmas day is a bit uneventful for the swedes. To have a bit of American tradition, Sven and I opened stockings that morning. We also decided to cook everyone an American breakfast of eggs, toast, and bacon. I think everyone really enjoyed it since it was gone to quickly! Annica and Leo then headed out to meet up with Leo's family. For the afternoon we relaxes and spent time by the fire. And much to my delight it snowed! A white Christmas!! I've never had one of those before. That evening is a big night for people to go out. So we meet up with some friends and went into town to a bar. It was nice to see people and be out on the snowy night. Such a wonderful christmas.

Julafton (christmas eve)

Julafton is the big christmas celebration day in sweden. We (Christer, Ingvor, Annica, Leo, Sven, me) started out the day by going to church with sven's other grandmother (farmor). It was a children's mass and so cute. Lots of singing and setting up of the manger. Afterwards we went over to farmor's house for julbord (chritmas food). It was an amazing setting. Lots of meat, fish, salad, potatoes ... very swedish and yummy. We ate and ate, it was very nice. I think Sven especially enjoyed it!


Afterwards we all headed back to Sven's parents house just in time for 'kalle anka och hans vänner' (donald duck and friends) on TV. This is a bit of funny swedish tradition where everyone sits and watches disney cartoons for an hour starting at 3 in the afternoon. The best part is that you can ask any swede and they all know all the songs, very funny. When the show is over it's time for presents!! We all went into the living with the treee and Annica played tomte (santa). She handed out all the presents to each person first. Once everyone had their pile then the opening began. I think I had the biggest pile :) All the presents were wonderful as always and so fun to see what everyone was getting.

Not long after the present opening we sat down to a nice dinner. We then had some time to look at all the new presents and relax a bit before the second cartoon that you have to watch came on. This one is a swedish cartoon about a swedish postman who takes presents sent from the rich and gives them to the poor. It's very cute and a very nice way to end the jul celebrations.

day before christmas eve

We are at Sven's parents house now. Today started off with putting up the x-mas tree, always one of my favorite things. It happens pretty much the same way, except that the lights are more like little candles that you clip on the branches. We also put up the decorations. Annica put all her porcelian tomte (santa) in a shelf in a row kinda like what my mom does. Christer also had the fun, but cold, job of putting up the lights outside the house. Just a few around the deck. Not long after he came in it did start to snow which was very nice. Unfortunately that snow turned to rain. It's hard to believe, but I do wish it was a bit colder so it would all be snow instead.


This evening we went over to Ingvor's mom (sven's grandmom) house for a jul celebration. It started off with a wonderful fika. Then we helped out by decorating her tree, but this time with REAL candles. Yep that's right, crazy. After that we made some swedish tree ornaments and other fun crafts. Then we had a bit of jul food. Starting with julskinka (ham) and köttbullar (meatballs, made out of Elk & beef). They were so good! After that we had what I think is closest to hot rice cereal, with milk and cinnamon. After all the wonderful food we then opened our julklapp (presents). We got some very yummy looking homemade jam. When we got back tonight it was time to make jul candy and bread for tomorrow. It all smells very good here right now. Can't wait to see what happens tomorrow ...

skating, sun, and friends

Sarah and Darren came for a visit from London this weekend. On Sat we spent the day in the city. The best part was when Sarah and Sven decided to go ice skating. There is a small place for skating not far from where we live in the center of the city. So we all went and Darren and I stood by the fire and laughed a lot while we listening to a chore of swedes sing away. On Sun we went out the coast and walked around an island in the cold. It was actually a great day weather wise, with lot of sun and not much wind. We enjoyed a nice fika as well. Lots of laughs as always ...

opposition

Today is the opposition to my thesis. Basically what happens is another team read and reviews our thesis and they goes through it in front of the class. We have a chance to explain why we did things certain ways etc. Actually not really that nice of a things as someone is critiquing all our hard work. But it’s part of the academic process. Today is the first day for the class as well so it will be interesting to see how it goes. We do them tomorrow as well and then for two days in Jan when Caroline and I have to oppose a paper.

Stockholm in the winter

Went to Stockholm this weekend with Jenny and Anders to enjoy the city during the holidays. We took the train up and spent the weekend in Sven's dad's apartment. We spent a lot of time out walking around the city. It was darn cold (i don't think we were ready for that), so we had to break-up the walking with being inside stores or having fika.

The city was so beautiful with all the lights. We found fun places to go and enjoyed great tapas for dinner. We also had a great Italian lunch with Anders brother. Stockholm is one of my very favorite cities, probably right behind San Francisco.

thesis done

Handed in our thesis today. Well not really handed in at all, sent an email with it into our professors today. So glad it is done!! I think Caroline and I did a good job but there are always things you think you could have done better. Really it just feels wonderful not to have to read it again, and again, and again. Yippie!