November

So, over here, nobody really cares about Thanksgiving, which makes sense because it’s an exclusively American holiday.  Fanny wasn’t even that into tracing a turkey with her hand but I think she did it for me anyway.  There was no way that I was going to make an entire Thanksgiving dinner for the family on my own, so I made a pumpkin pie.  Which was a lot harder than it sounds. I went to three grocery stores on my island and none of them had any canned pumpkin.  The three workers I asked all said they had never even heard of it before.  But I had promised the girls an American pumpkin pie! And I already had all of the other ingredients! So, the next day I had to go all the way downtown to the English shop, which also has some American products as well.  I spent about six dollars on a can of pumpkin.  And I was so happy that I found it, that I bought three cans.  I better start baking. 

November near my home.

The kids loved the pie and I’m really thankful for that.  It was a little hard to be away from home on Thanksgiving, but I didn’t cry the whole day so that’s good.  Home also doesn’t feel so far away with Skype.  I’m also so thankful for the opportunity to travel to and live in Stockholm for free.  So even though it can be lonely sometimes, I have to remember that it’s worth it for this amazing chance to see a new part of the world.

A few weeks ago, I got the awesome chance for a friend to come stay with me here in my little cottage. It was so fun to show my friend Emily, who is staying in Krakow, Poland for the semester and whom I know from college, around the town.  We bummed around in Gamla Stan and had a delicious and expensive fika, a Swedish coffee break. We went to the world’s biggest Ikea and had the cheapest lunch in Sweden.  And I finally had some Swedish meatballs.  At nights we relaxed with the Big Bang Theory and caught up on gossip from home.  It was so much fun that next weekend I am going to visit her in Poland for the same thing. 

World's biggest Ikea!

December is going to be a very exciting month for me.  Next Thursday, I am off to Krakow, Poland to visit my friends Emily and Agnieszka, I haven’t seen Agnieszka since she was a foreign exchange student at my high school during my freshman year.  The weekend after that, I will be having a Christmas party with friends and going to the Stockholm Lucia Concert with my host family.  Also, I will be seeing Paul McCartney that weekend! Then, just one weekend after that, I will be heading to South Africa to see Tebogo Moremi and the stars on the other side of the world!