Emelie
So this night Emelie called me, she was free and wondered if we could do something. Lucky for her I just finished making chickensalad, so she came by for some dinner. Then we had frozen raspberries as desert!
So cute in her new haircut :)Wrap
I do not eat junkfood all the time. This is an effort to healthy food. Kind of.
Shaw's
When we were in Newtonville we went to Shaw's grocery store. (Pumpkins all over, as usual).
I haven't tried these yet, but you see them everywhere so I might do it soon..
There were white onions (not garlic) and they were huge!
Here are some pictures of cakes, cupcakes and etc - they have soo much here and it's so fun to see!
(an exception - here's where you can take your food by yourself, how much you want, pay by weight or something)
Soo cool, an elmo or something. Reminds me of Arno playing "Call me maybe" in the Elmo-version: "Call me Elmo!"
And to the ice creams! I would really like to try hot fudge on vanilla ice cream some time!
Red Sox ice cream - crazy americans!
Ben & Jerry's!! (I will go to Ben & Jerry's ice cream bar some day!)
They do everything to make the kids eat....
And, as you can see, there are things for halloween everywhere!
Newtonville villageday
Julia & I took the T to another T to go to Newtonville today. On our way to the other one we passed Fenway Park - the big arena were the Red Sox basebollgames are. We didn't know that it was there, but will totally go there some time! We'd already planned to see an american sportgame!
On the other trainstation
A really old, ugly train. (It felt like Madicken when she goes to the schooltrip).
Movieeees!
Love!
Love!
Lemon with red raspberrytopping! Love!
Already? Haven't even been halloween yet -.-
Pumpkins made of fabric.
Oh, Arno would love all these ties...
T-shirts with Barack Obama!
The Police etc were here for the kids, but I looked aswell, inside and outside!
Karatekids!
We actually walked home after that. That is pretty far, but since we ate junkfood to lunch that was nothing but fair. Now my knee hurt and I guess I have myself to blame ;)
Thoughts
Now I'm sitting in my room watching Criminal Minds.
It's grey and rainy outside, a quite boring day. Arno's having a playdate after school later today so I won't go and pick him up. Thought I should share some of my experiences here now that I have time.. I have a lot of stuff I always think I'm going to write here in my "diary", but I keep forgetting.
I start to get more comfort with the english. I talk more and I always try to repeat the words I don't know how to spell or write. A couple of days ago Arno wanted me to read out loud from "Emil in Lönneberga", (about Emil with the soup tureen). He can get a bit frustrated when I say something wrong, but at the end he was more positive and cheering. I always ask them to teach me because I really want to learn everything. I guess I can be a pain in the ass for them sometimes. Atleast for him because I spend more time with him. But english is very important to me!
It's always easier to speak with the kids, since they use an easier language and they correct me like nothing, no big deal. Adults usually speak faster and more complecated - but that totally make sense.
I noticed that the difference between a passive and an active english-speaker is huge. I mean, you can know exactly how a word sound, but if you never tried to say it by yourself it's totally different. You need to SAY everything to get the connection between your head and your mouth. Maybe that is cobvious for you, but I didn't think of it like that before. Now I do. So I try to say the words and talk as much as I can, I can learn as much as possible.
It's really fun, I can hear myself talking with their accent already, and say thing like they do. You immitate more than you think. Well, my goal is to learn to talk english fluently, so I don't really care how. But it's kind of fun.
I also want to write about how well-behaved the kids are. I didn't expect them to be so nice, but neither do I know what I expected.
Like when Arno got home from school once and I had emptied the dishwasher (which is his/Mirea's job but sometimes I do it, and sometimes the parents do it) and he said: "Oh, thank you for emptied the dishwasher for me!". I didn't even think he noticed that, but he was really grateful. They are really good about saying thank you, and they are always so polite. They never argue, they always discuss things as adults. They listed when you tell them to stop with something, and they always say they're sorry when they did something wrong. Arno have a little hard to accept a "no" sometimes, but who doesn't? I must have been a complete devil when I was little compared to these. I mean, they never argue, so when they do I won't know what to do, since I never experienced it ;) Arno can tell soo funny jokes, and the kids laugh a lot together. He can also make this spooky-laugh that is SO fun!!
I know I'm only in the "Honeymoonstage", but what's wrong with enjoying my time so far?
In one way I think it would have been better if I found it hard and difficult here at the beginning - you can always make it better. Now I really hope it won't be the other way, that I started on the top and it will go down, but I don't think so.. And, if that happends I can look back here and see that I atleast had some good time.
My goal are to develop as a person, I want to make it through hard times, so I was kind of prepared to face a difficult life when I got here. So far, this has been a dance on roses and ofcourse I am glad for that. I love it here, and I am so happy that my family are so good.
This is going to be a great year!
Monopoly
We're playing monopoly while eating snacks!
Pumpkins
There are pumpkins all over - sooo american!
And it's still like a month until halloween..
Starbucks
Frappuccino!
Cheesecake Factory
Yesterday we went to CHEESECAKE FACTORY!!
Julia & Emelie
I took a small plate with chicken/mushroom salad, that was truely enough. Emelie warned me their plates were huge and they really were! So I was happy with my small one.
Dulche de Leche- cheesecake. It was wonderful!!
Julia, me, Sabina, Kristoffer, Martina, Ellen & Emelie
We tried each others but Julia's was the best - mango/lemon something!
Happy girls!
Totally worth it!
Rox Diner
Today I met this german girl, Anna.
We had banana/chocolate chips- pancakes at Rox Diner.
Treats Cupcakes
After Plaster Fun Time we went to a cupcakestore were you could design your own cupcakes!
Here are turtles!
So, you got to choose the muffin, the cream and the toppings.
Mine are chocolatemuffin, vanillacream with bones, pumpkins and legos (those that looked most fun)
Yummi!
We had so much fun, I can't believe it. My kids rock!
Plaster Fun Time
The kids got SO EXCITED when I asked if they wanted to go to Plaster Fun Time!
Totally focused. Arno painted a dog and Mirea a fat zebra.
I did a magnet with Noah's ark.
There were kids screaming and whining in the room and Arno, who really think he's a professional artist, kept saying: "an artist need peace and quiet, why can't they just shut up?"
Here are things you can choose to paint. You just grabbed one, paid for it and then got your colors. (there were SO MANY different things to choose between!!)
Here are the really big ones. Doesn't look like it since you have nothing to compare with, but the converse-shoe was giant!
She is sooo lovely!
Mireas zebra!
Noah's ark.
Then Julia showed upp with her kids Anders and Linnea - so cute!!
When you were done paiting you got to choose surface and I took shiny.
Seriously, I would love to have this castle as my next project. I hope it's not too expensive!
When we got home Arno made a hat and a bow tie for his dog!
September 26
Today the kids are off school. Some jewish holiday again.
Yesterday Arno was quite mad since he was going to have a playdate with his friend this day. I didn't understand why, he would be excited.. but after awhile he said: "I can have that another day, tomorrow I want to do the things that WE planned". He is so cute! (still mad when he said it). So today he planned that we are going to the movies - which I haven't talked to Lori about, otherwise he wants to go ice-skating in a rink - which i doubt is possible when it's not even cold. Too bad to break his fancy plans..
Today I start a little later since I will take care of the kids the whole day. I just came out from the shower and now I'm sitting here doing some research of what you can do. We can go to "Plaster Fun Time" - a place where you paint plaster-things like horses or other kind of stuff, that seemed pretty fun, but I doubt they want to do it, I'm sure they only want to do their own idéas.. Maybe they are allowed to their screentime and then they probably don't whant to do something that takes long. We'll see what happends!
About something totally different - here are some words I learned until now:
Charger, wheat flour, cauliflower, stir, refrigerator, cage, soup tureen, silverware, crochet, cereals, leash.
Glass they usually call cup and all kind of head-wear are hats (even though its a keps). Sandwich is two pieces of bread, if you just want a macka it's called "one piece of bread".
There are so many more, but when you want to find them you can't. It's just ordinary words, you've probably heard them, but there are so many word all the time so it can be hard to keep track of all. Atleast for me!
Klart.se
All american places have flags, but Sävsjö shows rain instead - ofcourse!....
Nightwalk
I went to Julia's place yesterday when I finished work. I took a walk and the weather was wonderful! Such a summernight! Here is some church in Waban, pretty close to my house.
This could be really fun to see! Maybe we will go to that...
...since we're going to Village day on saturday!
Here is Starbucks.
... and my bank - Bank of America.
On the way to Julia's house!
Softish
This is what we look like while waiting in the car for Mirea's dance-lesson to end!
Reading time
On Wednesdays Arno has Library at school.
He always walks and reads on the same time when we go home from school those days - it looks so funny.
And when we get home it looks like this!
Chipmunks
Look what I have outside my window! There are tons of them :)
Niagara Falls part six
This was the last day of our trip!
Here was our room. Even though it was pretty old fashion I kind of liked it. It was cozy!
Me in my new sweater, after telling Julia that I never took pictures of myself -.-
Breakfast at Starbucks!
Atleast I'm trying to be a little healthy if there are choises - multigrain!
We just had to go in to the chocolate-store next-door!
The falls from rainbow bridge.
These pictures are from the bus.
Snack in the bus
It would have been so cool to go by helicopter over niagara!
We weren't exactly healthy on this trip so this comming week we are both eating diets....
We plan to eat at McDonald's when we are homesick, but this time we stopped here and both Julia and I felt on the same time that we needed ice cream. That doesn't count as food.
Chocolate milkhake - soooo good, this is only the beginning!
Tired girl here as you can see. But this is the last picture of the trip! I had SO much fun!!
Talk to you later!
Niagara Falls part five
We took a swin in the hotel-pool in the afternoon! Wonderful!
And then we went out to take some pictures of Niagara Falls in the beautiful sunlight!
Then we went to Hardrock Café!
These were the best drinks EVER!!
Food (toooooo spicy!)
My new sweater!
And here we found a big chair and a tall man..........
If you go to Canada, you can drink when you're 19 (lucky me - not lucky Julia that turns 19 in about 3 weeks!! haha :)
Our car...
And at last, we ended up with hot chocolate at Starbucks!
Niagara Falls part four
Breakfast!
Here is Maid of the Mist (the boat-tour when we wear blue). We passed here on our way to the tour behind the falls, so I took some pictures.
The weather was cloudy and a little bit rainy, but it didn't matter since we got wet here anyway! So the weather couldn't have been better it you are positive because it was just rainy when we were going wet anyway. The night yesterday was wonderful and later on the sun came!
The line to the boat-tour Maid of the Mist
On the boat!
(this is from the other camera, but before the boat) I have my bag under the "raincaot" so I look kind of fat!!
Last picture for you, dad!
Niagara Falls part three Movieland
Niagara Falls part two
Here is when we arrived to our hotel Michael's Inn:
Even though it was 11 pm we wanted to go out to explore Ontario and afterwards I'm so happy we did that, because it was AMAZING!!
Our hotel!
The Rainbow-bridge
A sign of Niagara Falls
Beautiful, wonderful, georgeous Niagara at night!!!
I still can't believe how the pictures could be so beatuful!?
Here is the boat-tour we were going to go on the next day
Cinema with 4D!
Here we bought Ice cream with bubblegum-flavor!
We went to this Wax-museum Movieland (pictures will come in a different part)
She made hands of wax in a shop.
Hands!
Cool hats!
Jack and Will outside the wax-museum.
Fudge Factory!!
Live fugde-making! The smell was gorgeous!!
Burger King with Frankenstein on the roof!
King Kong on the tower (Sooo cool!)
Here were some random people that wanted me to take a picture, so funny!
Niagara Falls part one
I took SOOOOOO MANY pictures on this trip it will take the whole week to upload them all.
I publish different parts to make it a little bit easier, these are pictures from the way TO Niagara.
My lunchbag!
I bought some blueberries and strawberries at Whole Foods before we went!
We got snacks at the bus: apples, water, triscuits, cookies, candy and crisps!
One of the places we stopped at on our way.
In the line to the hamburger-restaurant
Here came the hamburgers
My burger with cheese and bacon and fresh vegetables
Hungry girl!
The Finger Lakes (don't really know what that was)
The second stop on the way.
Here we are at the Canadian side!
The stamp in my passport!
Circus
Yes, you heard right, I have been to Circus in the US - in our backyard..
This little guy is like a monkey, full of energy!
Jewish holiday
The kids were off school because of a jewish holiday this monday. We spent the day making our own books!
We wrote stories and drew pictures about monsters.
This is Arno's book:
Mirea drew a map of where the monsters lived (they were all relatives in some way).
After that we went to Newton Library. It was quite big (two floors) but the books looked well-worn and kind of trashy so I didn't like it very much, but i guess i will have to get used to it. Sävsjö has probably one of the nicest libraries even though it's small. But it's still fresh.
The book-covers were also kind of different. There were so many books there but every single one looked boring or old.. Well, well. I borrowed "Hungergames" since Mirea insisted I have to read it, and two others I don't really know what there were. I probably won't read them since I'm already reading "mamma, pappa, barn" by Carin Gerhardsson - good book by the way, i can really recommend it!
Anyway, this monday went superfast! I thought it could be kind of boring at some time since we didn't make any special plans, but we had so much fun!! My kids are just great, they are the best!
New things!
A green sweater and a green leatherjacket with hood (love them!!!!), a skin-colored sweatshirt with transparent/flowers back, and a black panties/bra-set.
A notebook that only costed $2! I had to buy it, it is brown old-fashion paper inside :)
Slippers from Laura Ashley I bought from TJMaxx. Size 6-7, I figured I have 5 ½ in my converse so they would fit - but no, when I got home they were to small, so now I'm working on to stretch them!
Do I have to say anything?
HAPPINESSSSSSSS.....
Starbucks
I won't start to drink coffee, but i'm very close. Starbucks are soon as tight in my heart as everybody says it will be. This is where me and Mirea hang out while we're waiting for Arno's gymnastic to end, and Mirea is doing her homework.
God, i love their hot chocolate! And I kind of felt like these typical americans when we drove home and i was sitting and sipping from my cup while I was driving... hello america, here i come!
The Farm Again
I felt that the last pictures of the farm were unfair, and I went there today again (with the good camera) so here are some more:
The Farm
Here is the Farm where I pick up vegetables for the family once a week
There is a white tent in the middle of the picture, here is where you pick up all your stuff. They have a slate that tells you how much you can grab of everything and if you can choose between something. Everything is really fresh and it feels so good that it's local!
It kind of looks like this where you pick the things up, but these are things that aren't on the list that you can buy too if you want.
This is a field with flowers. Sometimes they add that on the list of pick ups and you can go and get some by yourself. To the right here you have fields with tomatoes and other wierd vegetables i usually never heard of. But still, i like this place. It feels so natural and well treated.
Wrapping-time
As you can see - my paper is really popular...
Mohawk Monster
Here's Arno's present for Mireas friend
It's a mohawk monster made of yarn!
Isn't he gorgeous in his sweden-shirt??
Sunny day in Boston
Hello!
Sorry for my bad update, but you had so many boston-pictures last time so you should be happy for a week atleast.. Now i'm here and updating again! I don't really have time (that's how it feels), there is so much going on all the time. Today me and Julia went to Boston for some shopping. In the morning the weather seemed pretty grey and rainy (we kind of had storm here last night) but later on it turned out to be a gorgeous day! I'm just enjoying life as never before.
Me and Julia are going to Niagara Falls, Canada on friday and we needed to get a paper signed before we could go. We had to go to EF:s office, Lori offered to take the papers since her office is only 10 minutes away and since she used to work at the EF, but I decided I wanted to try to find it on my own (with Julia). So we went with the subway and actually found it pretty quick! Here are some pictures:
Later today Lori asked me what I thought of the office and I said that the fishes outside were cool. She told me that it actually were the people in the apartments over the office that always putted the fishes in there. The EF-workers didn't really care, but there were always fishes in the water..
I think it's pretty fresh and modern inside, they are really nice here to!
So we got our signature and went by subway in to "city" (this was at cambridge)
We went to this great Burritoplace for some lunch:
The birds had no problem finishing our food, they weren't shy at all!
Then we went to buy some frozen yoghurt (ofcourse!!)
This was banana-graham flavor with blueberry-topping. LOVE IT!!
Password on my blog
Soon I'm going to but a password on my blog. It will be:
"lösenord"
Remember that if you want to continue to read my blog!
Boston Special!
We had a totally awesume day in Boston yesterday! It was 10 of 10 points - a very wonderful day!
At first I was quite uncertain about go so early - me and Emelie were going to meet Emma in Boston about 10 am. Later that night I had the disco boat cruise so I thought it would be fun to discover Boston before, but I still thought it was very early in the morning. The cruise wasn't until 6 pm. But anyway, I met Emelie at Waban subway and we went in to the city (it takes about 30 minutes).
We walked around on Newbury street where all the stores are, took pictures like crazy and waited for Emma.
When Emma arrived we wandered around, just chilling, looking in the stores. I LOVE Boston, it is such a nice, cozi city!! It's wonderful contrasts with old churches and new skycrapers!
And here are some pictures of Boston Public Garden:
This is a man who sang and played a lot of instruments on the same time. Totally cool!
From September 11
Tourboats with a swan as the motor.
It was some kind of festival in Boston Common, when we passed there. We didn't really get what it was but many of the sellers screamed out "cannabis" and we saw a lot of people smoking so we figured it was some kind of drug-festival.. (when we sat on the train home Ellen (that we met up later this day) & Emelie talked to an american guy and he said it was something else). Here is a few pictures:
Look at the green-haired girl in bikini and... some kind of shoes!!
And look at the yellow sign to the right!
It was both normal and wierd people there. Both old men wiht long beards and families with young kids.. Very strange!
Well, it was a lot of people and the weather was gorgeous! It was very fun to wander around just to see everything.
We went to Panera's Bread for some lunch.
I ate chicken ceasar salad.
Here are Emelie and Emma.
Then we continued walking.. Here is Boston Marathon:
The Converse-boutique
Sweet- a cupcakestore
Robin's - a candy store!
This is jewelry from Forever 21:
And here there were street-painters!
Emelie & Emma.
This was really cool! They were great artists!
We met up Ellen, Sofia and Sandra who also were going to the cruise tonight. We went to Starbucks to buy them some lunch and then we continued to Pink Berry - the place of frozen yoghurt (how will i survive without frozen yoghurt when i come back to sweden?)
Watermelon with yoghurt chips! Yummie!
Here we are - the gang at the donkey on our way to the port for the disco boat cruise!
Me, Emelie, Emma, Ellen & Sandra. Sofia is the photagrapher!
Beautiful Boston!
Sandra, Johanna, Ellen & Sofia in the line to the discoboat!
Here's my ticket!
The view from the boat! i do not complain!
Sunset in Boston. We were so lucky to have the cruise on this beautiful day!
When the cruise was done, we went to eat at Dick's Last Resort. It was SO MUCH FUN!!!
The waitresses here are like actors or something, they are loud and rude, in a fun way.
There were live music and many of the customers here get a big white hat that they write jokes on. Some people get with balloons etc. The waitresses pretty much make fun of and with everybody!
It was really fun. Not my style, but really fun anyway!
Olivia, Ellen and Sandra with their hats and aprons!
This is the last picture of today. My fish & chips!
We had a really awesome day that I won't forget in awhile!!
Breakfast at Cabots
Me and Emelie went to Cabots to buy frozen yoghurt, but when we got there we realized that we were more up for a breakfast/brunch... I took a waffle with syrup and butter (butter, how can they just have butter?). It was good, but not really my favorite.. The only taste was sugar from the syrup since I didn't even had butter on. But now I've tried american original waffles.
This is Emelie!
Lovely Cabots!
We had to take a desert - here is Emelies BIG smoothie!
And here is my frozen yoghurt with chocolate chips!
Sunny day
Ready for a sunny day in Jeans!
Scrapbookingnight
Here's some pictures from our scrapbookingnight last week!
Mirea made this top of the cookie-box
I found these matchboxes.
I decoreated one of them.
Arno did a house of a box and Mirea did a happy birhday-card for her friend + the cookiebox.
Here is my matchbox with lace.
I planned to put some stickers on it too.
And since they were the family's I decided to take the eiffeltower since the love France.
Arno made this birthday-card for Mireas friend, Emma.
I really like the last O...
And I also did this one..
Marbells
Sorry for my bad update, but it happends so many new things all the time, i've been quite busy!
Here's some pictures when Arno and I built towers:
You are supposed to put marbells in the holes so it can roll down the way.
Happy boy before we break it!
Password
Okay, so in about two weeks or something I will put a password on this blog.
The password will be:
"lösenord"
So just make sure you remember that, or ask me if you forget.
Cabots
Today Julia picked me up to go to cabots. I love cabots, you guys that are going to visit me - you have to come to cabots!
So, we went there to buy some frozen yoghurt and icecream while talking about our trip to Niagara falls.
The menu
My goal is to taste everyone ot their frozen yoghurts. So far I've tried Snickers, Oatmeal cookie, Toffe/caramel and this one is peach. They have so many different flavors!
Cabots!
Do you see the sign up to the left, there's all the flavors of the ice cream!
Well, later today we registered our trip, so on september 21 to 23 were going to Niagara Falls, Canada!
So much fun!!
Schoolproject
Arnos homework was to do some creative cover for this notebook. He really liked the black and white background so he didn't want to cover it. Then he decided to just put another label instead, on this one.
So here's the result:
I'm glad he took that paper, I don't really like it and I kind of start running out of my nice papers since these kids really love scrapbooking with my stuff. Tomorrow I promised Arno to go to Paper Source in Wellesley to buy this GLUEGUN he has been talking about forever! That's not bad to go there on worktime since that is my favorite store too so far!!
Photoframes
When me and Julia were shopping we just bought basic stuff we needed. I have written a list on things I need and I'm so glad to be able to draw a big line on every thing I bought.
Later today I drived Arno and Mirea to their activities. While waiting for them to be done I decided to go in to a store called T.J Maxx. It was like a whole new world in there. I didn't think it would be so big! But there you could find pretty much everything you need. I bought these photoframes:
(this one is red/brown and looks a little bit well-worn)
This one I really liked, so I bought two of them. I haven't planned what to have in them, but I thought I could print some nice photos...
Tomorrow I have sleepmorning, since Lori has to get Vespa to the vet she will take the kids to school becuase she doesn't want to risk that i work too many hours if it gets late. I think she was going to work late too or something.. i don't really know. I'm pretty tired as you can see, I don't even understand by myself what i'm writing... But today i also did laundry (!!!) and now my knees are killing me, it's getting colder.
Now i will watch some tv before i go to bed (i can actually watch it from my bed). There are so many channels here, it's like a djungle to find anything! Good night, talk to you soon!
Shopping with Julia
Today was a really nice day, and me and Julia decided to go out shopping in Newton Center
Here was some american flag..
Tess & Carlos is the name of this store I think, they had a lot of nice clothes and converse, but only the short ones. Maybe i'll buy one of them even though i don't really like them.
This was in a little store with gifts, cards, wrappingpaper etc. Sounds like something I would like, but it wasn't very fun.
Outside..
Inside..
Soooo american!
We went down here to look at handbags.. The man who worked there repaired broken handbags and also did new ones... When we got down there there was crocodile-skin all over. Snakes etc. I asked if they were real and he poudly showed us the skin of a frog. We went out of there within two seconds....
A nice, (very pink!) cupcake-shop. I really have to buy one of those some day, too bad i'm not very into cupcakes..
The other side of the cupcake-store.
We ended up with subway in a little grass-place in the city... I wouldn't call it park, we don't really know what it was, but it was nice :)
This was in the front
We had a supernice day, here is the last picture - Julia :)
My house
This is my house (under a tree, the neighbours must have wondered if i was crazy!)
It's pretty hard to take a good picture because of the trees and the sun actually makes you believe that the house is white, but it's blue. I know, it's BLUE... I hate it, but what can i do?
And that's the car I drive - the minivan!
Crazy Boy
To mention
So. When i'm driving, walking, talking or whatever here I always think: "that i'll put on my blog later"
It can be Arno's funny comments, the schoolbus, a house or anything. There are so many different things that it is hard to mention even some of it.
But here are some things I remember for now:
-
The cars drive very close to you, both behind you and on your side, especially on the sides. They have other speedlimits here - 65 here is about 110 in Sweden. You drive in 20 when your passing a school (if there's children on their way). The roads here are pretty bumpy with a lot of holes and reparations, and they're also pretty wide. Sometimes there are more lanes, like two for example (the most common here in my neighbourhood, which is not very big) then you can drive in whichever you want to, pretty often in the left one i think. Atleast Charlie and Isabel drove there a lot. When there is a red traffic-sign and you're going to turn right you are allowed to drive as long as there is no other sign saying you can't and you have to make sure no other car is comming. There are tons of cops here........
-
There are tons of squirrels in our garden (and all over) and we also have chipmunks here, but I don't like them, they look like rats..
-
A typical streetsigh (the one on the top ofc). It's not very clear, but it's green with white letters.
-
At the grocerystore they usually have one entrance and one exit-door. When you get in there they have so much stuff that we don't have in sweden. For example they have something that looks like our swedish buffé - you can take whatever you want from a serving table, like in the school restaurant. It is all kind of stuff, like chickenlegs, rice, vegetables and much more. What's hot is hot. And you pack it like take away. They also have a person that pack your goods in bags when you have paid for it - what a service!
-
This one make me think of the US. There are a lot of them on the streets.
-
We also have two doors when we enter the house we live in. There is one door with nets against bugs and insects in the front and then one more, a little bit more serious.
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Seen this one before? My family doesn't have it, but it's still really cool! There are newspapers on every driveway when I walk Arno to school.
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Another thing is that they have special grasscutters in the neighbourhood that have their machines and goes from house to house, cutting the grass. It's just for the people who pay for it ofcourse, but i think it's a smart thing. Insted of having everybody do it all the time, some people do it as a job.
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Just another cool thing if there's a fire.
Well, I think that's enough for now. I know I have still more to tell, but that'll be another time.
Braid hair
Mirea braided my hair at the house in New Hampshire
Pillowperfume
When I got here for the first time my present from Arno was a pillowperfume.
It smells like cocos-something I think, my nose-skilles is not very good as you know.
Well, when we were down here in my room he asked if he could put some of the perfume on my pillow. "Yeah, ofcourse you can", i said, continued with what i was doing. After a while i heard:
"Oh. There's not much left in here now..."
I can't stop laughing, he is so cute!
Nothing special
Today I went to Whole Foods - the foodstore with the car. I'm trying to find to all the places on my own, and it's easier to do it when you have time etc. The car is pretty easy to drive after a while, i haven't hit anyone yet atleast.. Even though it's very big!
I bought some shampoo and stuff, also popcorn for tonight!! Well, wether Julia or Emelie could join me in my movienight, but actually i think i will have it by myself anyway. The family are going to the other house and will be back at saturday evening/sunday morning i think. It will be good to have a little time alone.
Here is a picture for Ida O:
Almost the same as what Sockerklaras have. I decided to try green apple..
Now I have had italian meatballs with turkey in it and a fullcorn (?) tortilla bread. It's really good that i can decide everything i want to eat when i'm alone (and otherwise too). I'm free to take whatever I want, and buy whatever I want outside the list. I really like it here :)
Scrapbooking
I think i'll need to go buy some more scrapbookingstuff, because these two really liked scrapbooking!!
5 september
Today was a really good day.
I got my nails painted of the PRO Arno, and we did a little scrapbooking - Mirea wanted to do a birthdaycard for her friend and Arno joined fixing an old jewelrybox.
Today I also met Ryan - my LCC for the first time. Lori and Charlie warned me about how much this guy talked, but that wasn't the first thing i noticed. The first thing i thought of when i saw him was how much he looked like "azerbajdzjan" - like he was his older brother or something. Oh no, will i never get rid of that idiot?
But Ryan was really funny, I was kind of trying hard not to laugh all the time. He showed me some classes to choose between and he talked a little about rules, safety and that boring stuff.
He actually talked about an english-class which many aupairs usually choose. Then he asked me how good my english were from 1-5. My answer was that that was a really hard question, then Lori said it was a 4. So I guess i'm better than i thougt (happy girl here!!). Well. After hearing Isabel, still speaks with her swiss refractive, i guess i can be pretty calm. And it also makes me more comfort that she doesn't know exactly everything, even though she've been there for one year. Sometimes she seems more uncertain about some stuff than i do. That makes my confident better :)
So, my question to you - that i really wanted to ask:
Who are all you people reading my blog?
I don't get it, i didn't tell that many? Did i?
Anyway, i'm very tired so i think i'm going to bed. Maybe i'll show you the kids scrapbooking tomorrow.
Update
Today was a pretty regular day i guess - i mean how my days usually look like.
Isabel, the last aupair came here yesterday and today we went to the bank to open an account for me (and close hers). After that i went to see Julia, we went groceryshopping and i practiced at driving (it's kind of getting easier).
We went to her house - what a big (BIG) fancy house! she had like a whole apartment at the attic.
Then i got home, talked with Sofie on skype and then me and Isabel went to pick Arno up from school.
It is very nice to talk to a person who knows exactly how this is, we could share things from traingschool and so on.
Now we're going to eat, talk to you later
What's under my bed?
No comment........
The neighbourhood
The pictures of my room actually looked worse than they are, so here's something that will make it up:
the houses in the neighbourhood.
The first day when we were out with the car i couldn't help it - i was sitting like a dog watching all these houses!!
They are usually very big, usually very american!
This one is pretty close to our house.
Our house is pretty hard do take pictures of, there's a lot of trees and such stuff in the way..
Shoe cabinet
Soo. do you want to see what i have done today?
I was thinking about doing something about my room - it isn't exactly glamorous (and i don't think i ever will be) but atleast i gave it a try to be more "me" and just a little bit different. And, as you know, i can be very smart and inventive when i want to..
So, outside my room i have a basement entrance and also a shoe cabinet. Well, i only have like three pair of shoes, so this cabinet isn't very useful for me. It's white and has many smaller boxes in it - why don't just bring it into my room and make it an scrapbooking-holder?
Here's from before:
I cleaned my desk and the shoe cabinet
There is is, so i have all of my scrapbookingthings in there.
I have now also filled it with electronic-stuff on the bottom line and i'm wondering how it would look if i added a lace ribbon to make the edges a little bit softer? we'll see about that. I'm happy for now, because this part makes the room more "me".
When i showed this to Arno i said: "you can only see it if you promise not to laugh.."
He nodded and went in to my room to see. After a while he said "it's nice but i find it really hard not to laugh though"...
First dutyday
This is my real first day of duty. Well, yesterday Lori and Charlie was away and i had to watch Arno, but that wasn't much of duty, we played monopoly..
So today I got up at 7 am, walked Arno to school - he showed me around and said hi to all his old teachers and the new ones. He's been talking about wearing a bow tie on the first day, so a fex days ago we went (maybe on my first day here) to wellesley to buy one. Arno is extremely accurate, so we were there for a very long time, but at last he picked one - a green one with designed leafs on it. It was a little bit funny because we were at a real design shop with armani etc, and i think it's great that Lori takes him so seriously. He is like a little adult. He is so smart and he knows what he wants. Anyway, he got his bow tie and gets so happy everytime he get comments for it.
This is Arno at his first day of third grade:
This is a very exited dude!
I didn't get his shoes in the picture, but these are his skatingshoes he is very happy about.
Lori had fixed his hair but then he began to shake his head and Mirea said: "Arno, why are you doing that, mom fixed that for like half an hour".
The answer was: " well, if i have both the bow tie and fixed hair it looks too proper. And that doesn't match my shoes..." He is so cool!
It was a little bit strange to see Lori and Charlie in their workingclothes - all this time i've been here they've had soft clothes like t-shirts and shoes like flipflops, but now Charlie was dressed up and Lori had heelshoes. I didn't think they were going to look like that, a little wierd and new to me.
well, now the cleaninglady is here.. talk to you later
Trainingschool
Hello everyone!
I actually can't believe that i have so many readers, i only told about five people or something but the statistics shows more.. but, that's great! keep up the good work!
I forgot to show you the picture from our little graduation from trainingschool:
And ofcourse the biggest one needed to be in the front -.-
But can you see me? I'm to the right with sunglasses and a white t-shirt.
Bedclothing
These are my new bedclothing (i will have to do something about the holes on the wall)
It's all white and grey
Pictures of Andover
Here's some more things about Andover:
You know the typical american films when they are camping, scouting (?), waterskiing by the lake - that's the way the place in Andover looks like. It is firs, squirrels, blueberries (in very big bushes).. And waterskiing, several times people went waterskiing - soo cool.
Another thing about our visit was that we bought a bunkerbed to the house as i told you. but Charlie wasn't finished until late so Arno fell asleep (so did I), so Lori carried him to another bed. Me and Mirea was sleeping in the same room, because her part of the bed was done. Anyway, so the next morning when I woke up there was a little person standing there staring at me. It was so funny, like when you watch a movie or something. He was just standing there - totally quiet. I don't know for how long, but it was still funny!
Here's a picture of two happy persons in the new bunkerbed! Arno was so exited he had the top-bed, but also sad that he couldn't sleep there for this time, because we were going home that night.
Here are some other pictures of the house:
This is the balcony with the view of the lake - totally awesume!
There's the dog and sunchairs (the lake in the background)
This is the kitchen
The balcony again. I'll take more pictures the next time!
Well, today was a pretty strange day I think. I got up late - skyping with mum, dad, grandma and sofie. Lori and i talked through the schedule and the rules. later me and Arno played monopoly (fun, the rules are the same!) and then me and Charlie went out for my first car-ride. Guess what, i'm blaming myself for telling them that i drove a campingcar because now they probably think i can drive anything - i'm going to drive the minivan!!
It went all perfectly good, but who knows what can happend? It's a really big car ;)
Now i think we're going to eat, talk to you soon!
Andover
So. First of all, I don't think i will update as often as before. Well, it depends on what happends ofc, but we'll see.
Now were home from Andover, New Hampshire (i can add another state to my list!). Well, there is SO much to say, i'm not sure i have time for everything. But let's start with the house - their summerhouse/vacationhouse is maybe two times bigger than our house in sweden. They have the lake next to, so the garden ends with the lake on the backyard. The have two docks where Arno teached me how to fish with a casting rod (very fun).
The garage is probably as the size of half our house, and inside it was very fresh and modern. They have a big porch/balcony from the kitchen/living room (the house is "sutteräng").
So when we were at IKEA (by the way they have all their furnitures names on swedish, so you could by the lamp called "maskros" and something else called "smörboll") we bought a bunkerbed for the kids and the "Malm" bed to the parents. I got Arno's old bed at the house (exactly like the white one I used to have at home before).
I was also free to pick out sheets and bedclothes to my bed in Newton. Maybe you'll see later which one i picked.
So I had a very fun time here - I played with the children a lot, even though Lori always said I was free, but we had a very good time. We'll maybe i'll write again soon.
At the family's
Now I am at the family's house - my home for a year.
After a long bus-ride we finally made it to Newton bus-stop. Lori, Mirea and Arno picked me up.
It was so fun to see them - they were pretty much as i expected them to be.
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After showing me the house we went to Wellesley (we went to a fantastic scrap/paper/stamp/all-i-ever-dreamed-of-shop!!!) i'm going to spend SO MUCH TIME THERE! After that we went groceryshopping. A very fresh store, reminds of Ica Maxi but nicer, with a lot of organic food. And i'm happy we're not the only one who looks on the contents about sugar etc :) All americans ain't fat!
Later we went to the coolest restaurant - like in the 50th, you know with the waitress going by roller skates, it was so fantastic! I didn't take any pictures, but hopefully i'll go back there!
Maybe you'll see pictures of my room soon, but i will make it more ME first, and i'm going to talk with Lori and Charlie about publicity etc..
Tomorrow we're going to IKEA and then Andover where the family have their other house (this first house is VERY big btw, 3 floors with pretty big rooms).
Now i think i'm going to sleep. It have been a long day and a lot of new experiences. Talk to you later!
NY pictures!
Promised you pictures. Here they are:
Our lunchbags looked like this!
Our guide (with my two roommates in grey and green in the background)
NY from the ferry (notice the helicopter!)
From the ferry
This also..
Do you recognize her?!
She was just standing there, so totally full of.. liberty?
On the ferry with blueberry slush-ice (life complete)
Golden wannabe Gate..
NY-buildings!
NYC!
Some high buildings
Trapeze school (practicing and acting for films I think?) Costed about 800 SEK/hour...
One of the pictures of the streets/avenues of NY. I've got tons of them but most through the bus-window so many of them are pretty bad..
(very bad picture of times square)
Times square
Times square
New York public library
NY
Top of the Rock
Empire State Building
This was amazing!
Top of the rock
Top of the rock
The GANG!!
The cupcake-shop where they bought cupcakes in "sex & the city"
We ate at "Pasta Lovers" - chickenpizza with BBQ sauce!
NY at night!
Empire at night!
