Jag talar engelska. Jag talar inte svenska.

hovfjallet and a view from my snowboard.

so....i am giving you a pretty view to grab your attention. i don't think this blog is super exciting but i do have several photos for you all!

...it has been several days since i have updated this blog, for that i am sorry. i have been trying to keep myself busy here in karlstad. especially on the four days a week that petrus is at work, today being one of those days. sometimes, i go on walks, i have been keeping the house clean and doing laundry, and petrus even bought me some knitting needles and yarn to learn to knit (he surprised me with this one evening, so thoughtful of him). i also, told petrus we should get a little beta fish (i need a little pet until i can have my penny lane again) and more plants to make it feel even homier in the apartment. most importantly, i have been cooking (this one i am really proud of)! i have never really had anyone else to cook for but myself and often, i have felt like it is too much hassle to cook for myself. i am excited to have someone to cook for AND he actually enjoys my cooking! at least he says he does... i have been getting a better and better about making just enough serving for the two of us and maybe a little leftover but still i feel like i have been overindulging in the food a little too much. i need to remind myself that i need to fit in a pretty, white dress in less than four months. at least the cooking gives me something to do. and i am in love with my crock pot. i use it two-three times a week. i set a new record for myself last week; i cooked dinner 5 nights in a row. i am not sure it will ever get any better than that. i am actually totally fine with that though because petrus is a fantastic cook (better than me, i think).

here is pulled pork and roasted veggies i made thursday night. success!

when i am not eating or cooking, i have been doing rosetta stone (the computer language course)(once again, thank you ben bittfield) in swedish four days a week. i am now on week four and almost done with level one. there is only three levels...crap! that means i am going to have to start using the words that i have learned and continue to learn everyday. this thought scares me a little bit. i mean, i definitely feel like i am reading swedish better and even starting to hear words i recognize on an occasional basis, but speaking?!? that is a whole new level that i am just not confident in yet. here i am, stepping out of my comfort zone again... being a big girl in this big, giant world. i am hoping by next week i can enroll in the SFI language classes that sweden offers (and that it won't be too late for this semester). i think that would really help me get out there and push myself a little more. i don't like other people to push me when i don't feel ready but if i push myself, that is a whole different thing. i need to push my limits a little bit.

we have green apples. duh!

getting "into the system" here in sweden has taken a little longer than petrus and i both expected, i think. once we got to karlstad, we picked a day to travel to orebro, sweden to the migration services building, waited in line for 2 hours and then spent the 10 minutes filling out information for my residence card. 4 business days later it was in our mailbox. easy! we then walked the 4 miles, in the snow, to the tax building to register for my personal number (i have to have this number to register for everything; SFI, insurance, etc.). that took 5 minutes. we have an up to 10 business day wait for the number...it's been 6 business days. i still can't do anything and i am still without insurance..for now. i took another big step that day. i dropped petrus off at work and walked all by MYSELF (3.5 miles) back to our home. it was very nice to walk at my own pace and just enjoy the scene. it was snowing but it wasn't windy so it was very peaceful.

on the train from orebro to karlstad (i was a little tired)

it started snowing again. orebro is a pretty city and this picture doesn't do it justice.

petrus in his office at work.

sjukhus. directly translated as sick house. this my former coworkers, is the hospital in karlstad.

a lovely little walking path that reminds me of robert frost poems.

walking back home. a path used often, as you can see. i was the only using it at that moment.

the lake.

a bridge. petrus was afraid i was going to fall between the railings and into the lake. i didn't.

hammaro kommun. almost home!

home sweet home. and the bike ulla (petrus' mother) is lending me.

walking from a bus stop to a friends home for dinner. so pretty and well lit :)

here is a random picture from a walk taken at 3pm. the moon was out at 3pm.

it hasn't been all waiting though! we have had some fun weekends. we have gone to the movie theatre a few times (which, FYI, is not as cheap here as in the US, something around $25 a ticket here for a movie) and had dinner with new friends, birthday partys, and one of my favorite days: snowboarding! it has been a few years since i went skiing in colorado and when we were asked by two of petrus' friends, we jumped at the opportunity. i have been wanting to try snowboarding for several years and this was the perfect opportunity as Per used to be a snowboard instructor. it doesn't hurt that the ski resort wasn't very big or too busy. petrus decided to try it with me. let's just say, he didn't like it. as soon as we got to the bottom of the mountain, he decided he was going to go back to the rental store and try telemark skis instead (which is what Lotta was using). i, however, really enjoyed snowboarding and picked it up much better than i thought. i hit a wall shortly before the slopes closed. my muscles were so tired. mostly from getting up from falling. it is not easy learning how to stand up on a snowboard. petrus and i got much needed exercise that day and it felt really good. once, we got back to per and lotta's apartment, we ordered a giant pizza, drank wine and watched a marky mark movie. the perfect ending to the day. i really enjoyed getting out of the house with a group of really fun people and i already look forward to hanging out with them again.

9am, on our way to the ski resort.

the don't clean the roads up much in sweden. this road was windy and scary. per was our confident driver

finally at hovfjallet!

petrus before he quit the snowboard

after picture. so very tired.

we ended the night with Per and Petrus spending 10 minutes talking like batman.

i will end on this tonight. i hope you are all well and keep staying in contact with me! you are all keeping my hopes and spirits up!
kramar (hugs)

A new beginning...Part två (2)

hello friends! here i am again, hoping part two will be as well received as part one was! i took a very long walk today (which i took plenty of photos on for all of you!) and had plenty of time to think about what i wanted to blog about for my second posting and decided that christmas was a good subject. i even have some pictures and video! so here we go...round two: ding ding ding!

christmas here in sweden is celebrated a little bit differently then christmas in america. first of all, all of the family visiting, the gift exchanging and opening, and delicious food happens on christmas eve. so with presents comes santa. he visits on the 24th as well. there is no stockings, at least in this family (going to try and start that tradition next year) and no cookies and milk for santa. hugo, petrus' sisters (sara) oldest son, hugo, is a bit of a worrier and he was a little afraid of santa. i mean, i don't blame the child, the guy is huge and he sneaks into peoples homes and eats their food. but he does bring gifts! hugo still believes in santa but he announced that if he didn't get what he asked for this year that he is no longer a believer. lucky for santa, he has maybe one more year with this sweet kid.

santa dropped the gifts off on the front step (luckily for hugo, his own mother has santa's phone number and called and asked him not to come in and scare the young man) and we began handing them out. this new family of mine has a very fun tradition of writing poems that the recipient must read before opening the gift. the poems traditionally have something to do with the gift that is being received. everyone was gracious enough to write my poems in english so that i could understand it but i think they all had a little bit of a difficult time with it. i thought they were all fantastic. here is a little example of a few of them:

"Emily
i hope these will fit your little hand
now that you have changed your land.
God Jul 
önskar/ Ulla"
 -She gave me some wool mittens. They do fit and they are so warm!

"If you like to cook a seal,
the first thing you need to do is peel.
The flippers and his cute little head,
maybe we could eat it with bread.
If you instead prepare a hog,
this is surely will be moist as bog!
Oink oink! Merry Xmas" (from Petrus)
-I got a crock pot. I might have squealed with happiness..

"God Jul Emily!
Från Simon och Fanny
The world can be cold
and you are not bold...
With this on your skin,
you can do everything."
-They gave me some thermal underwear. Very very nice!

i have a few more but i think you all get the idea.

for dinner we had all kinds of food. everyone brought something they made for dinner. petrus and i made the meatballs (which were a big hit), there was ham, bread, herring, dill potatoes (requested by me), pickled beats, and so much other wonderful things! (i can't quite remember what all we had as that was three weeks ago)

i almost forgot! christmas eve morning we went sledding!! it was a very beautiful white christmas in sweden this year. it really made me feel less homesick and more cheerful.

 a lovely view from the front of the Johansson's house.

hugo and wille sledding!

 

 petrus and erik packing snow for a little more oomph on the ride down.

 

a short video for your viewing pleasure. this is hugo (age 6) and wille (age 2) sledding. no one was hurt in this video.

 i think he shed three whole tears and then he was back on top of the hill for more. 

snow fight between hugo and me.

 he tackled me. i am not crushing him! look at wille in the background! so cute!!

 some of the delicious food being prepared.

 the tree we went out into "the woods" for. we cut and carried it back to the house and petrus and i decorated it. those are candles. this is one of the two times they were lit.

 petrus and wille relaxing on christmas

 my first glögg in sweden! homemade and delicious!

 christmas was expected to be difficult but it went much better than i thought it would be. i am so grateful and blessed to be around such caring and uplifting people! it was even better that on christmas day i was able to skype with my parents! it was there first christmas in 26 years without either of their kids. i am hoping that maybe next year we can join the two families for a christmas together!

i hope you all had a lovely christmas holiday! here is a very belated merry christmas and god jul to all of you!

A new beginning..Part 1

i shall start this blog with a warning: i am not a writer. i don't feel like i have ever been good at it and i don't necessarily enjoy it but as i have left everything that i know and completely jumped out of my comfort zone in a new world, i feel this may be the best outlet for me and easiest way for people to follow my new life. how's that for a run-on sentence? please don't expect my writing and grammar skills to be top-notch and i won't mind being corrected if you feel the need. with that being said, let's get this blog started.

most of you that will read this already know how i got here. to sweden, i mean. i met a great boy and he whisked my heart away and took it to sweden. i always wanted to visit here (my father's side of the family immigrated from sweden), and i finally did june 2012, but i never in my right mind thought that i would actually move out of the good ol' US of A. it's exhilarating, scary, fun, nerve-wracking, and difficult. all of those things i expected. i also expected it to be much colder and much darker (don't get me wrong, it's cold and dark) but it's bearable! and i don't hate it. it's nice to go on long walks and explore this new place.

i left kansas city on december 19th, 2012. after a small panic attack that morning, my family took me to my final meal in kc until may 7th. we went to oklahoma joe's. best. sendoff. ever. we checked my too big bags (both weighing in just under the requirement, at 49 lbs each. that was a close call) and sat and people watched and chatted for about 45 minutes. then came the goodbyes. i have never experienced a child leaving but i can only imagine it has got to be similar to leaving my whole family and all of my friends behind. we cried a few tears. once i made it through security, i just sat there and wept. i guess i needed to feel a little sorry for myself. then i made myself remember what i was getting ready to experience and who i get to be with. i felt much better after a few deep breathes and i boarded my flight to chicago.

the flight to chicago went as planned. no delays. no scary moments (except for the landing. that is the worst part of flying. always). i made it to my next gate with 3 hours to kill. at this point, i was so glad airports had bars. one glass of wine is enough to make me wind down a bit. i sat next to a girl who was in college in chicago. she was going to london simply because she never had before. the guy across from me was going home to cairo, egypt. i wanted to ask him so much because i would love to visit egypt someday but i just sat and listened. until they asked me where i was headed and why. both of their faces dropped. straight from a movie, right? i seem to get that a lot any time i tell our story. finally, it's our time to board the international flight to london!!

here is when things stopped going as planned. i got to the counter and the lady tells me there is already too little space and that they need/want to check my bag. they reassured me my bag will get all the way to gothenburg, sweden without any issues. i was a little weary about it and didn't really want to but i didn't feel i had a choice. i get to my seat and am immediately relieved to find an american girl of about 21 sitting in the seat next to mine (she didn't get up once throughout the 8 hour flight. win for me!) i sit down, notice that my seat light is on. something clicked in my head to reach up and turn it off. surely, it is one of those lights that you push to turn off, right? wrong. i am pretty sure my middle finger of my left hand got a second degree burn. the pain started immediately but i tried to pretend that nothing had happened. i am sure anyone that looked at my face knew that i was in pain as it went beat red. we begin to taxi to take off and i am getting light-headed. my whole body started sweating, my hearing is just a ring in the ears, my vision is slowly fading. i laid my head on the seat in front of me for what seemed about 20 minutes while the symptoms subsided. i was not about to tell the stewardess that i was going to pass out and delay this flight. stubborn, yes. stupid, probably. the thing is is that i have passed out several times in my life and by-golly i know what to do now. after all of the hooplah that had just happened in my body, i was fine. the skin on my finger swelled quite a bit and filled with fluid. to this day, that part of my finger is still numb to touch but it is finally looking normal again. great first international trip alone.

the rest of the travel day went quickly and smoothly and suddenly i was in gothenburg waiting for my luggage. two out of the three bags showed up. the bag that i was forced to check in chicago never showed up. at that point i was too tired and ready to see my man. i didn't care so much about that bag anymore. i filed a report and was the last person through customs. customs in sweden is a joke. they have drug sniffing dogs at the baggage claim. that is customs here. that's all. nothing else. they stamped my passport, after a few questions and a little joke from the swedish official about how great swedish men are, i was finally just a few feet from my new life. i walked around the corner and am greeted with the best greeting anyone in the world has ever gotten. i mean, 20 swedes with flags and hugs and coffee and tea and cookies, can it get any better than that? i was told it was just going to be petrus and his mother. this was completely unexpected and completely wonderful. i wanted to cry but all i could do was tell everyone i lost a bag and burnt my finger. i am now that weird, awkward american girl. luckily, they all ignored my weirdness and embraced me into the family.

on the way to lysekil, (pronounced lish-e-shil) we stopped at mcdonald's. my first meal in sweden was mcdonald's. i will never forget that just based on the fact of how strange, funny and ironic it is. i haven't eaten it since. i am not complaining about that either!

so there is my travel story. that is all i am going to start with. it is quite long and hope that isn't too boring. i am just glad to finally be here. i'm glad to have such supportive family and friends back in the states. not one person made me feel bad about leaving and i had two whole weeks of send-offs from my amazing friends. i appreciate that more than any words can say. i am glad to have such a wonderful swedish family that has taken me in and spoke english to me when most of them don't feel comfortable with it. finally, i am so very glad to have petrus here as my anchor.

until next time...