January

While I'm busy blogging, I might as well try to wrap up as much about January as I possibly can.  My gosh, people!  We've been busy!

So, Astrid headed back to school on January 2nd, and she had decided over the break that she was going to see if she could join the basketball team.  Happily the coach agreed and I got a text asking me to pick her up after practice.  She has enjoyed getting to know the girls on the team, as they are some different people than she has gotten to know in cross country and in school in general.  I can't keep all her friends and acquaintances straight, which she finds frustrating. She'll be going on and on about Jane, and if I ask "Who's Jane?" she rolls her eyes and sighs deeply and says "JANE!  THE ONE IN THE PLAY!" or whatever.  But she's got far too many people she is friendly with.  It's not my fault, Astrid! :-D

So basketball has become a consuming sport in our lives. She asked if she could watch the boys play one night, so I took Leah to see the game after vision therapy.  I grew up in a VERY small town and in the winter, the only thing you could count on for entertainment was going to watch high school basketball.  I had forgotten how much I totally loved it, so I spent the time teaching Leah some of the finer points of the game.  Astrid was impressed.  Well, this touched off in me a wave of nostalgia, and now all I need to hear is the word "basketball" and I'm all in!  The boys played at the local university during the Martin Luther King holiday weekend, so we went to that, and we've also been to see Astrid's team play a home game.  It was a close game and unfortunately she didn't get to play, but we had fun watching her teammates come back from an 11 point deficient to win by 9 points.

We also went this past weekend to see the Fredericksburg Grizzlies play basketball at the college.  A former host family owns this American Basketball Association team, and we have been invited to many games.  This was the first one we could go to and it was a great time.  The Grizzlies lost by one point in a game whose scores went into triple digits.  It was pretty incredible.  There was lots of music and dancing and fun.  So I'm looking forward to lots of basketball this winter.  It will make the time go by much more quickly.

Astrid also auditioned for her school's spring production, a play called something like In-Laws, Outlaws, and Other People You Wish You Could Shoot.  She started rehearsals this week.  It's going to take up a TON of time, and I am a bit nervous about that, but I am looking ahead to the end of the road when I get to see her on stage and how proud I will feel of her and I know it will be great.  If you are free the weekend of March 25th and would like to see Astrid's American stage debut, contact me and I'll give you the information!

Also as part of the school's activities, Astrid joined up with some of her fellow upperclassmen to participate in Canstruction, a local event to collect canned goods to donate to the food pantry.  Local teams assemble, collect as many canned goods as they can, and then use those canned goods to create a display at the mall.  Astrid's school collected cans for weeks, and then she joined the group of kids building a Nascar stadium out of cans (they called it Nascan).  She was amazing at letting Leah hang around her and her friends, and they had a great time doing the building.  There were a lot of great displays there, but I'll selfishly say that FA's was the best!

Also where school was concerned, Astrid had to make a video for her biology class.  It had to show the beginnings of the universe, the creation of Earth after the Big Bang, and then from the dinosaurs to humans in 2 1/2 minutes.  She decided to cast Leah as a dinosaur, and Leah had been practicing for weeks as to the proper dinosaur stance, growling, and more.  On the day we shot the video, I spent some hours creating a dinosaur tail, we researched what colors dinosaurs were (interestingly enough, many were purple), and serving as assistant to the director, the star, props mistress, meteorologist, costumer, and more.  It was a lot of work for a 2 1/2 minute video, but Astrid got a great grade on it and we had fun doing it together.

A rare siting for the Leahsaurus in the wild

We also took some time on Martin Luther King weekend to go up to Baltimore to visit Leah's birth family.  We try to see them once a year but it has been a while since we've seen them, so it was past due.  We drove up Sunday afternoon after church and had a great time.  Astrid fell in love with Leah's little half-brother, Baby Za, who is just 2 years old.  Baby Za did not mind the attention whatsoever.  While we were there, Tasha, Leah's birthmom, had to run out to pick up some furniture she had purchased on line and Astrid asked if she could ride along with her.  It turned out to be a good thing she did, as apparently there were a lot of stairs and the furniture was quite heavy!  Tasha said she would never have survived if it hadn't been for Astrid's help.  I think they had a lot of fun together.  Leah was happy to see her birth family and we had a nice day.

Afterwards, we had dinner with Bill and Linda, our friends from the cruise who we had seen briefly when we went to Philadelphia in the fall.  Bill brought his motorcycle, as a while ago, Leah developed a fascinating with motorcycles and black leather jackets (which thank you God seems to have faded into the background).  He let both girls sit on it after dinner, and Astrid looked entirely too happy to be perched up on there.  It was too cold for the girls to go for a ride, but perhaps another time!

The next day, we decided to take a little road trip down to Bowling Green, VA, where the movie Loving takes place. You might remember that in December when Claudia was here, we went to see the film.  I had wanted thereafter to go visit the Lovings' grave sites and "thank" them for their courage and integrity and faith and love.  I think they really helped pave the way for my little family's transracial adoption.  And it was good for Leah to see that the Lovings were real people.

It took us about an hour to get down there.  I thought maybe with it being MLK Day, there would be a lot of people around, but it was totally quiet and we were the only ones there.  There was a small path on which to drive into the cemetery, which Astrid was totally opposed to, having never driven into a cemetery before, but we went in despite her objections.  We had stopped to get flowers for the graves, and Leah charitably split them in half.  It worked out that Leah gave her half to Richard Loving and Astrid gave hers to Mildred Loving.  It was very sweet indeed. 

Almost as soon as she placed the flowers, Leah fled to the car, saying she was too cold.  Astrid asked me if we could say a prayer, so I said that would be nice.  First she had to school me on the proper stance for saying Danish prayers, and then said an empassioned and lovely prayer of some sort in Danish.  I have no idea what she said other than "Mildred and Richard", but it did feel like the right thing to do.  The graves are very peaceful and I was glad we went.  That evening, we went to see the movie Hidden Figures, which I don't mind telling you was absolutely incredible.  It was so affirming to see those ladies in action and I hope Leah got a lot out of seeing smart, strong black women doing incredible things. I think I only cried about 6 times.  It is an absolute must-see movie, we all agreed.

Now, you may have heard that there was a hotly contested presidential election here in the US in November, and many people are very unhappy about the results.  I am one of those many people.  This past weekend, we had a chance to get very politically active.  AFS had warned host families that it advised against the students participating in demonstrations due to safety concerns and we were to take that under advisement in making plans for how we would witness history. 

Friday here in Fredericksburg, some people organized a silent inauguration.  The idea was for us to assemble in the local park and at the moment when the president took the oath of office, we would observe a 15 minute silence.  I took both girls out of school early and took them down to the protest, as I felt that it was important that they witness history.  As we all feel generally the same way, it was good they used their presence to voice their opposition to the regime.  The event was very moving.  It was attended by many friends of ours.  It was pouring rain, so there were lots of umbrellas, but everyone was happy to be together to support each other in our nation's darkest hours.  Rev. Doug from our church was the keynote speaker and there were lots of reporters and press there to cover the event.  You can read about it here. If you click through the pictures, you'll see one of Leah standing by herself, and you can see Astrid's scarf in the background. :)

On Saturday was the Women's March on Washington.  I decided I would use an abundance of caution but that we were not sitting out the march at home.  I had no doubt it would be historic and I wanted to go and I wanted my girls to go.  We spent Friday evening making signs and Astrid came up with her own lovely sentiments.  On Saturday morning, we drove up to my sister's, met up with her family, and caravaned up to the Metro, which we rode into DC.  Spirits were high and we met amazing women from all over the place, just on the train ride.    We got to the march site and unfortunately, Leah immediately had to go to the bathroom.  I took her and we were thus separated from our group.  I spent much of the day in a panic of what was going on with Astrid, but it turned out she had a great day with my sister and her family.  You'll have to ask her about it, I wasn't there. :)

We were all reunited later in the day at the cars and everything was fine.  As you all know there were no reports of violence, it was peaceful, and it was a truly incredible day full of spirit and resistance.  I would not want to be the current administration right now, to be sure.

The one picture I got of us all on Independence Ave. before we were separated.

On Monday, we had the opportunity to express our opinions in Richmond at the state government level.  In the late summer/early fall (Astrid was here, so I know it wasn't too early in the year), the UU hosted a speaker from One Virginia 2021 to speak about the situation in Virginia with gerrymandering.  Gerrymandering is a situation in which the politicans carve up the maps of the state to make it so that they are more likely to win elections.  Thus, the politicians choose us, we don't choose them.  They decide where to draw the voting lines and determine who votes in which areas.  Virginia is the fifth most gerrymandered state in the US, and we had the opportunity on Monday to go to Lobbying Day at the State Capitol to speak with our lawmakers about the situation and encourage them to support two bills that would allow for non-partisan redistricting of the state.  I decided to take both girls to Lobbying Day.  It was a unique opportunity for them to meet our elected officials and to get to observe the state Senate in action as we had been invited into the gallery.  We drove down to Richmond at 6:30AM Monday morning, far earlier than the girls even have to get out of bed for school, and attended a training on redistricting before heading out to see our lawmakers with others from our area.  Our first meeting was with Delegate Bill Howell, who is our representative in the Virginia House and is also the Speaker of the House for the state of Virginia.  It didn't go well, as he had no interest in non-partisan redistricting.  He likes the system as it is, largely because he can count on his own job security.  But it was good to meet him and we got an education on lobbying.  Our second appointment for the day was with Senator Richard Stuart, who was unfortunately unavailable.  We were able to meet with his legislative aide, O. T. Crowther, however, and have a conversation with him about the importance of redistricting along non-partisan lines, and he was actually quite open to the idea.  The girls got a picture with Mr. Crowther afterwards and he was very good to speak with and a good listener.  He didn't realize Astrid wasn't American, so he encouraged her to register to vote and he also encouraged Leah to be a voter, which I thought was extremely moving.

Afterwards, we went up into the Senate chamber at the Virginia State House and witnessed the Senate in action for a short time.  The members of our group were welcomed and publicly acknowledged, and that was pretty neat.  They even introduced "Susan Kosior and her two daughters".  :)

Afterwards, we went to the Marshall building for lunch and a debriefing and then on home.  It was a fascinating day--I was absolutely terrified as I don't know anything about lobbying and talking with politicans, but I learned a great deal and I think the girls did as well.  I was very pleased we went.

So now they are back in school and things are hopefully settling down a bit.  As we head into February, we will have play practice and basketball, and thankfully winter break when we are heading south to see Savannah GA where Forrest Gump was filmed.  Mama needs some sunlight and warm weather--the girls can tell you I've been a bit grumpy lately!  Other things on the horizon for this busy family include a benefit for St. Jude's Hospital, more political action/organizing, Lukas Graham in concert, a chili cook off, upcoming AFS mid-winter orientaton weekend and a ski trip, movies, birthdays, and more.  Stay tuned!

Christmas & New Years!

It seems impossible that Christmas has come and gone, and with it the new year is upon us, we have crossed the halfway point in our exchange, and I haven't managed to update my blog once.  With February closing in on us very quickly, I figured I'd better get moving and get this blog updated!

Christmas vacation lasted three weeks between the two girls' opposing school schedules.  It was exhausting and hectic and crazy, but I loved having special time with each of them separately and together.  I was also happy to send them both back to school, although I haven't had a whole lot of peace and quiet even with both girls out of the house all day!  :-)

During the break, we had a blast doing a lot of different things and just spending time together. On the 23rd, my friend Linda from the UU invited us to go back to Paul's Bakery to see the lights and go out for a snack afterwards.  The girls got to see Santa again and he gave them each little craft kits as a present.  Santa and Mrs. Claus were adorable at Paul's.  Astrid did NOT stuff herself into the reindeer carts this time, however.

One of the things Astrid was most worked up about spending Christmas in America is that we don't open our presents and have a special meal on December 24th.  I couldn't understand why the Danes (and many Europeans) do this, because what is the point of Christmas Day then?  If everything good happens the night before Christmas, why celebrate on Christmas itself?  We had many debates about this, and finally I told Astrid that we would celebrate Danish Christmas on the 24th.  She could plan a special meal, talk with her family, and we would open the presents that were pouring in from her family around the world.  So that is what we chose to do.  We were due to have a friend over for dinner, and he declined to eat the traditional Danish Christmas duck, so we went with the traditional Danish Christmas roasted pork.  Astrid's menu also included some potatoes that were cooked in butter and sugar, red cabbage and orange salad, and rice pudding.  She worked so hard and everything was really delicious and beautiful.  She was inventive on new ways to use the oven which I had never seen before :)

I don't think anyone has ever cooked meat directly on the oven rack.  But she did and it was incredible.  The top didn't come out quite as she wanted--the fatty part of the pork is supposed to be quite crispy when it's all done, so we put it under the broiler for a few minutes and it was fine.  I have to confess that it was as delicious a Christmas Eve meal as any I have had before, and I didn't miss the traditional Kosior seafood feast that we usually have.

After dinner, we went over to the UU for a Christmas Eve service.  I was singing with the choir and leading the service as worship associate, so I had many tasks to complete that evening.  Both girls were as good as gold, and the service was one of the best I have ever attended.  The girls ran through the halls and rooms of the church snapping pictures with friend, chasing The Bup around, and generally having fun.  The music and readings were beautiful, Reverend Doug gave a wonderful sermon, and we had a very moving and sweet candlelit version of Silent Night together.  It was a wonderful evening.

Astrid recently told me that she was kind of nervous when she read in our application that we attended church every week, because in Denmark that would probably mean you were part of a cult, but that once she started coming, she found she enjoys  it.  I find that hilarious--maybe it IS a cult, but one I'm glad to be a part of.  hehe

After the service, we went home and I let the girls open some gifts.  They enjoyed that very much--for Leah it was a BIG treat.  I bought them each pajamas to wear for Christmas Eve, but unfortunately Leah's were an adult medium, and Astrid's cousin or aunt or someone sent her footie pajamas that she immediately put on and refused to take off for about 3 weeks, so I guess I need to up my pajama game! :-)  Then it was time for bed.  Leah announced that this was the year she was going to catch Santa in the act and she was going to stay up all night under the tree and wait till he came down the chimney.  Needless to say, this raised my blood pressure tremendously.  I let her do it though, and went to bed, setting my alarm for nearly 2AM.  I got up and tiptoed downstairs and found a sweet scene--Astrid and Leah curled up together, sound asleep under the Christmas tree.  I did my best to quietly put the presents under the tree and hang up their newly filled stockings, but Astrid woke up.  It was just as well, as she was able to help me bring everything downstairs and make sure Leah stayed asleep.  A friend told me about an app that would photoshop Santa into a picture of your house, which I got, but I must say, Leah was not fooled in the least by this the next morning.

Christmas morning was a riot of gift opening.  The girls were especially excited to get a new Wii U--our old Wii had died a painful death just before Astrid arrived, making it useless for anything other than pulling in Netflix on the TV.  Leah was at an age where not only did she enjoy playing the Wii, she was getting quite good at it, so she really missed it.  They also both got tons of make up, Orbeez, clothes, and promises of upcoming trips which they are both very excited about (and so am I!).

After gift opening, we got ourselves ready for breakfast and then my sister and her family arrived in the afternoon, as well as my mom and her husband.  We had another big round of opening gifts before sitting down to a traditional meal of roast beef, yorkshire pudding, and trifle.  It was a wonderful day indeed.

Just before New Year's Eve, my niece Dot came to stay.  I wanted to take everyone to the Ginter Gardens for the light show, something my dad and I started doing years ago and a tradition I have enjoyed keeping up with Leah and Ine and Dot and whoever else has been around.  We had a nice day together, as I introduced the girls to Waffle House for breakfast, and then we went over to my mom's for a while so the girls could see their Nana.  We had lunch there, which was fun and then headed down to Richmond when it started to get dark after dinner.  The Ginter Gardens partners with the electric company to put more than a half million lights up all around the gardens. There is a maze made entirely of Christmas lights, there are animals and statues made of lights, and all the trees are draped with lights.  It is truly an incredible thing to see.  We bundled up as the temperatures were quite cold, and headed off into the night.  The girls were especially delighted by the maze and the tree house you can climb into and keeping up with them was nearly impossible.  I love the greenhouses with the giant trees (the first picture on this post was taken in the Ginter greenhouse) and the animal dioramas and the beautiful flowers they tend to year-round.  It is a real spectacle, to say the least.

Let's see, what else did we do during Christmas Break?

Well, Leah started with a new mentor with Big Brothers Big Sisters.  Her new "big" is named Megan.  Astrid admitted she felt a bit jealous of how happy Leah was to go off with Megan, because Megan is a special once-a-week friend and it's easy to have fun for a few hours each week.  So I suggested Astrid plan a special activity to remind Leah that she can be fun too.  She thought that was a great idea, so she decided to take Leah to SkyZone Trampoline Park.  They went for 90 minutes.  Frankly, they were done after about 45.  All that jumping is a lot of hard work.  But I think they had a good time!

Starting on December 30, we were the darlings of the New Year's party scene.  We went to a party at my friend Susan's house on the 30th, billed as a New Year's Eve Eve party.  there were a lot of UU's there and of course, it was packed and there was tons of good food and friendship.  Susan opened up her basement for Leah and Astrid to go play with the Wii and they discovered the joys of Wii Fit.  Afterwards, we headed to the UU for a kirtan, which is a sort of religious performance art with drums and singing and chanting.  My friend Cindy from Northern Virginia came down, and afterwards I dropped the girls off at home and went to a late night snack with Cindy.

The next day, it was time to bring Leah to my sister's home.   We always meet at the Marine Corps Museum in Quantico to do a kid swap.  Astrid was very interested in going into the building as we have only ever seen it in the parking lot, so we went in and checked it out.  I've been there several times, but always get lost and discover something new, so it was fun to go in there and see what was new and interesting.  They are expanding the museum, I think, so it will continue to grow and develop for years to come.  Astrid found a 'Marine' and helped raise a flag over captured WWII territory.  We touched a piece of the Pentagon and the World Trade Center from 9/11.  It was a nice little break, and fortunately quite warm, as it was FREEZING outside!





Afterwards, we headed to my friends Amy and Tom's New Years Eve game night.  It was a lot of fun. Astrid had been once, and didn't care for it, so she said she didn't think she would go.  I told her I wouldn't leave her home alone on New Year's Eve, so I would stay home with her.  Consequently she decided to go, especially after I pointed out that she had only gone right when she first arrived and everything was crazy.  Happily, she really enjoyed herself this time!  She also introduced us to the time honored Danish New Year's tradition of jumping off a chair at midnight.  I'm not sure what the significance is, but she and I jumped off a chair at the stroke of midnight and she and Tom then jumped off a chair as well.  It was dark, so I'm sorry that my picture isn't better!  We played a bunch of games, but one I really came to enjoy was called Ticket to Ride.  My friend Linda met us there as well, so that we had a nice crew of people playing games and didn't leave till nearly 1AM.

On New Year's Day we had another party to go to, this one at the home of another friend named Amy.  She had a pile of people from the UU over for the traditional southern New Year's meal of black eyed peas and cornbread and greens.  We enjoyed visiting with some of the same UU's as Susan's party, and also some other friends who came to this party.  We were quite tired after all this partying, and Astrid had to start school the next day. I called my sister's to see what was going on, and Leah asked if she could stay another day, which I agreed to as her school didn't start back till January 3rd.  Astrid and I took advantage of the night off by going to see the movie La La Land, which we both liked.  We considered Star Wars, but ultimately wound up with a singing and dancing Ryan and Emma and no regrets.

The next day, Astrid happily went back to school.  She had only managed to get together with her friends once--doing a gift swap with some of her "squad" (as she calls it) one night while Dot was visiting.  We had a lovely time together, but it was definitely time for school to start again, as she hadn't been in school since December 15th when exams finished.  I went to my sister's for our 4th New Year's party and retrieved Leah and came home.

Finally, on Saturday, January 7th, we had our final Christmas celebration by hosting a Feast of the 3 Kings feast at our home.  I had offered this as a service auction for the UU--my final item and I was glad!  We had 35 people coming to dinner to cram into the house, and I offered each of the girls $20 for their vacation fund if they did all the chores on the chore list I had setup for them to do.  Happily they each did their chores and I happily paid into their funds.  Astrid asked if she could invite a friend to come and wound up inviting Dipthi and her friend Sophia from school, but Sophia was in Colorado skiing, so she couldn't make it.  Dipthi came for the weekend and we had a great time.  The party was a smashing success--we managed as usual to have 35 people all sit down together and eat at the same time together, a feat which never ceases to impress me when I pull it off. 

There were lots of leftovers when all was said and done, and everyone was extremely complimentary about the food and the atmosphere.  It had snowed during the day so we were worried that people would want to cancel, but instead, everyone said they were coming.  UU's are hearty folk!!  I was relieved, as it would have been hard to put everything on ice and cook it the next day without my sister's help.

After the majority of people left and I got Leah to bed, my friend Andy pulled out his copy of the game The Village Crone for us to all learn.  I thought I would be way too exhausted, but it was actually a blast.  For some reason, Astrid decided she needed to learn to talk with a southern accenet--she is obsessed with not sounding Danish--so we tried to teach her.  It was hilarious.  She had the worst time with the world "you're" which when pronounced in a more southern way would sound like "yer" which rhymes with the world "fur".  Dipthi had no trouble with it, but it took me making the connection with the rhyming words to help Astrid get it.  It was a riot.

I've been so pleased that even though we were 'only' Dipthi's welcome family, she has continued to be such a big part of our lives.  She is such a sweetheart.  It was nice to have her over.

The next day, the Moores, Dipthi's host family, met up with us at the UU for services.  Then we sent Dipthi home and the Christmas season was officially over.  It was blissful, exhausting, at times stressful, and crazy, but I thoroughly enjoyed every single minute of it.

I hope you enjoyed this update and stay tuned for our January wrap up in short order! :)

The Best of Times, the Worst of Times

Well, November has come and gone.  I had intended to update the blog every 2 weeks, but unfortunately, I have never found the time to be able to do that, so here we are in December, and I am making the time.  Astrid and Leah had a bunch of weird days off at the beginning of the month, so I got to spend time with each of them separately and together.

Astrid had off the Monday before Election Day, and I really can't remember what we did.  Leah had off on Election Day, and I took Astrid into school late so she would be able to see what voting looks like in the US.  We, like the majority of voting Americans, had every expectation that the election would turn out very differently than it did, and so we felt very happy to go and cast my vote for the first woman president.  I felt very emotional doing it with both girls there, and I truly felt I was voting for them to know that there were no barriers to what they could accomplish, but unfortunately the election went in a different direction.  Astrid and I watched the returns until midnight, but by 10pm, I knew it was over and what the result would be and it was very, very disheartening for us both.  We had hoped to go and see the inaugural parade and were making plans, but now we are considering joining protests and we are writing letters and making phone calls and becoming active locally.  The rest of the week was a total blur of emotion--I have not felt so bad about anything since my husband died 4 years ago.  Consequently, we spent time at the church talking about our feelings and just trying to shake off the disbelief we felt over the whole event.  It still, nearly a month later, feels unreal.

On Thursday, Astrid asked if she could have a day to catch up on schoolwork and sleep, which I agreed to.  We went and surprised Leah and had lunch with her at her school.  The look on her little face when we walked into the cafeteria was hilarious.  She was so happy to see us.  Then she proceeded to look grumpy in pictures.

Over that weekend, I had discovered that the Danish Club of DC was having its annual Danish Christmas bazaar, so we went up to Rockville MD to experience some Danish culture.  It was mostly food and a few handicrafts, but Astrid got to speak Danish with a few people and torture us all with her favorite candy, black licorice, which tastes like salt.  We had fun, though, and I'd say it was worth the drive.  The secretary at Leah's school is going to Copenhagen next summer and was asking Astrid about Aebleskiver, so we made sure to try those, as well as fancy open faced sandwiches.  We also got a candle for our table that will burn down the days till Christmas, and we got ornaments for our tree.  Astrid is going to teach us to make some kind of Danish heart ornaments and folded stars, which we are looking forward to as well.

Leah was a big fan of Aebelskiver

Danish fish balls in brine. Yum?

Some of the sandwich varieties

Some of the items we tried

After we finished at the bazaar, we had to jump back in the car and drive like crazy for F'burg because we had a baby shower to attend for my friend Toni.  Astrid loved it because there were lots of little babies there for her to hold, plus she won a shower game by guessing most closely the number of Hershey Kisses in a giant baby bottle.  Leah is green with envy over those kisses, the majority of which are still sitting in the bottle in Astrid's room

But wait, there's more!  We had to leave the shower early to drive down to Westmoreland State Park and visit with the Moore family and Dipthi.  They were on their last camp out of the year before the cold set in and they invited us down for a campfire and dinner.  We arrived around 4:30 and it was already getting dark, so we took a quick walk down to the beach and then we went back to their campsite for a dinner of chili before heading back home after a wonderful, full, and exhausting day!

Walking on the beach by moonlight with the Moore family

At some point, Astrid also had her fall sports awards ceremony, and received a certificate for participating in cross country.  It was very nice, and I was quite proud she had seen it through without giving serious consideration to quitting, despite how hard it was for her sometimes.    The coaches made a nice speech and then gave each kid a certificate.  Afterwards there was a team gathering in the classroom and I was able to get a picture of Astrid and her coaches.  They were very complimentary about her hard work and dedication and really enjoyed having her on the team.

The following week was International Education Week and AFS asked each student to do some outreach with their schools, so Astrid spoke during the morning announcements about "the proud nation of Danelandia" (as we call it) and her experience as an exchange student.  I understand it was very well received!

The following weekend, we enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving service at the UU.  It was Thanksgiving potluck time!  Astrid prepared our entry--salted caramel butter cake bars, a favorite of Bup's parents.

Somewhere in October, Reverend Doug, our minister, emailed me to see if Astrid would be willing to share the story of her coming to the US during the Thanksgiving service, and she was so excited to do so.  She practiced her speech only once on me, and then made some notes.  Just ahead of her, a young lady talked about how she had been adopted from China and her trip back to China to visit her birth city and orphanage, which made Astrid quite nervous.  I told her she would be fine and off she went.  If you'd like to listen to her speech, you can find it at http://uuffva.org/home/ministry/sermons-and-presentations/ (scroll down to the November 20 service).  She needn't have worried, she made a lot of people very teary eyed, and we could really not leave the building later on without lots of compliments about how she did and people congratulating me on having such a wonderful young lady in our family.  I was justifiably proud.

Astrid giving her speech

The UU congregation

My little beauties eating Thanksgiving dinner

 
Then it was Thanksgiving week!  Astrid was struggling a bit with swimming and decided to take a week off and think about if she wanted to continue on the team or not, so her objections to not going to school on Wednesday were null and void.  I kept her home, because it saved me some running around.  My father, "PopPop" arrived on Tuesday, and although he was immediately captivated by Leah, he had lots of time for Astrid and enjoyed spending time with her a great deal.  One of my dad's favorite activities is playing Yahtzee.  He sensed a fresh victim in Astrid and on the first night, we played.  Astrid swore she was a very good Yahtzee player, but she plays as we have never seen before.  My father was absolutely beside himself.  The more upset he got by Astrid's score, the more crazy she made her score become.  It was HILARIOUS to say the least.

He kept trying to suggest she couldn't take 6 for 3's or a small straight for a full house or something, and she just took that as a challenge.  By the end of his visit, we were calling him The Yahtzee Nazi, and Astrid may be the first person not to bend to his will in scoring.

On Thanksgiving Day, we had a lovely day.  My mom came over early and we all played cards for a while.  I was very happy that Astrid suggested a dish for Thanksgiving dinner--her school had a dinner and she had fallen in love with sweet potato casserole and requested it for our dinner, so I made it for her.  I had never made it in my life and don't especially like sweet potatoes, but this, I have to admit, was quite good.

Our whole family just before dinner

It was a very nice day, we had a lot of great food, played a lot of cards, we went for a post-dinner walk, just very satisfying.

Playing cards with Nana and Cioci

As best I could do for a picture of all of us feasting--only my sister and I are missing

Astrid, my sister, and I taking a post-dinner walk in the neighborhood.  Astrid says I take horrible selfies.  She's wrong.

Until 9pm.  All of a sudden, my father fell violently ill with the stomach flu.  Astrid quickly followed suit.  I was next 2 days later.  We were all miserable and disgusting.  It is the most sick I have ever been.  On the plus side, none of us gained any Thanksgiving weight.  We had plans for the weekend and managed to make it to my niece's birthday party on Saturday, but by Saturday evening, I was totally done for.  Astrid and PopPop rallied Sunday morning, but we missed church.  They took Leah on a carriage ride with Elsa, which had been arranged for by our friends Jason and Nancy in gratitude for watching Bup on Wednesday nights.  I gather they had a good time.  Bup's aunt Mary Ann was Elsa, so it was a nice occasion for the families to come together.  We were supposed to go with the Moores to cook at the respite center for the homeless in town, but unfortunately we had to cancel.  There was just no way I could get up the energy to get up for that long.  So hopefully in a couple of months we'll be able to do that again.

PopPop went home on Monday, and for some reason Astrid didn't have school, but I did have to go back to work on Monday.  I still was feeling a bit weak, but much better than the previous day.  This week has been pretty quiet.  Astrid officially decided to drop swimming and join the fitness club instead at school, which I supported, as I don't think she should do something that's going to make her unhappy.

In preparation for the holidays, and the season of giving, I always like to have Leah volunteer a night at the local soup kitchen, and Monday night was our night to do that.  Astrid and I were serving on the dinner line and Leah went to help at the dessert buffet.  It was a great evening.  Astrid did a great job slinging pizza, which was all I really asked of her, but she actually took it a step further and really engaged with everyone who was there.  It wasn't just a job for her to get through, or another one of my crazy schemes she had to go along with.  By the end of the night, she was actually sitting with some of the people who came to eat, getting to know their stories, talking with them, and was able to tell me about some of them.  I was suitably impressed.  She asked at the end of the night if we could do it again sometime, so I agreed that we could and will sign us up again after the new year.

Getting suited up and learning our jobs

A well deserved pizza break

Talking and visiting with some of the people we served

Last night Astrid asked me to chop off her hair, as she has been growing it out for a while and wanted to donate it to Pantene's Beautiful Lengths hair donation program.  We went to a concert at her school, then she came home and prepared herself.  I cut off nearly a foot of hair from the back of her head and then we fashioned her into a short, choppy cute little haircut that I don't think will take too long to grow out into a more preferred length.

Before we evened it out, it sure is shorter!

Tomorrow, we ship it out to Pantene

We are starting to try to get prepared for Christmas and the holiday season, but it seems the more I try, the further behind I get!  Last night, we went to a concert at her school and they had some nice Christmas music that the kids played and/or sang, and we went to the Holiday Concert in Lights at the mall for 10 minutes.  This weekend, we will head to Wolf Trap for the President's Own Marine Corps Band Christmas Concert.  Also in the works, we will be finishing up the UU Christmas pageant, we have a Christmas concert and dinner party with friends in NoVa, an AFS potluck (she and Claudia, another Danish girl, will be doing some kind of dance around a Christmas tree and Astrid is making rice pudding), visiting local Christmas lights displays, decorating the house, and baking cookies for the neighbors, to say nothing of the day itself and our post-Christmas travels to Rhode Island, New York, and Canada.  It's going to be a busy month, so no promises that I'll be able to update before the New Year, but I will definitely try.  Hope you enjoyed this update!!!  See you soon.