Thursday, November 22, 2007

Giving Thanks

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!! And while I'm at it, a big THANKS to anyone who has stopped by to read this blog, such as it is. Fallen by the wayside is probably the best way to describe it. Well, I had good intentions....
So in an effort to review the last few months while keeping with the spirit of Thanksgiving, here is what I am thankful for:

My family on two continents. My children are happy and healthy and I have a wonderful husband. What more can one ask for? My family in the States who I miss a lot is equally wonderful. Being so far away is not easy. I want everyone together!!
My friends back home. I'll never have enough time to visit when we come over on our "every other year" trips to Chicago. Speaking of Chicago, I'm so thankful for our trip to Chicago this summer. What a fantastic 3 weeks. The kids are finally old enough to really appreciate the differences and enjoy the truly American aspects of life in the US. The trip to the Field Museum was a definite highlight as all 3 of them love dinosaurs. Although there was an 1hr 1/2 rain delay and the Cubs lost, Kevin had a blast at his first baseball game. The girls opted to go to the movies with my sister where they saw Ratatouille. They loved it.
A computer that is finally working after some much needed updates were installed upon our return from Chicago. The lack of a working computer did account for some of my absence in posting but certainly not all.
NASN sports channel. Being able to watch the Lions and Packers play live on Thanksgiving Day does ease the pain of not being there ever so slightly.
Working! I've been hired back this year to teach in the primary schools. Yes, I'm thankful to be back teaching. My classes this year seem better so far. I go to 5 different schools and have younger students this year. More in 2nd and 3rd grade. And then others in 5th grade. These are the ones who can be a pain sometimes. They're the big kids in the school since next year they go on to junior high. All of 10-11 yrs old and they think they know it all.....ok don't get me started on french school children, I'm trying to keep this post a "Happy, Thankful" one.....
And I would have to say it's the working part that has kept me away the most. If I'm online it seems I'm often looking up stuff for english teaching or otherwise reading.
At the moment I'm researching a camcorder to buy for the holidays. There are so many options but with the online sites available, looking for one is not a problem.
I transferred all our family home video cassettes onto DVD's. It was so neat to watch videos of the kids when they were babies and I'm sooo glad I took video. There's so much I have forgotten already although it really hasn't been that long. It reinforced what I already knew that it's so important to take videos of just everyday stuff so they can have it to look back on years from now. The camcorder we have now is truly ancient so a new one is definitely needed and as I see, even though it's a major purchase, it's worth it. These home videos are priceless.
Kevin is on the town basketball team. He's enjoying it although they've only won one game. It's pretty funny to watch these little boys and girls running on the court. It's a mixed team and for the moment the girls seem more aggressive on the court. They're the ones that'll fight for the ball or run after the opponent to try to get a steal. Too funny to watch how they play.
It's the first time he's doing a sport and I'm glad he likes it. That's all the counts to me.
It's amazing how the time is flying by here. I will try to keep this posting more up to date because there really is a lot I could write about. For example the vin chaud Pascal and I tried last night. It's called Blossa Glogg and we bought it at Ikea a few weeks ago. It's all ready to go, just need to heat it slightly. I put a cinammon stick in mine. It was so good. I'm not even sure what I'd call it in English. I've never heard of warm wine and cider isn't really it either. I'm wondering if it's available in the Ikea stores in the US? I could probably find out if I checked out their website but I'm too lazy.
So here's to warm wine on a cold winter's night and hopefully more posting. Although with the Glogg just waiting to be sipped, posting might have to wait.....

Gobble, Gobble to you all! :)

4 comments:

Ksam said...

It's called "mulled wine" in English, though in the Midwest, it's also known under it's Swedish name "Glogg". And yep, it's available at Ikeas worldwide!

Madame K said...

My mother-inlaw had warm wine for the first time last year and now won't shut-up about it.

Will you be going to see Pere Noel at the Metz gare this year?

If you have a minute, drop me an e-mail at my hotmail account: aryalis@hotmail.com. Let's chat about Metz!

Anonymous said...

So glad to see you blogging again. And glogging. The German version may be gluwein (2 dots over the u), but I should double-check that with Vinnie.

I loved when Matt did basketball too. If he ever had the ball, he certainly wouldn't know which way to run down the court :) But he loved it.

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