Halloween preparations

Today Mats bought a pumpkin at the store, so after dinner I taught them all how to carve it! They were pretty grossed out by the pumpkin guts, so they made me do that part, but then I helped Oliver draw on the eyes and Theodor draw on the nose and mouth and then cut it out for them. They were thrilled when it was done. They ran into their rooms and put on their costumes then turned out all the lights so the pumpkin would glow. Then I baked the pumpkin seeds with salt and they turned out delicious.

Halloween has really only been celebrated here for about the past 5 years, so the whole carving-pumpkins thing was new to my family. I'm glad I got to help them start a new tradition!



I never really updated much on my family beeing here, but it was great! We saw the Vasa (an 17th century swedish war ship that sunk minutes into its maiden voyage, but was taken out of the Baltic Sea in the 1960s and put in a museum), had many delicious dinners at Orwar and Marie's house, went to Skansen (an outdoor Scandinavian museum), had pancakes and pea soup (a Thursday tradition in Sweden) with my host family, and went on an archepelago tour that ended in the town of Vaxholm, where we got to do some shopping. Everything was so fun!

Rudberg Familj!

My family arrived yesterday! Saturday we attempted to go to the chocolate festival at Nordiska Museet but the line was SO LONG. So instead we walked around the city then went to Orwar and Marie's for a delicious dinner of salmon and homemade coffee ice cream for dessert! Today we went out to lunch and on a "Under the Bridges of Stockholm" boat tour with my host family. It was a gorgeous day and a fun tour. Then we went to Orwar and Marie's for dinner again, this time with their friends. It was a very traditional Swedish dinner with a salmon cake, herring, meatballs and strawberry-rhubarb pie for dessert. We also had Aquavit ( a swedish liquor) and sang Swedish drinking songs.

More fun things to come!

10-10-10 in Amsterdam

After spending a few days in Nantes, I hopped on the train to Amsterdam with my friends Zoe, Emily and Charlotte. Many people from Grinnell were meeting up there in honor of "10/10," which is the biggest party of the year at Grinnell and takes place on the Saturday closest to October 10th.

Over the next few days we toured the Anne Frank house (very interesting), went to the Van Gogh museum, went on a canal tour by boat, rented bikes and biked around the city (EVERYONE in Amsterdam bikes, I have never seen so many bikes/ such a bikable city), ate lots of stroopwafels, went to an outdoor market, and partied with cool people, mostly Grinnellians.

The red-light district was a very strange place to see, and somewhat frightening. In some areas it was just a narrow alley and the doors with the red lights and girls looking for customers were literally inches away. The existence of "coffee shops" and the whole marijuana culture was also very interesting. That's all I will say about that...

Anne Frank house (middle)

"homomonument"- one of the few monuments to homosexual people in the world

on the left is the symbol for Amsterdam (from their flag)- they do love bikes!

"Travel Hotel"- our hostel, with a private room. Just outside the red-light district

The whole city is made up of canals- So pretty!

Me on a bike

Amelia et Laura à Paris!

This week I am on fall break, and I spent the first weekend in Paris, with my friend Laura from Grinnell, who is studying in Nantes, France. I got there Saturday morning and we met up, then went to the Eiffel Tower (not up it, just saw it, it was too cloudy to see much from the top), the Champs Elysées, and the Arc de Triomphe. Then we picked up a baguette, cheese, wine and chocolate and had a little picnic in a park right next to the Arc de Triomphe. There we met our friend Ria, who graduated from Grinnell this past spring and has spent the past month traveling around Europe.

Laura and me in front of La Tour Eiffel

Ria, me and Laura in front of L'arc de Triomphe

Champs Elysées (notice- no lanes!!)

After our picnic we tried to check into our hostel, but there had been a problem with confirming it, so they set us up in a hotel down the street for the same price and Laura and I got our own room with a sink and a shower! Great deal.


Then the three of us went and got more cheese, bread, wine and chocolate and sat in the park by the Eiffel Tower and ate dinner/talked, and at 8:59 the tower started sparkling! (It is lit up throughout the night but sparkles at a minute before every hour for 5 minutes.) It was beautiful!

We decided to get a better view, so we went to the gardens of Trocadero, which is across the seine but has a great view of the tower. There we heard live music (it was "Nuit Blanche"- a culture festival in Paris), and saw the tower sparkle again!

The sparkling Eiffel Tower from Trocadero

The next day Laura and I had pain au chocolat (chocolate croissant) for breakfast and went to the Musée D'Orsay, which was spectacular because I love impressionist/post-impressionist art. After that we went to the Obelesque, met up with Ria and had lunch at a café near by. Laura and I didn't want to wait in line for the Louvre because it takes hours, but we went there anyway to see the glass pyramid.

We tried to go to the Grand Palais to see their Monet exhibit, but it was 23€ (over 30 dollars), so instead we split a banana and nutella crèpe in the park before we had to leave for the train.

After a 2 hour train ride we were in Nantes (west coast of France). I am staying with Laura's host family here. They have 4 kids (3 girls age 12, 10 and 5 and a 7 year old boy). They are all lots of fun. Last night we made sweet potato turnovers for them, and the kids all helped. Timothé had a clever idea to prevent crying while cutting onions...

I'm looking forward to spending two more days here, then it's off to Amsterdam! 


(p.s. these are all Laura's pictures, because I didn't bring my camera cord. You can read more about her France adventures at www.lockwoodinfrance.blogspot.com)