summer has arrived!

The weather here has been AMAZING.. finally! It's crazy how drastic the weather changes here especially between seasons. Only a couple months ago was it freezing, snow on the ground and the sun not shining many hours in the day. Now the sun rises a little after 4am and not setting until after 10pm! This is only going to increase as the summer continues and in peak summer the sun will be shining almost the entire day! I love it, but it's sometimes hard to go to sleep when the sun is still shining and waking up automatically way too early in the morning because the sun is up already! Anders and I need to buy some black (or dark) shades/curtains for our bedroom to solve this issue!

A week and a half ago I celebrated my first 17. mai: Norway's national holiday/independence day! It was just like I had imagined.. Oslo was filled with thousands of people. You couldn't even walk down streets without being shoulder to shoulder with people! A huge parade with orchestras and kids from schools in the area marched down the main streets in Oslo down to the palace to wave to the royal family. Anders and I got as close as we could get to the palace and waved to the king too! It was a cool experience. I hadn't seen so many people before in my life besides in the Rose Ceremony that was held in Oslo last summer after the attacks here on July 22. After we wandered around the parade we met up with our friends and ate lots of good food and went out to one of the most popular roof top bars in the city called Stratos and celebrated the night away! The view was incredible.

Karl Johan gate; right outside National Theater.

The Royal Palce/Slottet.

Dressed up for the festivities! :-)

Time to wave to the king!

Celebrating with friends.

View over the city from Stratos.

Who is this handsome guy? ;-) This past week the temperature reached over 25 degrees C/80 degrees F.. it was pretty hot! We had to bust out the shorts, tank tops and swim suits! We've tried to be outside as much as possible and went to the beach yesterday! Since Norway is a pretty small country they don't have very big beaches either and not very many.. you're pretty 'cozy' at the beach with not that much personal space, but that's just how it is here. It was such a great/relaxing afternoon. We went to a beach called Paradisbukta which means Paradise Bay! It really was a little piece of paradise on the coast of Norway. Norway being a country more up north too the water isn't exactly warm ha ha. Surprisingly there were many people swimming and enjoy the freezing cold water regardless, but I wasn't one of them. I was pretty content just soaking up the rays on my towel in the sand ;-) Anders swam a little bit though, because he's "a viking" as he would put it. He's too funny!

Sunday stroll in Rykkinn.

Picture perfect moment <3

Anders and his Mom!

Relaxing after school down on the pier in Sandvika..

Paradisebukta!

Soakin' up some rays 8-)

The viking!

The week has finally arrived where I will be taking my important Norwegian proficiency tests in listening, reading, writing and oral. Skriftlig prøven which consists of all listening, reading and writing takes place on Wednesday and Muntlig prøven which is oral takes place on Thursday! I'm not so nervous now as I thought I would be, but then again if you are 'too' nervous going into the tests then you're just going to choke up. I have all the confidence in the world that I will pass all the tests, I just hope that everything goes smoothly. The tests are all pretty lengthy and are timed. You are given several reading and listening assignments and 2 writing essays. There is a short essay and a longer one which must be at least 200 words. I know that doesn't sound like much, but trust me, when you're writing in another/new language it might as well be WAY more! The oral test is conducted with another student. We will be given 2 topics in which we need to hold a conversation with each other about them and then we will each be given an individual topic which we will need to talk about for a decent amount of time. Test settings make me a little uneasy and I'm only worried about the oral tests and being given topics that I don't have much to talk about/am able to communicate well in Norwegian, but if this happens then you are allowed to just be honest and say that you don't have much to say about the topic and ask for a new one. The sensors/judges are testing us on our Norwegian language skills; they don't expect us to be experts on every topic after all, so that's a bit of a relief! Today we have the day off here in Norway too (but not because it's Memorial Day, but because of a Christian holiday called Pinse), so I think I'm going to look through all my collected Norwegian assignments and just re-cap/try to practice for some of the topics that might be given to me! I hope all goes well.. wish me luck!!!

Yesterday I renewed my student visa to continue studying at the University of Oslo this fall! Before I know it, I'll be starting my Masters program in August after I return from the US. I'm becoming pretty excited about the entire thing and glad that I made the decision to go after all. There's no other place in this world where I'll be able to get a Masters degree from a leading university for only around $150/semester!!! NOT KIDDING. Completely nuts, right!?? I feel really blessed for the opportunity. Not everything is so cheap in Norway though and I know that I'm going to have to pay a boat load on books as I have heard, but I'll just have to deal with it when the time comes. Regardless, my Masters education is going to be pretty DAMN cheap (excuse my French Dad)! ;-)

I am now 23 years old as of May 18! Even though I'm getting older, I'm still only the 'baby' here in our group of friends. Anders is a few years older than me which means that most of our friends are around his same age. I love his friends though and fit in just fine.. no one notices that I'm younger and we ALWAYS have a great time! We're going to have a BBQ this Saturday to celebrate my birthday (even though it was a couple weeks ago). Things have been crazy hectic and I'm finally getting a Saturday free from work after working the last 5 Saturdays straight! My boss has been out of work sick so I've been taking on maximum hours. She comes back to work next week though so unfortunately my hours will probably go down once again, but I'll obviously embrace the free time that I've been missing out on! I'm allowed to work full-time during summer vacation at work if I want/am needed, because according to my visa I can work full-time during vacations! So after school is over at the end of June I'm hoping to work a decent amount of hours before I come back to the US for a couple of weeks. Anders and I want to start saving money so that we can start traveling! It's been a hard economic year for us, but we're a young couple and it's completely normal. We've still been able to enjoy life although we've had a tight budget. Anders got promoted at work so he'll start his new job in September! He's very excited and I'm proud of him!

My kindergarten internship will be over soon at the end of June. I'm really going to miss the kids and employees that I've been working with for the last 5 months.. I hope that I'll be able to at least stay on the on-call substitute list, because it was be awesome to be able to work/visit every now and then after my class is over. It's been an incredible, fun, learning experience! I know that I complain about the flower shop sometimes, but I've recently decided to stay at there until I've figured out my class schedule in August and know exactly how much free time I will have. It's probably for the best. Once I figure this all out then I will try to find a new job working with children, while I'm studying towards my Masters for the next couple of years! It's a job, so I'm thankful for it, no matter how inconsistent it's been. It's helped me learn more Norwegian and has helped me begin to build my CV here in Norway. I guess I can't complain about that!

"There are far, far better things ahead than those we leave behind."

I titled this blog post with this quote, because I just found it recently and I really it! It pretty much describes my life and the big decisions that I've made on my journey here to Norway, although I miss the things/people I left behind too of course!! I haven't written in a while so I have to think if there is anything interesting to write about.. funny thing (ok, maybe not so funny), but I ended up breaking my tooth AGAIN! The piece that the dentist put on my chipped tooth only held for 2 weeks and fell off one morning in class while I was biting on my pen.. I was not a happy camper. I wasn't thinking, but I also shouldn't have to live my life questioning every little thing that I put in my mouth. I was lucky to get an appointment right after school, but found out that I would have to come back for a second appointment later in the week, which meant that I had to go around 3 entire days with a huge gap in my mouth.. again! It was even worse than the first time, because the dentist shaved my tooth down even more so that she could make a better mold for my tooth! It took a few days for them to create the mold, so I went a few days going to school and working completely embarrased :( It was the worst when I had to work on the flower shop and my main job is to TALK with people so that I can sell as much as I can.. I could tell that everyone noticed the gaping hole in my mouth, but everyone was polite enough to not say anything ha ha. On the bright side, it was fixed a few days after and looks even better than the last! It's guarenteed to hold for a very, very long time, so I have my fingers crossed that I won't have to worry about, ever hopefully! This procedure was not cheap either, so I had to unfortunately cancel the London trip that I had been planing and that I was SO excited for.. but things happen, thus is life. I wasn't going to walk around with a hole in my mouth, so I really didn't have a choice. No one can do everything that they wish to do sometimes, but I'm hoping I will be able to take a trip to London this year!

I have so many aspirations and things I want to do and places I want to go.. you could say that I'm kind of impatient ha ha, as most of you all know. But, I have also learned by living here in Norway that all things take time and patience can be a virtue! I know that in good time I will be able to travel where I wish and do more things, but first things first: I need to learn Norwegian, get my Masters and become economically stable enough to fulfill all my wishes. Now that I'm studying in the fall, we won't be able to travel somewhere for very long, but maybe Anders and I will try to take a long weekend somewhere before my classes start! We're going to try to take a trip to a city called Stavanger, which is on the west coast of Norway. They have endless hiking and outdoors possibilities.. but the one thing I want to do is to hike a trail that leads to a place called 'Preikestolen' which directly translated means 'Preacher's Rock.' It takes a few hours to hike up and then you get to take in a fantastic view over the fjord. I posted a couple pictures below that I found online. Norway is such a beautiful country.. I want to travel around Norway just as much as I want to travel around Europe! But, all in good time ;)

I have been pretty busy these days with school and work. I'm working more than usual, which I can't complain, almost the most hours that I'm allowed to every week (which is 20). It's exhausting though! I look forward for school to be over at the end of June and specifically for my test to be taken and done with so I don't have to carry with me any added stress! I really hope that I pass the test(s).. everyone (teachers, friends, etc.) believe that I can pass it, so I think I need to have more confidence that I can too! Some random, but relevant news: a couple weeks ago I received 2 job offers in only a 2-day span!! The leader of the kindergarten where I have my internship now, called me and asked if I was interested in working full-time as a substitute in another kindergarten where she is in charge of! My first reaction was obviously 'YES!', but that's when things are tricky and out of my hands.. I'm only allowed to work 20/week, because of the specific visa that I'm on now. The only way that I would have been able to take the job is if I had been offered a full-time job; not just for 2 months. Do you know what I mean? But that wouldn't have worked anyways, because now I have decided to take my Masters in the fall. The other job offer was in an outdoor kindergarten that I applied to back during Easter vacation and an employee called me and asked me to come into an interview.. although it was great news to hear, I told them that I am going to start studying again in the fall so I couldn't consider taking the position, unfortunately. What great steps though! I know that I'm making the right decisions by going back to school. Things will only be better off for me (job placement, income, etc.) after I complete just 2 more years at school.. my Norwegian will continue to get better and better too, because I'm constantly learning new things every day! It doesn't matter that the program is taught in English, because I've already given myself a good foundation.

Next week I'll be celebrating my 23rd birthday and the day before celebrating Norway's national day, like our 4th of July! It's on May 17, the day before my birthday. There is a huge parade on the main street in Oslo and everyone walks down Karl Johan gate (the main street) with Norwegian flags and dressed in nice clothes or some with their national costumes! There are TONS of people! Everyone walks down to the palace to wave to the King and royal family who will be standing on the balcony. Everyone eats ice cream and hotdogs and just enjoy themselves! It should end up being a great day! Hoping for good weather! Anders and I will be going downtown with a huge group of friends.. it should be a lot of fun. Here a couple pictures of how they celebrate their national day here that I found online also!

I've been a little homesick lately, so I really look forward to coming home again at the end of July!! I feel like I don't have very many friends here that I can confide in about anything.. which is probably normal, because I've only been here for a year and I didn't grow up with people here, like I did with my friends back home! It's hard sometimes though and I feel lonely every now and then, but I have to trust and believe that the quote is true..