Alt for USA

All the boys were awake before Kory and me this morning. I’m sure they only slept about four hours. They were up playing a board game before we even had a cup of coffee. It’s was another gorgeous day, for which I was very thankful. Keeping those boys inside all day would have been no fun at all, as Kory was worried sick they would do something to hurt that otherwise unblemished cabin. I had them eat and drink everything out on the porch, and even then, I needed to wash down the deck. Boys can sure be messy.




I brought some props to the cabin to create a kind of birthday party feel for the weekend. Normally, for Kaleb’s huge birthday parties back home, we have several games and competitions. I didn’t plan anything ahead before we came to Norway, so I had to make do with things I found in the boxes we had left here. It worked out pretty well. I decided to copy some of the ideas from that “Alt for Norge” TV show and also do some standard American games. It took several hours, so it was good to give them a focus, and I think they had a lot of fun in the process. None of them liked losing, however, especially Kaleb.



I called it “Alt for USA,” and they competed in a watermelon eating contest, an egg toss, water balloon throwing, shooting hoops with balloons, English speaking competitions, little wind-up car races, a scavenger hunt and a lot of other things too difficult to explain. We never did have time to go for a hike. One boy, Henrik, was way behind in points, so that’s when I thought of doing an English speaking contest, because he’s very good at that. I took each boy aside and spoke to them very slowly in English, “If you can understand me, say ten words in English, not using any numbers.” One boy looked around and said things like, tree, rock, house, lake, sky, birds… things he could see. Another boy just repeated back my sentence, which I thought that was pretty clever. When I gave the instructions to Henrik, he responded in English, “Oh boy, this is going to be easy!” Then he proceeded to rattle off some story he had read, using very old and difficult English terms. It was pretty funny. There was such a difference in the boy’s English skills. As it is, Henrik’s parents are divorced so he watches a lot of TV, being that he’s home alone a lot. Most all of the TV shows here come from America and they have Norwegian subtitles, so the kids who watch a lot of TV, learn quickly. (For that portion of the contest, I made Kaleb give me ten words in Spanish, even though he’s never studied it. He did just fine.)



After serving them a standard party lunch of hot dogs and brownies, Kory took the boys down to the lake (see photo). Some jumped in the ice cold water with all their clothes on. I stayed behind to clean the cabin. We got on the ferry to come home at five o’clock, then had to rush to get to the store to buy food for tomorrow, clean up, and get over to Odd and Turid’s for dinner.



I was so thankful I didn’t have to cook, as I was pretty tired. Turid is such a good cook too, so it was a special treat. Kaleb fell asleep just as we were sitting down to eat, so he missed out on dinner. He curled up on the couch in Odd’s living room, and that was it for him. We all huddled out on the balcony, drinking wine and talking for several hours. Odd’s opinion is, “If it’s summer, we sit outdoors,” (no matter what the weather.) This is why their household has wool sox and wool blankets at the ready. It helps.



They days are so long now that when we were driving home at midnight tonight, there was a bunch of kids playing volleyball in the sand by the beach we passed. Summer in Norway does have its advantages. I’m so sad we are leaving in two weeks.