Wednesday, May 27, 2009
A chapter closes...
I received a text message this morning from Ina that she was back in Norway. Her parents met her in Oslo and she is on her way home with them now (from Oslo she still has a ~1 hour flight and then ~2 hour drive to get home).
Ina Therese Alvaeren is an exchange student from Norway who lived with us from last August through yesterday. She attended our local High School as a senior. Due to a family event, she finished the school year early. We dropped her off at LAX yesterday afternoon and have been watching the British Airways updates on her flights since then. Now that she is with her parents, our responsibility has been passed back to them.
Ina's visit helped us have a fully packed year of family activities! A few examples:
- San Francisco
- Monterey
- Yosemite
- Las Vegas
- Sea World
- Hollywood
- Universal Studios
- Knotts Berry Farm
- Disneyland Annual Passes
- Attend a taping of America's Funniest Videos
- Visited more beaches in 1 year than we have in the last 10 years!
- Purchased a new family Christmas Tree (we go the artificial route - Ina talked us into the new tree that we bought)
- Our version of holidays such as Thanksgiving, Christmas, etc.
I am cutting the list very short, but this provides a good sampling of the things we got to do with her.
More importantly, she got to be a member of our family. She got to know a number of American kids her own age and see what we were like. She got to tell us and our friends about Norway. She walked to school with Bethany daily. She gave her extra US and European coins to Hayley and answered Hayley's questions about how to say things in Norwegian.
This is not the end of our story with Ina - just the closing of the first chapter.
Ina Therese Alvaeren is an exchange student from Norway who lived with us from last August through yesterday. She attended our local High School as a senior. Due to a family event, she finished the school year early. We dropped her off at LAX yesterday afternoon and have been watching the British Airways updates on her flights since then. Now that she is with her parents, our responsibility has been passed back to them.
Ina's visit helped us have a fully packed year of family activities! A few examples:
- San Francisco
- Monterey
- Yosemite
- Las Vegas
- Sea World
- Hollywood
- Universal Studios
- Knotts Berry Farm
- Disneyland Annual Passes
- Attend a taping of America's Funniest Videos
- Visited more beaches in 1 year than we have in the last 10 years!
- Purchased a new family Christmas Tree (we go the artificial route - Ina talked us into the new tree that we bought)
- Our version of holidays such as Thanksgiving, Christmas, etc.
I am cutting the list very short, but this provides a good sampling of the things we got to do with her.
More importantly, she got to be a member of our family. She got to know a number of American kids her own age and see what we were like. She got to tell us and our friends about Norway. She walked to school with Bethany daily. She gave her extra US and European coins to Hayley and answered Hayley's questions about how to say things in Norwegian.
This is not the end of our story with Ina - just the closing of the first chapter.
Labels: Bethany, Family, Hayley, Ina
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
A few more notes
Once again, work and life activites are keeping me busy. It shouldn't be that hard to write a few lines once in a while, but I obsess over my postings. Usually. Not this one. I will keep it free flow and let it go no matter what warts it may contain. My goal is to post something despite not having a lot of time. I am also not checking what I have written before, so apologies in advance if there is any repeat material here.
My customer in Sweden has gone live with our software. They have been using it for a few weeks now and so far, so good. There are still issues to resolve, but nothing that is stopping use of the software. This customer has operations around the world. The next step is planned to be Germany in September.
Last week I was in Finland working with another customer. They plan to go live with the software in January 2010. I have 2 more planned trips back to Finland during the process.
Hayley is in the middle of volleyball season. I had to miss our first game against another site last week. I understand that the team won 2 and lost 1 game. This is a co-ed league and not very competitive (no playoffs for example). However, the kids really like to win and try hard. My team is in the 11 - 15 age bracket. I happen to have all 7th grade girls. The one team that they lost to was mostly boys on the older side. From what I hear, they made a respectable effort against them (the score was something like 25 - 15).
Ina (our Norwegian exchange student) goes home next week Tuesday. This is before school gets out, but she is getting home early for a family function. She has finished her finals and is going through her last week of school. After school on Friday, we are going to a beachfront hotel in Oxnard to let her get one last California beach weekend. It has been a great experience having her here, but after this weekend we need to give our budget a break from all of the travel and activities!
Bethany is taking French as her language in school. She plans to take it all 4 years and is finishing her second year. She was invited to join a French student honor society and had the ceremony last week. I missed it due to being in Finland. I really, really don't like to miss things like that, but had no choice this time. At least I take solace in knowing that I attend way more than most dads (based on my experience when I do attend). My job requires a lot of hours, but it gives me a lot of flexibility most of the time to attend events like this.
Andrew has gone back to school and is almost done with his first semester. He seems to be more serious this time around and in some of our conversations has recognized that he has lost a lot of time. On the other hand, he has gotten some real life experiences. He still performs a lot: singing, guitar, some keyboard. He has had a chance to play in a few for-pay shows which is good experience. However, they have been places that are not "family friendly" so far. We really want to see him perform sometime, but need to wait for a venue that he thinks will be ok for the girls to attend.
Damn. I couldn't resist. I just went to paragraph 1 and made a correction. I caught myself and stopped before doing any more. It's like an addiction!
OK, back to work. I think I spent about 10 minutes typing this up, although I really didn't time myself. In any case, it was significantly less than I usually spend!
My customer in Sweden has gone live with our software. They have been using it for a few weeks now and so far, so good. There are still issues to resolve, but nothing that is stopping use of the software. This customer has operations around the world. The next step is planned to be Germany in September.
Last week I was in Finland working with another customer. They plan to go live with the software in January 2010. I have 2 more planned trips back to Finland during the process.
Hayley is in the middle of volleyball season. I had to miss our first game against another site last week. I understand that the team won 2 and lost 1 game. This is a co-ed league and not very competitive (no playoffs for example). However, the kids really like to win and try hard. My team is in the 11 - 15 age bracket. I happen to have all 7th grade girls. The one team that they lost to was mostly boys on the older side. From what I hear, they made a respectable effort against them (the score was something like 25 - 15).
Ina (our Norwegian exchange student) goes home next week Tuesday. This is before school gets out, but she is getting home early for a family function. She has finished her finals and is going through her last week of school. After school on Friday, we are going to a beachfront hotel in Oxnard to let her get one last California beach weekend. It has been a great experience having her here, but after this weekend we need to give our budget a break from all of the travel and activities!
Bethany is taking French as her language in school. She plans to take it all 4 years and is finishing her second year. She was invited to join a French student honor society and had the ceremony last week. I missed it due to being in Finland. I really, really don't like to miss things like that, but had no choice this time. At least I take solace in knowing that I attend way more than most dads (based on my experience when I do attend). My job requires a lot of hours, but it gives me a lot of flexibility most of the time to attend events like this.
Andrew has gone back to school and is almost done with his first semester. He seems to be more serious this time around and in some of our conversations has recognized that he has lost a lot of time. On the other hand, he has gotten some real life experiences. He still performs a lot: singing, guitar, some keyboard. He has had a chance to play in a few for-pay shows which is good experience. However, they have been places that are not "family friendly" so far. We really want to see him perform sometime, but need to wait for a venue that he thinks will be ok for the girls to attend.
Damn. I couldn't resist. I just went to paragraph 1 and made a correction. I caught myself and stopped before doing any more. It's like an addiction!
OK, back to work. I think I spent about 10 minutes typing this up, although I really didn't time myself. In any case, it was significantly less than I usually spend!
Labels: Andrew, Bethany, Family, Hayley, Ina, Work
