My Birthday in Iceland

My birthday was amazing. I had Erla over on April 13 for a sleepover. We watched Glee, played board games, and had fun. On my actual birthday, all the girls in my class made me cards. Daniel, a fourth grader, also made me a card. It was nice of them to think of me. Near the end of the day, my parents brought in Rice Krispy treats and marbles to play with. Everyone had fun. ThorEli even said that if he ever came to Gunnison, he would join the marbles team. After school, I opened gifts

from my family. My parents gave me playmobile, thin gloves, and Sequence Dice. Alex knit me a pink pair of socks. Spencer also gave me a some playmobile. We had next Thursday off because it was the first day of summer. So, I planned on having Agusta and Johanna over for a sleepover on April 18. In the end, we dicided to have Agusta's parents over   for chilli-cheese dogs, also. When they got here, they sang happy birthday in Icelandic to me. I opened the gifts they gave me.

Agusta gave me a little rock cairn, and a Vala. Johanna gave me a Icelandic book translated to English called "A Giant Love Story", and a children's book in Icelandic. Gaui, Magga, and Agusta left for the night, while Johanna spent the night. The next morning, Agusta came back for the breakfast of American pancakes. On April 23, Daniel gave me a birthday preasant. It was a mug with Icelandic monuments on it, all the Icelandic coins, the lowest denomination bill, and a small chocolate egg. It was so nice of him. My birthday in Iceland was one of the best.

Our Apartment

I think it's about time you see what the apartment looks like. The floor is rock hard cement. I'm sharing the biggest room with my sister and brother. Our room has a bunkbed, which I share with Alex, two twin-size beds, and a work desk. Also, our room has three closets, two big, and one small. Alex and I share a big closet and the little closet, so Spencer has one big one. Spencer has a twin-size bed, and the other is

for guests. We have a mud room, which is connnected to the main part of the apartment and to the storage room. Our parents' room is between the mud room  and the kids' room. When we come into the apartment, we walk barefoot to keep the apartment clean. The kitchen, dining room, and living room comprise the main area. The apartment's small compared to my house in Gunnison, but I sort of like it.

Snow Fun

A few weeks a go, Alex, Spencer, and I made two snowmen. The snowmen looked like my mom and dad holding hands. Alex used Spencer and I as a ramp to get the second balls on top of the first balls. We got on our hands and knees and she pushed the second balls over the top of us on to the first balls. We

made them in front of the back window so we could see them. After a couple of nights a woman took a picture of the snowmen. A little while later some dogs peed on them!!! We decided to make a fire hydrants. While building fire hydrants, we found a snow hole. We started digging and pretty soon we had a snow hole big enough for us. A few days passed and our snowmen melted until nothing was left.

Woodworking

Jan. 30, 2012

So far, my favorite class is woodworking. Right now I'm making a cutting board in the shape of  a pig. Once we finished cutting them we sanded the sides. We used a really rough red sheet then a softer yellow sheet. It took me a long time to finish sanding. We are supposed to paint one side, the other side is for cutting. In the last 5 minutes of class, I painted my pig. I made it as pink as bubblegum, but I didn't have time to make an eye. Some of my classmates made their pigs black. I think woodworking is a fun class to be in.

Swimming

Jan 22, 2012
On Friday I had my first swim lesson at school. Mom had purchased a new pink one-piece swim suit for class. They wear one-piece suits for class. We had to take a shower before we got in the swimming pool. Then we had to find flippers that fit our feet. The pool is smaller than the one at Western State but very, very warm. Even though it was outside and snow on the ground, I was still pretty warm.
We started by swimming a few laps without flippers. Then the whole class held hands and swam in a circle. Once we stirred up the water, we let go of each other and we went underwater. When we came up for air, we had moved to another place. That was very cool. We did it a few more times. The teacher had us swim back and forth across the short side of the pool in pairs. I was number one. Near the end, we got to hang out and play around. I back-floated with Erla in the deep end. When we got out, I rinsed off and got ready to head to the bus and go home. It was time for a real shower at home.
                          Bless (Bye), Joslyn

Birthday Parties

Jan 22, 2012
I had two birthday parties to go to. The first was on Wednesday and the second was a sleep over on Friday night. On Wednesday for Dagbört's birthday, we get there and had some snacks of candy, chocolate and chips. Then we started the movie Rio while eating pizza. The movie was in English with Icelandic subtitles. During the movie we started playing the Wii game Just Dance. After the movie we turned on some music and danced around. We had fun. During the party, we had some chocolate cake. They did not put candles on the cake nor sing happy birthday. There were both boys and girls from the 5th grade class. It was really tight because there were so many kids there and it is a small apartment (just like ours). I went home a little bit after the party was over.

On Friday, after school, I had to pack for Johanna's birthday party. I went to Erla's (pronounced Ekla) house at 5pm because the rest of my family was heading to Reykjavik for a US Embassy party my parents wanted to attend. We headed to Johanna's at 6pm which is across the street from Erla's house. Between Erla and myself we had 7 bags to carry plus two pillows and a mattress. When we got there, Johanna's parents had moved all of the furniture out of the living room and into the hallway (right in front of the bathroom door) so all the girls (7 in total) could spread out their sleeping bags and mattresses. We changed into pajama's right away.We listened to music and jumped around on the mattresses. We had a snack of peas and corn then danced while listening to music. When the music stopped we had to sit or else we were out. After that we had dinner of lamb, small caramel potatoes, peas and corn. It was delicious. We had a lemon

eating contest and I won! The prize for winning was a toy race car (Spencer loves it). Then we played a few more games. After that we had cake. The candles were cool but didn't didn't work as they were supposed to. It was suppose to be a flower that you lit the wick that made a spark to light the candles to open the flower petals with candles on

them and twirled around. It also played the tune Happy Birthday. We were trying to choose a movie to watch and some of us went over to Erla's house to choose one there. The movie we choose was "How to Lose a Guy in 10 days." It was in English with Icelandic subtitles. Johanna's mom put food coloring on the popcorn which turned our mouths blue. At 11pm we finally went to bed.
The next morning we had toast for breakfast and some had cake also. We watched the movie again then changed into day cloths and played hide and go seek. I brushed my teeth because we forgot to the night before. We finally headed home at 11:45am.
All in all, I had fun at the birthday parties. I am glad I'm making lots of friends here.
 

School

Jan. 11, 2012

Yesterday was my first day at my new school called Varmaland. My first class was math, then I went to drama class. In drama class we were in groups of 4 and made us into a picture of a family who has a sad problem. After drama class we had breakfast. For breakfast we had Cheerios and milk. Then we had a break. After that I got a book which taught me how to write in Icelandic. Next, I had the lunch of chicken and french fries. There was another break. At that break we went to a big hill, which had 3 snow slides. There is a big, a medium and a small. I started on the small one then moved to the medium, but I liked the medium and I was too scared to go on the big snow slide. When we went inside, I got to do what I wanted, until I talked

about Gunnison. We got our backpacks, and went to gym. From gym we went to the bus. And when I got off the bus, I saw my mom smiling. Right after I walked in the door, two younger girls came over to see if I wanted to Leik (play in Icelandic). We went sledding. Overall, my first school day was fun.

I'm in Iceland!!!

Jan. 10  2012

I made it to Iceland safe and sound. If you don't think we have enough sunlight at home, you have to come over here. We only have 5 hours of sunlight each day, not to mention it's always covered by storm clouds. We have 22 inches of wet, sticky, snowman building snow. But I can't go outside, thanks to the 50 mile per hour gusts of wind. Today was supposed to be my first day of school, but of the 90 kids [ 90 for whole school mixed together ] 50 ride the bus from Bifröst to school [ including me ] . With such strong winds,  it would be dangerous on the bus and over half the kids ride the bus, so school was [ and is ] cancelled. My classes are knitting/sewing, swimming [ the swimming pool is at school ], art, drama, religion, Icelandic, gym, English language [ I don't take it ], math, social studies, life skills, home skills. There are 3 buildings for the school and the swimming pool is outside. There are 18 other kids in my class, 15 fifth graders and 3 fourth graders (only boys) not including me. They mixed fourth and fifth grades together because of such small classes.
I was invited to a birthday party for a girl in my class but Mom did not check her email in time for me to go. This made me sad. I can't wait for school tomorrow (if we have it). I hope I make friends tomorrow.
Missing Gunnison and all of my friends,
                       Joslyn