One year ago...

One year ago I was packing out my cute wee house thinking I'd never be back again. No one has any idea how happy I am that this year there are no more last dinners, goodbye picnics, final fika's, sad goodbye parties, tearful goodbyes, and more embarrassing tears. 

Here to stay man!

Jag älskar dig Sverige!

 But, my dear Bonny Scotland. 

I love that people ask if I am from Engliand and that when I say that I am Scottish their reaction is "Oh I'm soo sorry!". And I like that I say 'roooooad' and 'poooor yoooou'. Mum always said that one day I'd realise how much I love Scotland and as soon as I moved I realised. 

We are awesome!

See you soon!

Freedoooom

21 and the streets flow with beer and loud music

I'm writing this blog as a babysit, surrounded by the sounds of toy gun fire and the screams of "he hasn't washed his hands!! DON'T WIPE POO ON ME!". Life is going to be so quiet in 10 days time :(

So I am officially 21 years old and not so sun burnt anymore! I think I matured over night and realised that a wee bit o' sunblock = no pain/lobster remarks.

For my birthday the family surprised me with a card and pressies in the morning, and after school we had cake and mini bottles of champagne!

They had printed a "Gillies Whiskey" card from Moon pig which was really funny. They drew inside as well, including "p.s Paulo still loves you!" who is an 11 year old kid that follows me around the playground asking me to marry him.... 

After a stressful bike ride full of near death experiences and angry car drivers horns being heard behind us, we arrived home to my birthday cake (which Katie had quickly baked while I went out the day before then hid in her room!) and two mini bottles of champagne, which I wont lie, had me a tad bit sozzled having only eating a few slices of cake all day. And chocolates. So much sugar...

Me and the boys. 

Actually looked okay even though I was a sweaty mess after having cycled at 20mph trying to keep the boys alive to them be told that it's picture time! Just before this was taken they both threw a football at the camera :) Never a quiet moment, gonna miss that!

THEN it was dinner time with Sab. I can safely say that it was the yummiest dinner ever... the fact that it was free made it taste even better as she had been given a "dinner out" voucher from her amazing au pair family!

The starter was Skagenrora, probably my favourite food ever. It was so good in fact that even though there was caviar on top I calming scraped it off my dish and managed to not run screaming from the table. See what I mean about maturing?! Although I have not actually looked closely at that picture as I don't wanna feel sick..

Next was beef, best steak Ive ever had. The words "amaaaaazing" were used repeatedly. The yellow stuff is bearnaise sauce. Simply deviiiine dahling.

Then last but not least was chocolate Crème brûlée with some kinda yummy biscuit thing. so so sooooo good! It was perfect, and definately worth more than what we paid for it ;) We decided to leave a small tip.... and Sab managed to give her 100kr (roughly £10) by accident. We managed to stop her asking for it back as Im pretty sure we'd have been chucked out by the angry waitress. Dont anger people who serve you food!

                                                          A hugging, drunk couple in Gamla Stan. I find it cute..


All in all a great birthday and now looking forward to the summer! Have work fo sho during the summer and hopefully for afterwards as well. Also have to improve my Swedish more as I complain that I cant speak it yet Im just too scared to... gotta bite the bullet really! Wish I could press a button and then BAM Im amazing. I'm avoiding my hairdresser right now as every time she keeps saying "next time we will ONLY speak Swedish!".

This is what the students do for graduation, or just after it. Basically large groups of drunk teens play loud music, dance, take off their clothes and throw beer at you, all while on the backs on huge trucks. Welcome to Sweden folks! Not jealous at all...

Regretting the fact I haven't taken many pictures of inside the house as now its pretty bare with everything mostly in boxes. And at the weekend my bed is being sold so I will be sleeping on a mattress, I dont mind though. After the "dog bed" that me and Nicky slept on which zara loving made up from random cushions and placed in the corner of her room .... a mattress doesn't seem too bad ;) Actually had the best nights sleep in that dog bed though. Huh.

These 6 months have past too fast. As Sabrina said "life goes faster each year you get older" and as the boys said ""21 is when your at your fittest, then you get worse". Happy Birthday to meeee!

Long sunny weekend

Heeeej there! Well this weekend was awesome, I had Thursday, Friday & Monday off as well as Sat&Sun and instead of sitting inside watching re-runs of The Office and eating cake I actually did loads...

On Thursday I met up with two Au pairs close to where I live, found our own tiny private beach (just a tiny bit of sand on some rocks) and sat there all day sunbathing. After 5 hours of sitting the in sun chatting and gossiping we went home, it was only when I got home and my 'Host mum' said "Oh my GOD what happened to your back????!" and that's when I realised I was burnty burnt burnt. So for the whole weekend Ive been told to use sunscreen and told that I'm going to get skin cancer. Really? Is burning your skin off not healthy? Huh... thanks for letting me know!! I DID use sunscreen..... just not all over...

That night we went to see The Hangover II and it was soo worth it! I liked it just as much as the first or maybe a little bit more. Some of it was... shocking though.

On Friday me and Sab took a train then a bus ride (about 40 mins all together) to the oldest town in Sweden, Sigtuna. Its not uncommon for me to walk around here going "ooooh it's so pretty" at everything I see, but there I was in "sooo pretty" overdrive. Everything was like a postcard, pictures cant show just how cute it all was... but I tried!

 We didn't realised that you could get there free on the travel cards, but we know that now! So I'm definately going to travel a lot more and make use of it, it gets boring in the city all the time.

 They had realy cool handmade signs on all the shops, very ye 'olde!

They also had "Rune Stones" everywhere, most of them hundreds of years old. Mainly dedicated to people but some said God related things but all written in symbols... strange indeeed.

On Saturday we went to the theme park Gröna Lund. It was AWESOME. Didnt get any pictures though, was too excited for the rollercoasters. I've only ever been to Blackpool when I was 12, so it'd been a long time since I was on a scary ride. My throat hurt from screaming so much on the big ones, the first one I didnt open my eyes the entire time... kinda useless! Also went on a ghost type one as well, since Sab was ahead of us I didnt get scared as I knew whenever a scary thing was gonna jump out as I was warned by her screaming :)

 Also was told by "the one who knows all" about a cool picture app for my phone. It's pretty snazzy...
FINALLY managed to convince Kevin to eat that damn Haggis. Was literally like I was asking him to eat his finger. So yes, finally a Swede has eaten a haggis although he only tried it by eating a tiny uncooked bit (stomach of steel) then decided to make a sauce of haggis, a tonne of spicey spices and cream. Okay, I admit, it tasted deviiiiine but would have tasted just as good on its own. Managed to demolish a family sized piece before have to share it anyway which was simply grand.

 Grilllin' the meat! 

This morning was weird starting "work", It felt like a long holiday! And it didnt make it easier that the kids were super tired and grumpy in the morning.... now have them alone for 2 nights and they have football late tonight so theyre gonna be MEGA grumpy! Just gonna make them behave by feeling them sweets and early beds!

Okay thats all for now folks. Petro, you will probably say soething about my spelling but I dont care! I don't wanna have to read all of my babbling... that's for you to waste your time with! See y'all soon!! 

Puss puss!