69!

day 69 here, haha. i only say haha because i was number 69 in my graduating class..and that is the only reason it is funny, right? anyways. not much happening today. hard to get out of bed this morning for some reason. i think its a monday thing. then went to language class where i THOUGHT i had my final exam but nope, its tomorrow and the next day instead. so wish me luck with that! then i met a few friends for lunch. who knew the irish pub would have such good coffee? then it was english class time. english here is just really different. first of all the teacher has this crazy british accent and secondly we learn ridiculous things. such as today, we had a test on like animals and sea pollution stuff. we had to DRAW a picture of a "green meadow with a fountain with a blue tail of a whale, a dog barking in a kennel, two pigeons flying, a squirrel, etc etc"..sorry lady but my drawing was just awful! to make things worse (or better?) we had a half hour left at the end so the teacher made us all move our desks in a circle so the class could ASK ME QUESTIONS. sounds fine, right? but you see, theres a girl in the other class that joins us sometimes that has this somewhat nasty-but-fake-nice attitude and she asked questions such as "have you found any nice boys that you like" and its just the most awkward class of my life!!! i think i still have my pride after that one but i wish people that don't know me could try not to make me feel so inferior or something, girls girls girls. some things will always be the same. anyways, afterthat we had music for a couple hours. i read my book. the book is really great actually! its called "i was told there'd be cake" and its a bunch of essays by this new york jewish writer girl. i really like it because she writes pleasant little stores about her life and in two chapters she has even mentioned belgium! its crazy. so i will leave you now, dear reader..because i have to watch desperate housewives. its pretty much an addiction. but i will leave you with two of my finer webcam pictures. first one is a lovely shot of my wrist and an extremely unflattering picture of my face. this picture is here to state that i have introduced belgium to the wonderful world of silly bandz (shaped rubber bands) and everyone so far has loved them! i gave some to my host mom and brother and they wear them now, how cool right? and im starting to give some to my classmates too. they aren't in belgium yet for some reason! but they will come soon. anyways, the next picture is of me having some cuddling time with my newly finished blanket. burrrr cold in belgium! goodnight all, thanks for reading.

68!

hello hello. sunday day 68! woke up pretty late this morning and tried to clean my room up a little..failed. so then of course it was "brunch" time and it was a little different this morning! i got introduced to the (almost infamous) "worstenbrood" and i must say this is definitely not one of those judging a book by its title sort of things. (get it, worst?) anyways. its the belgian version of a pig in a blanket only its more like..breakfast tasting sausage in a croissant, i guess. so here are a couple pictures..weird right!?

then we hung around a bit and then went to see the grandparents on the host dads side in the afternoon. it was nice there, i worked on my blanket a bit more and we had dinner..i had hawaiian pizza, haha. i don't have much else to say because i have part of my final exam tomorrow in dutch class, so i should really be studying! thanks for reading!

67!

hello blog friends! thanks for tuning in to day 67. happy hobo day weekend to those of you in the western world, and to those of you who have no idea what i'm talking about, just happy weekend. started out the morning by forcing myself to get up at 930 to bike to the saturday market in turnhout! it was pretty cold on my way there but i was determined to get some fabric for my blanket. so once there i went to the fabric guy, asked him if he spoke english in my weird dutch..and he responded with "i speak PERFECT english", so thus i got some pretty material! i also got a waffle, yumm!

then i went to get my bike and some jerk tipped it over to get to their bike that was next to mine...thats usually what happens i guess.

i started on my blanket when i got home and found out that even the fabric scissors at the house are not too good so i will have to buy some nice ones soon! but nonetheless i got halfway done with the blanket already. clearly the material was not perfectly the same but i also bought pins so it will work out fine in the end as long as i cut some extra off!

i tried to take a few pictures coming home on the bike but it was starting to rain and they didn't turn out that well, but maybe you will get an idea of what it looks like. i know how you guys LOVE pictures on the blog..i like it too, but sometimes when the internet is slow it takes forever to upload!

sooo after all that i just hung around and made my blanket during the day. then we had lasagna for dinner! it was good but made me really really full..ouch. tonight i went to this really really weird party/festival type thing. i have no idea how to describe it other than like..chaos. it was like 5 big tents set up in the middle of some random field, and then you walk in and feel like you're in a really weird movie or doing crazy drugs. bumper cars, french fries, a girl dressed as the pope singing, loud techno music in one tent, faster loud techno music in another, i am not sure what to tell you. it was fun especially since i met A BOY there (hahaa..you guessed it, cherry beer!) but i was kind of overwhelmed by the whole thing the majority of the time. such a different kind of subculture thing going on here in belgium. these kids love their beer, cigarettes, and techno. interesting! anyways, time for bed. slaapwel, world!

66!

hi world! day 66 here. FRIDAY! long day at school. i did a lot of nothing. such as, sleeping in the library during german and reading my book in the majority of the other classes. i also had gym today where we danced a salsa(i think..1, 2 cha cha cha?) and then played volleyball. thank goodness no more running! after gym we had geography and of course we watched a movie (usually in english, with dutch subtitles..occasionally in some crazy language with english subtitles then covered by dutch subtitles..ridiculous) and in the movie was something about a farm in montana andhow the cows are only fed grass. since i am starting to understand quite a bit of dutch i figured out that the teacher thought this was almost an unbelievable fact..grass fedbeef..no hormones..can NOT be possible. unfortunately she is the type of teacher you do not argue with so i left it alone, but man would i love to take her to cottonwood for a grass-fed-beef tbone or ribeye..hah! so then we went to the irish pub after school as usual. of course a cherry beer for me! oh and i should mention we went to the tea house for lunch and ihad hot chocolate like usual! so then on my bike ride home i decided to stop at the grocery store and buy things to make rice krispie bars! hooray! but man if you think cereal is expensive in america..pushing 5 dollars a box sometimes! and the marshmallows were PINK (not flavored, just colored) so they turned out a little weird looking. anyways i got home and then we all went to another grocery store again only this time to shop for the family for the week. i guess the grocery store is open late on friday..who knew! so here are some things i found amusing at the grocery store. i hope you enjoy them as much as i do!

mr clean=mr propre

weight watchers is in belgium too!

nasty shrimp things (from the north sea!)

and really expensive ketchup. ONE dollar sometimes at walmart!

wine sample station!..we tried it!

and an example of fish you can buy out of the freezer..look at the picture then get it out of the deep freeze below it..interesting..sams club?

so then we went and got some frituur and i had way too many french fries with my chicken burger thing. oh boy! then i made the rice krispy bars that i just tried and they are not that good. but now i am going to bed. thanks for reading!

65!

hi bloggers! day 65 here. it was a nice day, although very cold! high of 48 degrees fahrenheit..so as you can imagine it was a very chilly bike ride this morning! something i have yet to get used to. good news was that i wore a warm sweatshirt from the box from my mom yesterday along with a new scarf and some mittens from here too! i went to language class and guess what..I GOT A 10/10 ON MY TEST! hooray for learning Dutch! next week we have the final exam and it is one day of writing and one or two days of speaking..kind of nervous! so then i met my friends for lunch and we walked to a baker that sells those smos sandwich things i always talk about. so at the bakery i asked for "een fles water"(a bottle of water) and the lady instantly said (in dutch) "you're not from belgium are you" haaha..i must have an accent or be timid while asking i guess. so then we went to school and i had jazz ensemble. it was nice and we played "Summertime" so it was kind of boring for me. i let the guy from argentina try and play once and he was really bad..serves him right for having such a bad attitude!!! i got a whole new schedule of classes emailed to me the other day, but i have not attended any of them yet partly due to the fact that the argentinean is in the new classes as well, so if i stay with my class..then he will not be there. he really changes the mood of the class in a bad way! whatever, we will see what happens! all i know is that i am excited for fall break at the beginning of november! a week without school, fabulous. then i had a few more classes where i did some dutch homework and read a book my mom sent me from home. after school i decided to treat myself to tanning since i did well on my test and it felt very very nice. i wish there was real sun here!! well thats not true, theres sun, but it is NOT warm whatsoever, its insane. so after tanning i biked home and sat in bed for a little while because i was cold and a little tired. then we eventually had dinner and it was good! potatoes, green beans, and some beef gravy type thing. so now i should go to bed, a full day of real school tomorrow..so goodnight and thanks for reading!