Our Swedish Daughter

Today I want to introduce you to a new member of our family.  Our foreign exchange student Josefine, from Stockholm, Sweden.  We could not possibly be more excited to have her here with us for a time!  I will be doing posts once in  awhile to update you on her stay here with us.  But today I just wanted to introduce you to Josefine.  Can you give her a big hello?

This is her when she was on her way to the airport to fly to West Virginia. This is all of the luggage she brought for the whole year!  I think I know someone who is going to need to go shopping!  Well, I think I know some people who can help her out with that, ha!

Her journey to the US was not without plenty of drama.  She had a layover in Newark, NJ and was dues to arrive Friday evening, Aug. 9 at 5:40 p.m.  We arrived at the airport at around 5:00 and received a text message that she had missed her connecting flight.  I knew that seemed wrong because she had a 4 hour layover.  Of course, the rude lovely ladies at the United Counter were no help at all.  They simply would not tell me anything.  Even when I explained the situation.  We finally found out a few hours later that her flight had been cancelled!  We ended up driving back home and not finding out where she was until 12:30 am.  I was very upset and worried for her.  But it turned out that her parents helped her book a hotel at the airport and book another flight.  Oh, BTW, NO HELP from United Airlines!  They did not compensate this poor girl anything!  She was here all alone in a foreign country and she was upset and afraid.  So her next flight was re booked for Saturday, and she was due to arrive at around 8:00 p.m.  This is Mr. 5 Year Old and I waiting for her to arrive.  Nervous and excited!

 

And before we knew it, here she was!  Sorry for the blurry iPhone picture.  I hated to keep asking her to pose when she just got off the plane.

We spent Sunday taking her to Walmart and to the mall to get some food she liked and she wanted to get some things she needed for soccer and school.  Then we went to dinner.  She claims that everything here is bigger than it is in Sweden, and she about died when she walked into Walmart, ha!  She thought it was huge!  I think she was a little confused when trying to choose the items she needed, but we helped her out.

She wanted to go to an American restaurant for dinner, so we took her to the Texas Roadhouse.  You can’t get much more American than that!  She said she loved it!

And she began her first day of school on Thursday.  She doesn’t have to go to school until around 10:00a.m. so she was shocked that they start here at 7:30!  She also started soccer this week.

All in all, I think it was a good week for her.  She is as sweet as can be.  She is adjusting very well to life as an American teenager.  She is exhausted I think from being immersed in the English language, even though she has been studying English for 9 years.  Studying it and living it are two different things.  I feel lucky that Josefine is the student we ended up with.  I can feel her stealing my heart a little bit more every day.  And I think I am going to be heartbroken to say goodbye to her in the end.  One thing is for sure though, this year is going to be a year that my family will never forget as long as we live.  And we are all going to learn and grow and be enriched for it.  This was a family decision for us, and I have a feeling it is one of the best decisions we have ever made!

She has started a blog about her adventures to the US if you would like to check it out.  It is in Swedish, but you can use google translator to translate to English.  Besides, I just think it is super fun to look at the Swedish language!  I know where this is going to end up for me, and that is with a trip to Sweden (hoping, praying, somehow it WILL happen).  I am 25% Swedish and have always been curious about Sweden, but now I am bordering on OBSESSED!  So be looking for me to share some Swedish style with you in the near future as well!