update #14 - Hunington Beach/mid term Finals week/ Swiss Traditions

Days count: 154
It's been a while since the last update, so there's a lot to tell about. By the way, yesterday was half-time of my time here.
So, we went to Hunington beach, which is near Los Angeles, because my host mum had a cross fit competition there. We got out of school earlier, it took us like 4 hours to get there, but we stopped in Valencia to have lunch. Basically we just drove around and had dinner somewhere in Long beach I guess, after that I took care of some friends kids. The next day, we went to Hunington and cheered for my host mum at her competition. For dinner we went to Hooters. 
The next day, we headed out home, but we stopped at a mall and we went to visit my host mum's sister.


Monday after our little trip, our mid term finals week started. Monday and Tuesday we had our usual schedules, Wednesday we wrote exams in Aerobics and US History. On Thursday we I had my finals in Biology and Choir (but my teacher quit, she told us on that day, so I'll probably have another fifth period after Christmas break, I don't know yet). On the last day, I had Algebra and English. 
To be honest, I feel like the tests were easy. It's still hard, because you have a 90 minutes test in every subject and this every day twice, you have to study, because if you fail there's no way you can pass that class. 

We baked Grättimänner on Thursday, my host sisters cousine came over and we made some. Actually, the cat ate them, so we only had a few. They really liked them though.

On Sunday, we had Kingsbury Christmas, which is the Christmas party of my host dad's family. They're all firefighters, that's why it is hard to find a date where everyone is off work, that's when they celebrate it. 

We had breakfast at the house where the party was, then we got presents. Everyone got a little box with their name on it and presents from the grand parents in there. I got a lot of nice things, I have no clue how I should get all that home. 

On Monday, the IEC (=International Exchange Coordinator) of this town took some of the Exchange students on a christmas shopping trip to Bakersfield. 

Yesterday night, we made traditional American Sugar cookies. We made the dough by ourselves and then we decorated them. It is not the same as in Switzerland, because they make different kinds of cookies than we do and they decorate them way more. It's kinda like a party, because you invite friends to do it together, then you have dinner with them and stuff. 

      

I am part of the EF High School Exchange Year Ambassador Program in Switzerland. If you are interested, there's still time to sign up for an exchange year in Ireland, England or the US. http://www.efswiss.ch/de/highschool/

update #13 - christmas parade

days count: 137

Okay so this week started off pretty usual, just high school. I've had many test because I had to make up some that I missed when I was absent from school. 
On monday it was 'Cyber monday' which means every online store has everything 50% off, so I bought christmas presents and stuff. On tuesday we had our cross country banquet, which means cross country season for 2016 is definitely over & everyone got their certificate and stuff.
On wednesday we didn't do anything special, but on thursday I went to the junior high choir concert for my mixed choir final, so we had to do our concert critique. The high school choir concert is going to be the following thursday.
Friday we didn't do a lot, but yesterday I hang out with two of my friends. One of them just got her license, so we got starbucks and went to a little store in downtown Tehachapi & got stuff to make necklaces by ourselves. After that we ate pizza & went to the christmas parade, and after that to a house which was really decorated with lights, so the made a light show.
Today we went to a gender reveal party. It was really exciting and there were many good desserts, everything in blue and pink. The reveal was really cute, they had a box which they opened and the color of the balloons that flew out said if it's a girl or a boy. Actually I was dressed pink, but it's gonna be a boy.
I have one more week and then it's finals week, which means I'll probably mess up 'cause I'm not ready for that, lol.