2016.11.30: Photo recap

Here are a few pictures of Anya’s Thanksgiving dinner preparations.

Anya put in a lot of effort into the Thanksgiving dinner on the weekend after a heavy exam week. This Monday is back to full study mode for the challenging International Baccalaureate with 4 higher level courses (normal is 3). She was also the only one who showed up for pole vault practice tonight, so there was little time to rest between vaults. Yes, she is tired, but generally, she is getting an adequate amount of sleep.

I spent a lot of the weekend developing a mid-term exam in Swedish. A colleague proofed it today, so it is ready to go tomorrow. My co-teacher was pleased with the content, but made a few Swedish tweaks as well. I’m trying to get an understanding of the accommodation process for various learning and physical disabilities. I think I have the bases covered for tomorrow.

I spent 2.5 hours in the afternoon with my Monday Swedish conversation partner going over a set of my PowerPoint slides. It took 2.5 hours to go through Genesis. So, it will be a long process, but this is a standard course that I will teach over and over.

This evening was spent preparing for Wednesday, as I will present at a Johannelund research seminar. I think that it will be attended by mostly our faculty and perhaps a few retirees from the Johannelund network. It will be a presentation of my PhD research for the first half, but I will also connect it with what I spoke on in Norway in September—about different ways of knowing (or if you like the fancy term, different epistomologies). I think the latter part will be of more interest to many colleagues and continue to strengthen Johannelund’s positioning for intercultural theological education. Many of the Johannelund faculty have taught in Tanzania and Ethiopia where the ongoing relationships are strong.

I don’t think I’ve mentioned our Christmas plans. We leave Sweden on the 23rd of December and fly to the Bay Area. We are there for Christmas with Eric’s family through the 26th. Then we fly up to the Seattle area, where I will rent a car and stay in our dear friend’s condo while they are out of town for a bit. (What a great blessing!) Anya is eager to see friends, and is hoping to shadow a friend at two different high schools. I have friends to see too, but I also have a garage that needs a bit more sorting. At the end of our packing, we stored quite a bit of stuff. We will strategically select things to bring back with us to Sweden. We fly out on the 6th of January, as Sweden’s Christmas time continues through the 12 days of Christmas to Epiphany.

With blessings,

Beth