Hello! I hope you have had a Merry Christmas and a happy new year. I certainly have.

On the day of Christmas Eve, our family hiked up the local mountain, and and stayed overnight in a cabin we had rented. It is called the Tuba Kuba, which means Tuba cube (those of you who have seen my previous blogs already have heard about this cabin). It is called this due to its design. It was designed by the architecture department in the university, by students their. The wood is bent in, so it becomes a hole. At the end, there is a little hobbit hole door. When you get in, it is generally warm, because every day the cabin is booked, except on Christmas Eve (it seems almost unthinkable for some reason).

 But we have rented it 3 times on Christmas Eve. It’s become a tradition. We hike, then playing games, listening to christmas songs, and eat charcuterie or cheese fondu. On Christmas morning, when I woke up, our stockings were full. We had agreed to only bring stalkings up on the mountain. I got a cool flashlight, a GIANT box of Toffifees and a cute Niffler teddy bear (Niffler is a creature from Harry Potter that is attracted to shiny things, and is always getting in to trouble around banks or fancy places) When we got home, it was what I like to call a movie moment (movie moments include opening the hotel room door for the first time, christmas, or my birthday). 

I got three really cool books by Randal Monroe. He is basically this insanely smart person who takes questions from people and answers them, Scientifically. They are also it is super funny. I also got a really cool book that is about harry potter, and it’s got all sorts of history and magic and backstories. Then I got games such as Exploding and Imploding Kittens, Paramedic, Munchkin, Ticket to ride and a game called Carcassonne. They are all fun and interesting in different ways, and add to our collection for Sunday game night!

A couple days after Christmas we rented a car and drove to another cabin, this time near a ski lodge. The road trip along the fjords was nice and we even saw a really old (from the the year 1120!) stave church.

They had cross country skiing, which we did on the first day, and boy was it fun. But the days afterward were VERY icy, so we did not go skiing. We stayed in the cabin, with a toasty fire and doing puzzles. we would occasionally go for a car ride, or I would go outside and fight an army of snowmen. We also played a lot of games.

We also went downhill skiing. I thought is was fun. There was a really long T-bar lift that we had to take up a steep black diamond hill in order to get to the easier trails. But I would fall off, and then have to ski down a black diamond! Finally, on the 4th try, we were getting progress, but my ski hit a rock, and kind of got knocked off. I hung on and let the lift drag me because I didn’t want to ski back down again! Eventually had to let go. We walked a while uphill but downhill skis are super heavy and the boots are like wearing casts on your feet, so it was very challenging. Eventually a guy with skidoo drove up and stopped the lift so we could get back on. When we got to the top it was so fun!! It looked like heaven!! (see below).

But it eventually got steeper, and even though I was getting the hang of it, at one point it went from snow to complete ice, were you can’t stop. I had a pretty good wipeout and after I confirmed that I was fine, my mom took a photo for good measures. I was near the end but there was one last hill and it was ice and steep. I ended up rocketing down, and I could feel the wind trying to stop me. I have never been more scared! I had a pretty good crash and got quite a few bruises, but it made for an exciting finish to 2019. That night we rang in 2020, a new decade, hopefully filled with new adventures.

Happy New Year from the International Moose!