Merry Christmas (Glædelig Jul)!

Hey, everyone! We hope your Christmas break was fantastic, because we had a really lovely holiday season here in Denmark. Of course, we miss you all terribly, and we wish we could share all the magic of the season with you, too, but hopefully this post will inspire you to join us here one of these years!

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To wrap up November, we celebrated Zac's birthday. He got presents and cookie pie (shout-out to Meg) and went to work and Danish class. Being an adult is fun. Haha.

We also went to see Dan Pulzello's stand-up act at Lygten Station in Copenhagen. He's a comedian from the U.S. that does a lot of funny TikTok/Instagram videos of American vs. European work culture. I'm not posting a picture because it was taken in really bad overhead stage lighting, and all three of us (me, Dan, and Zac) look ghastly. Here are the escalator stairs going to the metro station from that night instead.

We laughed a lot, we were selected for audience participation, and we got our first snow!

Zac put lights on the house, too, so it made it all glow-y and cute. The snow really kicked off that Christmas feeling!

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The snow wasn't great for everyone. The busses struggled a little and it took Khloe a couple of hours to get home from school. They had to kick everyone off the bus, so she walked quite a bit of the way with a friend. Also, the traffic jams had people stuck on the roads for hours. The next day, we went out and saw that people had just abandoned their cars all over the place!

We just stayed at home drinking Christmas beers. Suckers!

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The kids had plenty going on, too. To kick off the season, we had many obligations at the school. Activities really ramp up at the school as Christmas Break nears!

Khloe played for the school against the other international schools in a volleyball tournament. It was so fun watching her play. She had such a good time in her volleyball unit at school that she decided to join a volleyball club in a nearby municipality! She's loving it.

Here's a video of her at the tournament. She's in the upper left of the court in a white shirt and black shorts.

(And if you didn't already know: If you want to watch the videos I post in the blogs full-screen, make sure you click the full-screen icon in the lower right of the preview window so you can see them larger! Below is a screenshot. The red circle in the bottom right shows you the icon to click.)

This is just a pic to show you where to click. It's not an actual video. :)

Harrison had an exit point, which is basically a presentation at the end of a themed learning unit. His class spent months learning about chocolate! They learned about the chocolate production process, designed their own chocolate bars in art, did chocolate-themed math, and spent time learning about cacao farming, fair trade, and the unethical child labor practices. He was so proud to give us his poster presentation and search for fair trade labels around our house.

The Christmas Bazaar is another tradition at North Zealand International School. Each class creates carnival-type games, puts on musical performances, or hosts snack bars all in an attempt to earn the most money for the school. It takes place on a Saturday, which is a mandatory school day for all students, and parents are expected to come, buy tickets, and then spend tickets as a family on the games, food, and raffles.

We hate it.

I'm sorry! We do. It's sooooo crowded and chaotic and long and LOUD. Like, I was seriously going to bring my Loop earplugs and was crushed to see that I forgot them. The school does raise a lot of money and do a nice job of having a variety of things to do, but the kids win prizes they don't choose, need, or want, and I would always rather just give the school money for the things they need than spend three or four hours going deaf and struggling to breathe.

To keep you there, they schedule kids' holiday musical performances at the end of it. Sly, NIS. Very sly. I enjoy watching my kids perform, but I do not enjoy watching them perform at this school for one reason: No one takes charge and makes people be quiet!!! People are talking and yelling and laughing and buying food and all kinds of things. It's almost impossible to hear your kid sometimes over the din. It's just a nightmare, and so disrespectful to the performers and the music teacher who all worked so hard.

Oh yeah. Then there's this parent who thought it was appropriate to shove their entire phone and flip case forward with a fully extended arm to film the entire performance as it bumped against the side of my glasses...

Don't worry. At the end of it I said, "All right, now get your fucking phone out of my face," at a volume that will surely be picked up by the phone's mic, but probably wasn't audible to the parent behind me.

Anyway, Khloe did a lovely job singing "Last Christmas" and Harrison didn't miss a single word of "12 Days of Christmas."

Harrison also had a Christmas breakfast in his classroom, but neither Zac nor I was able to attend, so he was pretty sad about that. Thankfully, he got over it quickly and they had early release that day with his siblings.

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Speaking of school...Zac and I had to take our Module 3 Danish test in early December! We were nervous but prepared, and thankful it didn't involve listening or speaking, just reading and writing. When the exam was finished, we all filed out into the hallways of the school for a surprise. The instructors were preparing gløgg and æbelskiver for us! They started singing Danish Christmas carols as they served us, and even though it was a little chaotic, it made us smile.

When we were finished with our holiday treats, we all had to sing, and then everyone joined hands (I mean, like 80(?) people) and we ran and skipped and danced and sang through the hallways of the entire school. At first, it was weird and I didn't quite know what to make of it, but after just a few seconds, the unbridled joy on everyone's faces was evident, and it really was a very special experience.

We technically still had one more day of class, so the following class day, we met at Gammel Strand in Copenhagen, and our instructor, Anders, walked us through the city, pointing out landmarks, telling us interesting facts, and showing us cool things we didn't know about before.

We went to several Christmas markets, and finally settled at Broens. In the summertime, Broens has food stalls, ice cream cycles, and tables spread out all over. It's on the canals and situated at the start of a bridge (bro is Danish for bridge). In the winter, they close some of the food stalls, the ice cream is gone, and they set up an ice skating rink where there used to be tables. They do still have some tables under lovely heat lamps with big furry rugs laid out so your butt doesn't get cold when you sit down. There were chocolates and French fries to share, and we all said our goodbyes to Anders since he, sadly, will not be our instructor in the coming Module 4.

He was such a great and patient Danish teacher, and we will try hard to make him proud as we continue on (because we totally passed).

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Ugh. Enough being wistful. At work, there were lots of things to do, too! I mean, we had to decorate, of course...

...and remember to open up our delicious Summerbird advent calendars every day.

There were meetings to attend with Christmas-themed treats...

...a fancy champagne-and-kransekage celebration of a major milestone with one of the projects...

...and the annual Christmas pre-pre party, pre-party, and party which were all a good time!

Pre-pre party of Christmas brews, holiday song parodies, and merriment with the department before heading to the pre-party.

Pre-party in the canteen with a DJ, Carlsberg on tap, and fun games with pebbernødder!

And finally, the Christmas party. Good food, good company, and all the dancing and drinking you can handle. Oh, and Zac in a Christmas sweater. :D

We picked up our company Christmas gifts, too, and we are very happy with them. I got a PH Flower Pot lamp. It's solid, hyggelig, cordless, and rechargeable, and it has three dimmer settings. Great for puzzling, late-night visibility, and creating a cozy atmosphere. Thanks, ALK!

Zac selected the crystal wine glass set, so we got 6 red wine glasses, 6 white wine glasses, and 6 water/cocktail glasses. You'll see them in the Christmas dinner photos soon!

Remember my self-imposed challenge to ride my bike to work 100 times in 2024? I also had to squeeze in the last few rides right before the holiday break, but I'm pleased to say that I did it!

Maybe 100 days doesn't seem all that impressive when there are 365 days in a year, but if you consider that of those 365 days, only 262 were weekdays, and that I didn't start riding until April, that means there were only 197 weekdays that I could have chosen to ride. Subtract 12(?) holidays, 30 vacation days, maybe 10(?) sick days between me being sick and staying home with sick Harrison, and we get 145 days. If I worked from home one day a week for 30 of the weeks, that leaves only 115 days I could have cycled to and from work. When you think of it like that, hitting my goal of 100 days was slightly improbable, but I do love a good stretch goal, and I hate to lose.

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In work-adjacent holiday stories...

We got invited to a colleague's house for a delicious family dinner. It was fun to get to meet her husband and kids, and we had a great time playing games with the kids and visiting by the Christmas tree. Kaden was offered a beer by our hosts since he's 15 (if you haven't gathered by now, Denmark has a very free drinking culture), but he only tolerated a couple of sips before I had to finish it off for him. He doesn't really like alcohol, which is fine by us, but he always likes to try a sip or two to see what he's (not) missing!

We also got some visitors from the U.S.! Rachel and Courtney got to come to Denmark for some work meetings, and we wanted to be sure to meet up outside of work for some fun. Vibe and I had an amazing day of Christmas shopping planned on the Sunday they arrived, so we decided to meet up with them in the city for dinner. First, Vibe and I drove to the shopping center in Lyngby, got some coffee, chatted with a colleague we ran into by chance, and really just had the most perfectly efficient day of shopping ever to be had during the holidays! We dropped our things at home, picked up our kids from their activities, and then she and I took the train to Copenhagen and met up with Rachel and Courtney for dinner. We had a really nice visit and a tasty dinner at Palazzo Diner near their hotel, then Vibe and I left them to go get some sleep while we (and our train beers) headed back to Birkerød.

Rachel's husband, Jason, arrived on Thursday and I left work early to pick him up at the airport. We got empanadas at Torvehallerne and then traveled up to Birkerød to hang out at our house with Zac. Rachel and Jason and Courtney had all packed some requests we had from the U.S. in their luggage. Mostly it was Christmas gifts for the kids, but there was also a giant Costco bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos for Zac as a fun surprise. After seeing only tiny European-sized bags of chips for the last couple of years, the size of the Doritos bag looked comically large! (Note the large bag of chocolate chips he requested in the background.)

Zac and Jason and I had a magnificent dinner at Sticks 'n' Sushi at the harbor, and then we got to go say hello to lots of other colleagues at the hotel where the meeting attendees were staying. Zac and Jason and I played some ping-pong, and when Rachel's dinner was over, we left Jason to catch up with his wife, and Zac and I headed home.

We took Friday off to have a fun day in Copenhagen with the two of them before they took off - it was their first time here and there was a long list of things they wanted to squeeze into a single day, but I planned it well and we had a great time.

Our first stop was Nyhavn because it's so picturesque.

We walked to the original Gasoline Grill for lunch, where Jason was pleased to learn that you can get two burgers, two fries, and a 6-pack of Tuborg for walking around the city. We got two of the "Double Troubles," enjoyed our lunch at a little outdoor picnic table, and then packed the extra beer in our backpacks for a day out on the town.

Next stop was Kastellet and The Little Mermaid. We walked through the fort grounds photographing birds, found hot chocolate from a little cart for Rachel, walked around the beautiful St. Alban's church and fountain, watched tourists fall down the slippery rocks trying to get a better look at the statue of the mermaid, checked out the big ships in the harbor, and took some fun and ridiculous photos.

We saw Amalienborg, watched the changing of the guard, and stopped at a cozy little coffee shop for a bathroom break (and to warm up). We went to Christiania and toured the main points of interest, then stopped at the Gray Hall for the Christiania Christmas market. We all found something to buy, then made another cozy pitstop at a smaller Christmas market in Christiania. We left Christiania to explore some of the more traditional Christmas markets in Copenhagen, and then stopped at Comedy Zoo for a drink to kill time while we waited for a very special winter tradition in Copenhagen to start: the Santa Lucia kayak parade!

After the kayak parade, we headed to Tivoli! We played carnival games and walked around looking at all the beautiful lights. Eventually, Zac and I left our guests at Tivoli so we could still get a train and a bus home, but it was really a great day and we all had so much fun.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. Did you think I was done talking about visitors? No way! Remember back in August when our friends' son came over to Denmark to start a 4-month folkeskole program? (Did I write about that? Probably.) He was finishing the program, and our friends Mike and Marci were coming to pick him up. They had planned a Christmas cruise and then had a couple more days in the city before heading back to the U.S.

We met them and our mutual friendly colleague, Dorte, for a fun day in the city just after Christmas. We walked around Christianshavn and Christiania, strolled the canals across from the Black Diamond, and went to a very cozy cocktail bar that Dorte knew of. When we had finished our cocktails, we went to a beer bar that Zac loves nearby. They thought that was very cozy as well, and we stayed there chatting and sipping a beer until it was time for our dinner reservations.

Dorte had selected a Spanish restaurant in the Gray Friar's Square in the Latin quarter, and it was fantastic! We shared appetizers and wine by the open fireplace and then gushed over each others' entrees (because it had been a tough decision and we all wanted to see the dishes that we didn't order). Wonderful atmosphere, decadent food, and great company!

Mike wanted to visit one of the oldest bars in Copenhagen, Hviids Vinstue, which has operated in the same location for over 300 years! It was pretty loud and crowded so we didn't stay long, but we did all have a beer and visit a little longer before we had to separate. It was nice to see everyone and share a little of the city with them. We were also so thankful to Dorte, who not only selected some great stops, but also recommended other places we should go some time when we are in the city! It's good to know a local.

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My nålbinding is going pretty well! I did finish a second good mitten that matches the first, and they are quite warm and good for chilly bike rides. I also decided to see if I could make a slipper. My practice slipper went better than my practice mitten, but it was still too long, too wide, and had a big bulge on the top. Khloe was a good sport to model it for me.

You can see the lump, but at least it was slipper-like and I knew what I did wrong. On my second try, I produced a comfortable slipper that fit my foot well, and over this holiday break, I successfully completed a second matching slipper. Heck yeah!

For Christmas, I got a good nålbinding needle and a book about the craft, so I look forward to some new fun projects.

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And I guess I should talk about Christmas itself!

The lovely tree in the center of Birkerød

Our tree wasn't as magnificent as the big one in the town center, but we did find a nice little tree at a tree farm!

We tried to go the the same place we went last year because our experience was so wonderful, but their website and Google hours indicated that they weren't open on weekends. We thought this was maybe wrong, but it was the same in two places, so we figured maybe they were getting older and didn't want to work weekends? We went during the weekday during a time when the website indicated they were open.

The lights on the sign were turned on, the gate was open, and it looked just as we remembered it, except there weren't any people there and the æbelskiver shack was boarded up. We saw a couple guys from the planteskole unloading pre-cut trees, and we figured someone would come out and help us once we found a tree. We picked one that they had already cut (no need to cut one if there's a beauty already waiting for you, right?), and no one came to help us wrap it. I called the phone number an no one answered. The planteskole guys closed the gate.

We stood there for another minute, no one came out, and so we just put the tree back, opened the gate, and let ourselves out. Who knows what happened.

We drove up the road to another place that had a "Juletræer" sign. There were a couple of cars in the lot, and we saw trees and lights. We walked into the main building and someone came to help us. They were a little surprised that we were their midday on a weekday at the beginning of December, but they were happy to help anyway.

"Most people come on the weekend to get trees. If you come on the weekend, there's a nice party and we give out free gløgg and æbelskiver. You should come back then with your family!"

We didn't feel like explaining that we had only come out during the day because our tried-and-true tree farm had a mistake in the hours posted online (maybe?) and had led us out mid-week. We just said it was hard to get us all together at one time and we should just get the tree when we had a chance.

Anyway, we got a tree, even if the process wasn't very magical this year. And bonus, we now know that there are two really great places to get trees on the same road!

The Christmas break has been really nice. Of course, in early December, Harrison was sick, then I was sick, and then Kaden was sick. Harrison is coughing again, but Zac and Khloe have somehow survived this long without much trouble. So there have been some sick days and some fun days, but all good spirits.

The can art alone is worth buying. I wish I could keep them all somehow and make a quilt of Christmas beer artwork. That's actually an incredible idea...

The kids all got Kinder Bueno and Toms advent calendars for the month. They struggled to agree on who would get which one, but eventually, it got sorted and I think they were all pretty happy with their choice.

We decorated the house and the tree as a family, listening to Christmas records and playlists. No Christmas puzzles were brought out because I had one mission before Christmas Eve dinner: to finish a Mickey Mouse mosaic puzzle that I had started like six weeks prior. It was SO HARD!!! (I am pleased to say that Khloe and I did finally triumph about 4 hours before dinner.)

Harrison brought out the nisse hat, hung up his homemade nisse doors in secret places, and hung a little paper cone on the tree for the nisse to fill with treats. They surprised him with cookies and chocolates a few times over the holiday period. They played a trick on him one night and lined up all the shoes in pairs from his bedroom door down the hallway. Another night, they put his nisse hat in the fridge! Tricky things.

I bought some brunkager dough from the canteen at work, so Khloe and Harrison helped me bake them up.

I bought three rolls of dough and we ate all the cookies in one night. Brunkager are like gingerbread spice cookies, which were historically made from Christmas spices and leftover rye bread dough, sweetened with honey instead of sugar, and laced with pistachio and almond slices. Now, the dough is made with sugar and butter and flour and all that instead of leftovers, but it is a whole process, and I was happy the canteen did it for me. All we had to do was figure out which temperature to bake them at and how thin to slice them. I think we did OK, but some of them were a little softer than the traditional cookies. We didn't mind. They were amazing.

We got ambitious and carried on the family tradition with some old-fashioned sour cream cookies, too. In fact, they turned out better than ever this year. I don't know what we did, but they were puffy and perfect and delicious!!

All the kids helped cut them out, but Kaden didn't want an apron or to be photographed candidly. That's OK. I know he was there. :)

And of course, we decorated as a family! There is no canned frosting here. The frosting I made last year was fine, but not quite right. This year, I opted for a homemade buttercream, but I added almond extract and a little extra whipping cream. It was actually fantastic and not too runny. It thickened up nicely but was still soft, and I think it was all we could've asked for.

At the Christiania Christmas market, I picked up a bottle of Bornholm Julesnaps. At Christmas, Danes drink snaps, which many English-speakers pronounce as "schnapps" because that's what we equate it with in our minds, but "schnapps" and "snaps" are different. Schnapps is a low-alcohol mixer in either peppermint or peach flavor. Snaps has about double the alcohol content, is meant to be taken alone as a shot in small akvavit glass with a meal. Bornholm (a Danish island - Khloe went there on her class trip in June and wrote about it in the blog) is kind of famous for their snaps, and so I took the opportunity to get some. The Julesnaps seemed festive, and when I sampled it, it burned at first and then tasted like gumdrops. Mmmm.

I also attempted to make my grandma's cheeseball to make it really feel like Christmas! For as long as I can remember, my Grandma Iris has made us a cheeseball at Christmastime. She displays it in the center of a light beige veggie tray dish from Tupperware and fills the surrounding compartments with various crackers: Better Cheddars, Chicken in a Biscuit, Ritz, Wheat Thins, and those good grainy crackers with the little sesame seeds in them. When we moved to Denmark, we said goodbye to cheeseball.

Last year, she gave me the recipe, but some of the ingredients are very American and are sort of niche holiday canned cheese spreads from Kraft. I did my best to figure out how to make those cheese spreads from scratch, or to find a good replacement. I think I did OK, but ultimately, I had to make it more of a cheese dip because the cream cheese here is only the softer, more spreadable cream cheese, and the final product was too thin to be made into balls. Alas.

It was still incredibly good, but not exactly Grandma's.

We also had some fancy Juleost with crackers and pepperoni. The cheese cart visited ALK just before we broke for the holiday, and I was all set to buy my favorite Vesterhavsost (the cheese from Jutland that's cured by the salty sea air and aged in a lighthouse), but then the cheesemonger (maybe the first time in my life I have ever had the opportunity to write that word) asked if I wanted to try Juleost, which was similar to Vesterhavsost but with extra salt flakes in it...um, YEAH?!

Between the cheeseball dip and the cheese board and the cookies, we snacked like kings on our holiday. Kings that will have high cholesterol issues, probably, but kings nonetheless.

Basking in the glow of our Christmas beers and cheese-themed treats, Zac and I found a quiet two hours to snuggle on the couch in the soft light of the tree without kids around and listened to the Dr. Demento radio show from 1976, an annual tradition and one that always makes us happy.

The day before Christmas Eve, Zac and I visited our first Danish butcher. We were hoping to get some ribeye steaks for Zac to cook as our Christmas Eve dinner. There was a large line out the door, and everyone was taking numbers. They had a big canopy set up so people wouldn't get wet when it rained, there was a little gas fireplace to keep everyone outside warm, and there was a little bowl of chocolates to snack as you waited. Many people were there to pick up pre-ordered duck for dinner, because in Denmark, it's traditional to eat duck or roast pork belly, but we were being different.

The butcher shop was just another example of how wonderful the customer service is in Denmark and how kind and competent Danish shop owners are. Anyway, the butcher dry-ages their beef, and he said that the dry-aged ribeyes were one of their specialties. He trimmed and sliced them and wrapped them all up for us, and on Christmas Eve, Zac did a great job cooking them. The meat was incredible.

We made mashed potatoes and vegetables to go with the meat, and Zac made up his mom's delicious vegetable sauce and a pepper sauce to complement the meat. The kids had Faxe-Kondi from a champagne bottle, and Zac and I shared a nice red wine. The table was set with placemats and napkins that I made (years ago, when I still owned a sewing machine), our fancy new glasses from Zac's ALK Christmas present, and a centerpiece I threw together from trimmed Christmas tree branches, ribbon, and a stabby plant that was trying to overtake our recycling bins. We looked for pinecones or larch cones to add to it, but there aren't really any conifers near our house and dinner was nigh!

Still pretty cute, eh?

I made a salted caramel pear pie for dessert, and I am pleased to say that, for the first time ever, I did not burn my skin with hot salted caramel as I was making it. I am winning.

Zac demonstrating the capabilities of his "Brewdolph" shirt.

On Christmas Eve after dinner, we opened our presents one by one. The kids were so grateful for all of the wonderful presents they received. They were so happy, and we were happy to see them so happy. Even Han and Marabel got gifts (although Han was more excited to open his own presents than Marabel).

Look at these other little angels, too.

The kids had their moments of bickering, but overall, they were pretty good to each other. They played games of their own volition that weren't on a screen!

And even though I have several old standby Christmas albums and Christmas playlists I've curated over the years, I always try to discover more. Maybe it's an old classic crooner that I haven't heard before, maybe it's a '90s version of a traditional song, or maybe it's a Christmas song in Danish that I am just now learning about. This year, it was Star Wars themed Christmas parodies. I'm in love with this little album.

We listened to SO MUCH good Christmas music this season. I love it.

Anyway, we had some nice video chats with family members, we played games with the kids, we watched "A Christmas Story" as a family and ate treats, and generally just had a really relaxed holiday. We do miss the togetherness of a big family Christmas Eve, but these nice, small holidays are really wonderful, too. It's a good opportunity to focus on the family and get in quality time with our kiddos.

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In the few days after Christmas, we did virtually nothing productive and enjoyed sleeping in a lot. It was great.

Khloe practiced learning songs on her new electric guitar. This girl has been really enjoying the string instruments lately, and maybe when she's done with volleyball for a while, she will start some formal music lessons. Until then, she's been doing pretty well using TikTok and YouTube.

Zac and I have been trying to learn from YouTube as well...on accordion!

We had hoped to maybe learn enough to include an accordion part in an amateur-ly arranged family Christmas song performance, but as I said earlier, I enjoy setting stretch goals, and sometimes, I do not reach them. :) No matter. We'll keep at it.

Harrison has been playing the electric piano he and Khloe got last year for Christmas. He uses YouTube to learn as well! He does a pretty good job for someone who is teaching himself as a 7-year-old.

I like having time for music and yarn crafts and blogging and playing with the kids. Christmas break is the best break. I said it.

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We hope every one of you had an amazing holiday as well. We hope you got to spend some time resting, rejuvenating, and eating inordinate amounts of cheese.

We love you all! Merry Christmas.