Thanksgiving Prep in Poland

I cannot believe it is already Thanksgiving time. This will definitely be a very weird Thanksgiving for us! Thanksgiving is specifically an American holiday. While it is one of the major holidays in the US, it is not even a blip on the radar here. Fortunately Myles does not have to work on Thursday, but it has nothing to do with the holiday. It is just the way his schedule worked out. We are having our (only) American friend over for dinner on Thursday afternoon. I am so happy she is able to make it. I have just spent an hour translating all of the ingredients I need into Polish. I have a hard time telling what some of the stuff is in the stores here, and not being able to read the packaging does not help at all. But now I am armed with my Polish list for my traditional American Thanksgiving meal. I am going to the big grocery store tomorrow while the kids are at school so I can take as much time as necessary. I could be there a while!

We have been working hard on schoolwork this week. The weather has been about 50 degrees for the past several days which has been really nice. My laundry has been out on the balconies blowing in the breeze! That makes everyone happy. When it is too cold, our laundry racks are in Ben's room and the girls' room and hanging all over the railings.

The kids have been hanging out with some of their new friends.

This is a great group of kids and we are so thankful that we have been able to get to know them and their parents. My kids look forward to going to school on Mondays. I'm sure it doesn't have anything to do with getting away from me!

Trey is going to be the Gingerbread Man in the school play. He is thrilled and we have been practicing his lines. This play makes me laugh because if you recall the story, the Gingerbread Man gets eaten at the end. The US has become so worried about political correctness to allow a student to be in a play where he gets eaten at the end! I'm glad we have the opportunity to be a part of this.

We are still waiting on our Temporary Residence cards. There is a Fulbright family in Warsaw who is having a very difficult time getting this done. The wife had to leave Poland yesterday or she would have been considered illegal. The Fulbright office and the US Embassy did get involved, but she still had to leave for a period of time. She flew to London and I have not heard when she will be able to return. They have four young children. One is a nursing baby who obviously had to go with mom. The other three have been cleared to stay. We believe we have supplied all of the documentation necessary to get ours done, but one never knows what further documentation they will ask for. We have until December 27th to be approved. That date is based on when we arrived. There is nothing for us to do at this point but to hope for no problems. We are fortunate to have Magda, Myles' colleague, who helps us at every turn with this, and we might need the Fulbright office in Warsaw to help.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! We will really miss it this year and will appreciate it all the more next year!