Christmas in Sweden - 2000

We had a great Christmas this year!  My first Swedish Christmas!!!  We went to Katarina's house on Christmas eve (when the Swedish celebrate) and spent the day there with Malin and Christer.  We had ham, meatballs, potatoes, and salmon, along with a lot of other food.  We watched Donald Duck in the afternoon (another Swedish tradition - an hour of old Disney movie clips dubbed in Swedish).  It was quite funny! Then after Disney, we opened our presents.  Some of the presents that Måns and I exchanged had rhymes on them to guess what was inside. We ate porridge that eveing and the next morning, Måns and I opened all of the gifts from the U.S. And now, the day after Christmas, we have about a foot of snow!!! Hope you enjoy the pictures!!!

Here is our Christmas tree at our apartment.  We decorated the night before Christmas eve because that is the tradition here. It's full of glittery ornaments and teddy bears.  We put Owl near the top to help guard the tree.  There IS a star, but the tree is so tall (about 10 feet) that you can't see it. The Swedish people have a tradition of keeping a straw goat by the tree guarding the presents, because before Santa Claus, there used to be a goat that delivered gifts (or punishments). You can see our goat to the right of the tree.

Katarina was Santa Claus and in charge of handing out the gifts!

Måns is so excited about his blue lights!   Maybe Malin wants some too?

Christer enjoys his new singing Billy Bass!

Katarina and Malin are checking out their new socks while Måns looks into the camera.

Heather is so happy to have the new Beatles anthology book that Måns has bought her!

Katarina helped me to make a gingerbread house.  Ummm.... we burned it on purpose so it would be a darker color.

Malin opens her gift while Måns seems very satisfied with his new NeoGeo video game system.

Chistmas morning and we open the presents from the U.S. Måns looks so festive! Heather wears the shirt that Måns gave her for Christmas!

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