Old friends + burst of energy

Hello Tuesday! This past week has been pretty full, both with work and in the evenings, hanging out with good friends. Eloane came back from Finland and it was really nice to see her again, although she's leaving soon again for A-lag in Ukraine. A bunch of us got together in Rachel and Doris' apartment one evening and it was really nice to hang out again. Ruthi made special Brazilian bread that smelled rather interesting, and had a very interesting rather squishy, squeaky texture, but was actually quite good, especially with the assorted cheeses Rachel served! Agnes couldn't stand the "stinky feet" smell of the bread so she held a tea bag to her nose the rest of the evening! We also celebrated Cecilia's 18th birthday! Since she had an ice cream cake, she had to blow out the candles on the table! They were kind of far away so it took a long time to blow them out, and she got a lot of help from everyone else! Love you, girl!! Today: We finally go the last pieces moved back into place in the kitchen downstairs! We had the floor in the dining hall and downstairs waxed over the weekend so we had to move everything out into the entrance and out onto the veranda. We had some extra girls on Friday so I had them start moving everything out, including all the paper plates and stuff in the storage room, shelves and couch in my office, work tables, etc. One of the extra girls (Norwegian) who was working in the kitchen that day saw them moving the couch out and wondered what they were doing. I told her that Brunstad was really short on funds and since we didn't have so many events at Brunstad this year, we were asked to sell anything we could get by without to bring in a bit more money. She asked where we would sit and I told her on floor pillows. She wasn't sure if I was serious or not, so I told her to go look in the storage room and that we had already emptied it and my office was bare as well. She was just exclaiming and saying it wasn't possible and "do we really have so little money??!!" It was pretty funny and the other girls who knew, and I, were just cracking up! I finally said to her that we were getting the floor waxed over the weekend and she was like, "oh, that's nice". I was like, "that's why we're moving all the stuff out.....". She was like "OH. MY. GOODNESS. I am so BLOND!" Pretty funny. We're trying to get as much as possible ready before AEG (Arctic Equestrian Games) starts in 9 days. We've been making muffins, brownies, cakes, rolls, cookies and all sorts of good stuff to put in the freezer for those long 11 days where we will definately NOT have time to bake anything and people will be running on sheer will-power. We are short on personnel this year and in Oasen alone, they need 500 shift leaders, not to mention co-workers, during those 11 days. Instead of working anywhere and everywhere, plus trying to do our regular jobs, Haike and I decided to put in long hours at House 33. We ordered 2 people to come and do breakfast from 6:00 - 12:00 and then Haike and I will cover the rest of the day ourselves! We are both really looking forward to it, actually! It's fun to get your hands dirty too and we both miss making the food, although I'm sure we'll be ready for a breather by February 2nd! Here's to getting lots done in the next week!