So before January is over and the holiday's are in the far past of everyone's mind, I thought I'd take a post to share with you how we celebrated our holiday's here in Denmark this year - since I never wrote much about it before!

It turns out, I mostly took photos of our food! So you can see photos of our various celebrations via what we ate!

THANKSGIVING
As you (probably) know, thanksgiving is a US holiday - but we decided to bring a bit of festive food and love to our new friends. We had a couple danish friends and one of DJ's swedish colleagues join us for dinner! I made a turkey (from boneless turkey breast - there's no WAY i was sticking my hand inside a whole turkey...), ate some veggies and introduced sweet potato casserole to the group!

I seriously wanted some pumpkin pie, but could not find pumpkin in any stores - so I made apple. It was a delicious meal, especially considering it was my first thanksgiving I ever cooked, and it was not as easy to find basic foods as it is in the states. (like sweet potatoes, and cranberries!)

CHRISTMAS DATE NIGHT
DJ & I took one evening the week before Christmas to actually go down to the city, by ourselves. It was a nice evening to stroll the walking street all decorated for Christmas. We decided to enjoy a casual dinner together and spent our night at a small Irish Pub, enjoying good beer and grub - I tried this traditional lamb stew, and I liked it!

CHRISTMAS COOKIES
I love making sugar cookie cutouts. I have done it every year of my life, and I think it has to be the best fun for all kids. So I made sure we continued this tradition - and I know they had a blast making, and eating, our creations!

CHRISTMAS EVE
Christmas in Denmark is traditionally celebrated on Christmas Eve with a large meal and then children dancing around the tree and opening gifts. We did the meal! DJ really wanted to have a semi-traditional danish christmas meal, including the duck, rødkål (a sweet red cabbage side dish), and sweet potatoes (not "sweet potatoes", but actually sugared white potatoes). We had our danish friends join us for dinner again, and they said we did a pretty good job making the dishes - for our first try AND not knowing how anything was suppose to taste!

DJ also made a classy version on his favorite christmas dish: mac & cheese! It was a HUGE hit with our danish friends, who said that it tasted VERY american. And we're pretty sure it's the reason our bellies were all so full by the end of the night. 

CHRISTMAS DAY
We had a nice quiet Christmas day at home, complete with presents under the "tree" (we did not buy a real tree this year!) and a yummy breakfast as a family. Then pretty much we played with toys all day long - it was nice. We had a chance to Skype with both our families, which was wonderful, as this was our first year away from the family and we missed everyone! This was PROBABLY our only year celebrating Christmas in Denmark. The PLAN is to take some time off in December and visit the states each year for Christmas. Hopefully that's when we'll be making our first trip back in December 2012!

NEW YEARS EVE
We were warned about new years: the fireworks are insane. We tried to prepare ourselves, but had no idea what to really expect. We knew our kids would not make it to midnight, and doubted we would last ourselves! Our real hope was that we could all sleep THROUGH any craziness (i know, we're party animals...).

The fireworks began around 8pm, and just kept on going. People all over the town would set them off and we could see them from our windows. I fell asleep early (no surprise) and at midnight woke up to watch the show for a bit. It was absolutely awesome. I'd never seen lights coming from every direction before. I loved it, then... I went back to bed and thankfully fell back asleep even thought the bright burst and loud cracks were literally in our parking lot. The kids? They slept all night.

PUMPKIN PIE
Pumpkin pie is my favorite of all. It equals the holidays to me. I was SO bummed not to have it for thanksgiving OR christmas. So for new years, I finally found canned pumpkin in a nearby town, and I made these delicious treats, gluten-free crust and all, for the whole family to enjoy. And for any bakers out there, there is no evaporated milk here, so I used heavy cream instead. I will never make pumpkin pie any other way again. You should try it like that... BEST. PIE. EVER.

NEW YEARS DAY
We brought in the new year twice, once at midnight, and again at 6am when I woke up with the kids and we watched online as the celebration happened in new york city. Funny how 6 hours never feels so far apart until a day like that... our new day begins when the previous day ends for most of you reading this. 

And while you were curling up into bed calling it a night, we were enjoying our delicious banana pancakes! Happy 2012 to you all. Maybe next year, some of you will be in our happy holiday photos. We miss you back there. :)