December 25th will mark a year since I packed up most of what remained of my wordly posessions and moved myself over here to Belgium.  Plenty has happened since then and I’ve kept much of it chronicled here.  You’ve followed me through my 9 month crash course in Dutch, my inebriated yakking in Cabandad’s car, my unwitting fashion faux pas of the purple coat, the confusing period of registering for university courses and many other memorable moments.  And now? Now I’m moving on into a different phase of my life, especially my life in another country.

On December 4th I will be going to the town hall, yet again, to start the process of getting my electronic identity card with my new “partner” status.  It means I’ll no longer be here as a student, but rather, as the partner of CB.  I’ll be able to work full time and my status will be good for 5 years.  So I’ll finally be a more permanent resident here.  I will also have to get new working papers. Again. But that’s okay because those will be good for a year.  This upcoming weekend I get to celebrate my first Sinter Klaas (I think it’s similar to Michaelmas, if that helps) and I can’t wait to take pictures of the Kerstmarkt and other holiday trappings that are going up in the city center to show you all.  In the meantime I’ll also be spending much of December preparing for my final exams.  From what I can tell the exams here are far more rigorous than any I ever took as an undergrad, but at least my professors are willing to translate them into english for me.

As for the other part of my life that will be changing…we’ve set the wedding date for May 29th, 2010. The day before my 29th birthday.  Right now that’s the only really solid thing, but I’ll definitely be keeping you all updated.

The winners of my giveaway were chosen and contacted.  It’s possible that someone may have attempted to refuse the prize based on shipping costs or the fact that they commented on my mom’s blog for fun, not the contest.  Well, that’s all well and good, but I never said you had to comment strictly for the contest to win, nor did I ever say shipping was a restriction.  So too bad winners, you won anyway and my Mama will be contacting you for shipping info.  Congratulations to Bubblewench for her numerous comments, Jen in MI for randomness and Kelley for having my mom’s favorite comment!!

Chances are it will take my parents a few days to recoup and send me the photos from the trip, but once they do I’ll be blogging a bit about some of what we did while they were here.  Suffice it to say that we did have a wonderful time.  CB likes them very much and enjoyed getting to know them better and vice versa.  I know I was a much happier person while they were here, although now I feel like I used to at the end of an awesome house party in college.  The fun has been had, the guests are all gone and I’m surrounded by empty beer cups, muddy footprints and I think someone clogged the toilet.

Okay, okay.  More like, the guests are gone, I have too much homework (and almost 200 posts clogging my Google Reader), the litter boxes need scooped and CB’s ears are clogged.

Calgon, take me away.