La Nouvelle Année

Bonne Année! Happy New Year! I'm still at Maura's house while the school is under construction, so the holidays have been really quiet. It seems unusual to be the only girl in the whole house, with just Maura's kitty Licorice for company. I've just been catching up on my reading and watching some TV; I even get the remote to myself!

Christmas morning wasn't as lively as usual. Maura's parents were really sweet and bought me a new outfit...the Sparkly Tunic outfit! Isn't it great? I'd been wanting it for the longest time, and it really was nice of them to buy it for me.

So what I am doing for New Year's Eve 2008? I think I'm just going to sit under un grand sapin de Noel (the large Christmas tree) with a good book. I'll probably turn the TV on as 2009 gets closer and get my noisemakers ready. It'll be a blast to ring in the new year, even if I'm still used to ringing in the new year with France.

So Happy New Year, my friends!

Dorm Changes

As Christmas and Hanukkah approach, the commuter students at FHSG come to school less and less, thus leaving us non-American students. It's awesome really, as Nathalie and I love having the place to ourselves. D'accord, Megan and Rose join us for meals, but we don't really see much of them, even though Megan and Nathalie are cousins.

But Mlle Laurette says that, while FHSG is undergoing renovations, the dorms are closed, kicking us out to the curb. We are forced to stay in our commuter students' homes, which means that Nathalie and I won't be celebrating the holidays together. She's supposed to stay at Lindsey's house, while I think I'm going to go back to Maura's house (even though Maura is currently in London with a great aunt). So Christmas will be uno giorno tranquillo, a quiet day, (Did I mention that I study Italian?) with Maura's parents without even my best friend Nathalie!

I wish I could go back to visit my family over the holidays, but it's not possible this year. Je suis jalouse, I am jealous, of Rose because she says that she'll soon be visiting England over the break. Wish I could sneak on the plane with her!

Le Noel

Don't you just love Le Noel, Christmas time? I cannot say that I'm as devoutly Catholic or even as religious as I should be, but I do love the time of gift-giving. I love how everyone scurries around to stores, buying up cheesy reindeer sweaters and lots and lots of wrapping paper. I love drinking un chocolat chaud (hot chocolate) and listening to Christmas carols ("Adeste Fideles" is my favorite) while wrapping presents and decorating le sapin Noel (the Christmas tree). Admittedly, it's why I kept putting off the introduction of my blog.

Don't you just want to be in that picture right now (vote for it in ourdolls.net's holiday photo contest, if you want) ? I got an early start on decorating this year, mainly because my teacher didn't exactly want to study for her own exams, but I prefer saving my wrapping and tree-decorating for Christmas Eve; it just seems so magical. Watching a Christmas movie while wrapping presents, then dressing up to attend Midnight Mass? We haven't done the Midnight Mass thing for a couple of years, but I'd love to be able to do it this year. I know I just said that I'm not that religious, but mass on Christmas Eve? There's nothing better.

Another holiday favorite of mine is ice-skating. Okay, it's a new favorite. I've been getting to know one of FHSG's newest students, a girl named Nathalie Caroline Thibodeau. Nathalie's from Montréal, Québec, so she speaks French, too, with a very strong Canadian accent. She loves history and reading (mainly Anne of Green Gables), but also has a passion for wintry-type sports like figure skating. So, a couple of weekends ago, Nathalie was getting her skates on for practice and persuaded me to try it. I was like, "What? I don't even have any skates, let alone the skills to skate," but I decided to borrow Isabel's skates for the heck of it. And I still can't say I'm the best skater, but once I got on the ice, I really, really enjoyed myself. I didn't fall down much, at least.

Nathalie's such a pro; she can spin, jump, do anything on ice!

Bonjour, tout le monde!

Bonjour! Je m'appelle Sophie Amélie Moreau, et je suis une poupée d'une fille américaine. J'ai 12 ans, et j'aime voyager à l'autres pays, et j'aime écrirer quelques choses dans mon blog. Alors, comprenez-vous?

Oops, I forgot that most of you aren't fluent in French. My teacher isn't even fluent, as she's always telling me, "Slow down, Sophie, repeat yourself calmly and rationally." Anyway, my name is Sophie Amélie Moreau (but you can just call me 'Sophie,' 'Soph,' or even 'Figchen,' the nickname of Catherine the Great when she was still referred to as Sophie). I am an 12-year-old American Girl doll #25, but to be honest with you, I'm not all that American. I was born on August 9th, twelve years ago, in Paris, France to Jean-Luc Moreau and Sylvie Kowalsky. Et après dix mois passed, my younger sister, Juliette Adrienne Moreau, followed me into this grand world. That's right - we are exactly ten months apart! We're practically twins!

But, anyway, I decided that I'd had enough French schooling for now and proceeded to enroll myself into Fair Hollow School for Girls, an elite girls' school particularly for girls with an interest in the fine and/or performing arts. So, with a few bittersweet tears, I headed off to America, trunk in tow. It was très difficile, very difficult, at first, trying to fit in to a place that was so unlike home, but once I get the hang of things, I'm not at all shy. Now that I've taken part in classes, solved a few mysteries, traveled a bit, and written loads of letters to ma famille, I feel like I'm truly an essential part of Fair Hollow School for Girls (or FHSG, as we call it).

I'm starting this blog not as the school assignment it's meant to be, but as a way to record my feelings throughout daily life here at FHSG and, hopefully, to preserve pictures of any travel adventures that I embark on. I'd also like to keep this blog up for longer than it takes to fulfill my grade. You may remember that some of my classmates, Lindsey and Anya, had blogs as part of school assignments, but they decided not to keep theirs up. I'm determined to be different. I may not post every day, but I do think it's essential to keep up my journaling, even if only as a way to send pictures back home.

If you're reading this (and you're a fellow doll like me), feel free to link my journal to yours, and we can correspond back and forth--I love new friends!

Sophie