Juhannus

Minä olen nyt junalla Helsinkiin. Sitten matkusta lentokoneella Lontoon iltapäivällä. Minulla on minun läppäri ja netti, siksi minä kirjoitan blogiin.

This is me practicing my Finnish. What I said above is "I am now on a train to Helsinki. Then I travel by plane to London. I have my laptop and internet, so I write to the blog."

Sounds a bit odd in direct translation, but you get the idea ;)

With the free two hours I have on this train, I thought it was a good time to make a post here.
This past weekend was Juhannus, or midsummer. It's a big holiday here in Finland, so most people went out to their summer cottages to celebrate the 'yöton yö', or nightless night. We stayed home for the weekend, so on Friday night, I had lots of coffee and stayed up late to watch the sun. It was quite a cloudy night, so most of the sky was obscured, but it was still quite bright. I know in Northern Finland, the sun doesn't set at all, but since we are in the southern part, I thought it would get dark for a little while. Turns out it just looks like dusk for a few hours, which was amazing to see.


This picture was taking at midnight, 12:00, from the roof of my building.

This one was at 2:00am

And this one at 3am, when the sun was rising again.

Kesä!

We have been quite busy since the new year has begun! I'm now in a full time Finnish course, so my learning has greatly improved! I still know very little comparatively, but learning more every day.

Amy has completed second grade and is now on her summer vacation! She did very well in school and we are quite proud of her. She already misses her brother during the day though as he still goes to daycare. We love how well they get along and how much they seem to still love each other. We know it won't last forever, so we try to enjoy and encourage it now :)

Finland has had amazing summer weather so far! It was sunny and warm for the entire month of May, so we tried to spend as much of it outdoors as we could. We went to parks and lakes and just played in the yard as well. The sun stays up late and wakes up early, so it's hard not to enjoy it.

The summer (kesä) is already unfolding and it's exciting! Toward the end of June, I will be going to England with some friends of ours. I've never visited England, so I'm quite excited to explore it. I will be mostly in Cheddar, with some time in Bristol and London as well.
Then in July, my niece is coming to visit and we have some fun things planned, including going to a mökki, which is a summer cottage here in Finland, and a trip to Tallinn, Estonia. We will also spend a few days in Helsinki to explore there. Then there is also a trip to Turku and possibly another to Stockholm later in the summer. It will be quite the traveling time!

We don't yet have plans to go back to the US, but hopefully it won't be long. We do have some family coming to visit in December, so we're already very excited for that!! I can't wait to show everyone around our new city and spend time with them here.

As it's been almost a year since we moved here, I've been doing a lot of reflecting. It's been a great year and I'm happy to be where we are. It's hard to miss so many people, but it's been such a great experience and there still seems to be so much to look forward to!

Hyvää Uutta Vuotta!!

It's hard to believe another year has come and gone. Every year brings a new adventure and this past one did not disappoint.

I think we all are settling in to our Finnish life nicely. The kids seem to be doing well in school and enjoying it. I've been enjoying getting to know the culture and lifestyle here, while also taking some night classes to learn the language. It's a slow process, but it's getting there!

Amy's school is one thing that amazes me. Many of the things people in the US hear about Finnish schools are true, but not all of them. There are also things I had no idea about. First of all, one thing I hear about most is that there is no homework. That's not true at all. Amy has homework every single day, sometimes even quite a bit of it. She does only go to school for 4-5 hours a day though, depending on the day of the week. School schedules vary, so she starts and ends at different times each day. They do so many different activities as well. Tomorrow she starts learning parkour, which she is super excited about. They've also gone swimming, ice skating, orienteering, to museums and plays, and other things I can't remember at the moment. And this is only in second grade, older children do even more activities. So far, that's one of my favorite parts, all of the fun things they do. My other favorite part is school lunches. They are free and all of the children eat whatever is served, they do not bring their lunch. (If a child has a special diet or allergy, the school will accommodate that). This, mixed with some strong enforcement at home, has led to Amy trying and eating so many new foods. She just doesn't have any other option. It was really tough at first, but we're so proud of her for it.

I also hear the kids, especially Cole, throwing in some Finnish language in everyday conversation. Tonight they were playing together and showing each other dances. When Amy was finished, Cole said "Hyvä!", which means good. They also often says "kiitos" for thank you and "moi" as a greeting to people on the street. All of our language skills still have a lot of work to be done, but I'm proud of their progress.

The weather has finally gotten cold here, today was -13C. There is snow everywhere and the trees are beautiful. Growing up, when I saw a fake tree that was made to be white, I never liked it. I always thought it looked too unrealistic, like they were trying to be whimsical and it failed. Here though, the trees are actually white! I now realize why manufacturers make fake white trees!
One of these days, I hope to take my camera on a walk to get pictures of the nature. Every time I step outside, I am amazed at the beauty, so I want to share it!

Getting settled

We're in our apartment. Kids have started school. Brandon is back to work. Things are slowly settling in to every day life.

It's definitely been an adjustment living here, but not completely unfamiliar, at least for me. I feel like this is similar to when we moved to Montreal, only more pleasant. It's a new city to learn, we don't have a car and therefore walk or take buses everywhere, smaller grocery stores (but more of them), and everything is in a different language. The more pleasant part comes from the people. Everyone has been very nice so far, and when we mention that we don't speak Finnish, they don't seem bothered at all to switch to English. We've been very welcomed and have met several wonderful people. I am looking into Finnish classes, of which there are many, and hope to start one pretty soon.

Cole is adjusting well, though he is so young so it's not quite as big of a deal to him. Amy is having a bit of a harder time. She had friends at school and certain things she enjoyed about home. She knew her school and how things worked there. Now she is at a new school that works differently with new kids who don't all speak English as their native language (and therefore switch to Finnish on the playground and during break time), so she doesn't quite feel like she fits in yet. She hasn't found her place. I know that with time she will adjust and it will get better, but when you're 7, it's hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

One good thing that has changed with Amy is her attitude toward food. She has always been the pickiest eater I know. She lived on nutrigrain bars and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. For months, we've told her that will have to change when she gets to Finland, and now it has. It was really hard at first, but she has gotten over the hump and is now eating so many more things, and trying new foods happily. It's such a huge deal for her, and I'm so proud of her for it.

Amy leading the way to school practicing for next week when she starts walking by herself.

Cole picking out what pastry he wanted after a day at school.

She asked, on her own accord, if she could have some blueberries. So huge for her.

Overall, I think we're all hanging in there and doing well. Each day is a new adventure and new opportunity!

We made it!

We arrived in Tampere two nights ago, and are mostly relaxing and enjoying our time so far. The time change is difficult to adjust to, so sleep (especially for the kids) has been a bit of a challenge. Our first night here, they slept 17 hours, then last night decided to wake up for the day at 2:30. We're crossing our fingers for a normal night tonight!

We're currently at the studio Brandon has been renting, and will be staying at one more temporary place before our apartment is ready late next week. Once we get these keys, we have so much shopping to do since we are starting with practically nothing.

It's been fun walking around the city so far. We had a parents meeting at Cole's new school and we're able to meet the woman who runs it (she is actually from the US as well), and I'm excited for him to go there. It seems like a great place. Next week we have a meeting at Amy's school to hopefully learn more about that.

Brandon took off work for a few weeks so that we can all get settled in together, which has been great. These are very exciting first steps and I know we'll only continue to learn more!

Here is a view from our current apartment window.

Home stretch and Italy

We've been so busy with everything lately that I've barely had time to get on the computer, which also leaves no time for posting here.

Quick updates. We sold our house, I left my job, we moved in with friends, kids finished school, we went on vacation, and then we went to Texas to visit everyone there.

Vacation was great. We traveled around Italy and saw so many beautiful things. It was a nice country and we would love to go back one day. I took so many pictures, but here are a few of my favorite.

As for everything else, we move to Finland in less than two weeks!! While I'm sad to leave everything and almost everyone I know behind, I'm very excited to be there, see Brandon and have everything settled. To not live out of a suitcase and to have our own space. We have an apartment and we'll move in shortly after the kids and I arrive. It's very close to their school, which was a high priority for us. So everything is falling into place and finally happening!

Bump in the road

We hit a bump with the house. The original buyer needed to terminate the contract for personal reasons, so we had to put it back up for sale. We got a new offer and are now under a new contract. So hopefully things go well and we close in a few weeks as planned!

Other things are still about the same. The basement bedroom in our friends' house opened up, so the kids and I will be staying there until it's time to move, which works out very well.

Next weekend, I fly to Finland to visit Brandon, so I'm very excited for that. It's been far too long since I've seen him. I do feel bad that the kids won't also be seeing him, I know they miss him as well. But that would have just been too much for a weekend trip.