Finally... A Home

We came back from Finland on Thursday evening. Yesterday we went to get the keys for our new apartment. Today we're moving in. Well, probably just the essential stuff. The place is rather small, so we cannot pack up everything with us, but we're excited. It has lots of windows and is very bright which we both love. Let's hope we all fit in it (I mean, they did in the old days too!).

It's actually an old hotel from 1922, located in historic downtown Rexburg, right off of Main Street.

Like A Rolling Stone...

That is the tune of this day.

Yesterday we moved into an apartment. A temporary apartment, but that's ok. Because the one we really want isn't available until August.

Another summer away from Rexburg? Another summer living with in-laws? Another summer full of car rides because the distances in small town?

I could bear no more.

So I started hunting for another apartment, a temporary one until August. Which isn't really all that difficult in a college town like Rexburg. Now, getting one that's on your budget is, because rents are ridiculously high in Rexburg and they keep rising...

Thus, this apartment is actually some one else's home. They left it furnished for us which is kind of nice and kind of creepy. They were going away on an internship and will be back in August. So I don't really want to take all you guys on a tour or anything because that would be just weird and little inappropriate in my mind. Which sucks for your guys, because it's pretty sweet apartment. It's spacious, it has two bedrooms, washer and dryer included, pretty big kitchen with tile floor, good size bathroom and a living room.

I wonder how it will go, when we move in August from this to a much smaller one bedroom apartment. The location is really good though. Right off from Main Street in historic downtown, on third floor.

It's so nice and feels so natural to be again just us. And quieter. It's nice to have Touko take his nap in the bedroom and go do stuff on the computer for example to a different room. I just finished making a tomato-ground beef-lots-of-onions-sauce for dinner later and it's just nice to be the only one responsible for cleaning the kitchen. It's nice to know that all the food in the fridge is yours and yours only.

Weedman to the rescue!

It's been a busy week. So sorry, I haven't had the chance to tell what's going on in our lives like I said I would.

Anyway, Daniel got a job a while back working for a lawn care company Weedman. Over the phone sales stuff and a couple Saturdays of mascotting for fairs. Daniel really liked it there. The hours were just a problem, on weekdays except Fridays from 5:30 to about 9 p.m. The gas cost too much for him to drive back and forth all the way from Rexburg to Menan, so he would leave most days before Touko and I got up and came home after Touko had gone to sleep already.

So when Daniel's dad offered him a job at his new company with better hours and better hourly pay, he took on it. Yay. We get to see him actually now! So nice.

And he is doing really good in school. He is going to try to get scholarship. I'm so excited. He loves learning, and is loving school. He is so happy.

I'll tell about our news about apartments soon...

Plastic Egg Shell

On Saturday morning Touko and I went to an Easter Egg Hunt held in the Menan City Park for kids. They had different slots for different ages and Touko of course went to the 0-2 spot.

Touko was pretty excited, I had been talking about how we're going to go get eggs. He has seen Grandpa and Granny take the bucket and go get the eggs from our chickens.

I could read some disappointment on his face when we got there. Where's all the eggs? There's just candy lying on the ground. Touko was all puzzled out, with all the people and tons of kids in the park, that is mostly deserted when we go there.

Then the race began and everyone ran to grab candy. Except Touko who was just wondering what the heck was going on. I had to take him by the hand and tell him to pick that up and put it here. Wow, maybe the bilingualness isn't really making him super smart. Oh well.

Then I remembered how he loves the nursery Clean up -song. At home I just say clean up, and Touko starts to sing "Clean up, clean up" and picking his toys off the floor. So I said "Touko, clean up!" And he started to sing that song super loudly and picking up the candies very diligently.

Here's our catch. They actually did have a few plastic eggs that you went and exchanged to a prize. Touko got one, and we went and got a bath duck.

Here's the every parents must have Easter photo. Their kid scared to half dead next to an oversized Easter Bunny.

This was my first Easter in the US. Easter has been my favourite holiday, ever since I started investigating the LDS Church around Easter time in 2006 back in Finland. Even though at Christmas time, Saviour is often mentioned and remembered here in the US, I didn't really notice anything like that around Easter (excepting of course in church on Sunday, but we talk of Christ every Sunday)! No cards with the Resurrected Christ on them, there were just bunnies and chicks everywhere. I was very surprised, since I'm used to thinking of Easter as the biggest event of the year in Christian world! Maybe it's because Finland has a pretty big orthodox population. I understand that it is better to celebrate Easter every Sunday than just once a year, but why Christmas is still a big religious event, even though that one is purely originally a pagan holiday? I guess plastic egg shell really sums up Easter in US for me. Looks fun and neat, but it's just plastic.

Not to get too gloomy about Americans, so here's a really touching blog post about Easter by my American friend.

Touko's Party & Reflexions of an In-Law

Here you can read more about my thoughts on Touko turning two.

Oh, it was so nice to finally get to be the hostess for a get-together. These months that we have lived with Daniel's parents (I really love them, yet I don't recommend it to anyone to live with in-laws) I have just watched from the side when everyone else is cooking, decorating, organising...etc for whatever Holiday... Thanksgiving, Christmas, birthdays... I guess some (probably mostly men) enjoy just sitting to a ready table and eating, but I felt a little left-out, and not being able to put forward traditions that I felt were important to me. Especially when I was an outsider for my own husband's birthday planning and execution I knew I just had do something so the same wouldn't happen on Touko's birthday. Mind you, I am not blaming anyone or anything, I understand that it was not done on purpose at all, it just happen, because one gets used to doing it and because I'm an in-law, in a way like a guest still. I am merely trying to reflect my feelings as person living in another's house.

So, I tried to take my stance from the beginning, with shaking knees and gentle suggestion and fortunately they got the hint and I didn't need to be all that straightforward. "I was thinking of just making brownies... 'cause you know, he likes them so much..." were the only words that were needed and I think my mother-in-law was probably very pleased to be for once on the other end who gets to just sit at the ready table and be served.

I loved every minute of it. I took my time, planned a menu and executed it. In the end, it was just Daniel, Touko and I who ate the real meal before cakes and pastries but still I'm going to say that I made a West African dish that I learned from my step mother who is from there: peanut-tomato sauce with honey marinated chicken served with rice, because Touko loves the flavour of peanut butter and he loves chicken and he loves this dish.

I baked some Finnish Christmas treats called star tarts. They have prune filling, but mine were prune-apricot filled. (I'm using just internet pics, because I didn't take photos.)

I also made a bunt cake, because I love them and always have, and because they belong to the traditional Finnish list of foods for guests (Daniels' translation of messy Mandi's Finglish train of thought). It was a cake that we call a tiger cake because of it's stripes.

I got lots of compliments on both of these desserts, especially how they weren't too sweet, how funny.

I also baked as a birthday cake a brownie-style chocolate cake with almonds that I used to make quite often in Finland. Daniel put some chocolate frosting on it and then I formed a big "2" on it with banana slices (Uncle Jacob's idea). We put two little candles on it and I brought it to Touko while we sang Happy Birthday to You. He was so excited. He had heard that song so many times during this year here being sung to his cousins, uncles, aunts, Grandpa, Dad... He knew what it meant: cake!

Touko got a Woody and Buzz -blanket that his Aunt Sara sow (Woody is his favourite toy). Grandpa got him a little Woody and Buzz dolls that he got so excited for that he went and gave big kisses (by the way, he goes for the mouth...) to Grandpa and Granny and was so excited that gave them also to his Uncle Dan (Aunt Sara's husband) who was sitting next to Grandpa and thus next in line, for everyone's surprise. We gave him a card with a promise of a swimming pool trip as a family. His mummi from Finland send him a Jokapoika-shirt which is a Finnish design classic from Marimekko and matching socks and a Moomin card, that Touko stared and examined for a long time.

In Donovan's Footsteps

Daniel's homemade harmonica holder.


Proven also to be of great joy for a toddler.

Touko the Toddler

I know I haven't kept my promise of continuing this blog or even keeping the other one but now seems to be good time to make a come back. Yesterday Touko turned two years. We're going to have a party on Friday when Daniel isn't working. I'll tell what's going on otherwise in our lives more later, but now let us talk about our first born.

Touko dancing with his cousin Emma

I cant really say that these two years would have gone by quickly, it's just hard to remember our time when it was just the two of us. It is like Touko has always been part of our family and it's hard to imagine our lives without him.

The most interesting and funnest part about motherhood for me has been getting to know this child's personality. Touko is such a funny fellow and a good kid. I feel amazed that this little boy has been given to me to raise, that Heavenly Father trusts me with him! Sometimes I feel so inadequate, but just seeing how he actually listens to me and obeys makes me feel better. I want to be the mother he deserves and Touko keeps me trying to be better.

It has been an interesting journey being a mother and living through everything, like thunderstorms, snow, slides..., again for the first time with him. Happy Birthday my dear dear first born!