New Hair Cut for Me

I am loving my new hair cut. In the past several years the only haircuts I have had have been done by Troy (several times), great clips with Eerika a year ago and then Missie graciously trimmed my hair in the fall.

I had talked to Angela about cutting my hair and I finally made it happen. She was amazing. She cut off at least 6-8 inches and I feel so free and confident in this hair cut.

Joulu 2018

Our first official year of hosting Christmas was a success. It was full of Finnish candy, thanks to Aino and Tatu bringing it. Game nights with ticket to ride, and the new version of it made us work hard! Troy and Miio were usually the winners. I didn't even bother counting my points on most nights.  

We had an amazing Christmas Eve dinner with Pasteija, ham, lohi and salad bar. We had left overs as usual and were able to eat them the next day. 

On Christmas morning, we had cinnamon rolls, orange rolls, smoothies and scrambled eggs with bacon.

There was too much soda drinking.  There was ton of dart wars in the basement. Both Tatu and Mio were amazing about playing with the kids. 

Selja was a sweet baby. And it was so precious to see Mio being a dad. And she slept like a dream! I will admit that I was envious of the 8 pm-5pm streak each night!

We had modpizza night, electric safari at the zoo while it was cold, girls night making gingerbread houses, men and big kids went to the movies to watch Star Wars. 

Emil and Miio with matching Christmas PJs.

Big kids having a sleep over in our bedroom with their little Christmas tree and Saku up until 11 pm. And then up at 7 am to check out presents. 

Mighty MIio at 7 months

Miio turned seven months! He is a delightful and happy baby. He has two teeth and wears size three diaper. We finally went to the doctor and he is 17 lbs and 6 oz. I can't remember his length or head circumference. 

He sits on his own well and plays with toys. He does not crawl, but he will get on his knees and rock for a bit. I just dont think he gets much tummy time. He does move around in his crib a ton as he sleeps or as he is trying to settle him self down or when he is upset. 

He has a cold again with a nasty cough so last night was a rough one. BUT we have finally had some good nights when he would only be up once or twice. This is huge.  

He continues to nap three times on most days, but sometimes he only naps twice.  He continues to be very good napper and flexible. 

He prefers me. If he sees me, he wants me. 

We have started doing more baths as he will sit in the bath tub and even splash a bit.   

I was a bit annoyed that Saku crashed this "photoshoot" but then I realized what a blessing it is that the kids love Miio and want to be part of the excitement and taking care of him. 

Christmas Eve 2017

Christmas Eve was a happy one over here. We went to church in new Christmas outfits made by Grandma.  Aleksi's smiles are so precious and so is his four piece suit. Miio rocked his velvet pants and all boys, including Troy, had nice hair cuts. 

We had a delicious Christmas Even dinner with ham, salmon, pasteija and lihaliemi plus a big salad bar and rolls.  The kids had pasteija and then were ready to play and run around. Aleksi and Eerika played well and Eerika has made about 20 presents for everyone. It is nice to see her excitement about giving presents. 

Saku and Eerika are still up at 10:45 pm. They are very excited. They are sleeping in our room and we had the little Christmas tree all lit up. 

We opened pajamas tonight and read the nativity story. I shared my testimony of the realness of Jesus Christ. 

We facetimed with Grandpa to wish him happy birthday. 

We played Ticket to Ride Rails and Sails, which was quite the complex version of Ticket to Ride. Mio won the game.  We held babies while we played. Miio isn't feeling super great so he is a bit more needy and isn't eating very well. 

Aino is here

It is 10:55 and I have been up way too late for the past three or four days. I just wanted to write down few of my thoughts. 

Aino came on Tuesday night. I am so happy to have her. It is so easy to be with her. It is easy to take care of each other's kids. Poor Emil is sick which has been stressful on top of adjusting to jet lag. But Aino handles it all so well. Emil fell asleep on my chest the other night while Aino was eating dinner and it made me so happy to be able to help her out. I feels good to take care of her.

My kids have loved having Aino here. Aleksi keeps calling Emil "Miio's cousin". Miio and Emil squel at each other. Emil is almost walking. Miio just sits there but he is stable with his sitting. 

Wonder-movie Experience

While we were in Phoenix, we went to see Wonder in the theater. And of course, Grandma spoiled all the kids with their own slurpees and popcorn trays. The movie was so good and my kids seemed to understand it. It made me think of my own parenting and how to individualize things. Saku later made a comment to Troy how much he enjoyed the movie. I think I will want to watch it again with them once it comes on DVD.  Miio woke up right when the movie started so it made a bit less enjoyable as I had to keep him unhappy. However, he wasn't unhappy and we were all able to watch the movie so that's a win!

Vail and Beaver Creek Ski Trip

Saku and Eerika had some american airlines miles that were about to expire, so I found us a hotel in Avon, which is near Vail and Beaver Creek ski resorts and we had an early ski trip for three days and two nights. In fact, it was such an early trip that there was barely any snow and only few runs were open. However, we had a fantastic trip. Yes the snow was not great, but we felt this sense of togetherness and adventure and it is quite priceless.

Saku and Eerika made thank you notes for the hotel and delivered them to the front desk.

Aleksi actually did some skiing and loved it. I should clarify that he loved it on the second day of skiing. The first day, he had a lot of tears because it was cold and skiing is hard. But the second day, he was all smiles and even joked with Troy "remember when I cried yesterday". 

Saku and Eerika are such good skiers. Saku received compliments for his helmet. Eerika skied a black diamond. I love Eerika's confidence on the slopes. I love that I saw Eerika struggle to ski on the flat part and I saw Saku push her along as he has poles and it is easier for him to move. Eerika is wearing Saku's snowsuit as both kids outgrew theirs, and I think she rocks it. 

We enjoyed freshly baked cookies at the lifts at 3 pm at Beaver Creek and then at 4 pm we were treated with smores. We got the fancy experience without paying for it.  

Our hotel room worked great as it had kitchen and we didn't have to eat out for most meals. The kids got to watch TV in the morning. We went to the hot tub. We played in the game room upstairs.

The only draw back was the fact that all the big kids had to sleep in one bed and Miio got cold at night in his pack-n-play so our second night of sleep was pretty crappy.  We ended up actually putting Miio in his car seat. Troy said it was an inspiration after he prayed.

Aleksi and I hung out at the Vail library on two different days to keep us warm. Aleksi also threw snowballs at a wall and just played in the snow for a good 30 minutes. Then we took the free bus around the Vail village to keep us warm and check out the sights. 

Our hotel was about 10 minutes bus ride away from the slopes. On the first full day, I went to wait at the bus stop and one bus stopped to ask where I was going, I informed him and he said I had missed the bus but he would take me to the right bus. He called on the radio to the other bus driver and that bus waited for me at the transfer station. It was so incredibly nice.

Miio was obviously a hit. We got many compliments for our cute family and Miio was happy in spite of the cold weather. 

The third day I was quite the sight as I had Miio sleeping his car seat, Aleksi and his skis to get to the mountain. 

I nursed Miio outside while others were drinking their beers. We ate our own lunch at the lodge and no one complained. We hung out by the fire to keep us warm.

We stopped at Cafe Rio to eat dinner on our way home and barely encountered any traffic. And we accidentally didn't get charged for one of our pork salads and when we mentioned it to them, they told us not to worry about it. It was awesome.

And then it was awesome to come home and not have kids sleeping in our room!