Resan till Göteborg

Efter två härliga månader i Finland åkte vi till Göteborg den 15 augusti för att se min "gamla hemstad", besöka Kika o Martin o barnen, och träffa vänner. Vi bestämde oss för att resa den långsamma vägen, med tåg, färja och tåg, eftersom det var billigare och Weslie aldrig hade åkt en stor passagerarfärja.

After two wonderful and relaxing months in Finland, we left for Gothenburg, Sweden, on Aug 15th, to visit my old hometown, where I lived for three years before moving to the US, and old friends there. Also, that is where my sister Carina and her family live, so we were very happy to be able to spend some more time with them. We decided to take the slow route there. We took the train from my parents' place to Åbo (Turku) in southwestern part of Finland, then the ferry between Åbo and Stockholm, and finally the train from Stockholm to Gothenburg. This was the first time Weslie has been on one of these big passenger ferries. We took the night ferry, which means we left at 9pm and arrived at 6.30am. We had a nice cabin to ourselves so we were able to get some sleep. We also got to see some of the beautiful archipelago outside of Åbo, so here are some pictures of that. The whole trip took about 21 hours (it would probably have taken 5-6 hours from door to door if we had been flying). It was very nice though, other than the fact that we had to haul all our luggage everywhere, since we were flying back to the States from Gothenburg.

On the top deck:

Lots of nice cabins on the islands that we passed:

Per request - Dani's & Sofie's house

Äntligen tid för lite uppdatering av bloggen. Det har inte varit mycket vila den senaste månaden, med de sista veckorna i Sverige och Norge och sedan resan tillbaka och inflytt i vårt nya hus, skolstart och pluggande på sjukskötersketenta (för de som undrar så har jag inte fått svaret på den ännu). Vi ska lägga upp bilder på huset, men först lite bilder från slutet av semestern.

Finally time for some blog updating. It has been a really busy last month, but now we are pretty much settled down in our house. We will put up some posts with pictures of it all, but first to the end of our stay over seas.

Wayne and Sylvia, here's for you. Our last day in Finland we went over to Dani's and Sofie's house to take some pictures. They have a great big lot with plenty of room for the four of them (counting the baby) and all the horses. There is still some work to be done, but it is looking great so far.

The yard:


The stables:


The folds for the horses:


The house:


Hannes running around:

Plättkalas

Tonight we had a plätt kalas, just as we did last summer.

Hampus gets the first one:

Jopi and Janina:

Tiina, Edgar, and Sofie:

Even Momo came!

The kids loved the plätts (basically Finnish crepes):

Serious discussion:

A little silly? Jå!

Grill night

Friday night the gang got together for a grill night at a neat little forrest area:

Hannes is enjoying himself:

The boxes

Kristina's parents very generously bought us an extremely nice Emmaljunga pram and some baby clothes. The question was, though, how to get them back to the U.S. We decided to have them shipped, and made two boxes for the units. In the background is the "Boat Box" and in the foreground is the "Tank Box". We just made the weight limitation on the Tank by 220 GRAMS. They're now in the hands of the Finnish postal service, and we're tracking their progress.

Bostadsmässan

Last Wednesday, Kristina and I went to the yearly tradition in Finland known as bostadsmässan. It's a sort of builder's expo that changes cities every year and allows you to walk around and look at new building techniques, furniture designs, materials, etc. This year there were over 40 houses and apartments to view. It took all day.

Here is a view of the whole expo. It's a little different than in the U.S. in that all of these homes and apartments will actually be lived in and, in fact, most of them are already spoken for:

Interesting kitchen / living room:

Boy's room with neat bookshelf idea:

Apartment building:

Really neat table and chairs made out of raw wood:

Nice little grill:

This little girl's room had a wooden tea set that was amazing:

Noah's Ark:

Very comfortable looking chair:

Outdoor sauna with grass on top:

Another great chair:

One of our favorite houses:

Probably the neatest kid's room we saw: