Utah Trip

Took another little trip this past week - my annual romp to Utah. Instead of flying straight to Salt Lake this year, I made a little detour in St. George to visit my family, see my nephew and pick up my sister so she could romp with me! It felt like such a whirlwind because there was a LOT of driving. But we had a great time. Got to see some old friends, enjoy delicious food (I know, that is always at the top of my list), spend time with my cousin's family, ride segways at Thanksgiving Point, and the kicker was actually getting to see a DMB show! FINALLY! It all worked out. And it was great.

Oh, by the way, my nephew thinks the baby is a "gril". Hmmm?

Finland: In a Nutshell

I can't believe we've already been home for 3 weeks. I mean we were in Finland a month ago. Crazy. Traveling to Finland was a bit like time travel to me. We left our house at 4am on Tuesday and arrived in Helsinki at 10am on Wednesday. I swear I saw the sunset and the sunrise within an hour of each other. It really weirded me out! The total flight time was about 14 hours, but we lost almost a whole day since they are 10 hours ahead of Cali.

My relatives live in Lappeenranta, which is a couple hours outside the capitol. It is nothing less than beautiful there. Trees as far as the eye can see. The freeways wind through forests. Lakes are all over the place. If you look it up on Google Maps you can see how much water surrounds them. The air is so clean, I wasn't really bothered with allergies. You can even drink straight from the tap and it tastes amazing. Like the best water I've ever had. So it was really, really nice.

Unfortunately, we happened to be there in the midst of the hottest summer ever, so the heat and humidity made us feel really worn out. And my feet and ankles were swelling like crazy. It might not have been so bad, but nobody has air conditioning. Even a lot of the restaurants and stores don't have A/C. They don't ever need it! And the stores were completely sold out of fans and portable units. My aunt and uncle had a little 12" fan cooling the whole house, but it didn't help much. Our only escape was to take a ride in the car. Otherwise, we just had to accept the fact that we were a bunch of sweaty fools. But at least everyone else was sweaty too.

We stayed at my aunt and uncle's house and they took such good care of us. Here are some of the highlights of the trip:

- They fed us extremely well. Lots of breads, cheeses, fresh veggies, salads and potatoes.

- We spent a lot of time down by the Harbor. We had ice cream and meat pies, took a cruise down the Saimaa Canal, and saw the annual Sand Castle display and some nearby shops.

- Visited the house where my Mom grew up. It was a short walk from my aunt's house and the people currently living there let us have a look around. There was even a playhouse still standing in the backyard that she used to play in! It was really cool to imagine my mom growing up there.

- Spent time at my Grandma's house and of course she fed us all kinds of homemade yummies. We also looked at a bunch of old pictures and heard some stories of her youth. Seeing pictures of her at around age 14 was totally surreal because she looked exactly like my mom.

- Strawberries from the Farmer's Market. Hubs ate so many I thought he'd poop a strawberry patch.

- While we were out walking the town, there was a pleasantly surprising rainstorm that lasted for about 3 minutes. It was one of the happiest moments of my life because it cooled things down for the first time! The raindrops were about the size of your head and the thunder and lightning were loud. It was great.

- Of course, one of the best things about going, was meeting and getting to know a lot of my extended family. I even met my Grandpa for the first time. I'm so glad I got the chance, because I would hate to look back knowing that we never talked or hugged once.

- My cousin's wedding was beautiful. Everyone had so much fun.

- My pregnant belly made it's first appearance. It was the first time I felt pregnant and not just bloated.

- Saw the sunrise... at 1am...

- Had a big family dinner at the local Greek restaurant. For dessert we ordered french toast, and it was definitely my husband's favorite treat from the whole trip.

- Homemade Coke.

- We spent one morning touring Linnoitus (which translates to The Fort). It's a really old part of town where most of the war was fought. It was really cool to walk through the trenches that the soldiers actually used!

- Tried the Finnish version of fast food. Of course they have McDonald's (which sells mozzarella sticks) but to get something a little different, we went to Hesburgers. I think they put tarter sauce on their cheeseburgers. It was good though!

- Our suitcase got so destroyed on the way there, we had to jimmy-rig it on the inside with one of our camera tripods, just to get it to roll properly.

- On our last day, my husband and I took a train back to Helsinki. The train ride was a bit of an adventure in itself, but visiting the capitol was awesome. It was the perfect way to end our trip. It's one of the coolest European cities we've been to.

So that was a bit more than a nutshell, but 10 days worth of Finland is hard to condense into one little ol' blog entry.

Pregnancy Sucks!

There I said it. I know it's a miracle and it's wonderful and I shouldn't be complaining. But I'm not going to lie. It's been hard too. A lot harder than I thought. Not because I'm tired (which I am) or sick (which I was) or fat (which I'm getting there) but because it is stressful! We tried getting pregnant for a long time, and when it finally happened, we were apprehensive but excited. I remember telling my husband "I think I'm really going to love being pregnant." I felt like I was just ready for this. But some challenges have come our way and when doctors start using words like genetic counseling and placenta previa, you can't help but sometimes fear the worst. I know things will be OK, but those little doubts creep in once in awhile and make you wonder if you should have ever felt like you'd be good at this in the first place.

We don't have it as hard as some couples, and I do remind myself daily to just be grateful. And not all days are hard. The days that are good are really, really good. And the excitement outweighs the worry. I had my first dream about holding the baby and it was pure bliss! Plus, I gotta say, I really love wearing maternity pants. I never knew such a comfortable thing existed. So there's always that.

Of all the people to be bad at documenting such a momentous time in our lives - that has been me. This is seriously the first belly picture I've taken. 19 weeks! (21 more to go?) I'm gonna be huuuuge!! :)

The Other Guys

I was hoping this would be funny. But it wasn't. I mean, it was OK and it had its moments, but the story was so long and overly complicated and it was hard to get into. Will Ferrell always gives me a giggle, even with some of his dumbest movies (like Semi-Pro), but it wasn't enough to make me like this very much. And what can we say about Mark Wahlberg? He is not bad when he sticks to a particular type of role. This one? It was his funniest performance since The Happening. Way over the top.

I think one of my favorite people in the movie was Michael Keaton! He actually had me laughing quite a bit.

Holy Crap! We Just Went to Finland!!

What a great experience! My Mom grew up in Finland, and I still have a good chunk of family that lives there. I went once when I was about 2 years old, but obviously don't remember it at all. My cousin got married, so it was just the perfect excuse for me and hubs to go. I kept a daily journal so I wouldn't forget anything, but it will take some time to get that condensed and posted. As you might have guessed, we also took a crap-load of photos. So out of 1,500 pics, this is one I will share with you for now...

This is what Finland looks like at almost 11pm in the middle of summer. It was so weird that it never really got completely dark. Maybe for like an hour around midnight, and then the sun would be raising again at 1am. Glad I got to see this first hand, although it didn't make getting over jet lag any easier!

More to come...