Week 5

Field of Sunflowers by our apartment, 4 plants for a euro

A busy week this past week.  Biggest event was that Steph had a trip to Germany so I was a single dad for three days.  Christopher did indeed ride the bus to school by himself as his post below attests.  As I think I mentioned in a post below, I have been taking the kids in the morning at 8.  When one of them has to start school at 9, they stay at a matroned or supervised park.  The park is fenced and is about an acre inside and has a zip line.  When the times comes, they go to school.  

Floor ball at the matroned park.  

Well, they've never been fans of doing this.  Christopher has wanted to go to school by himself.  This entails two city buses, the 109 and any of the 12, 13, 14, or 19.  He has to be responsible for his own pass and for getting there on time.  So Friday, I took Gab at 8 and got her settled.  This is going much easier than it used to, i.e. no crying when the bell rings.  Then I went to work and apparently Christo got himself to school.  

This week Gab also joined the 'after school' club.  This was somewhat stressful for her but it meant she didn't go to the matroned park after school and instead stayed a school.  Confused yet?  This is an option for 1st and 2nd graders but not older kids.  Wednesday was the first day.  Thursday it took Gab 15 minutes to extract herself from her drawing.  The person that runs the 'after school' club is a gregarious Scotsman, Iian, who ran for a US college in Gunnison, Colorado.  (Note: Gunnison has really really good black bean enchiladas, amazing camping and rattlesnakes.  There's probably other stuff like great skiing.)

The kids on a rock near the Matinkyla
(Matinkoola) Ice Hall

Meanwhile, Daniel just walks to school, though this week he had school on Saturday from 8:45 to 12:45.  Wonder how that would go over in the states.  We leaves 15 minutes before school starts and just walks.  Too easy.

Friday after school, I loaded the kids on the bus and we went to a used sporting goods store in Helsinki.  We switched from bus to tram at Kamppi.  The placed closed at 6.  We got there at 5:40 and it was a mad dash to get 3 pairs of skates, 2 floor ball sticks, 1 hockey helmet.  The place was really impressive -- wish I had had time to take a picture.  One room was floor to ceiling skates with shelves only 10 inches high with skates two deep on each shelf.   We then hauled the equipment back to the main Helsinki train station via tram.  We ate at Vapiano, an Italian restaurant.  Good pizza, good pasta.  Hungry kids.  

Christo after his first hockey practice

Steph got home safely Friday night.  Saturday was low key in part because everyone was exhausted and Daniel had school.  We did do some shopping (new hockey sticks and mouthguards) and made it to Ikea.  Yes there is an Ikea.  There is a bus stop right near the store and it is a zoo.  

Eating after kayaking and a first hockey practice
at a place called 'PizzaTaxi'

Sunday, Christo had his first hockey practice.  Teams here have been practicing for about a month but we finally got our stuff together, literally.  One thing to know is that the Finns are kinda serious about hockey so that the 12:30 Sunday practice is an hour of training (running), then an hour on the ice, then 30 minutes of stretching.  Christo did pretty well but by the end of the ice time he was spent.  I talked to the coach and he agreed that today was 'pretty heavy' and that Christo could skip the stretching.  Christo will go to a couple more practices to determine at what level and with what team he should play.  We are still working on a team for Daniel but we now have stuff for him.  The ice arena is near a beach so that while Christo and I were a practice, the rest of the gang went to the beach and rented kayaks and paddled around.

Finally, big news that Christo alluded to.  Steph and the kids are going to Lapland this coming week.  A colleague of hers who is from Finland has a time share in Lapland and is unable to use it this week.  So Wednesday they will take an overnight train north of the Arctic Circle and return the same way on Saturday evening.  I'm not able to get off work so I won't be able to go with them.  The timeshare is just outside of a National Park.