OUT IN THE GREEN

The other night when I couldn't sleep I did something I haven't done in almost a year I think: I browsed a couple of the blogs I used to read. I've missed reading blogs.  And both of them were just the same as they've always been, with similar photos and happenings and themes. Which made me laugh a bit at the fact that it's just the same over here as well. So now I'll do yet another post about me having a day off and thus finally get to attend things in my garden. But you know what they say, few things are as important...

We had lunch with Dag on the porch. Fresh tomato-filled pasta with herbs from my garden.
In the background you can see my tomato plants, which I planted from slices earlier this year. They've grown so well!

Here are the herbs "in action". As I suppose their action is growing.
This year I didn't grown them myself though as I was too late, so I bought them ready and planted.
Dag loves to water plants. He also loves to go on excursions and "secret discovery expeditions", which I once used to get him along on a walk and that he now wants to go out on all the time. But it can be turned into making plain things interesting: watering the plants turned into one task we had to do on our secret mission. Well, the kid actually loves to water plants. But it works well with other tasks.

 Dag equipped me with weapons, in case we ran into any bad guys.
(Also note my haute floppy pink home-wear shorts. Or un-note them. Not very picture worthy in any more vivid angles.)

 The cats serve as panthers.

The first thing we saw on our investigating excursion was that the wild strawberries are ready! THey are THE absolute taste of summer.

Noticed it will be a good cherry-year! Wohoo!
Last year we did not get any berries; I am not even sure the trees bloomed then.

And then we ended our mission by harvesting the rhubarb. Pie and jam coming up!


And I'll be bringing some (= a lot) of that pie out with me to the archipelago; heading out there for those classic three days of summer, family, food and wine (in moderate doses only folks!) tomorrow. Happy midsummer!

REMEMBERING THE SUMMER LIGHT ON THE DARKEST DAYS

A few weeks (three to be exact) ago the paper would state that the sun would set at 15:29 in Helsinki, and rise the following day at 8:45, while the next sunrise in Utsjoki (in Northern Finland) would be on January 16, 2016. That's kaamos for you. Now, with just a couple of days left until winter solstice, we are at Up at 9:22 and Down at 15:12. So one could say it's pretty dark over here yes.

I'm getting a little nostalgic about midsummer, six months away, when the sun rises before 4 in the morning and sets around eleven at night (and above the polare circle it does not set at all) - it never really gets dark.

As there are no snowy slopes and frosty branches to post for the moment, I'll go for some light summer night memories from last midsummer (...that are very relevant now six months later...) instead.

We were out in the archipelago as usual. 

With the big harbour next to us.

Picking flowers and tasting chives.

And having lunch.

My cats turn into archipelago panthers.

Midsummer dinner set. Next week it's time for huge tables and settings and family dinners again, with a Christmas tree instead of birch branches.

The eleven pm sunshine. I love this moment, the long sunset and it's colours.

 

 The sun has set.

Out on a nightly walk by the shore. Here's a silvery trunk that the sea had washed up, shining in the pale blue night. The wood was so soft.

Around 1 or 2 am and a ship comes in.

The pale midsummer night.

On midsummer's day Dag turned three. He got a lion bag for his birthday, which he now uses when he goes to playschool.

And he was very sad that he could not go fishing with the older boys and guys on the wet, slippery rocks.

Dissapointement maximus. He may have been one year older, but still too small for so many things.

But then got a cake and things were fine again. A rubarb cake. Rhubarbrs are in season in June. I wonder if we'll get any next year as the sheep pretty much munched them all away last summer...

And then some sudden sea fog. Kind of what it looks like all the time now, in December -

The fucked up thing is that the weather was almost the same last June as it is now at the end of the year, which was wrong then and is wrong now. Around plus ten and rain, when it should have been ten degrees warmer then and ten degrees colder now (Celcius, obvuiosly)...

This year summer came rather and late, and last year winter arrived just a few days before Christmas- perhaps we'll get lucky this year again, and get a little snow after all just in time?

MIDSUMMER SAUNA

The sauna is among the most Finnish things there are. The word sauna itself is a Finnish word. You have the midsummer sauna, Christmas sauna, bridal sauna, the Saturday evenig sauna and the regular everyday sauna as well... Most Finnish summer cottages and cabins will have a separate sauna, and many old apartment buildings has a mutual one, while new apartments tend to have their own small saunas next to the bathroom. I've never been that much of a sauna goer at home really, the sauna at my parents' house was mainly used for drying clothes in . We have a weekly sauna hour in our building that we sometimes manage to make it to. I mostly just go to the sauna when at the gym.

But being in a wooden sauna on an island or by the lake, being able to jump right into the water straight from the heat, is a different thing. This midsummer when out in the archipelago we heated the sauna, which I haven't actually bathed in for a few years, in spite of sleeping in the sauna chamber every time we are over at the island.

The sauna window view.

When we were small gathering pine cones was one of our "duties". It works as a spark together with the wood when you heat the sauna (or any other fire; we mainly collected these for heating the house.)

I like a more mild sauna that is max 80C hot, preferably just a bit over 70. But  it is often heated above that, up to 100 degrees celsius.

(There used to be sauna championships where the contestants tried to out-sit each other in the heat, with very high temperatures. Some years ago one finalist died, while the other got really sick and was in a coma for a long time. That's insane.)

The sauna is something pretty much every one here has grown up with.  Babies under 6 monhts are not recommended to bathe in the sauna though. Kids usually sit on the floor, as the heat is lower there. Women actually used to give birth in the sauna back in the days (it was the cleanest space).

My first plunge for the year! The water was only +12C. That's cold, but it has been colder than usual so far this year.(The sea usually gets around 18-19 in summer, but it can be over 20C as well. It depends not only on the weather but on location as well. Some days during good summers the sea has hit temperatures around 27-28C. Lakes tend to be warmer. In Southern Carelia at my grandmothers cabin the water is often  around +25C.)

Where the harbour opposite of us is, there used to be an island, just in front of the mainland. They blew it away.

Midsummer flowers in newly washed hair.

4 x SUMMER RAIN

Midsummer rain in the archipelago.

MIDSUMMER

Three lazy days filled mostly with food (and food and food) lots of people and many cats and dogs. Those kind of days when you don't really know if it is noon or evening, but it doesn't matter.

 Dinner preparations on the jetty. A few seconds after this my iphone took a dive in the Finnish Bay...


(Iphone recovering from it's minutes under water and the quick sweet water dip wash afterwards. I am rather amazed that it actually works normally now. Phew!)

Dag and my brother-in-law(-to-be) going WEEEEEEH!

 Dag were the dogs best friend, well, after dinner at least; the spot under his chair being their favorite.

Matching tracksuits are so last millennium - matching ponchos are The Thing!

(Also, apparently, shaving for a months is also tha thang every time it's summer.)

Forget me nots. My favorite flower when I was small.

The boys got a little wind in the end.

I woke up in the middle of the night to the so called super moon. Quite magic actually. (This is taken around 4:am)

And on Sunday evening just before going home this strange sunny total white-out fog hit us, totally managing to hide out the background from everything, even the big harbor behind the bend.