On Friday we had our work teams spring recreation day. Usually my workplace (as all of the city places) has one in fall and one in springtime but the fall one is for the whole workplace whereas in spring we have two: one for the team and one for the whole workforce. Now I’m leaving for my summer vacay so I can’t take part to the whole workplace day.
Well, we were going to have a breakfast buffet in a nice cafe near our workplace but in the morning it was closed. There had been some accident with pipes so they couldn’t use the kitchen as all electricity and water had to be cut off. So we wandered off to another location and finally in a third one we finally got breakfast for all 18 of us.
Afterwards we walked to the Botanical garden where we had a guide to walk us through different climate rooms. It’s been years if not decades since I’ve been there and so it was lovely to enjoy the gardens again.
After the guided tour we did a very small group thingy and then we had lunch at the Botanical garden’s restaurant. All in all the day was nice even thou it started with a disaster and the weather could’ve been a bit nicer.
Last week was a bit hectic and this one is too. Looks like the closer the vacations are the more hectic the days before it become.
Last Wednesday I got roped to a dinner with our AV teachers as one of them was unable to attend. We went to one of the best restaurants in Helsinki, it has three Michelin stars and I’ve never been there with my own money. We were served a tasting menu of different Asian dishes and they were all so good (except the dessert which had lyches..) so I was quite stuffed and tired since it took three hours to complete the dinner. I didn’t mind the time spent as the people were nice but I had a bit of anxiety over Thursday since I had promised to our workplace head steward I’d go to a meeting since everyone else of our union were taking part to another meeting.
So on Thursday I found myself in a meeting with another union representative from our partnering trade union I knew a bit and some employers representatives and of course the employees whom we were there to help. I’ve never taken part to other negotiations than our own so it was quite new situation for me but luckily I had the other person there too.
In the end I think it went well. Of course the employees were not all together happy of the final result but it was the best we’d do for them and the employer side seemed well enough mood too. The situation is continuum of the vocational studies reform the Helsinki Vocational school did last year and it is reasonable but people feel they’ve been forgotten in the great shake.
The area has streetnames that describe some jobs and since this is the mechanic’s street it has a mechanic on top of the street sign. These small signs were made some years ago by a group of local artists and I think they are quite funny.
On Friday we had my work teams Spring recreation day but I’ll write more about it tomorrow since I’m about to fall asleep with my head on the keyboard. It’d not look nice to have qwerty on your forehead.
I’m writing an another entry just about two exhibitions I’ve been to lately.
Last week I went to see Frantisek Kupka’s works in the Finnish National Gallery. As a matter of fact I had almost never heard of him but I had seen some pics of his works and liked them. So on Wednesday after I had given my donation at the local blood bank I went to the art museum to see them myself.
While there I also walked through the basic collection which has some of my fave articles. I’d also tell you that my brother’s ex-wife’s granddad was one the Finnish impressionists but it’s like the game ’almost related to a celeb’ so I’ll just keep quite about that 😉
Albert Edelfelt: Luxembourg park in Paris. One of my all-time faves.Bibliophile by KupkaFrantisek Kupka: Way of silenceFrantisek Kupka : Surfaces of color seriesSurfaces with colorThe deep reds were awesome, this pic doesn’t show them well enough.One of my faves in the Kupka exhibiton. I’d just stare at this painting for hours.And this one. So sunny.
Yeah. I really loved most of the paintings there. I used to paint porcelaine when kids were small and as I know how hard it is to make deep reds like the one above makes it even more beautiful.
Today I visited a game exhibition with my friend at the Finnish National library. Our ex-workmate was one of the people who put the exhibition up and he showed us around.
There was all kinds of boardgames starting from the 19th century and it ended to the Nintendo and SuperMario played with a C-cassette thingy. It was fun too.
A historical boardgame based on Finland’s history, a fictional character Ensign Ståhl by our national poet J.L. Runeberg.Kids playing a boardgame in 1950’s. The colorful back is from the most famous Finnish boardgame of all times called the Star of Africa.
I’m counting days. Luckily I have only 7 more workdays before the summer leave. I’m taking the last Friday off and the Thursday is a public holiday since it’s the Ascension.
On the June 1st I’m going with my friend Heidi to Lenny Kravits concert here in Helsinki and I can’t wait. I was so lucky to see Prince perform here in 2011 and now Lenny!
We started to watch Lucifer’s 4th season with youngest one, it’s so good. I’d watch it through the night except I’m really tired. I had an almost-migraine at work and due to taking the pills to prevent it I was almost asleep all day, kept forgetting words and so on.
As I promised on Zee’s comments I finally found the Mug of Uncontrollable Joy.
I had hid it to a safe place which only I know of because if I keep it on my desk I can’t get anything done and besides hubby makes funny faces upon seeing it. So it resides in a certain place in my bookshelf.
Yeah.. That smoulder made my phone wriggle when I tried to take a decent pic and the rest are just as bad. The pic is printed three times on the mug so you’ll face it from all sides.
You’re welcome.
I’m going back to sew and listen to RA read a Joy Ellis book in my ears 🙂
We’ve got eldest son back home today as their flat’s pipe renovations are nearing. It feels weird to have him back and I think he feels the same. It’s just about three months so it’s quite all right. And even if it was permanent it’d be okay, don’t get me wrong. I just think that a young man wants to live with his friends more than with his parents and little brothers 🙂
Just to celebrate this day I’m giving you and old pic of my mom in her twenties at the French Riviera and another one of my boys at the grand Canyon some seven years ago.
There’s quite a list I should be doing but instead I’m just sitting here and staring at the net. I’m so tired. It was my first full week back to work since during wintertime I work only four days per week due to the indoors air problems I have. Since it’s been colder outdoors we must keep the rooms warmer and so I get more symptoms again, just like in the fall when the heating period begins.
Yesterday I met my good friend after work and we had coffee at one of the oldest bookstores in Helsinki. It’s one of our fave cafes and I love their tuna salad. There’s also the great thing of browsing books before and after coffee.
Before I met my friend I visited a fabric shop nearby and bought some cloth for swimming suit. I have a good tankini pattern with which I made one tankini for myself last spring but I need to check if it still fits me and besides it’s not an awful thought to have two tankini’s for Hawaii right?
I checked some other fabrics too and took a pic of one which had horrible pattern on it. My friend said it’d look like an ad for STD if one were to sew trousers of it (I had the same thought).
At work one of our head teachers is leaving for another job, he got headmaster’s place from a private adult education school nearby ours. I’m glad he leaves, he is a bit narcisstic so everything that doesn’t go like he wanted is wrong. It’s quite annoying and it sucks all positive energy out. When one talks with him it’s always about him, never about you or what you’d like. So tiring.
Middlest son’s gf is coming with us to Hawaii and we asked if her parents would like to come for a coffee or something to our house to see that we are not a pair of serial killers and she laughed and said they won’t since they are so introverted. I looked at hubby who looked back at me and we both heaved a huge sigh because we are both terrible introverts.
I had my dentist appointment earlier this week. It was nice since I like him a lot (still). I used to have a huge crush on him and he looked like Karl Urban’s brother which wasn’t bad thing. Of course now we are both older but he’s very nice man still. Before I found him I was terrified of dentists but he helped me to conquer that fear just by being kind and telling and showing what he was doing and why and took my fear for real.
I’m rewatching Broadchurch and now I’m on season 2. It’s good the weather has stayed cold since I’m knitting my cardi and it gets really hot with all that wool on my lap and the cat on my side.
One third of the colourwork ready.
On my to-do-list I have also letters to write, art journaling to do, beginning a new quilt for which I’ve had all stuff ready the whole winter..
We are already first week in the May which means my summer holidays are nearer and nearer, just four weeks to go.
We Finns celebrated Vappu – the 1st of May eve – with a spring carneval but since it was pretty cold and we hadn’t planned any kind of party with our friends I was just happy to stay at home and watch tv. On Wednesday we actually slept until noon with hubby, that hasn’t happened in years.
On Friday I went to movies with youngest one and my friend to see Tolkien. It’s not a document so it’s bit different than how Carpenter tells Tolkien’s life in the biography. The One Ring Net had quite a good article of the movie. Don’t forget to bring a hankie, even the very end makes one cry. Of course since the director is a Finn and a Tolkien-fan himself made the film even more touching.
We liked the movie a lot and youngest son asked what would have happened if Tolkien had died in the WWI. I said that probably the whole genre would have been born later and/or different than what it is today. Sometimes the 13-y-o makes me wonder with the questions he asks…
On Saturday we went to see Hairspray musical to middlest son’s highschool. he played the percussion and his girlfriend was one of the mean girls. Their highscool is famous for the musicals they do, last spring it was Grease and it was very good too. We got youngest son to come too, with a bit of meanness by my part (not proud) and with a little pushing by hubby. In the end he was happy to be there and middlest and his gf were happy to see him there too.
Yesterday evening I watched Brie Larson’s Unicorn store from Netflix, it was quite good too. I’ve also watched a Finnish tv-series about how the Finnish diplomats help save Chilean people during the 1973 coup. The Swedish ambassador is played by Michael Persbrandt (Beorn in the Hobbit).
Today hubby and I did a cemetery tour and went to see how his parent’s grave and my father’s have survived the winter. Our parents are on different graveyards and my mom has been buried to her family grave in Porvoo, a small city nearby, where she lived her childhood and then she moved back there when my dad died in 1994. Me and my siblings decided to give up my dad’s gravesite after this year since none of us has much time to take care of it so we didn’t plant anything there now. Maybe I’ll take some pansies there later. We didn’t drive to Porvoo today but instead as we went home middlest son asked if we’d go to garden shop and so now I have a new climbing rose and flowerbed has new plants and middlest one got cucumber and tomato.
I also baked a mudcake and hubby made a chocolate fudge covering for it, it was really good ❤
Cherry trees near my in-law’s grave at Honkanummi cemetery
Nokisuu 