Travelog for: Gary Boldie

It's Christmas! Merry Xmas! Iloista joulua!

It's the last day of the xmas calendar too and me, Alfie and Roo decided to suprise our host/mentor by hopping in the pouches in the morning  She has felted the tree herself! The pouches were a bit too small for us - and I fell all the time 

When my mentor had "opened" her calendar (the kids had taken their stuff already) we went to cook christmas porridge! It's rice porridge but if you do it the traditional way you put an almond in it - the one who finds it while eating gets to make a wish! We didn't have any almonds. We didn't have cinnamon either, which is the other traditional part in serving christmas porridge. Luckily we did have sugar and milk at least  It did taste very delicious!

After the porridge we sat and listened to Mamba, a finnish band, and their xmas album. My mentor had just bought it as they didn't have any Finnish xmas songs on cd before. Just one "Ally McBeal" xmas album...

Later we baked some Xmas Pastries with plum filling! After that it was good to sit down and watch tv (Shrek the halls). Then we went outdoors for some fresh air and see the whiteness of the xmas. When we got back in we got the traditional xmas lunch--- wait a minute! Burritos? This can't be right... Oh, it's my mentor's and her family's new tradition... ok. For dessert we had sweets and pastries. Then it was time for sauna and --- Santa had visited us  He had brought me a gift too  A photo frame with a pic of me and my first tv pals Alfie & Roo.

It's New Years Eve! We did a traditional New Years magical trick: melted tin and tossed it into water - and read our future  Mine looked like a boat! Does this mean I get one? or a cruise? Or a vacation by the sea--- wait! I live by the sea... Maybe it's the cruise...

Happy New Year!
Onnellista uutta vuotta!
Gott Nytt År!

It is freezing cold here! I thought the winters were supposed to be lame nowadays! We don't have much snow now but the temperature... brrrr... Here we are walking on the Baltic Sea! Some crazy people were even driving on it! Finns... 

This little creature thought he could scare me as he's a ghost, ha! I pretended I got the creeps just to humor him 

Later we made a snowman with crazy, spooked hair. Oh yeah, the new "scary" guy is called Etwas.

Today we celebrated two birthdays at once. My mentor's daughters turned years. These are the cakes we made for them! The "playing blocks" are for the younger and the crown is for the elder. The "snake" is made of leftovers of the crown  And the marzipan figures are made by my mentor's sister who obviously is quite talented!

Yummy! Fun! Gotta go to bed ZZZZzzzzz

Well well... Last time I visited the capitol of Finland I didn't get to do much sightseeing. So here I am again, with the most wellknown sights. At first, you can see the Presidential Palace on the right and the Uspenski Orthodox Cathedral further away.

Then there are the ferries that run between Stockholm (Sweden) and Helsinki & Tallinn (Estonia) and Helsinki on daily basis  ---- wait! these are not sights! But they're big! At least to me... No laughing there!

Then there's the Cathedral and in the last pic there's the Parliament and a statue of Mannerheim.

Okey dokey, so this is a postcrossing meetup... Bunch of 'crossers chatting, writing cards and taking photos. My mentor called this meeting "Post-xmas-party-meetup" as they had a "Pre-xmas-party-meetup" last year. The coffee was good too! 

Sweet Valentine's Day!

In Finland it's called Ystävänpäivä which means Friend's Day. So here you send  a card or give chocolate or a cute fluffy thing to your friends. Some couples remember each other too. Some people think it's just bah commercial humbug brought from the States.

Hi ya folks! No autographs today please  'Cos you see, I'm a nominee for Most Promising Newcomer in the Golden Bear Awards - the Oscars of toyvoyager community. I look pretty handsome don't I! Who could resist voting me? It'll be exciting to see who wins! Also Alfie has been nominated for Best Action shot. And our little Vladimir is in one of the Best Ensemble Cast photos. There was also my mentor's Repa Räpylä nominated in several categories. I wish good luck to everyone who has been notinated in any other gategory than mine 

I'll put the champagne on ice!

Today was Alfie Langer's 2nd birthday/Anniversary of Arrival. He didn't know we were throwing him a party as this is not the exact date I didn't know I would be so stuffed I couldn't move my "behind" when everyone started a boardgame - I told them I'll be the judge... Judge didn't have to move... Alfie was very happy and pleased for everything, which is cool. He got a card but he gets to go shopping later, shopping for his own b-day pressie. Way cooler!

Life's all party nowadays... 

Roo turned 5 years today - and next week she has 1year anniversary like Alfie. They both came here a year ago. Well, Roo had cake with marzipan decoration and yummy chocolate cookies. Then we played Princess Memory/Pairs. I was Prince Charming of course 

There we pose: me, Ewan E. Ewok, Alfie Langer, Roo and Vladimir.

My mentor attended a yawning seminar in Vantaa, in a building called Flamingo. The Flamingo was a spa but there was also all sorts of stores and cafe's and restaurants and a movie theatre... We posed with some movie ads but what really got me jumping was the spaceman! I colleague! Wohoo! Although he was very silent - maybe he didn't hear me behind the glass... And my mentor got excited in the toilet... Yep, she's nuts. The toilets had posters of famous men (I guess they had all the groovy chick pics in the male toilets). My mentor chose Viggo Mortensen for some mysterious reason.

Oh well, the seminar was *yawn* but the chairs were comfy! My mentor was really interested in the seminar and the talk but I missed most of it... zzz....