Hyvä Blues, Hyvä Honka, Hyvä Honka!

Yep, I'm still alive even if my words have not found this site.

The Blues
My home town sports flagship teams in the sports I'm interested in are all in interesting situation. Blues in ice hockey, Honka in basketball and Honka in football (soccer for some of you). Let's bite them one by one...

Unfortunately the Blues are now out from this year's playoffs. JYP from Jyväskylä beat them 4-0 in quarter finals hence no excuses, better team won.

Now the players like Bracken Kearns can focus on their family & kids. I happen to know this morning he was rolling on the floor with his about 2 years old daughter. He apparently was more on top of the situation than Tuomo Ruutu last summer when he lost his kid for a while at Hoplop indoor adventure park in Espoo...

I'm glad I went to the first playoff home game as the 2nd one I missed for a different culture reason, Ystävän Risti concert at church of Espoonlahti, lead by a local music industry 2nd generation legend Ile Vainio.

Tapiolan Honka
My basketball club Tapiolan Honka with long and glorious history has been back in the top league for the 2nd season after a visit at the 2nd highest level. The drop was due to bad financial situation of the separated league team. Now the team is on the last place in the league and the last team is supposed to drop one level down.

But what does the Finnish Basketball Association do?
They decide to expand the league from 11 to 12 teams. It has not yet been (at least not published) how the extra spot will be filled, while my best quess is they will keep Honka up and rise the winner of the 2nd level.

Why to keep Honka even if they should be dropped?
Well, it is the biggest basketball club in Finland with 1000+ juniors and 1 of the 2 teams in the capital area in the league. The other team, Helsinki Seagulls, does not have such junior operations... This is why I'd put my money on Honka playing the league also next year!

FC Honka
Another great club FC Honka with sad stories around the flagship team that has been separated from the main club running the junior operations. The league team lost its place in the league and now they are kicking off a fresh start from the 3rd highest level with new background team (you can follow them at Twitter). The team with mainly young talents completed with some experienced guys willing to take the challenge to boost the club back into the spotlights.

To make a one-man-statement, I will most probably get a season ticket for the upcoming season. The price also should be at the level that I don't mind if I miss half of the games...

So... 3 sports, 3 clubs, 2 names, 3 different situations. I love sports!!!

Now I'm off to watch FC Honka juniors game, missing an overlapping Tapiolan Honka juniors game - which will be covered by another one tomorrow.

Have a sporty weekend!

The Fall - It's Here!

I'm not the only one who has noticed the time of the year - and enjoyed taking photos. Great pics on Facebook, on media and blogs, like Tsupukka's http://tsupukka.blogspot.fi/

If you have never tried, you should go out and find yourself a tree with yellow leafs ...or leaves or how ever you write it, I chose leafs from Toronto Maple Leafs... with branches coming down. Take a stick, go below the tree and it the branches enjoying the rain.

Put on rubber boots - and buy ones if you don't have them - and go out and kick the leafs. Let's hope you won't hit dog shit.

And if your kids take the effort to rake the leaves, let them make a big pile and then break it - or jump into it.

Enjoy the fall!!!

Fruits, Vegetables and Independence - Hyvää Itsenäisyyspäivää Suomi!

The local main newspaper Helsingin Sanomat had in their online paper an interesting article about eating habits of fruits and vegetables. UNICEF had conducted a survey and quite alarming fact was that only 14% of 15 years old boys in Finland eat daily fruits or vegetables! Only fourteen procent!!!

I know from my own experience that it is not only the boys that have difficulties to eat them, it's also the girls. Unfortunately some allergies rule out some of the fruits that our lady in the same age group can eat, but I can tell you it wouldn't be that easy even if she could eat them all. Same challenge with the veggies. The only one that is on "I like to eat it" -list is cucumber (Cucumis sativus), but there the vitamins are as rare as Finnish NBA-players...

What is positive, is that the younger man in the family is happy to eat different kinds of veggies and salad. He has even loves "well prepared" green beans, or I'd say Haricots verts as the French, thinner and longer version is. That's one of the things picked up during Belgium years.

What is the "well prepared" then?
Well, I'm not 100%  sure how my wife does them, but an easy option is to put some (a lot) olive oil on a hot pan, put the beans in, add some sea salt & pepper and that's it! You don't need to cook them long, even if you use the frozen ones it takes only some minutes to prepare. Very good - unless you are too suspicious and afraid to taste one...

What comes to the fruits, the shops are full of different type of them but as the article refers, they are not that cheap up here in the corner of the world - in a country covered with snow. We try to encourage the kids to eat them, naturally showing example, and even push it a bit by putting on a plate in minimum one piece of the veggie prepared or served. Be it green bean, cherry tomato or what ever, they get familiar with the taste and it becomes a habit bit by bit. A healthy habit.

No veggie or fruit - no desert. And the desert can also be or include some fruit - which is something where we could improve a bit.

To read the article at Helsingin Sanomat online newspaper, go here.

To finish the Finnish topics, let's talk about independence;
Tomorrow is again the independence day of Finland, this time # 93 I believe. Hence we get to enjoy a long weekend while tonight most of you prepare again for a 5 day work week.

Last year I wrote the 100th posting about the Finland's Independence day. You can check it out to read a bit about the history, and more details you can get from Wikipedia... Along the years we have build a tradition of two TV evenings per year: Finland's Independence day reception at the President's Palace and the Eurovision song contest in May (I've also written about that few times).

...I actually was wondering in the vey same 100th posting if I'd ever reach 200 postings but today we are somewhere around 230 postings. Since you keep coming back, I guess I need to do the same...

The reason for watching the reception is not that much the event itself or the party, but the biggest fun is to be a home-couch-critic for the dresses. There are always both tops and flops and naturally the flops come across easier. Some flops from an old article from here.

For Finns, here is an old sketch, nauttikaa!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPJY3PoVWKw&feature=related

So tomorrow at 6 pm we shall light 2 candels in the window, a tradition that dates back for a long time. I'm not so sure about where it comes from and will not find out just now. If you know, please share!

Happy Independence Day Finland -

Hyvää Itsenäisyyspäivää Suomi!

Who's the mother...?

I've started to question who is the mother of my children. I must be the father - and I have some evidence to claim it;

One has got a running style as heavy as mine. She also has got the strong perfectionist mindset. The other has got the strange sense of humour, loves the situational comedy and is almost as fit as me.

But the mother then... Yes there are just as many similar things alike, but there must be a reason for both of them having musical skills. The young lady is playing clarinet for the 3rd year now and the young man started with saxophone last fall, having his first stage performance last Sunday.

IT WAS FANTASTIC!!!

The Pink Panther theme got a new status in my musical life but I can tell you the musical skills of the kids are definetely not from me - I am as bad playing music as my wife, the assumed mother of the children says.

Yes, yes, yes, I know I was present when the kids were born but still - there must be a trick somewhere. It can't be that both kids have been switched in the hospital by accident.

How to be sure...? Should I try to play an instrument myself?

Actually in today's world my musical skills are quite advanced since I still have my LP record player from the mid 80's. Still works! Hmmm, I've also played the simple rhime of Ukko Nooa in several island churches with harmonium, the piano type of instrument, but that requires only less then 10 keys so it doesn't count.

Or does this mean the the musical skills are from me and my wife is at the end the mother?

Shame on you, lazy parents - Activate you kids!

Short while ago I was speaking with a colleague who was going to baby-sit 6 year old twin boys. She told me that the kids were pretty wild ones and that of course alerted my active parent / coach-attitude.

I think wild kids are normal kids and the problem is not their energy, they need to be offered proper ways to channel the energy! All kids have both physical and mental energy bank that needs to be emptied regularly - and if you don't do it properly it will be directed to what parents consider "bad behaviour".

Give the kids proper stimulations and keep them active - physically!
The colleague of mine has got a 9 years old son herself so she is somewhat familiar with what boys are interested in. Naturally they will play X-Box, PlayStation or what have you if you give them a chance.

But also they are likely to enjoy outdoor activities and games if you just offer the option and encourage it. Don't be lazy - take the effort and join the game, you might enjoy it yourself too!

What can you do with such "wild" boys then?
Yep, I heard they only wanna play the consol games but so what...

From top of my head I suggested few things that I'd even like to do myself;
Take advantage of the winter, take a sleigh with you and hit a nearby hill. It doesn't need to be a big one, just a hill. Running up the hill for an hour, playing in the snow and having a snow ball fight I can tell you a cup of hot chocolate tastes fantastic!

Football is always fun, but you can also go for a walk in the woods - or if it is winter a walk in the neighbourhood is good too. You can set as a target the hot chocolate pit-stop at a cafe far enough - and then you can walk back another route. Take a camera with you and let the kids take pics of what they are interested (or funny looking trees, leaves, cool cars, clouds, houses or what ever...). Nowadays taking pics with digital camera doesn't cost a cent.

Afterwards, you can play cards. A simple game you can play is called "7" - it is played with regular deck and is similar to UNO. Then there are plenty of board games from traditional Monopoly to various different ones. And you should not forget Yatzy, the dice game.

When was the last time you read a book to the kids? Let them choose one and read it regularly - together.

After the colleague's baby-sitting I asked her what did they do. The answer was a dissapointment:
They were playing the damn Playstation...

Please take the effort and be active, stimulate you kids - and don't forget the books!

PS I saved an article from a local paper some tips for a car trip. I will try to share it with you, even if it is in Finnish...

I was thrilled to see we have been using some of them. This year again we went to the ski trip with a car, just like we've done since they were small - and we have always managed without GameBoys or DVD's. Surely they make the trip smoother, but also more boring.

Wanna spoil your toddler?

For the adults who don't have energy, imagination or courage to make their little toddlers to eat their food, I have found a solution: Airplane Spoon!
In Amsterdam you have it all - also a shop that sells such spoons enabling you to play with food. Soon you need to move up to helicopters and thereafter via motorcycles to cars.

If you wish to get one, I will NOT tell you the location but advice to get your kids to eat otherwise ;o) More stuff spotted in Amsterdam coming later...

PS Amazon.com sells it for 15.99$ and UK site coolest-gadgets.com you can find it for 5.99.