Salolampi weekend 2015

After missing a year due to scheduling issues, Minnesotan Suomi-koulu returned to Salolampi, Concordia Language Village's Finnish village, for a relaxing family weekend!

Last time we visited, which was two years ago, there was tons of snow on the ground. This year, the weather was more cooperative - it was in the 60s and sunny during the day, and not too cold even at night. It was perfect!

We arrived on Friday evening and got situated in our cabin, Savo.

Maisie was excited that this was where we'd be staying, because it was one of the boys' cabins last summer when she was a Salolampi camper!

She was also excited in general to be returning. She took a lot of pride in showing us around - this was my cabin, this was where we hung up our swimsuits to dry, this is where I had class. It was great to see how excited she was about Salolampi!

Friday night was pretty laid back - we just hung out and played games in the main dining hall as we waited for the families to arrive. There was fresh-baked pulla and lots of coffee and tea, so the adults chatted and snacked, and the kids played outside.

Saturday morning was sunny and warm! After breakfast, some of us decided to check out the hiking trails.

The trails are well-maintained, nice and flat, and made for a beautiful walk through the woods - even for little legs! Ella and I were joined on our hike by her B.F.F. Lillian, Lillian's little brother Oliver, their mom and dad Tonya and Reid, and Reid's mom Roxy.

Roxy is a member of the Minnesota Mycological society, and a naturalist, so she knew a lot about all the different things we were seeing in the woods! Ella especially enjoyed learning about some of the different kinds of mushrooms that were growing out there.

Roxy found a lot of a kind called "chaga" that grows on birch trees. It looks like it's charred on the outside, but when you break it off it's orangey-yellow. She said you use it to make a very healthful tea - just pour hot water over it. We all learned a lot from her!

There was time for a few photo ops...

And then we were back at camp. Time for some Finnish schoolyard games!

Maisie, it turns out, is aces at kyykkä!

Check out the arm on her!

While Maisie and I played, Ella and her friends (with parental guidance) went down to the beach.

They found all kinds of cool shells, and generally had a good time until someone threw a rock at someone else, which put an end to the beachy fun. Lunch, naps, and sauna followed.

Later in the evening, Maisie and I headed down to the beach with some of the older kids.

We found shells, driftwood, and even some bleached bones that we thought might be from a deer. When it started to get dark, we headed back up to the main dining hall for dessert, tea, and silly selfies.

Soon the little ones went to bed, while the older kids stayed up and watched movies.

Sunday morning it was time to hit the road and head back to real life. Sad! We had a wonderful, relaxing weekend at Salolampi. Maisie's more excited than ever for her next summer session (two weeks!) and Ella wants to go now, too!

We can't wait to go back!

Weekend update

Long time no blog! Life has been even a little busier than usual around here... hence the long silence. In early November I took a new position at the bank, so work's been keeping me busy! It's a lateral move, but with more growth potential than my old position. I've also changed locations; instead of working in downtown Minneapolis, I'm in a suburban location now. I'm very happy with the change, but there's definitely a learning curve/adjustment period that's been taking up a lot of time and energy. Hence the lack of blog posts!

We had a great Thanksgiving at Gramma Liisa's house, and are now getting ready for Christmas! Every year FACA (Finnish-American Cultural Activities) puts on a Joulu (Christmas) celebration, which was this past Saturday.

There's a Joulutori (Christmas marketplace), children's Christmas movies and activities, a delicious dinner, and a sing-along of Finnish Christmas carols and songs. This year, a group of kids from Suomi-koulu performed songs and dances during the dinner and the Joululaulut - including Maisie!

Isn't she the cutest little Joulu tonttu (Christmas elf)? And Grandma Liisa made the vest and skirt she wore - she got a lot of compliments on them!

She had a lot of fun dancing and singing - she really loves performing for an audience!

On Sunday morning, I realized we hadn't been to the Science Museum in a while, and their butterflies exhibit was closing soon, so we had to go check it out! Maisie's not a big fan of any kind of insects, so Ella and I went to the butterfly house without her and Aaron.

There were a ton of Monarchs in the butterfly house, and the Omni theater movie is also about Monarchs - their life cycle and migration. It was really interesting and I learned a lot from it!

Ella is a huge fan of all kinds of insects, so she was happy to let them crawl all over her. She's very careful not to touch their wings and is very gentle. She loves all kinds of insects, and has talked about wanting to be a scientist who discovers new kinds of spiders when she grows up.

So, that was our weekend in a nutshell! How was yours?

Willie the Millipede

This winter is really really reluctant to give up its hold on us. Every time I think it's finally over... we get another round.

Thursday April 3.

Today we're looking at a high of 38, but it was only 28 this morning at the bus stop... with a wind chill of 10. Tomorrow's forecast says "chilly with snow and rain." SNOW!

One side effect of the never-ending winter is that when it does warm up outside, however briefly, everyone immediately runs out to take advantage of the sun and warmth... and we're no exception! As you may remember, Maisie loved biking last year, but never really got the hang of it on her own - she either rode on the trailbike behind me, or used training wheels. This year it's a different story!

She worked and worked and worked at it until she mastered the art of the two-wheel bike! She was bound and determined to figure it out, and didn't stop until she got there. Now it's all she wants to do.

Saturday wasn't the nicest day ever - overcast and maybe in the 50s or low 60s - but it definitely felt nice compared to where our weather's been. So when we got home from Girl Scouts and Suomi-koulu, the girls headed outside to play almost immediately. They rode their bikes around the block (Ella's doing great on her two-wheeler with training wheels) and played volleyball and soccer with the neighbor kids. After a couple hours of that (seriously, HOURS), they ended up in the backyard where they climbed trees, dug holes, made mud, and found some little bug friends!

First the girls found a roly-poly, which they attempted to sneak into the house so they could keep it as a pet. I explained that it wouldn't be happy in the house - we didn't know what it eats, and the cats might get it, so we needed to put it back outside. They reluctantly complied... but we had to have the conversation again when they found a little millipede.

They really, really, really wanted to bring the millipede inside to keep as a pet of their own. They even named it Willie! Ella especially was unhappy when I said no way, absolutely not, Willie needs to stay outside. So I suggested we write reports about millipedes that they could take to the Science Museum to get points at the Collectors Corner, and that seemed to make everything better.

You may remember that Maisie did this once before, with her pine cones poster. She's also brought in small fossils that she found on the Mississippi River banks. Ella hadn't traded before at the Collectors Corner, so she was excited to get started!

The next morning the girls worked on their reports, using their observations and information we learned from a U of MN Extension website.

Maisie's had more text...



Millipedes have 400 legs. They curl up when they are scared. They are small. They eat leafs that are falling apart. You find them in damp places. They are dark brawn. from Maisie


while Ella mostly drew pictures, and then told me what to write for the captions.

They are long and skinny. They eat crumbly leaves and grass. They curl up and they go straight. This millepede is on my hand.

bonus pic, with Ella's new short haircut

At the Collectors Corner, the Science Museum staff asked the girls a bunch of questions about millipedes and their presentations... What kind of animal is it? How do you know it's not a bird or a mammal? Does it have a skeleton? How did you learn about it? Where do they live? Why does it curl up when it gets scared? The girls did great, and were each awarded 2,500 points. They now busy planning their next reports, so they can get more points!

We had plans to go to Gramma Liisa's house for lunch, but we had a little time to stay and play at the museum. I think the highlight for Maisie was getting to be the helper at the Science Live! show about cryogenics.

She's holding a ball and describing its properties (soft, squishy, bouncy) before it takes a trip to "Liquid Nitrogenland."

It was a great weekend of outdoor learning. I was (am!) so proud of how hard they worked on their reports. The Collectors Corner is such a cool resource, and a great way to get kids interested and motivated in learning about nature and science!

Vacation: Duluth

This past Monday, May 6, Maisie had the day off school for one of those random record-keeping or teacher in-service days. I figured I might as well give myself the day off, too. So we headed up north to Duluth, where we'd made a reservation at one of the girls' favorite places - Edgewater Resort & Waterpark. We stayed there Saturday through Monday.

We had a blast playing in the water park! You'll have to take my word for it, though - I didn't manage to take any pictures.

I did manage to get some pictures on Sunday afternoon, though, when we took a break from playing in the water to head down to Canal Park, which is a semi-touristy area right on the waterfront.

 One of Duluth's unique attractions is the aerial lift bridge. When a ship needs to come through that's too tall for the bridge, instead of it breaking in the middle and the two halves pulling up, the whole bottom part lifts straight up!


Ella as "Balance Panda"

So first, of course, we had to watch the bridge go up and down as a ship came through. It was kind of chilly, though, so once the bridge was on its way back down, we headed indoors to the Lake Superior Maritime Museum, which is far more interesting than I thought it would be. It presents the history of shipping on the Great Lakes. So on the top level, there's telescopes so you can watch the ships come in, and some fun hands-on exhibits.

Shipping on Lake Superior is not without its tragedies, of course. The museum displays multiple artifacts that have been recovered from shipwrecks... including this very famous wreck.

Once we'd had our fill of the museum, we went down to the lakeside to climb on rocks and to look for additions to our rock collection!

There's a wooden lakewalk that goes quite a ways down the length of the waterfront, and then these HUGE boulders all piled from the lakewalk to the shore that are oh-so-tempting to climb on.

See? really huge!

Some of the rocks have these holes drilled in them. I wasn't sure what they were from at first, but I think I figured it out.

A sign said that the rocks were from when MN-DOT was finishing Interstate 35's route through the east side of Duluth. So my guess is that the holes were drilled for blasting through the hillsides. What do you think?

As we walked, we all looked at the little rocks, too, for interesting additions to our rock collection. We found a LOT of different rocks (and I emptied a lot of rocks out of the girls' pockets!). Here are the ones we ended up bringing home:

Clockwise from the top: sea glass, gabbro, an agate!, quartz that might reveal some hematite bands if we take a rock hammer to it (a.k.a. stealth agate!!), red & black basalt? rhyolite, and either basalt or flint.

Geology rocks!

We headed back on Monday after a fun, relaxing long weekend. And for all the fun we had at the water park, Maisie and Ella both said that their favorite part of the trip was climbing on the rocks. It was a great time, and we're already planning our next Duluth adventure.

Maisie's pine cones

I'm pretty sure I've mentioned here that we're members of the Science Museum of Minnesota. One of Maisie's favorite things to do at the museum is to visit Collectors' Corner and the Trading Post.

This is a neat area that's tucked away in the back corner of their collections gallery. To be honest, it took me a while to even notice it... I don't know how many times we visited and just walked right by it. But it's really cool! Kids can bring in things they've found in nature to trade. They get points based not just on what they found, but also how much they know about it - the people working there ask the children a bunch of questions about where they found it, how they found it, and what they know about it. The kids can then trade in their points to "buy" things from their display case that has polished rocks, little fossils, and things like that.

The first time we went, Maisie brought some finds from our fossil-hunting expedition. Well! She not only found FOSSILS but she also knew a bunch about the giant inland sea (thank you, Dinosaur Train), so she got a bunch of points. Since then, she's been trying unsuccessfully to have another huge hit like that, and get thousands of points at the Trading Post. This weekend, she finally did it again!

This fall, we collected a bunch of different pine cones around our neighborhood. They were intended for a project that never really took off, so they've been sitting on a shelf ever since. With some encouragement and assistance from me and Aaron, Maisie turned them into a poster!

As you can see, she identified each of them, taped them to the poster, and wrote down the name. She also drew a diagram of the parts of a pine cone, along with a drawing of a pine cone on the end of a branch.

Well, the person working at the trading post was REALLY impressed. It's pretty clear that Maisie did this herself, and I think he appreciated that. He asked her some questions about pine cones generally that she was able to answer, too.

He awarded Maisie 7,000 points, which made her really happy. AND he told her that he'd see if they could display her poster as an example of work that children could do to show their knowledge and earn extra points. It was so cool! She used some of her points to get a conch shell with a lovely pink interior, and saved the rest for next time.

I was (and am!) so proud of her, and even better, I think she was really proud of her poster, too. I offered to carry it in and down the stairs, but she insisted on doing it all herself.

It was a great experience and really rewarding for her. She's already planning her next report - on leaves of trees in our neighborhood, once spring is here and there are any leaves to be found!

Unidentified flora

Botany time! What is this tree?

It's growing near our garage. It's been there for a few years; this is the first that it's had fruit. It has smooth bark, no thorns or anything like that, and the trunk is still relatively small in diameter. The canopy is pretty big already though. Aaron thinks it's a mulberry tree... is that right? What do you think? (looking especially hard at you, Gramma Jo!)