Update from Espoo

Well friends, I am sitting behind the counter at the complex where we live.  The missionaries each have a turn about once every other week to receive travelers coming to the temple in the evening when the full-time day person has left for the evening.  They are beds here for 48 people, 8 rooms each with 6 beds.  Usually there are a few extra beds left over and it is mostly empty on the weekends, but the first and second week after the first of the year, it is completely full of Russian saints to the east.  It is my understanding that Christmas is not a big deal in Russia but the New Year celebration is big time.  A lot vacation time then so the saints in the St. Petersberg area come to the Helsinki Temple.  They are a pretty happy bunch together and we are looking forward to working with them every day.

This past week we had a temple workers' party here at the asunto (guest house)  on Monday and it was loaded with goodies.  There was a short program and the funnest thing of the evening was a traditional skit put on by some Finnish members.  I guess that it has been around for over 200 years and it is a common skit to be performed in the schools and communities all over Finland.  The picture below is the four characters in the skit.

Tuesday, 13 Dec-Liisa's birthday,  we went to Helsinki to the annual Saint Lucia Day celebration and parade.  This is a tradition that has come down through 100s of years and I think each country in Europe has it own way of celebrating.  First of all there was a performance in the large church in Helsinki.  Lucia was crowned and then some singing and speaking.  After that she walks down the stairs of the church in front of thousands of people, gets into a big chair in the back of an ancient truck, and joins the parade through the streets of Helsinki.  It was really fun.  In the church her crown was actually made of burning candles, but in the parade the candles had to be changed to small lights because of the wind.

On the same street where the parade went was the big outside Christmas market with all the little shops that we have talked about earlier.  Well, this is a picture of one of the hand-made items.  Rachelle should like this one-it looks like a moose.  

Well, that is about it for now.  We are well and tired.  Hope all of you are having a great holiday season.  Bye for now.

Christmas is in the air.

Well good friends.  Life continues to go on in Finland.  Work at the temple is different from one day to the next.  We never really know what is going to happen the next day as far as who will be coming.  It is always interesting when the Russians are in town and also when the missionaries from Russia are in the temple.  We love them all and look forward to anyone that comes through the doors of the temple.

Holiday season is really in the air.  Pretty much like back home in the stores, not a lot of bargains like we see at home but pretty much the same shopping situation.  The end of last week we went to Helsinki to see all the shops on a big open marketplace in front of the church in Helsinki.  It was really fun to go around and see what many of them had made for the Christmas sale. Many homemade things and different wares and foods were available. Lynne bought the manger scene in the picture below.

We started talking to the lady below who made these figures and she does them all in her home.  She was quite the lady and we had a great time talking to her.  There were probably over 100 booths from which folks sold the items.  No snow on the ground yet, but it is coming from the north before too long

Not a great picture but maybe you can get a bit of feel for the marketplace Christmas booths.  

I hope and pray everything is well with you and your families.  We are doing fine and I think that all the kids are doing okay also.  Rachelle, Dave and Jackson are still in Vernal and doing well.  Liisa and Matt and five kids are moving to Cortez, Colorado right after the first part of the year.  Matt has a new job there working for a community bank and they have to move.  Ryan and Micaela and their five are still stuck in Morgan and loving it.  Becca and Phill and their three are housekeeping for her parents and seem to be doing okay.  Mark and Jessica and their three kids are doing well.  Their youngest just had a operation to repair some birth problems but she is doing well now.  Heather and Mike are making it in Georgia and are going to Utah for Christmas.

All in all, we are all blessed and give thanks to Him who gives us all.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.  Lynne and I will be in the center of Finland in a town called Jyväskylä. for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.  We are staying with Kaisa's sister Helena and her son, Oscar.  We are really looking forward to being with them.

Love you all and the best for the holidays.

Rick and Lynne

 ri

December in Finland has arrived!

Dec 6, 2011  Finnish Independence Day 

Well, it is December in Finland and winter has arrived and we are just fine, even if a bit cold.  We have had quite a bit going on at the temple and in our "on the outside" part of our lives.  The Christmas season is in full swing around here and the spirit is in the air.  Also all attempts to sell something to someone is in the air also, so I guess things aren't too much different than at home. Let me go through the pictures that I have attached at this time.

If this picture looks like Super Saturday at home, well it almost is.  The American sisters asked the Finnish sisters to teach them how to cook a Finnish staple called "riisipiirakkoita" which directly translate as "rice pies".  We had do this because we all like eating them so much.  So this a kitchen scene of them all working together plus Brother Williams that likes to be in the kitchen also.  It was fun and the sisters learned a bunch.

 This is the finished product and are they ever good.  I like to make sandwiches out of them and have them for lunch.  You can buy them in the store like this, but these are better than the store purchased items.  They do take quite a bit of time but it was worth it.  All the sisters get along really great and it was a fun experience.

 After that cooking experience, six of us went to Helsinki to see how Christmas is coming there.  It was raining and we didn't get around a lot, but we did run into this greeting card and decided to take advantage of it.  Helsinki was busy with all the Christmas shoppers and due to the fact that the next day was their Independence Day.  Before we arrived home it had started to snow.   I suspect that we will see quite a bit of that stuff this year.  It was fun to be in Helsinki and look around for a while.

 This is what we woke up to this morning.  It is still really beautiful with the temple in the background.  I suspect that I will shoveling many of those stairs this coming month or so.  Today is Finland's Independence Day and we celebrated it with the Finnish saints and the temple presidency.  It was a wonderful meal and all seemed to have had a great time.  The Finnish sisters did most of the food, but everyone kicked in and fixed something for the event.  The main course of the day was smoked salmon and it was wonderful.  We also had roast beef with all the accessories

 This is our close little group of missionaries that work in the temple, also President Haikkola and President Vorimo and their wives are in the picture.  We are missing a member of the presidency and one Finnish missionary couple that went home for the weekend. It really a great group of people.

As you can see here, it was quite a celebration.  After we ate, we sang some Finnish songs together and President Haikkola gave us a brief history of Finnish independence from Russia in 1917. The food was outstanding and a good time was had by all of us.  Talked to most of the kids this weekend and they are doing well.  Also George and Margaret Hopkin Skyped us and we had a good chat.
We miss all of you, especially during this holiday season but we know that doing His work is one great way to celebrate Christmas.

Merry Christmas and a great new year.                        Rick and Lynne

Holiday Season Begins in Suomi (Finland)

Today, 28 Nov, 2011 and we are having our Thanksgiving dinner in the visitors' kitchen down below.  I will try to take a picture and include it later in the blog. Lynne and all the sisters have been very busy getting ready for the event.  We have a number of locals coming also, so it should be a really fun day. More later.

However, this past Saturday we had an opening of the nativity scene with a little program that was really nice.  There were a number of Finns and missionaries there.  There was a short talk by a member of the temple presidency. We have a great temple presidency here in Finland.  All of them are certainly veterans of the basic founding of the church in Finland.  As I read the early history of the church in Finland, which really only began in the late 1940's and early 1950's, I recognize many of these early members in the temple all the time. The Helsinki Stake patriarch, Tauno Kasper Savolainen, is 87 years old and just as active as one could be. I have been reading his autobiography and what a story of faith and dedication.  It has taken men like him and many others over here to establish a firm foundation from which the church has grown.  From that foundation, 3rd and 4th generation active Finnish families have resulted.  What a blessing it is to work in the temple with these stalwarts of faith all the time.  True, they are getting older, like ourselves, but the opportunity for Lynne and I to associate with them is outstanding.

Here is the nativity scene that is on a little hill between the main highway and the temple.  It will be seen by many who travel by.    

Nativity Scene by Helsinki Temple

And of course, the children had to sing.  It was fun to see these Finnish children perform.

Finnish Youth Singing Christmas Carols

Thanksgiving in Finland 28 Nov 2011

Below is a picture of our group starting to eat their Thanksgiving Dinner.  It was really fun and everyone helped.  The food was excellent and we had a good time.  We are a pretty close group and all seem to work to help everyone else.

Love you all, we are doing okay.  The weather is getting more winter-like all the time but we have been really lucky and have not had any snow yet.  Mom's yams were a big hit this evening with all.  We did have turkey with all the trimmings and much more of everything else.

Lynne and Rick at Thanksgiving Dinner

Love you all, Rick and Lynne

Trek to Kouvola

Kouvola Branch building. The church is one the bottom on the left and in the middle, then there is a store on the right of the bottom floor.  The store is closed on Sunday, so everything works out pretty good.

Yesterday we went to Kouvola and visited a small branch there.  We attended both their meetings.  I had a chance to bear my testimony in sacrament meeting and Lynne helped with the music.  After the meetings we were invited to the home of Aimo and Nellie Jäkkö deep in the heart of Finland or about 50 kilometers from Kouvola to their home.  And are they ever deep in the forest.  They had us and the another couple, Williamson's,  to dinner and it was great to visit with them.  We had a wonderful dinner and then visited and saw her internet business which is selling miniatures of everything.  If you would like to visit her site, it is www.finnaimo.fi. We had a wonderful day in the country.  Church was really great, not a lot of people, but the spirit was neat and the members were super.

Below is a picture of the Jäkkö family near Välijoki, Finland.  Notice the old fuse box on the wall.  The house they live in used to be a dormitory for a teacher's school. This was a great experience.  They live in the kind of home that I used to tract out all the time when I was here before.  But they also have satellite TV and internet connectivity and heat the place with a modern ground heat-exchanger.  Don't for one minute think that these folks are behind the times, they are modern and up-to-date in all aspects that I can see.  I saw a robot at the pharmacy the other day filling prescriptions totally automatically .

This is a picture of the Mäkinen's who we worked with for a while at the temple.  Another couple from American is coming and their mission to the temple was completed.  Wonderful people whom we learned to love and appreciate in the short time we knew them.

We are doing great.  A bunch of Russians from St. Petersburg are in the dormitory this evening and will be in the temple tomorrow. We need to learn some Russian to help with the sessions, but we have got to get the Finnish down first.  Love to all of you.  Rick and Lynne

Our Trek to Hämeenlinna

Hämeenlinna, Finland  November 13, 2011

Well, our first experience speaking in church is over and we are still alive.  They didn't stone us or throw rotten food. It was in a small branch in the town of Hämeenlinna about a100 kilometer drive from our home in Espoo. It is in a rented building right now because their old building had mold and they had to exit it.  There were about 50 members present.  They hold Sunday School first and then have sacrament meeting.  Only a two hour block at this time.  No piano, they used the recorded hymns and it worked fine.  A sister that started her missionary work the same time that I did in October of 1965 translated for Lynne's talk and I gave mine in Finnish after laboring forever to get it written.  Anyway, it was a really enjoyable day and we had a great time driving up and back.  The Brother and Sister in the photo above is of a brother that I knew in Finland when I was here before.  Not many left in the country now, but I run into a few all the time.

On the way home Sunday, I had to stop at one of my old towns where I used to labor and found the old train station is still in use.  It was unbelievable, but I used this station so many times years ago.  The town has definitely changed but it brought back many memories.  This is in the town of Järvenpää.

What would the town named after a castle be without a castle in the town?  The is a side shot of the castle in Hämeenlinna, which translated means Hämeen's castle.  It is a beautiful location and site is right on the edge of lake.

Just took this picture a few minutes ago. We just had to share this sunset with you.  All is well in Finland, the Finns are starting to get ready for their first big snow storm and also for Christmas.  We love the temple and all those that are connected with it.  Love all of you.  Rick and Lynne

All Saints Day

Well, it is time again for an update from Finland.  Today was our every 6th or 7th Saturday off and we spent the All Saints Day holiday puttering around the apartment and getting ready for our Sacrament talks a week from tomorrow.  It will take us that long to get ready to speak.
Anyway, all is well and we are doing okay.  It was Estonian week in the temple so we have had all kinds of different folks around here speaking all kinds of foreign tongues.  They are great people and so dedicated to their  temple assignments.  We have also had a number of folks from Russia this week, so it has been quite interesting to say the least.
This first picture is a of us and our good friends, Roger and Janice Fuller in front of the Haaga Chapel in the northern part of Helsinki.  The younger sisters are some friends that help us at the temple. We go to many different wards, so I really don't know which one is ours.

The Finnish people celebrate All Saints Day differently than we do.  It is a pretty quiet holiday with all the stores closed and in the evening candles are place on graves by family members and others.  These two pictures are of one of the headstones.  The first one is without my flash and the other with the flash turned on. It is really quite a sight to see all the candles in this particular cemetery.

Well hope all of you are doing well and winter has not set in too much.  We have not had any snow yet but I am sure that it will come.

Some have asked for our mailing address:

Since we have opened our blog to the public, I have taken our address off.  But if you need our address, blog address, or phone number.  Just email me at Londonrt@msn.com.  Rick and Lynne