30 December 2013

So I've heard this song a million times before. It played a lot during my teenage years. I was listening to Love Songs on Pandora today because I'm a sap and that's what I enjoy listening to in my free time. Anyway I heard this song and suddenly it had a whole new level of meaning to it.

On the back of the loss of my father-in-law I've been thinking a lot about what my mother-in-law must be going through. This song was heart wrenching for me when I thought about what one more day with my father-in-law would be like for her.

I didn't know them for a very long time just a few years but their epic love touched me and it certainly formed my husband into the loving man he is today. Married for 41 years, almost 42. Their love and marriage has always been something I've wanted to emulate with their son. But this song... just wow.. What I would do to give my mother-in-law just one more day with her beloved husband. Or my husband another day with his father.

Sometimes the most familiar things provoke the most unexpected responses. This was one such case for me.

15 December 2013

Thoughts...my thoughts...on some stuff

So as the title suggests this post doesn't really have a theme its more like a diary/journal entry detailing my thoughts over the past couple days.

On Friday after a week or so of discussion on the idea my husband and I decided that I would create a "gofundme.com" page to perhaps raise some funds for us to go on a honeymoon trip since we weren't able to afford one when we got married in the summer 2011. I've since been sharing it on Facebook quite a lot, I even pinned it on pinterest and shared on Google+ even though I have no idea how google+ works. I shared it to various groups I am/was apart of on Facebook thinking it was a great way to drum up support.

I am well aware now that the people of the town I call my home are not nearly as generous and giving as I would have thought they were. Many rude and impolite comments were made about how we should "just (expletive deleted) save, like everyone else for (expletive deleted)'s sake" , how I was a bum for sharing such a page, "why don't you move to Greece if you want to share a page like this," and other comments along those lines. All of these from the group for the city I live in. This was quite surprising to me and hurtful and since I guessed/assumed there would only be more of the same and I am not as thick skinned as I try to make people believe I am, I took the post down.

The post is gone, the comments deleted, the rudeness however is not forgotten. I find myself thinking over and over again, why do people feel the need to share their rude thoughts, nothing forced them to donate or even to read the posting on Facebook and yet every comment was so rude, no positive comments were left at all, no likes on the post nothing to indicate that anyone other than a bunch of very rude people live in my town.

This leads me to think, well maybe it is not so surprising that I do not have friends in this town. At least not any that were not already my husband's friends before I was married. After all the negativity on a harmless post that people could have just ignored if the idea of donating to a honeymoon trip was so terrible in their opinion, I've come to the conclusion that maybe I really don't want to make friends in this town. Maybe I'm happier just being a hermit and having a social life on the web.

So you may be wondering, why are we asking people to donate to our honeymoon trip. The fact remains that after sending out job applications to all open positions that I'm even remotely qualified for and multiple open applications to be considered for any open position a company might have or that might become available in the six months the app stays in the company records etc. After all of this only and only one interview that required me to drive to a different city to attend, no job offers have come. Nothing, not even the hint of a possibility of being interviewed again by any other company and most haven't even responded to the effect that they would consider my application. I also keep an updated CV and cover letter document on the unemployment offices job listing page where employers can search for unemployed people who might fit their vacancies without making an official posting about such a vacant position. Anyway after all this applying and waiting I still haven't found a job in my new home. This is probably perfectly reasonable considering the unemployment rate and that I'm not Finnish and there are many Finnish people who are unemployed.

The moral of all that is that in order for us to have a honeymoon trip at any point in the foreseeable future we're going to need some help funding it. Gifts from friends and family and maybe even some generous strangers to make the dream come true. This means we're also saving our money if we can afford to do so and putting in in a fund towards the trip as well.

But the extreme lack of empathy and the really rude comments from people in town have just really ruined my day and done some serious damage to the mental image I had of the sort of people who live in my new home town.


Also as an ending note, if you're taking the time to actually read this and you want to make a donation to the honeymoon trip fund discussed within this post here is the link:

http://www.gofundme.com/JaniandMelsholidayfund 

Maybe some of my readers will be more generous of heart and spirit than the residents of my town have been.


11 December 2013

Amazed

I was listening to some Christmas music while cleaning up the kitchen today and it hit me how much I've changed in just four short years.

Four years ago: I was in Finland as an exchange student, I was incredibly homesick for familiar things and people from the US. I wanted to go back there like no body's business. Of course Christmas was a bit of a challenge for me emotionally because I was very used to having a huge family gatherings to go to. Here I was able to celebrate with Jani (my now husband) but it was strange to just be two people for Christmas.

That year was the first year I was in charge of making Christmas meal by myself. I made a ham, about 200 meatballs, plenty of mashed potatoes and the traditional "lanttulatikko, and "porkkanalatikko" which translate to rutabaga and carrot casserole respectively.  I learned that rutabaga's are acceptable in this format and this format only. We ate loads and exchanged gifts but I still felt a bit lonely. It was stressful and lots of pressure to be sure, but everything turned out just great.


Today: This will be my fourth Christmas with Jani, we've been married now for three of them. We have our own tree and traditions. I no longer feel the homesickness that I felt during that first Christmas together. I am again preparing to make a ham, meatballs (less than 100), boiled potatoes (which I've since learned are more traditional on a Finnish Christmas table), and again lanttulatikko and porkkanalatikko will grace our table. We're not focused on gifts this year but rather are just going to spend the time enjoying ourselves and the time with each other since we spent so much on gifts last year. This year is about family.

With the sadness that happened in our family recently with the loss of Jani's father I feel the need to make this Christmas a happy time. This goes especially for Jani's mom who has indeed expressed a wish to not celebrate this year because she feels like she'll be too sad without her husband there by her side. After all she had over 40 Christmas's with him. I can't imagine the pain and the sadness she must feel but I feel this overwhelming feeling that this is where I belong and I should do everything in my power to make this Christmas special even though we will be one family member short.

This is even more amazing to me because I have not had any pangs of longing for the large family gatherings happening at this time of year in the US among the various branches of my family there. I find myself more determined than ever to focus on the beautiful, wonderful, loving, amazing, family I've found myself a welcome part of here in Finland.

I feel truly amazed what four years and a lot of love from a new family can do to change a girl. I sure am lucky! =)

4 December 2013

Changes

It has been while since I've made a blog post but this morning's happenings have made me get back into it. Last week in my household we decided to start eating only healthy, low fat, low salt, non-processed foods. That means I cook everyday and my steamer has gotten more on time in the past week than it has in probably the entire year previously. The plus side of this is that we're saving money by not eating out and we're still getting to eat really yummy food. 

On a much more important note this new way of eating has had some serious weight loss benefits for my husband and for me! This makes me really happy because this is the first time in what has seemed like years that the number on the scale has finally started moving in a downward direction. 

Also I'm learning to really enjoy my rice crispies (while they last) with fat free milk, and also fat free yogurt has been really yummy too. Who knew? This diet is made even easier because in Finland there's this little red heart symbol on many products which denotes that it follows certain low fat, low salt requirements. Makes shopping similar to a scavenger hunt to try and find the heart symbol on products. 

I'm simply really excited that finally some changes in my diet and life that are actually working for once.