Finland: Cute stuff, Sundays, and Lappajärvi: Sun. Sept. 30

Kai, at his best, is an adorable little monkey. Last night he was so incredibly cuddly, wandering around in his pj's giving hugs and kisses left and right. We had a busy Sunday, but filled with great things like Bitti's scrumptious Toska kaka ("Tosca Cake"), playing in the pouring rain, and aimless wanderings around the neighborhood in the stroller.

There's a really beautiful type of hedge that's common in town here. Now that it's fall the leaves of these hedges are bright red, orange and yellow. In fact, so many of the houses around here have hedges I started to think about how it looks a lot like a little English village. I've only seen one house in town with an "American-style" fence - you know, the 6-foot high ones that wrap around the whole yard.

I forgot how everything is closed on Sundays. Which made me a bit nostalgic for my days in grad school here. Sundays were for sleeping in, going to church, meeting friends for coffee and just taking it easy. That type of Sunday just doesn't seem to exist back home for me. But not because I'm married with a kid, more because I just don't think that type of day exists at all in the U.S. anymore. Well, maybe still in the Amish towns.

Today is now Monday so we have one more week left in Finland. I'd really like to squeeze in a trip to Lake Lappajärvi. As part of the geology sightseeing I dig so much.

I went to a conference held at the Kivitippu Resort on the shores of Lake Lappajärvi in 2001. It was a fitting place for a conference about meteor impact sites, since that waters of Lake Lappajärvi fill an impact crater that was created. Sadly, I don't have any photos of the lake and central uplift island, so I'd like to take some this week. And, I read that the Kivitippu Resort http://www.kivitippu.fi/en/activities/index.html has an pool that I can take Kai to, and an outdoor wooded trail and a meteor museum as well. w00t!

The central island of Lappajärvi is home to several suevite quarries. Suevite is the melt rock that forms when a huge impact occurs on earth. In fact, the impact at Lappajärvi was so violent, diamonds can be found in this impact melt. Read more at http://www.somerikko.net/old/geo/imp/lappa_e.htm