Summer came and went but we are still here..

The whole summer was one big traveling plan, best described in pictures..


 to US, our trip was a dream, kids slept in the plane all the way, Peregrine didn't except the last half an hour and had to be woken up to cry at the immigration and passport control.. Where both the twins practiced their tear duct functionality up to the standard that we were ushered past the lines meandering about the arrivals hall. thanks US officers, Swedes on the way back let us wait like everybody else.. equality hurts.  

This is how I carried the two through Copenhagen airport, while Halle worked on keeping Peregrine from escaping, we were like movie stars...stared by everybody and photographed by the majority..

When one considers the practicality of the age of ones cells.. all the "eggs" of our grandchildren are already in Cordelia, they are as old as Halle.. So Cordelia is as old as Halle and Halle is.... you know what I mean. Here four generations of Gods mercy and Blessings!

We took the Strasbourg historic railway with P and enjoyed a day in the railway museum, where P was mostly  interested in model trains rather than age old transportation just behind the wall..


It so happened that my  dear US Mom and Pop were visiting near by because of work of Paul. Oh how wonderful it was to see them!! We made our way to the aquarium of which Peregrine kept talking about for days and weeks afterwards. Was a real special time!

Here are Helen's "grand children" on a stroll at a near by   park.

Like all good things, our holiday came to an end.Thank you Marshalls for bearing us for a while this Summer.

P

The End

Here I am with Transcript and a bottle of wine we bought some 5 years ago from France.. Popcorn is popping and Cordelia is crying outside.. (her sleeping or not sleeping has landed her a spot outside in the early night shift..) we do bring her in after a while.
Everything here seems to have happened fast when looking back; we arrived bright and hopeful and rearing to go to school. That enthusiasm has somewhat lessened since then, being replaced by busyness of our life. In Finland they call it "Rush-hour-years" And we are surely in them. New job, 3 kids, moving.. In fact these days we are so tired that if our good friends Niilo and Nora had not put up a party for my Graduation we would have not celebrated it.. So thank you Niilo and Nora!

Here I am given a very nice graduation gift from my dear friend Niilo, thank you.

[The popcorn is as good as I might ask for, but the wine has seen better days perhaps..]

 Now that we are thinking about leaving Oulu for Janakkala (Turenki town) it is sad to think of all the great friends we will sorely miss. In so many ways we rely on our friends, even if we don't see them daily, it is reassuring to know they are there. A new place will be void of friends to start with, but God willing we will find some great new ones. It is hard to think we could ever replace the ones we have gotten here though.
 It is not reasonable to list everybody here, but I would like to thank you all for your support and prayers for us. It seems that lately we have been in more need of your support than before.

Dr. and Dr. Mehtälä

We do manage to pull a smile every now and then it is part of the insanity of our life these days! 

The original idea of this blog was to record our journey through dental school in Oulu, to allow Halles parents to get a glimpse of our life and to preserve the experience of our time up north. I hope our journey will lead further South eventually than Turenki. Perhaps to a place where we don't have to dig out the winter gear at any time. In the meanwhile we try to stay happy in the place we are in and be content with what God has given us. I will cease writing this record of our experience in Oulu with one final thank to God for providing us with everything we needed and keeping us.

Pekka, Halle, Peregrine, Atticus and Cordelia (Oh my! there are many of us.)

What now and What next?

Spring/Summer in Oulu is a mixture of sunshine almost 24/7 and some occasional snow.. And I mean truly on the 1st of May we got some light snow drifting towards the ground.. As for my school it is coming to an end, it is very strange, 5 years of study has been the life we have lived here and now it is done. Last week I had my last lecture and I have few more patient contact days left and then it is all done. I'll be DDS finally..
5 years have included many memorable things for us, most of all our 3 kids, who are taking up the time I used to use for writing this blog and my PhD.. unfortunately my PhD is sitting on my computer and not getting done.. Anyhow we have been VERY busy here and for that reason have not had so much time to keep contact with people. Past few weeks we (Halle) has developed a good rhythm with the kids.. It starts at about 7am with everybody getting up from bed at the same time. Then at 8-8:30 the twins go back to bed, finnish style outside for 3-4h sleep which leaves only Peregrine with us here to play with. This has enabled more time for us to keep the walls from falling on us.. I raked the backyard and Halle cleaned the Kitchen and we are getting things done at home.
Atticus has started to eat solid food to supplement milk as his weight had not gone up like Cordelias, now he is on a  diet of Finnish potatoes and some other vegetables, to which he has taken to with vigor not familiar to us from Peregrines eating, which was barely a tablespoon at a time in the beginning.
As the snow has melted away we have been able to utilize the yard behind our home and get to know the neighbor kids, who are roughly the same age as Peregrine and are a great entertainment to each other.

 Here Peregrine is sitting on a bumper of the Oulu fire dept. truck, the car was on display at the May 1st celebration at the local YMCA (NMKY). Peregrine was little under the weather with spring cold, but was still a good sport.

 Here Peregrine is taking a ride in the back of a police car.. not a ride I would like to see him take later... and as you see he was not so eager to sit there anyhow.. Perhaps some bad vibes from earlier riders..??

There are some rare moments when Peregrine concentrates and here is one.. he is drawing a airplane or a helicopter on a piece of paper in our living room.. 

 We listened to childrens' songs with his daycare group from (Vihreä talo) Green house. To our surprise he sat in mom's lap the whole time instead of running around and talking to everybody.

One more shot of Peregrine driving the fire truck at the May 1st celebration in oulu... An for those who are from warmer climates in Oulu the first of may the weather is rather chilly... +4C (39F).. and as we live by the sea the wind chill factor seems to lower the temperatures down to -50.. 

Anyway the end is near and the new beginning is about to be upon us.. where should we go and what should we do.. ? 

God Bless! P 

Spring will come one day

Here we are still standing.. at least somehow we are. The twins do take their toll on us both, depriving sleep and requiring a lot of attention all the time they are awake.. Here is a taster of a day with Halle in the morning on a typical Monday..
Husband gets up so early that no babies have awoken of yet, and he hobbles into his clothes as quietly as he can.. the floor squeaks just ever so slightly and from the room next to our bedroom we hear Peregrine scream.. and it takes some 20 minutes and he quiets down again.. great! little bit of a snooze still.. Cordelia picks her bright head up and makes annoyed I am hungry kind of noise.. feeding time.. 20 min.. burb and plug her up again.. snoozing time.. Atticus wakes up, does not want to eat but action this time..20min. it is now officially 7am and Peregrine is loudly wanting attention.. there is no more time for snoozing. Get up and shake the dust of half slept night off.. Stick Peregrine in front of computer and watch some cartoons, get both twins down to feed and change diapers all at the same time as Peregrine is yelling as his toon finished already.. feed Peregrine something.. put on "million" layers of clothing to all kids, at which time everybody is crying, including mom.. and then out into -20C weather and run/walk to bus stop, trying not to lose any kids or forget diapers, lunch, things or your own mind..

I take all 3 out with twins sleeping and Peregrine walking after my school, the time I used to spend reading for exams is gone.. but I guess some ground work has been laid as I have passed all the exams so far.. We go for a walk some 2 miles in total, by which time Peregrine is ready to go inside and have dinner.. Atticus sleeps crazy 8h naps during day and freaks us all out, but as if to compensate Cordelia never sleeps for 8 hours straight..

What is the sign of spring coming here now?? the sun does warm the ground and snow during the day and it stays up for really long time already.. it is bright light outside at 6am and it gets dark after 8pm.. and this is just the beginning of it... soon the sun will be shining almost through the whole 24h. and hopefully by then the snow will have melted away.. :)

 Here we are playing in the snow with Peregrine, he likes to help with the snow.. shoveling it back onto the walkway from the sides.. but he looks so happy doing it I have no heart to tell him he is doing it all wrong..

 Our kids on the sofa.. Peregrine used to look so very small for so long it is hard to readjust to the idea he is big.. And he does sometime seem to forget it himself and play little too rough with his siblings..

This is the morning sun shining in to our kitchen at 7am..

The two little ones are here posing for the official 3 month photo shoot on our couch.. They were good sport and posed like pros or what do you think?

All and all I would like to thank everybody who have prayed or babysat or called us and told us we will make it.. we have needed all of your guys help and are very grateful for it all!

P

P.S. 2 exams before graduation!!

Twins, Two for one..??

Well, it has been VERY busy two months with the lovely twins and we have had no time to write, sleep, read or think about much else but twin related stuff.. It just keeps coming the word, twins.. meaning two individual people in a one word... So two in one.. Very few things come in one when you consider twins.. birthday (if you don't happen to give birth around midnight..) and pregnancy time one time two babies.. Birth bill from the hospital... one.. two babies.. One application for our socialistic government for two (actually three) new baby baskets... But that is coming to the end of two for one.. the rest are two for two and at the same time.. Feeding, changing, carrying.. We thought that it was difficult to eat with Peregrine in our lap... with Atticus and Cordelia in your lap... I have yet to figure out how one can eat then..
The in-laws were with us for the first few months of the twins birth they helped like a pair of oars in a row boat.. we could have not made it without their help, thanks so very much for all the great help!! The nightly waking time with the fresh babies to cleaning our home and getting the trash out.. It was so very nice of you to come by!

Here are some photos of the months past..

 Grandpop burning the midnight oil with Atticus.. How time seems to stand still in the middle of the night..

 Peregrine is taking on the role of the big brother and giving mom and dad a help with the babies.. sometimes.

 Peregrine has had his little scar on his forehead for a while now.. keeps scratching it..

 The twins have started to smile and coo and it is just amazing, makes all the tiredness fade a way in a heart beat!

They are just too cute not to take pictures of when you can!!

P

1 month olds

Life creepeth along slowly and surely here in the freezing north with very few upsets.. Although the nights and days are only separated by the amount of light, not by the amount of sleep or other activities in the house days and even weeks go ahead and happen.

 The first smiles may be accidental and brief, but they do warm the cockles of our hearts! Here Cordelia is giving an example of one of her good ones!

 It seems that Atti is the calm collected and sleepy calm, but it is only sometimes.. They seem to take turns in being awake and crying and staying calm.. makes it little difficult for us to anticipate who needs care more when.. Although they do tell us in a loud and demanding voice when they need it ;)

 They say the oldest child regresses in order to get more attention, here is a slightly set-up example of exactly that.. Peregrine in twins cot eating a tutti (pacifier).. Talking of Peregrine, he dislocated his radius bone slightly from elbow and we took a trip to ER, where one of my lecturers put it back.. it was like a miracle, one moment he was unwilling to use his right arm, the next he was showing the dr. how his helicopter lies...with sound and mighty crash landing..

From my own experience, twins are the best and worst company at times.. You are rarely alone when you grow up as a twin, but you are always compared.. I guess later in life it becomes less so.. Here they share the sleeping cot... calm as a cucumbers..

 The Cristmas tree is thrown out in Finland traditionally pretty soon after new year.. We saved ours for the christmas picture.. which we were to take as soon as everything had calmed down.. but there were the infections,-->ER, Weight gain scare-->kids ER, and general tiredness and fussing.. but here behold the 2012 (13) Christmas photo of the Mehtälä/Marshall family!

Our dear friends had a baby during the change of year also.. theirs was the first in Oulu 2013, and ours almost the last of 2012.. the babies are only few hours apart but separated by calendar year.... In Finland that does not give you tax benefits for the year, but gives us goverment child bonus already on January.. :)

Sometimes we end up with perplexed look like the one seen here when one baby is needing care.. you rush to it, then when you have managed to aid that one, the other alerts you for some urgent need.. and it is like a carousel.. then I pile them both on the rocker and rock them both the same time.. hope they calm down and sleep some time this year for more than an hour at the time.

Thank you all for your prayers and hope the year 13 has been kind to you. May God Bless you all.

P 

Atti and Cordie

So Halle and I were thinking, this year or the next... When you are given a chance to choose the year your babies are born in.. We decided that the last day of the year 2012 was as good as the first day of the year 2013. Babies are given and received not planned and ordered.

Here is Halle 6 hour before delivery..
Around noon we set out to Oulu University Hospital to get the labor going. It seems to be the current opinion in medical field that twins should be born at latest 38th week. It lowers the complication risks and allows faster growth compared to twins carried to full term. (just in case you wanted to know).
At the hospital everything went really well, The twins were born in the evening, Atticus head first, Cordelia butt end first.
After everything we got hot tea and coffee as is the custom in Oulu Hospital. The babies got little hats made for them by the local organization. Halle was wheeled to maternity ward where she met one of our good friends who happened to receive the first baby of the year 2013 in Oulu, what a treat!
Atticus has a face like peregrine, so much so, that I called him Peregrine few times, he is observant and calm, when Cordelia is active eater and fussy as a little princess.
The names come from fiction Cordelia from Shakespeare (or Buffy the vampire slayer) and Atticus from (to Kill a mocking bird). We hope Atti will have good qualities such as the fictional character.. "a defender of those who are unable to stand up for themselves" and Cordelia be as loving and understanding as Kings daughter.
Here is Halle few hours after..

It makes me tear up to think of them and little Peregrine, they are all so very precious to us, we feel abundantly blessed to have gotten such healthy good looking babies! Thank you all for your prayers and thoughts. Let us all embark on to a new year with fresh blessings and open hearts.