Making jams and going on swimming adventures
At the cottage I read an article on Tieteen kuvalehti (a Finnish science magazine) about how semen acts as an antidepressant in women. I finally remembered to search the net and it seems to be based on legitimate scientific research. I wonder, if I could find that original article at the Uni library... Nope, they don't have access to that journal. Well, if semen does in fact affect women's mood like this, it makes perfect sense from an evolutionary point of view.I made cherry marmelade and redcurrant-blackcurrant (punaviinimarja-mustaviinimarja) juice, and I put them in the food pantry in the cellar feeling like I was Moominmamma (Muumimamma). Not counting the time that it took to pick the berries, it took about 3-4 hours, so I can see why people don't often do this now days. The marmelade has an interesting flavor, which is at time sweet and at other times sour. The juice on the other hand reminds me of my grandma. They had a big garden and the cold cellar of their rintamamiestalo (iconic type of house type built after the WWII) was usually full of juices and jams and so forth that grandma had made. There were always some home made jams to be eaten with crepes (lettu). I remember one jam which was made from carrots and something else, I can't remember what it was, but it was good.
I kinda want to make some more jams. There are still some strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, gooseberries (karviainen) and northern bilberries (joulukka). There are also some rowan trees on our backyard and I've kinda always wanted to test making something out of them. The lingonberries (puolukka) aren't ripe yet and I don't much care for them so I don't usually pick them even though we have some on our lot. My tomatoes are coming along. I was starting to loose hope as this Summer has been more like a normal Finnish Summer and not like the couple last Summer's which have been very hot and dry. At least I haven't had to water the plants this Summer. My cucumbers died because the kitten damaged the sprouts before I planted them outside. The zuccini doesn't get enough light in it's current spot and hasn't grown much. My herb garden is doing nicely and my lavenders are finally blooming. ^^
I don't know, if I've written about the food pantry (ruokakomero) that I started on our cellar. We have this room, which stays cool, where we have wines (that sounds way more posh than it actually is). Mainly it's been used as storage until now. I organized it and made some room for a food pantry, and I've slowly been adding things to it every time that I've done some grocery shopping. So if zombie apocalypse hits we're living off canned and dried food and old home made wines, most of which have probably turned into vinegar already (I don't think that you can drink winegar). Well, I'd probably taste so bad after drinking nothing except winegar, that the zombies would leave me alone. Sounds like a plan. :p Anyway, I've wanted to have a walk-in food pantry for a long time now and for some reason, which still eludes me, it's deeply satisfying to put food into the pantry.Last week I went on a small adventure with MM. I wanted to see this lake where I remember skiing at with my family when dad was still alive. I remembered that there was a round lake, with a round island in the middle and on that island there was a circle of big stones. So armed with a map, some food and swimsuits in our backpacks me and MM went to scope it out. There's no road leading there so we had to take a foot path leading through the forest. I'm usually leery of doing that in forests that I'm not familiar with. It had been so long ago when I was there last that I couldn't remember the route. Well, we managed to find the lake, and even a spot where we could wade into the water. There were a lot of twigs on the bottom of the lake. The island was a short distance away, but we had to swim around it a bit to find a place where we could get out of the water easily. I'm used to walking barefooted so I didn't have shoes on when we walked through the small island looking for the circle of stones (MM swam with her sandals on :p). We didn't find a stone circle but we found a circle of big fir trees. Someone had planted them on a desert island for some unknown reason. The circle was so tight that it was difficult to get inside it, especially while wearing a swimsuit (fir needles outchie). Inside the fir tree circle there was a smaller circle of some bushes, they might've at some point been maybe blackcurrants, I dunno. It was an interesting place none the less. You can't see the circle to the outside as it's surrounded by forest. After that we swam back to mainland, ate the rest of our food and headed home to take a shower as the water was kinda slimy.
Later on I asked mom, if she remembered that skiing trip and it turns out that I remembered wrong about that stone circle. Somehow that fir tree circle had turned into a stone circle. I don't know which would've been cooler.
There are 2-3 dozen of lakes and ponds in Espoo alone and I've swam in maybe 9 of them. Many of them are very small.I also wanted to recommend this interesting documentary that I saw on telly last weekend called The four horsemen (Talouden madonluvut). It's about the economy and economics, politics and democracy and so forth. Check it out.
I kinda want to make some more jams. There are still some strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, gooseberries (karviainen) and northern bilberries (joulukka). There are also some rowan trees on our backyard and I've kinda always wanted to test making something out of them. The lingonberries (puolukka) aren't ripe yet and I don't much care for them so I don't usually pick them even though we have some on our lot. My tomatoes are coming along. I was starting to loose hope as this Summer has been more like a normal Finnish Summer and not like the couple last Summer's which have been very hot and dry. At least I haven't had to water the plants this Summer. My cucumbers died because the kitten damaged the sprouts before I planted them outside. The zuccini doesn't get enough light in it's current spot and hasn't grown much. My herb garden is doing nicely and my lavenders are finally blooming. ^^
I don't know, if I've written about the food pantry (ruokakomero) that I started on our cellar. We have this room, which stays cool, where we have wines (that sounds way more posh than it actually is). Mainly it's been used as storage until now. I organized it and made some room for a food pantry, and I've slowly been adding things to it every time that I've done some grocery shopping. So if zombie apocalypse hits we're living off canned and dried food and old home made wines, most of which have probably turned into vinegar already (I don't think that you can drink winegar). Well, I'd probably taste so bad after drinking nothing except winegar, that the zombies would leave me alone. Sounds like a plan. :p Anyway, I've wanted to have a walk-in food pantry for a long time now and for some reason, which still eludes me, it's deeply satisfying to put food into the pantry.Last week I went on a small adventure with MM. I wanted to see this lake where I remember skiing at with my family when dad was still alive. I remembered that there was a round lake, with a round island in the middle and on that island there was a circle of big stones. So armed with a map, some food and swimsuits in our backpacks me and MM went to scope it out. There's no road leading there so we had to take a foot path leading through the forest. I'm usually leery of doing that in forests that I'm not familiar with. It had been so long ago when I was there last that I couldn't remember the route. Well, we managed to find the lake, and even a spot where we could wade into the water. There were a lot of twigs on the bottom of the lake. The island was a short distance away, but we had to swim around it a bit to find a place where we could get out of the water easily. I'm used to walking barefooted so I didn't have shoes on when we walked through the small island looking for the circle of stones (MM swam with her sandals on :p). We didn't find a stone circle but we found a circle of big fir trees. Someone had planted them on a desert island for some unknown reason. The circle was so tight that it was difficult to get inside it, especially while wearing a swimsuit (fir needles outchie). Inside the fir tree circle there was a smaller circle of some bushes, they might've at some point been maybe blackcurrants, I dunno. It was an interesting place none the less. You can't see the circle to the outside as it's surrounded by forest. After that we swam back to mainland, ate the rest of our food and headed home to take a shower as the water was kinda slimy.
Later on I asked mom, if she remembered that skiing trip and it turns out that I remembered wrong about that stone circle. Somehow that fir tree circle had turned into a stone circle. I don't know which would've been cooler.
There are 2-3 dozen of lakes and ponds in Espoo alone and I've swam in maybe 9 of them. Many of them are very small.I also wanted to recommend this interesting documentary that I saw on telly last weekend called The four horsemen (Talouden madonluvut). It's about the economy and economics, politics and democracy and so forth. Check it out.