My Christmas in Rovaniemi

I have been busy growing up since my last web page. Daddy says I'm old enough to write my own commentary now, so here I go.

We flew to Rovaniemi, and I immediately got to know my new friends, Tatu and Heidi. I knew them before of course, but I was too young to remember. They are some kind of cousins of mine, but it's hard to know exactly what kind. All the same, they are very friendly, and I let them sit on the sofa with me.

But the best thing is that they have a super pram I can fill with dolls and push around the house. I was wondering how many times I could push it around the living room before crashing into the sofa. The answer turned out to be about three.

One day we made a gingerbread house, and lots of gingerbread biscuits. You can see here that Tatu was having all the fun with the decorating squeezy thing.

So what is a girl to do? That big biscuit on my right was just asking to be eaten.

Pretty soon I was in the mood, and dressed for some really creative cooking. Now, what needs whisking?

But Christmas was coming, and I couldn't afford to spend my whole time cooking. I needed to practice singing my song so I could sing to Father Christmas. I thought I would sing "Tuiki tuiki tähtönen". Daddy says it's called "Twinkle twinkle little star" in English, but I only know it in Finnish.

I was jolly excited to go to Father Christmas's office. It wasn't far to go from where my cousins live. And Father Christmas was right there inside the building you can see behind me. He asked me what I wanted for Christmas, but I was too shy to say anything. But this is me sitting outside the office. It was darn cold that day, minus thirty they say, but I found my best outdoor clothes and a big blanket, so I was nice and warm.

And then suddenly Christmas Eve arrived. I got started early in the morning doing my hair. I also helped Aunt Terttu a little with her hair rollers, because she's no expert.

The next thing to do was to get the tree decorated. Harri was trying hard to help me, but really he was just disturbing the tree and making the needles fall.

Mummy and Daddy advised me that I should change into some extra-nice clothes, so I chose a red outfit with sparkly decoration. Tatu and Heidi and I put our Christmas hats on, and I allowed them to play with me for a while.

So you can get an idea of how well I decorated the tree, here I am standing by my creation. As you can see, I wasn't quite ready when Daddy took this photo. Silly Daddy.

When it was time for lunch, of course I insisted I sit at the head of the table. In this picture, Mummy is passing the vegetables, and Marjaana is fetching me my milk. They'll make fine waitresses when they grow up.

Everyone knows that Father Christmas comes to visit after lunch. But what time will he come? We watched out of the window, and the wait seemed to go on forever.

But then he arrived! And isn't that a huge sack of presents in his hand?

Father Christmas sat down with his wife, and he even shook my hand. What a gentleman. But I wished he'd hurry up and hand over the presents.

Soon enough, the presents were distributed. And I got a BIG PILE! Daddy helped me open them. I was hoping for a pink Rolls Royce, but instead I got lots of clothes and toys. And then I opened all of Daddy's ones too. I think he'd had too much wine to do it by himself.

What an exciting day that was. But so quickly it's time for bed. I thought I would wish everyone a merry Christmas, and hug them goodnight.

Once I'd gone to bed I fell asleep right away. Well who wouldn't when Maisa and Little Ted are there to help you?

After Christmas we had a couple more days in Rovaniemi. Just enough time for some artistry. Marjaana's pencils were blunt, so we needed to sharpen them up. It's easy once you get the hang of it.

Then to make a nice drawing. But my pencil seemed a bit difficult to handle. Next time I'll try a different colour. The yellow ones seem better.

For some reason, Marjaana gave me her makeup brush. I stuck it in my ear, obviously. But Marjaana didn't seem to think that was the right thing to do. Adults just have no idea.

Mummy and Daddy wanted to stay longer, but our visit was over and we had to go back to Helsinki. It was still pretty chilly outside, so warmest winter clothes for the trip to the airport were a must.

My cousins live in a lovely house, I hope I can visit again soon.