Finally Here!

We left Eufaula for Finland on Wednesday, May 27, around 7 a.m. checked in at Atlanta airport and left there around 12:30 and arrived in NYC about 3 p.m. After a last dinner at McDonald's we took off at 5 p.m. and arrived in Helsinki at 8:30 a.m. local time which was 12:30 a.m. Eufaula time so that part of the flight was 7 1\2 hours. The Finnair jet was new--the back of each headrest had a TV screen which showed a big selection of movies and a variety of TV shows and had a game controller for different games.

After a 4 hour layover in Helsinki, we took a short flight across Finland to the west side of the country to a town called Jakobstäd where my cousin lives. He has 3 boys around my boys' age so they have been playing since we arrived.

Ivar, the oldest boy, took Davis for a ride in his own boat. They both enjoyed that. William, the middle, had soccer practice in the afternoon so the kids went to that and got to kick the ball around some. I went with my cousin's wife, Britt, to the grocery store which turned out to be a Finnish version of Wal-Mart! They have all the current brands and a wide variety as well. This is a big change over the last time I was here--30 years ago!

After a delicious dinner of grilled chicken, Uncle Ben's Wild rice, and salad (sounds like home) we decided to go to bed at 8:30 because now we have been up for about 30 hours since no one slept on the plane. The only problem was with the sun. At 8:30 last night, it looked like 4 p.m. in Eufaula. Thankfully, we were so tired going to sleep was no problem. But at 4 a.m. trying to go back to sleep was since it looked like 9 a.m. So today, Davis, Austin, and I have been up since 4 a.m. Tonight we will try to find something to cover the windows!