First snow, silence and candle-light

A thin white layer of snow covered the earth when I and JD arrived in Kemiö on Saturday after the Independence day. Only rabbit and dear spoor were visible, no neighbours at all. The sea was not yet frozen, and a lonely swan was swimming in the cold water. It was -3 C. 

The silence and the total darkness that landed after four p.m. made us lock the doors, put the sauna on, and light the candles. 

I was sitting in a rocking chair and knitting socks like a real old-time grand ma. JD was busy with some new sound devices to enable wireless music, or actually fine tune the settings.

These 'junasukka'
socks go to Santa.

We had bought some minced lamb meet in Helsinki (as you may not find it in the local food store) and ingredients for Bobotie, a traditional South African dish, for the first time. I couldn't find peach chutney or apricot jam for the recipe, but small dried apricot and mango pieces worked quite well. 

This tasty slow food is great at winter time. After the sauna, it tasted so good with a full-bodied Rioja (did not have South African wine). Despite many spices, it was not hot at all, and we'll cook this next summer for the kids.

We were memorizing Nelson Mandela and our visit to Robben island five years ago.  It turned out to be a melancholic but beautiful and relaxing evening.

Bobotie is great winter food 

Covered with moss

It feels strange to return blogging after a full year of busyness at work and laziness at leisure time which prevented me from blogging. 

I have dozens of pictures and memories of time spent on the island last summer, but now it’s too late to go into details. The most joyful thing was the new baby girl, Vappu, who spent her first summer in Kemiö this year. Vappu is JD’s fourth grandchild, and I could practice being grandma.

In the autumn we have spent a couple of weekends in Kemiö. We spent one day, November 16^th, checking that everything was OK after the storms. It was full moon, clear sky and unusually warm, +9 deg. C.

The only flowers left were Japanese lanterns and some sage and mint leaves. But because of the warm and wet autumn, bright green moss had covered all the stones. That was beautiful. A woodpecker was knocking hard to find some worms in a tall pine behind the house. The compost had cooled off. The sea was calm and there were still boats, most of them fishermen.

The sun set at 4 pm! We left right after that, before it became pitch-dark. Next time we come back, it is most likely winter.