"What the Helsinki ?!"
So, for our 2nd long weekend we headed up north to the land of the Fins. Let me tell you that Finland was unreal. The second we crossed the border from Russia to Finland I could all of a sudden feel my life getting one million times better. Everything is clean and beautiful and all the people are wonderful AND THEY ALL SPEAK ENGLISH. We hitched a ride to Finland with a couple from our ward, Brian and Christine. From the previous experieces with brian, we already knew he could talk you to death, but we knew nothing of his wife. Basically she turned out to be the craziest/funniest person on this earth and I'm glad we invited ourselves in their car because now we have our adoptive mother who buys us too much finnish candy and just about anything else we want. I'm so glad we are not fat Americans. On the way to Helsinki we stopped in a small town named...well I forgot the name...something like rampinlaantii or tarinlaaanitteee. We stepped out of the car and made eye contact with the H & M and the rest is history.
The soul purpose of going to Finland was to attend the Helsinki temple dedication...And we did. They had a fireside slash "cultural event" on saturday full of crazy european dancers doing their thang. I had a slight distraction whilst at this "cultural event" so I probably coudln't focus on what the crap these dancers where trying to show but that is not their faults. SO much anxiety slash apostisizing. I heart life. SO after that little event we went down to the beautiful city center in Helsinki and checked out all the awesomeness that is Helsinki. It was amazing...we didn't feel like our lives were in jepardy even once...and it was like 11:00 pm. No strange plastered men even approached us at all. Like we didn't even SEE one. Heaven in real and it is in Finland.
The next day we got up so incredibly early and went to the temple. We got to see the prophet cement the corner stone in and it was way cool. We then got to go inside and see the temple get dedicated...in russian. Mission accomplished (No pun intended). I have to say that it was a very successful weekend. Not only did we get to experience like 309.78 awesome things, but we got to hang out in a place that is dangerously similar to America. They even have Dr. Pepper and I think I overdosed. So anyways, we loved Finland and we can't wait to go back for our long vacation in a week!!!!!!!!

KIZHI/ PETROSOVODSK AWESOMENESS!
Hello to all! I don't have much time for this but I just have to say that I have been to the coolest place ever. Last thursday night, kristin, amanda, cavan, A.j. and I took off on our beloved sleeping train 8 hours north of st. pete to a town called Petrozovodsk. The town itself wasn't anything special but we decided to take a little trip to the island right off petro called kizhi. This tiny island is known for it's 16th century church made of wood. it's doesn't sound that special but it was. The island was so quiet and nice and beautiful. it was what I like to call "a feast for the senses" -Rita Francos Aunt (4th grade). So it was a whole lotta fun! After the long weekend we felt like we hadn't taught forever and it was fun to see the kids again! I might have gone on a shopping spree and that is was the following pics are. MOM: This is the pic of the "father frost" I got you! and I aslo have a pic of my collection of matroyska dolls and so on and so forth! Also last week I had a sleep over with one of the girls in my group and i was only slightly tramatized. Russians are intresting people but I really like it! Thanks randi/ lev. Also we fed the missionaries last sunday and it was a party!

"AMBER IS THE COLOR OF YOUR ENERGY"
Russia does in fact have one beautiful town : PUSHKIN!
So Pushkin is a smaller town about and hour outside of St. peter. It's most famous for it's palaces! With Svieta as our tour guide we set out to find all the awesomeness that pushkind had to offer. One of the most famous palaces in russia is Catherines palace ( I think that's what it is called). If that name doesn't ring a bell then maybe THE AMBER ROOM does. I didn't know what it was either so don't feel bad.

Mostly it this room made completely of amber. It's really cool but I was more impressed with the other rooms in the palace. Originally This palace was almost completely ruined in WW 2 but has been "restored", along with just about everything else in Russia...we decided. After that we went to another palace of a Russian Czar ( I foget his name...maybe nicolas...anastcia's dad whoever that is). It had so many original artifacts that the lady in our tour group almost had 5 heart attacks. Randy even spotted an origonal telephone from the times of the revolution. AMAZING. So to sum up Pushkin, it rocked and i wish it wasn't so far away because as you can see from the pics it's very beautiful. Along with pics of Pushkin I'm including other glamorous shots of my city...even though they aren't exactly everywhere..they do exist I guess.