My First White Christmas Story Part 1

Yellow, everybody! I'm bacccckkkk...how was your Christmas? Mine was FABULOUS except for one little fact: RASHES attacked me, but I'm getting too far ahead of the story he he he...let me start from the beginning.

Sunday, Dec 23rd, 2007

We went to Elvi's house. Elvi is my mother-in-law's eldest sister. She had her 76th b-day on Saturday, but hubby was too tired to visit her then. We bought a pot of flowers for her and we also brought her Christmas gift. I gave her a nice brooch and two identical mugs with the pic of Santa on them (cartoonish pic). She greeted as as usual, very cheerfully and gave us hugs. She gave more hugs and a kiss on my cheek after she opened her gifts. Yeah, she opened her Christmas gift right then and there as well. I noticed so many different pots of flowers in her house already. There must've been other people giving her flowers, as well ha ha ha ha...Gladly we didn't give the exact kind of flower like the rest we found there.

As usual she served us coffee and some buns. Before we went home, I asked hubby to take a pic of me and her and here it is:



Yep, she grabbed me like that right away. She's very sanguine and not a typical Finn, I guess. She talks a lot animatedly and she's always so bubbly. She also gives LOTS of hugs to everybody he he he he he he...

After that we stopped by at her son's house (Pirita's Dad, Arttu's closest friend who sometimes has game nights with him) to fix something in his computer. There he showed us his Christmas tree. He just got the tree the other day since his brother told him to come over to get it from his land.



Monday: Dec 24th, 2007

In the morning Arttu and I went to two different cemeteries. Lots of people go to these cemeteries to light candles in front of their loved ones' graves. Let me show you some pics.

The first cemetery we went to was the place where my mother-in-law's parents' graves were located.



This is another view of the cemetery: as you can see they even put and decorate a Christmas tree there! Nice! ;-D




Then we went to a second cemetery (the one I've been to last summer, though I couldn't find their graves). These are the graves of my father-in-law's parents. Somebody's put some roses there, though I don't know who did it.




I couldn't resist taking this pic since there were SO MANY candles there!!!!!!!!!



After we visited the cemeteries, we went straight to my in-laws and right away we started working he he he he he...Arttu had to take out all the carpets and dust them whereas I cleaned up the floors with a vacuum cleaner and then I mopped them. Then we put the carpets back inside and then my mother-in-law asked Arttu to change the curtains and I helped her change the table cloth to make it more "festive", I guess. Then we had lunch afterward since we were sweating already and we got hungry after doing the work he he he he...We had boiled potatoes and moose and salad. ;-D

Not long after that, Arttu's second brother and girlfriend dropped by and had some lunch, too. They didn't stay until evening, though, since I guess they were celebrating Christmas Eve with the girlfriend's family. He gave us a bag of presents (from him and girlfriend and the other one was from Arttu's eldest brother and family). Gee...we didn't even get Arttu's eldest brother and family anything but a postcard. Oops!!! Better do it next year, then. I suppose it's too late this year anyway he he he...We gave Arttu's second brother his gift then, but he didn't open it right away.

My problem started right after sauna. During HOT HOT HOT sauna, I got thirsty and I drank cider. This time the cider had 4.7% alcohol in it and I gulped it until more than half of the can, but I felt fine. I wasn't drunk at all. No headache whatsoever. BUTTTTT I started having rashes along the underside of my arms and they started being itchy. I tried not to scratch them, but I only rubbed them to get rid of the itch. Anyway, my mother-in-law played cards with us for a while. In the first game, Arttu won by 1 point from me. ARRRGGHHH!!!! In the second game, I lost since I got pretty lousy cards again and again he he he...

After that, we started serving dinner. The traditional X-mas dinner here is joulukinkku (pork ham leg). Here's a pic I took when Arttu was slicing it and taking away the fat:



It was such a HUGE pork ham leg!!!! ;-D



Then we ate it with boiled potatoes, salad, beet, and everything else. Mother-in-law took out a bottle of red wine so that we could toast using it. I only took two sips of it, but I guess it made my condition worse during the night. My rashes started spreading to the back of my legs and butt and eventually even spread to my back and the front of my legs. YARGH!!! Anyway, here're pics of the festive dinner table he he he...





After dinner, we cleared up the table and then took out our presents to open in front of one another. Arttu gave me a new mobile phone and a very warm and soft blanket (I LOVE the colours of the blanket!). My in-laws gave us a big candle, a cooking pan, and some chocolate. We got them a pair of warm long johns (top and bottom), a smoke detector, a kitchen tool, and the photo album I made for them. At first my mother-in-law thought that the photo album was just a blank photo album, but when she looked at the first page, she realized it wasn't a blank photo album HA HA HA HA...

Funny thing was that she didn't recognize the first flower I put there. I took a close-up pic of the flower, so to her it looked different. Finally after a while she did remember it, though. She had fun looking at the pics and trying to remember the occasion hi hi hi hi hi hi hi...Then she showed the album to my father-in-law. ;-D

We got some nice glasses and also some candles from Arttu's brothers. Arttu opened his gift from me and realized that it wasn't what he thought it was. YAAAAAAAAAAAAYYY!!! I gave him a pair of new jeans and he thought that the gift was a shirt HUA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA...I WIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNN!!!! I asked him to try them on since I was apprehensive that they wouldn't fit, but they did fit perfectly. YEEEESSS!!!! ;-D

After that we finally went to sleep, but I couldn't really sleep since my rashes started getting SO itchy. I brought some salve there, but it didn't really help. I went back and forth to the toilet to rub more salve, but the itch was there. Finally I was at my wit's end, so I decided to try rubbing some olive oil to the rashes and it worked...if only for 15 minutes at a time. The olive oil soothed my rashes for 15 minutes, then I had to go rub it all over again. But after rubbing it for three or four times, I could finally drift off to sleep. Arttu had a restless sleep, as well, since I kept on waking up. It was a VERY rough night for me and we finally woke up at around 10.30 am or 11 am. Yet still I was SO tired then due to my rashes.

I NEVER had any allergy toward anything before in my life and that was HORRIBLE! I can't imagine how people who suffer from allergy to many things live. I almost wanted to rip my skin off due to the itch. Plus the red patches also felt SO HOT that during the night, I had to move my blanket away from me. Only then I realized the suffering of those people who've experienced the same thing. Nothing beats experience indeed!!!!

OK, let me just post this and I'll continue the story later. I have to write down all the important details in my old mobile before I put the SIM card to my new mobile he he he...

Additional note: Don't worry. My rashes are getting MUCH better now and I hope they're gone tomorrow. But if they don't, then I'll go to the doctor tomorrow. Here in Finland the official Christmas holiday is until today, so nothing is open out there until tomorrow he he he he he...

After I got back home, I did some research on allergy and found out that Asians have a genetic disorder that makes their bodies unable to break down ingested alcohol completely. Ahhhh...no wonder...and some sites say that sometimes it's not because of allergy to alcohol itself, but to some ingredients in alcoholic drinks. I must say that from now on I dare not drink any more alcoholic drinks. Too scary! My body skin yesterday looked SO scary, you know??? But what really bothered me was the itch and the hot feeling all over the rashes. YIKES!!!

OK, I'd better stop now he he he he...

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