More Shopping Adventures

Hi all.

Maddy and I went back to the mall today to buy a few groceries. It's not that I really needed them, but it's a nice excuse for an excursion to get out of the house. I had 43 euros in my pocket and a shopping wish list of items.

The nice thing about Finland (and possibly Europe in general, although I'd have to verify) is that the price you see on the items includes tax. No guessing about what your bill will be at the end. That is nice when you have a set budget and you're not amazing at math. I pride myself on the fact that my bill came to 42,50 euros and I have 0,50 euros left for Maddy to get a mini ice cream cone from the store. (still dealing with 100% cash until my bank card comes in the mail...).

New jaw-dropping finds today:
- finally found pancake mix - it wasn't even the nice mix, and it cost 8,70 euros. That's about $15!!!
- also found the cheap pancake syrup - again, not Aunt Jemima or Old Tyme, it was some cheap looking syrup for 8,50 euros, again almost $15!

I haven't had any luck finding good-tasting chocolate chip cookies, so I decided that I was going to bake cookies for Andrew today. The only ingredient missing was chocolate chips. Well, guess what? Finland doesn't have chocolate chips. You have to buy a large chunk of chocolate and then flake off pieces of chocolate to put in your dough!!! Hmm, here's hoping he appreciates them. That is, if I decide I'm still going to make them.

Another Finnish fact - they use the 24 hour system. If you buy an alarm clock, a coffee maker, an oven, a watch, a cell phone, etc. in Finland, they go by army time - 16:00 hours, no 4:00pm. All hours on the outside of stores are all in army time. It makes sense, I guess, but sometimes I need to stop and really think about what time it is.

We've had a few nice sunny days outside, hitting around 10 or 11 degrees. Maddy enjoys being outside so we've done that quite a bit. Again, a nice excuse to get out of the house.

7 more days until my parents come!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!