The garden

As promised, I wanted to show off the facility's lovely garden in a separate post. It was fairly large in size, with lots of different things for kids to do - which is great when the kids can potentially spend many hours outside each day.

While it was big and included some slightly hidden areas where you might not be able to see the kids without actually walking closer, the whole garden was securely fenced to stop anyone from wandering away.

The environment had interesting variation, from trees to a little hill, rocks, sand boxes, tables and hidden paths. Plenty of nature, plants, trees, birds and bugs to observe. Sadly this is not always the case in Finnish nursery gardens, which can be largely just sand or even gravel, with only a few playground equipment to keep the kids interested.

Of course, I can't say how nice it would be in winter, but at least in the springtime, it was lovely, and you could see most of the kids really enjoyed their time outside and were eager to get their coats and shoes on and go.

Many kids were happy to continue their cooking games even outside - one of the little ones had a very funny game (in her mind at least) where she'd proceed to give me some sand, cake or soup, and as soon as I pretended to eat it, she'd yell "YUCKY" to signal I was meant to stick my tongue out and make a face.

Oh, and the little cars were practically always in use. Mostly by the boys, but the girls would occasionally try them out as well.