Nyt - right now - it is 100 days until Finland's Centenary Year kicks off. I've just found that out on the Suomi 100 website, and I recommend that you bookmark it and visit there to keep in touch with what's being planned for the nation's celebrations.
But we in Manchester have even more to celebrate, because next year marks a full forty - 40 - years since our suomikoulu was established in the city, the oldest in the North West and one of the oldest in the UK. One or two of our founders are still here, actively involved in the life of our school.
So we have a lot to think about!
We're definitely going to have a bit of an event later in the year, hopefully staging some special happenings. Here are a couple of them, fun competitions for you to sink your artistic teeth into, which you may already know about if you've visited the school recently, or read about on our Facebook page.
First - how about designing an anniversary celebration mug?! We need your ideas right now, really, because we're going to use the winning design and get the mug produced and it'll be available next year. More details, about both these competitions, including a template for the mug if you need it, from our Facebook page.
Secondly, an art competition, with two categories. For adults the theme is 'My Finland', for children 'My best holiday memory from Finland'. The art form could be virtually anything - though personally I'm walking out if anyone tries to foist a Damien Hirst type thing on us - from drawings and paintings and sculpture and photography and craft work, right through to poetry or even song. There are prizes! :)
Hopefully there are many Suomi-philes (is that a word?) and actual Finns who may well have just returned from a lovely summer trip to Finland, with fond firm memories and freshly inspired with images and ideas, who are ready to feed them into wonderful art pieces to show us all. We have a few entries in already, and there's one very keen young student who's not only shown a lot of enterprise but has even volunteered to help with the judging. She assures us she'll be totally fair!