If money is an issue, you’ve picked the most expensive places in Europe…… I would add the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) to your tour as it will fit in well with the rest of your locales, they’re relatively cheap and the capital cities are great visits.

I would do this trip between May and September, if possible. Your countries are far north; it gets very cold and there are few hours of daylight in winter (but, duh, I suppose you know that). Do you need a visa to visit Russia? If so, you probably need to have your letter of invitation in hand at least 2 months before your departure date (perhaps longer for the special “home stay” visa) so you can get your visa without paying the outrageous fast service fees. Thus, you probably need to have your money in hand (or know where it’s coming from), your basic itinerary laid out, and know the exact dates and the exact addresses of the places you’ll stay in Russia roughly 3 months before you leave.

We flew to Helsinki and took the train to St. Petersburg, then express train to Moscow, overnight train to Tallinn and ferry back to Helsinki. I recommend train from Helsinki if that works for your Russia visit. You could buy that ticket a few days in advance at the station in Helsinki — if 2nd class is full, 1st class will probably be nearly empty and will be roughly the same price as buying a 2nd class ticket before you get to Europe. For trains within Russia I would buy the tickets in advance even though it will be much more expensive as sometimes trains sell out. There aren’t really any options to cover the long distances if every train for a week is sold out — although it would certainly be easier for someone who’s fluent in Russian. See if your family can get tickets for you in advance.

I am actually a Russian citizen and still fluent in Russian! I am staying there with my grandparents in St. Petersburg, so none of that is an issue. But thank you so much for your advice, I never realized it’s such a hassle to get into Russia if you are not a citizen…

Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are actually countries I know very little about, but that’s all more reason to visit… Why are the northern countries so much more expensive?

I think mostly it’s the taxes that make Europe in general and Scandinavia in particular extremely expensive. Moscow was the most expensive city on the planet until the Ruble started to fall during the last few months.