We’ve been on a furniture buying splurge: some storage for the living room, to replace the messy-looking bookshelf; an armchair; doors for the cabinets in the office.

The cardboard boxes that the furniture was delivered in were quickly turned into play houses/caves, furnished with cushions. There have even been fights about who gets to be in which box.

This is Smurfan, one of Ingrid’s favourite ponies at the riding school. She is small, which Ingrid likes, and relatively energetic: it’s easy to get her to trot, unlike some of the other ponies.

I got up before dawn to catch an early flight to Malmö. The sun was setting again when I flew back home.

Adrian demonstrated how he can stand. “Like this! And like a triangle! And like an X!”

Monday was a nice spring day again so I spent some time in the garden. Planted some daffodils in flowerpots, put up the laundry airer, that kind of thing. When I was throwing out some of last autumn’s dead plants, I discovered a large tunnel in the corner of our compost hole: the opening was as large as both my hands together, and it went all the way to the bottom, so maybe a metre or so.

I am not even sure if I want to find out what is at the bottom. A huge rats’ nest, probably. I wish I could pour some poison in it but rat poison is no longer sold to consumers so that’s not happening, then.

My the next step was to unlock and crawl into the crawlspace underneath the house and inspect the mousetrap I put there last autumn. It didn’t catch anything then, so I had completely forgotten about it. It had caught a mouse during winter, so I rearmed and re-baited it. Hopefully it will also catch the inhabitants of that tunnel. If not, I think it will soon be time to call in professionals.

Yesterday I went looking for flowers in the garden and there were none. I couldn’t even see any crocus buds. And this morning there were three blossoms already fully open.

The first leaves are budding.

I didn’t post one during the month, because I didn’t get a good one, and was holding out for something better. But something is better than nothing. Here I am, sitting on the bathroom floor, toothbrush in hand, ready to brush Adrian’s teeth.

Nail polish. Plus a temporary tattoo, a too-small T-shirt, and a Bamse.

And daylight! There is still enough daylight for photography when we get home, even at some distance from the windows.

Spring is here. The ground is neither icy nor soggy any more, and the evenings are light. For the first time this year, today’s riding lesson took place outside, in the woods. The riding school is situated right at the edge of a nature reserve so we all had a nice walk in the woods. Ingrid was tired already when I picked her up at school, so an undemanding walk was just the right thing for today.