Ingrid, walking down our street. With wet asphalt and no snow, you might notice… Apart from the fact that the sun barely reaches above the houses, this doesn’t really feel like winter at all, even though we should be right in the middle of it.

A pretty sunrise, but not the most spectacular one. The bare fact that I saw a sunrise during my commute at all is noteworthy, though, because it means that soon I will have daylight on my way to work instead.

There is light on the horizon.

Found him in the quiet room at school, reading. In a pose that I guess he must have found comfortable.

A gray day.

This month’s big news is that Adrian learned to read well enough to read books for fun, on his own. We borrowed books from the library and are queueing for some more. When I picked him up at school today, I found him in the quiet room, engrossed in a book.

His favourite book above all is Harry Potter. (Not for reading on his own, but listening to me or Eric read it for him.) I’d have thought him too young for it, but he loves it.

Aside from reading, he likes colouring. But only in school – he never does it at home. But every afternoon at school, I find him colouring. Mostly Pokemon pictures. That’s what all the kids at school colour and draw: Pokemons are all the rage right now.

At home he’s more likely to do some fiddly project. Beading (Pokemon figures), or Qixels for example. He bought a Qixels kit for his own pocket money. He also likes sewing; we just started sewing a Pikachu plushie together.

If he isn’t doing something Pokemon-related, he’s playing with Skylanders – both the video game and simply playing with the figures.

Mostly the Skylanders figures fight each other. So do Pokemons, and so do the Qixels figures, and his favourite books and movies are all full of fighting as well.

Legos appear to have lost at least some of their charm.

At her last checkup, Ingrid found out that she has a cavity again. She’s taking tooth-brushing extra seriously now.

Going home after school.

Ingrid has suddenly started reading more actual books, not just Kalle Anka pocket. We went to a bookstore and bought a bunch of books together during Christmas break, and now she’s reading them and almost every one is “best book ever!”. The books she chose were all fantasy and (mild) horror stories. Current favourites: Rum 213 by Ingelin Angerborn, Stjärnstenen by Jo Salmson.

Normally I read for her at bedtime. Today for the first time ever Ingrid got so deep into a book in the evening that we missed our story time. She just couldn’t put the book down.

Otherwise it’s the usual digital entertainments: games, YouTube, etc. Current favourite game: The Sims 4.

She worries. She is more and more aware that she is growing up, and isn’t quite happy about it. She tells me she’d rather stay a child and relive her childhood years. She worries about ageing and dying, and about having to decide on a career, and having to choose a university, and getting into university, and having to move away from home. She sees adulthood at the horizon and is anxious about her ability to manage it. I guess it all looks like a burden from where she’s standing.

She is really sensitive to negative events and others’ negative opinions. They drag her down, and she has a hard time getting past them. A disappointment in the morning can set the tone and ruin a whole day. Even when it’s Adrian saying something slightly negative, she’s hurt – and he’s just a six-year-old. When he hugs her good-bye, for example, he finishes by pushing her off and saying “go now!” – and she takes that as rejection.

I guess she is unsure of her place in the world, and of her value. She doesn’t show it much of the time but that low self-esteem seems to be there under the surface.

We went skating.

Poring over a Qixels pattern. Is that a light blue or a medium blue?