Adrian pooped twice during the night and was awake for an hour afterwards both times. This becoming a bad habit – he’s had dirty nappies three nights in a row now, and each time it takes an hour for him to fall asleep again.

I had the alarm set for 8 to make sure we can get to the bi-weekly Estonian playgroup by 10. Ingrid was most cooperative all morning so we made it to the train station with time to spare. Playgroup went well; Ingrid is fond of the mums who lead the various activities and happily climbs into their lap when I’m busy nursing Adrian etc. Spare mums, so to say.

The streets in Gamla Stan (Old Town) were perilously slippery. The street leading up to the Estonian School, which is where the playgroup takes place, was the worst one: 10 metres of very steep slope, all covered with ice, and now with melt water running all over it. When I’d gotten most of the way down with the pushchair, at one point I felt that I’d either have to stay there, or slide down on my bottom. No matter where I tried to put my foot for the next step, I couldn’t get a grip. Luckily a couple of tourists were passing at the bottom of the slope, so I could lean forward and hand over the puschair to them. Then toddle up the hill again and help Ingrid get down. (Much easier without a pushchair.) Ingrid fell at least 4 times on the way to the tube station and was all wet by the time we got home.

The process of cooking dinner is becoming farcical. Peel two sweet potatoes. Pick up the toys that Adrian has swept to the floor from the table in front of him. Peel another sweet potato. Nurse, while reading a book for Ingrid. Chop the potatoes. Change nappy. And so on. I used to count with about 45 minutes for a normal dinner, from beginning to end. Now it’s about an hour and a half.

In the evening, Ingrid painted my face. They do face painting at preschool occasionally, and she loves it, so I bought a kit for us to use at home. She likes both to be the painter and to be painted. Today she made me a pumpkin, based on one of the ideas in the brochure that came with the kit. Her version looked way scarier.