One of Adrian’s birthday presents was a book with experiments using everyday things. A whole section was dedicated to experiments with candy. Adrian decided to try out an experiment that involved heating marshmallows in a microwave oven and seeing them expand (because the air bubbles inside them expand) and then contract as they cool.

That was kind of cool, but Adrian pretty quickly decided to add more. First he stuck wooden toothpicks in the marshmallow to see if they affected things.

Then he added more marshmallows and more toothpicks, and constructed sculptures – that he then heated in the microwave oven to see how they were affected.

He found out that the marshmallows got soft when heated, so the sculptures tended to collapse and needed to be reinforced with yet more toothpicks.

We went to a theatre performance in the afternoon – a modern version of Hansel and Gretel at Orionteatern. (Some fun touches but too much over-dramatized acting, not my style.)

Since we were going to town anyway, we left earlier so we could fit in a visit to the Science Fiction Bookshop. It’s conveniently on the way, close to the Gamla Stan metro station. Adrian wanted to look for books about drawing science fiction monsters; Ingrid wanted more manga; I always need more fantasy and sci-fi books.

After shopping we had lunch at Vapiano. It’s my go-to place for family lunches in the old town but they don’t seem to ever change their menu so even though I eat there just a few times every year, I’m beginning to get bored with it.

Favourite position in favourite corner of the sofa, with favourite oversized sweater and favourite reading matter.

It’s nearly Halloween. Today we carved pumpkins (just look at Ingrid’s stabbing!) and bought lots of candy for the trick-or-treaters we hope will come.

Eric’s computer is occupied by Eric, so Adrian can’t program in Scratch. He found Scratch Jr on the iPad instead. It didn’t have the flexibility to make a game, but he could make objects loop around the screen – one horizontally, one vertically – and go “bing” when they hit each other. And each time they hit each other, they also grew larger, so finally they were constantly hitting each other and constantly going “bing” which Adrian found hilarious.

This is the bath shark, reminding Adrian that it’s bathing day.

Ingrid is past the stage of needing reminders and can both see when her hair needs washing, and actually do it voluntarily and without prodding. Adrian is a different story. Once he is in the shower, he doesn’t actually mind showering and often stays far longer than he needs. It’s getting him there that is hard for some reason.

Adrian is programming a game in Scratch. You control a taco with the arrow keys, trying to catch apples and avoid the dreaded loaf of bread.

Adrian is thinking ahead to Halloween. He found that cloak I made years ago and thought he might want to use it to dress up as a wizard. A wizard needs a staff, of course, but he also wanted some spells. So he is now making a ball of ice and water magic from blue fleece.

He just started doing textile crafts at school this year so he’s had some practice with basic pinning and cutting and sewing. But not machine sewing, which he wants to use to sew the pieces together, so he’s doing that under close supervision.

Helping kids with their crafts projects is a tricky balancing act. If I help and meddle and guide too much, it’s not fun. But if I meddle too little and the final result comes out way too wonky, he will be disappointed in it and won’t want to sew again. He’s not so fast at it that he could just throw the first attempt away and make a new one. So I meddle just enough to help him avoid mistakes that would be hard to recover from – and also help him understand that the smaller mistakes that he does make are not the end of the world and can be recovered from.

Adrian likes oversized, loose, soft t-shirts and sweaters. And when I say “oversized”, I do truly mean oversized. This blue thing is his latest find from Myrorna. It’s a ladies sweater in size S. The ends of the sleeves reach past his fingertips, and the sweater itself is of course both very loose and quite long.

I suggested cutting off the ends of the sleeves (and refinishing them so they would still look all neat and tidy) but he explained that too-long sleeves really was the whole point of buying an oversized sweater, and this was just the way he liked it.

He is refreshingly unconcerned about social expectations about fashion and clothing.

Adrian is doing his homework. There’s a chapter from a book to read out loud, and a handful of questions about that chapter to answer in writing.

This is not his favourite pastime. He’s already halfway somewhere else, mentally as well as bodily.