What would Easter be without painted Easter eggs? Nothing, that’s what!

Ingrid had a theme in mind for her eggs, and I also found inspiration, so we got to work.

Adrian quickly finished his first egg but then struggled to find ideas for the next one. Instead he painted the newspaper protecting the kitchen table, and then got caught up in some article.




Finally I suggested that he just pick a colour and start putting some paint on the egg, and that was enough to get him unstuck.

He usually makes abstract designs on his eggs, and today was no exception. This is him with a dark egg that he energetically splatters with small speckles for a starry-sky effect.

My eggs this year are a picture puzzle, but it only works in Swedish. I made a “vägg-ägg” and a “hägg-ägg”. (Vägg means “wall” and hägg means “bird cherry”.)

We usually go to Uppsala and my mum and brother for Easter. But with all the government recommendations to stay at home, not travel, especially not from Stockholm to other parts of the country, not meet people, especially older people… that’s not happening.

My usual default solution for long weekends is to go out for a walk. Today we went to Tyresta, back to that north-eastern corner of the national park where we camped last summer. The walk to lake Långsjön and back is picturesque and varied and not too long, and there’s a fire place at a beautiful spot on the lake shore where we could heat our lunch. It’s somewhat harder to get to than the area around the main park entrance in the west, and it doesn’t have any of the super accessible stroller-friendly paths, so I was thinking it would be less crowded.

“Less crowded” maybe it was, but definitely not “not crowded”. Dozens and dozens of families had obviously found themselves in the same situation as us, and come to the same conclusion as us. The parking lot at the park entrance was completely full. Luckily there was another parking lot just a kilometre before it, where we got the last but one spot. (Technically we were probably outside the parking area, but the ground was flat and not in a shrubbery, so it worked.)

The resting place with its shelter and fire place was of course full of people as well. But again we were lucky to arrive a bit later than a large group who were mostly done grilling their sausages, so Eric found room for our “hike bombs” at the edges of the fire. (More good luck for us in that someone had brought their own firewood, because the park’s official firewood box was completely empty.)

On our way back we had an Easter egg hunt. I hid eggs for Ingrid on one side of the path, and she hid eggs for Adrian on the other. We’ve done this in our own garden several times, but there aren’t that many good places to hide colourful eggs in a bare, early-April garden, so this was a lot more fun. Under roots and under rocks and under twigs and moss. I wish I had thought to take close-up photos.

Ingrid and Adrian are both in a phase where they enjoy each other’s company. Well, Adrian has always enjoyed Ingrid’s, but right now she enjoys his as well, which isn’t always the case. Lots of silly jokes. It always makes me happy to see and hear that.

Now that it’s spring and the weather outdoor is inviting and pleasant, Adrian wants to cycle. He’s outgrown his bicycle, though, and cycling on a too-small bike is not very comfortable.

We took the train to town last week to see if we could find something at Cykelåtervinningen, a second hand bicycle shop, but our timing was not the best. They only had bikes at the extreme ends of the quality scale left in his size (24 inches) – no-gear bikes with rusty scratches, and mountain bikes with more gears than I have toes and fingers – so we came home empty-handed. (Nothing wrong with many gears, but Adrian wants a back-pedal brake, and you won’t find that on a mountain bike. And they tend to be expensive.)

Yesterday we found a bike on Blocket that both looked good and seemed suitable. We met the seller the same evening and came home with a shiny new bike, barely used.

Today, of course, he wanted to cycle. Unfortunately Ingrid is completely bikeless right now, because her bike got stolen last summer. (She actually got two bikes stolen within less than a week, because she left them outside at night… so we didn’t want to buy her a new one. If she wants one, she can earn money for it herself.) But she’s now tall enough that her next bike might be a full-sized one.

We ended up with a whole chain of bike switches. Adrian took his new bike, but everyone else got something they don’t normally ride. Ingrid rode mine; I took Eric’s; Eric took his recumbent bike.

After adjusting the seat to the lowest possible height, Eric’s bike was about the right size for me. But I was really surprised about how “off” the whole geometry felt. The seat was too far to the front and the pedals too far back, and the seat angle felt wrong. Pretty uncomfortable, on the whole.

We cycled to Vällingby, just to have a destination of some kind. Once there we bought ice cream, after which we would “just browse” the bookshop for a moment but bought three beautiful jigsaw puzzles, two books and one GeoBender puzzle. And then had a lovely cycle ride back through the spring sunshine.

Easter break. No difference for me or Eric but Ingrid is at home, and she treated herself to a pancake and anime breakfast in the sofa.

I’m guessing we might get a stricter quarantine soon, and I’ve tried to think about what that might mean for us. Boredom, of course, and cabin fever. We’re well equipped, with Netflix and Kindle and PlayStations and board games. But just in case, one of the things we did today was to buy the Nintendo Switch that Adrian has been saving up for, and letting him spread out the rest of the cost over the next six months. Just in case.

And we went quarantine shopping. If we get a quarantine, we might end up with the same kind of shopping routines that they have in the UK: strict limits of how many people are allowed to be in a supermarket at the same time, and hour-long queues outside. If this happens, it will probably be at its worst at the very beginning, so we stocked up with enough basic groceries to last us a week. No canned ravioli or meat soup or other panic food; just normal basics like pasta, rice, canned tomatoes and beans, and frozen vegetables, that we’ll eat anyway, with or without quarantine.

I made a list and Ingrid and Adrian immediately volunteered to take care of it, and seemed to have fun doing it. Meanwhile, Eric and I did the normal shopping for this weekend.

What we saw in Bromma confirms Google’s statistics. The parking lot wasn’t as packed as it would be on a normal Sunday, but it was more full than empty. Not much staying at home going on here.

Two of us are working from home now: myself and Ingrid.

For me it was a team decision. For Ingrid it’s quarantine. She has a slight cold, with a sore throat and a stuffy nose. Students with any symptoms of a respiratory infection are to stay at home.

On top of that, she also has whooping cough. Despite all the vaccinations! The next top-up vaccination is due next year, in eighth grade. I guess her immunity wore out a bit faster than whatever percentile the general vaccination schedule is based on.

I am somewhat proud of my ability to diagnose her whooping cough based on symptoms only. The doctor at the local clinic was sceptical but swabbed her anyway, and then replied a few days later that the test came back positive. Unfortunately she had been coughing for three weeks by then, so it was too late for antibiotics. And she might keep coughing for several more weeks. No school in sight for some while.

Adrian is still at school, and Eric’s job hasn’t decided to work from home yet.

PS later at night: Eric’s company is following suit, and will also switch to working from home as soon as practical.

Another beautiful but cold day, and we made another outing to the top.

Skiing from here to there involves one really steep red run. It’s so steep and icy that when I reached it last time I was uncertain whether I would be able to ski it at all. I was very sure that Adrian wouldn’t be able to do it. Instead we took the free ski bus to the cable car station, queued for a while and took the cable car straight to the top. Very convenient.

At the top (which is not technically the top of the mountain but I’m going to call it the top anyway) everything is encrusted with snow. The cable car station doorway, all the buildings, the signposts, the cables. It looks almost surreal.

From the top it’s mostly nice, gentle, long ski routes down. Pure pleasure and sightseeing!

A day or two before our trip, I checked the weather report for Åre and packed accordingly. The weather forecast was way off target, both fortunately and unfortunately. The forecast promised temperatures just around freezing, and clouds all the time. Instead we have temperatures well below &ndash,10°C, and much more blue skies and sunshine than I had hoped.

Yesterday the cold didn’t bother me. Today by midmorning I was so cold I had to go back inside and double up on all my layers. Double polar fleeces, double leggings, double wool socks. Double layers on my hands I already had – I wear merino wool liner gloves inside my mittens so that I can take off the mittens (for taking photos, for example) and not immediately feel like my fingers will fall off in the cold.

In the afternoon we stopped at a piste-side café for a hot drink. Does the water in the vases look cloudy? That’s because it’s frozen. The tulip stems are encased in lumps of ice. But we’re out of the wind, and the hot drink is hot, so that’s all right.

Adrian meanwhile wasn’t bothered by the cold at all. He’s like a walking nuclear reactor.

He’s still bravely practicing the snowboard. I was a bit skeptical and thought that he would probably give up after a few days. But he keeps at it, not just during the lessons, and he’s learning fast. He is already connecting his turns and getting some flow going.

After two gray days it was bright and sunny today and very little wind, so I wanted to head up to the higher slopes. See some views, maybe take some photos.

Getting from Björnen (at the far right end of the piste map) to the pistes near the peak of Åreskutan (at the far left of the piste map) and then back again took me and Ingrid effectively all day. We were not the only skiers heading in that direction and the lift queues ate up a lot of time.

We did get some wonderful views up there. And the slopes were quite to my taste. The map marks them as ski routes rather than pistes – they’re relatively long, narrow and gentle. They’re great for just gliding along and taking in the views.

The slopes were not crowded but the restaurants on that side of the resort were all completely packed. At one place the waiting time for a table was over an hour. So I didn’t enjoy all the fabulous views as much as I might have because towards the end I was just so hungry.

Meanwhile Adrian and Eric stayed in Björnen all day. Adrian has decided to learn snowboarding and is taking lessons, but it means he’s effectively a total beginner on the slopes again and can only manage the gentlest inclines at the slowest pace.

I’d like to see those views from the plateau again, and show them to Eric and Adrian as well. I’m thinking of going back up there another day, maybe on a day with less beautiful weather and therefore fewer people. And with an earlier start and a more efficient plan.

The weather was much less windy today, and we were all much less tired, so we enjoyed our skiing a lot more. We explored new lifts and pistes, but generally still stayed in the Björnen side of Åre. The upper areas were still closed due to high winds for a big part of the day, so we couldn’t ski to blue pistes on the other side of the mountain. There are shuttle buses but it didn’t seem worth the effort when the blue pistes on this side were so nice. Especially late in the afternoon when the sun came out, and the lifts and pistes emptied.