I made Ingrid go to the supermarket with me in the afternoon, because she hadn’t set foot outside the house all day. Jokingly she asked if I could pull her on the sled. I was quite happy to, because the streets are covered with fresh snow, and it seemed like a good way to get some exercise – I just know my body needs it.

She must have felt like she took advantage of me, because on the way back she insisted on pulling me on the sled for a while. I have to admit it was a really comfortable way of getting from A to B.

I’m happy that we have snow, and I’m happy that it is still almost light outside at five in the afternoon.

She has her nose in a phone quite a lot of time. Except when she is playing Overwatch or Minecraft or Fortnite. I keep reminding her to do get off the phone/PC/iPad but like a magnet the screen pulls her back, and I can’t spend all my time monitoring her.

I make her read at least fifteen minutes every day, but she likes postponing this task until late at night. She likes doing things last minute. Her argument – that it is better to play first and read later as a way to wind down – makes sense but does mean that sometimes it simply gets forgotten.

She is anxious and worried. Not all the time and about all things, but it’s a constant undercurrent. It seems like hard way to go through life, and I wish I could help her not worry. I hug her, I tell her that things don’t need to be perfect, and that she is good at what she is doing, and that whatever she chooses or decides will be just fine, but it’s still not enough.

Shrove Tuesday and its buns.

The semlor are usually so large that it is more or less impossible to eat them with your dignity intact. Once one of them got whipped cream on their nose, both gave up all pretense of table manners and rocked their creamy noses.

We spent today helping Eric’s brother and his family prepare for the upcoming sale of their house. I scrubbed stone floors with stinky chemicals; Eric helped carry and transport stuff to storage and recycling; Ingrid helped pack things and remove old anti slip tape from a staircase; Adrian kept us company.

Ingrid’s laptop got stolen in the burglary (along with mine, and work’s).

I replaced mine immediately so that I could work. The company wasn’t quite as fast with replacing my work laptop – or rather, Dell had delivery problems – but I finally got a replacement this week. But Ingrid has been without a computer until now.

Her old laptop was an old laptop. Her new one is not only brand new but also built for gaming, so she can play Overwatch and Fortnite and whatnot on it. In return for this upgrade she’s getting an extra chore (emptying the dishwasher) and giving up half her allowance, for the rest of the year. She was quite happy with this trade.

Another day, another trip to the ice rink. Just as we arrived, it looked like it might start to rain, but it never went beyond “a few drops of moisture in the air” so we stayed for a long while, until we got hungry.

The rink got resurfaced shortly after we came, so we got to skate on mirror blank, newly polished ice for a while.

Ingrid caught a photo of me skating as well.

Today was the first sunny day in ages, so I took the kids for a forest walk. Meanwhile Eric is away in Italy, skiing and cavorting with his colleagues.

Right next to the parking lot where we started, we ran into a playground. That was a good start: it’s been a while since we’ve been to a new playground, and this one had a bit of a climbing / adventure trail and the kids always enjoy that kind of stuff.

Then we walked through Grimsta nature reserve and picked up a few geocaches, until we came to Kanaanbadet (where we enjoyed the last Sunday of summer some months ago). I had been expecting the beach to be completely deserted on a winter day, but the beach café turned out to be open all year round, so there was a steady stream of walkers passing by.

What little ice there had been on the lake had all broken up and lots of large pieces were floating near the shore. The kids tried to fish them out and push them to the beach, but they were slippery and heavy and fragile, so it didn’t go very well.

Then we grilled sausages and walked back to the car.

That spot on the sofa is a comfy one.