The annual Making of Lussebullar.

Eric enjoys making and kneading the dough.

Ingrid enjoys tasting the dough…

… and making plaited buns.

Adrian got the knack this year of rolling the dough “worms” that you need for making the traditional lussebulle shapes.

Plenty of buns were produced. Since we’re making them quite close to Christmas this year, and generally eating less sweet stuff than we used to, there’s no risk we’ll run out early.

Making Christmas cards for friends and family. Last minute, as usual.

Current hobby/interest: knitting.

I notice a certain teenage moodiness. She is volatile, a bit fragile, and sometimes says she feels sad for no real reason. And she is acquiring a habit of performing chores or tasks she dislikes with drama, wordlessly demonstrating just how much she hates doing it and what a heavy burden it is.

Growing up is not easy. Quite often Ingrid says she wishes she was a child again, about 5 or 6 years old, with no real responsibilities.

She is full of Christmas thoughts. She’s quite busy making and buying Christmas gifts, and has made advent calendars (with a drawing for each day) for both me and Adrian.

Ingrid is opening a “loot box” in Overwatch. Adrian watches and shares the excitement.

Apparently there was good stuff in this box.

Opening advent calendars.

We have a multitude of calendars. A bit too many, in my opinion, but hey, it’s not me who needs to keep up with them all.

We begin the day by listening to the radio calendar in bed. The alarms go off, Ingrid comes to our bedroom and pokes at Adrian, and they both come into our bed. The story this year (“Marvinter”, roughly “Nightmare Christmas”) is interesting and the voice acting is good, so we all enjoy it. Plus it’s a nice way to wake – I’m barely awake at the beginning, and mostly OK with getting up by the end of the 10 minutes it takes.

The TV calendar (“Jakten på tidskristallen”, “The hunt for the time crystal”) got good reviews but I really disliked it and didn’t even want to watch it to keep the kids company. The story is silly but I could live with that, but I cannot stand the mannered acting that makes several key characters come across as caricatures rather than actual people. Adrian watches it at school; Ingrid has given up on it.

Both the radio and TV calendars have an accompanying cardboard “open the flap” calendar. In addition, Ingrid drew “open the flap” calendars for both myself and Adrian. I got a Christmas-themed one, while Adrian’s had a Minecraft theme. Plus of course there is the calendar I made, with small gifts for the kids every day. Phew!

Knitting a scarf.

The kids in Ingrid’s class spent half the day selling candy floss at the local Christmas market, to earn money for a trip next year. Making those fluffy balls of floss turned out to be harder than it looked, and there was sugar everywhere.

Ingrid participated in her first ever dance competition, and she and her partner got a bronze medal in the “duo junior 1” class!

It was an internal competition for members of her dance studio only, intended to be an easy first step into competitive dancing. So it was quite relaxed and low-key, but of course Ingrid was nervous anyway.

Making her list, checking it twice…

Another end-of-term dance class demonstration.