All the socks I’ve planned to knit for Christmas are finished but there are still several weeks left until Christmas Eve so I thought I’d knit some more things. Both kids will get a pair of mobile mittens with finger openings. I found a nice easy pattern to follow in relatively chunky yarn – Keep in touch by Drops Design.

Ingrid isn’t supposed to get any Christmas gifts at all this year, because the gaming computer she got was expensive enough to be both a birthday gift and a Christmas gift and then some. But mittens are more like a utility so those don’t really count, I think.

Oh, let’s be honest. Every gift I knit is a selfish one. The knitting is as much a gift to myself as the finished object is to whoever gets it.

Nice easy patterns are quick to make but also kind of boring to knit, so I decided to add some cables to these mittens, inspired by another design I saw in a book. Then I had the idea of doing the cables in contrasting colours and when I pictured the result in my mind it looked so much better than what I saw in the original pattern that I just had to do it this way. I’ve never done intarsia cables before, but how hard can it be.

Not very hard, it turns out, but fiddly. So my quick pairs of mittens are now not so quick any more. Every other row there is cabling to do, and in the rows between the coloured stitches have to be knitted backwards because the yarn end is at the wrong side of the coloured band. It’s not quite double the work but almost. Maybe it would have been wiser to stick to a simpler design for a last minute project like this… but I do like these a lot. I have two weeks left still so it’ll be fine.

I can knit for Ingrid right here in plain sight without her noticing anything. She’s busy with her own thoughts. If you asked her, she would probably be able to tell you that I have been knitting, but not much more.

It’s much trickier with Adrian. He is curious and sociable. He looks at my knitting, comments on the design, opines on the colours, tries it on even when he knows it’s not for him. There is no way he would not notice. So I’ll have to make his late at night when he is in bed. Or perhaps during the day when he is at school, if I can find the time.

A friend/neighbour found out about our woeful lack of pumpkin carving and generously gave us one of their pumpkins. It had done its Halloween duty already, but been painted rather than carved. So Adrian turned the other side and gave it a second life.

Usually I also carve, but this time with my hands free I could focus on photography.

To the list of things not happening this year, add Halloween and trick-or-treating.

And then add carving pumpkins to that list as well. I had too much in my shopping bags on Wednesday to buy pumpkins then. On Thursday I went off and cycled to town and shopped for yarn so we ate leftovers and I didn’t even go to the supermarket which otherwise might have reminded me about pumpkins. On Friday we had our usual movie night and I forgot about pumpkins again. And by today Coop was all out of pumpkins for carving.

Adrian was quite disappointed, and I felt bad about my lack of Halloween planning.

Adrian and Eric came back from Hälsingland with loads of blueberries (bilberries). Adrian and his friends – the ones with a cottage in Hälsingland – made bluberry muffins and then went out and sold them to people.

First they put up a table in central Spånga, just outside the supermarket. They didn’t get a single muffin sold and came home quite demoralized. Then they went house to house, knocking on doors – and had no trouble finding buyers. The whole project took all day and earned them 240 kronor.

There was so much constant debating and arguing and deciding about the smallest things that really can’t matter to anyone but small children. “You mixed the dry ingredients last time so now it’s my turn. You’ll carry the table and you’ll carry the sign and I’ll carry the muffins.” I wasn’t even involved in the project, other than very peripherally, and still it left me exhausted.

I filled the advent calendar again this year. It’s a mixture of small gifts and tasks. Underwear is a prominent part, since both Ingrid and Adrian have outgrown most of theirs and need new ones.

Yesterday’s “gift” was the opportunity to choose a new desktop background for me. Adrian chose for my home computer and Ingrid for the work one.

What you see here is Ingrid’s chosen wallpaper in all its triple-monitor glory. I can’t deny that it holds a certain appeal, and it’s been a great conversation starter, but looking at its over-the-topness for more than a minute is enough to make my brain hurt. I normally choose the calmest possible wallpapers, like the one here.

Adrian’s choice was an abstract picture of red and blue fire on a black background. There’s more energy in it than in the taco cat, but at the same time it is quieter.

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.

Ingrid and I went shopping for scout gear and for clothes. Somehow she has managed to lose her waterproofs and outgrow all sorts of things. How nice it is to be adult and not have to buy clothes or shoes only because you outgrew the (perfectly functional and not even worn-out) previous ones.

I amused myself with my camera and the fitting room mirrors while Ingrid was trying on clothes.

Overnight, things in the fridge grew eyes. Not just the egg carton but also juice bottles, the lid on the butter box, and all sorts of jars and cartons. It was like they were all staring at me when I opened the fridge.

Easter in Uppsala with my mother and brother.

It was just a day trip so the kids didn’t pack much in the way of books and toys, and by late afternoon they were quite bored. After complaining for some while, they ended up playing a version of rock, paper, scissors that somehow also involved a duster and a mixing bowl, and howls of laughter.

There are aspects of my parenting that I wish I could have done better – but I am so happy that I’ve managed to raise kids who enjoy being with each other.

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.