Last day of school for Ingrid. Adrian’s preschool also had a summer “graduation” celebration for the bigger kids who will be going to school this autumn, and the smaller kids and their parents were invited to watch (and eat the cupcakes).

End-of-term celebrations all involve a lot of performances. At Ingrid’s school first there was an hour in the classroom where the teacher thanked everybody and said goodbye, and the kids sang some songs for the parents. That was followed by the shared celebrations for the whole school, out in the schoolyard. I think each grade had someone perform something (ranging from dancing to playing the piano), and then of course the headmistress had to make a speech, and all the kids sang Flaggan vajar på sin stång and Den blomstertid nu kommer. That took another hour. In the afternoon at preschool the bigger kids had a circus performance for us. So I literally spent hours today watching other people’s kids perform. Rather boring to be honest…

I dragged the kids out for some geocaching, this time in Ursvik.

We found some really exciting caches there that the authors had put a lot of work into. One was “camouflaged” as a beautiful bird house; another was hidden inside a very realistic-looking rubber snake.

We picked Ursvik because Ingrid wanted to climb the activity trail there.

It had been raining yesterday and all night too, so much of the ground was muddy. This provided opportunities for additional muddy, watery activities.

The climbing ended with Adrian slipping off a stone into the muddy water. Luckily that spot was not too deep – only his shoes got soaked, so he went on barefoot.

If he had ended up like the kid next to him – flat on his stomach in the middle of the pond – we would have had to drive home and thus missed out on the sausage grilling we had planned as the finale for our outing.

“This is my stone, you don’t have to sit right where I am!”

We went out for a bit of geocaching in the afternoon, in Lunda. I had planned for a longer outing in a wilder place, but Ingrid was coughing so much this morning that we had to cancel those plans. But Lunda is 15 minutes away by bike (at Ingrid’s pace) and there is a decent-sized green space which includes an iron age burial ground and some traces of a very old village, as well as a nice large playground with an archaeological theme (Viking ships etc).

I learned today that the burial ground in Lunda is the largest site with iron age graves in Stockholm. And we bagged our first multi-caches.

Weekday morning. Both kids in their pyjamas. Adrian has fleecy one-piece pyjamas; Ingrid’s are Frost-themed.

Adrian is having porridge (with raspberry jam and cinnamon and oat milk); Ingrid has a cheese bun. Both love drinking berry juices.

Adrian wants everything close at hand. Ingrid cannot help fiddling with things.

Adrian likes to bring plush toys to the table – there’s The Frog on the table, and Johan the stuffed doll on the windowsill behind Ingrid. Ingrid likes candles, and since we have candlesticks on the kitchen table anyway during winter, she decided she wanted candlelight for breakfast as well.

Preparing for Friday evening movie time.

I used to aim for consensus, trying to get the kids to agree on a movie to rent. But their tastes are so different that this only led to nobody being happy. Now we take turns. Today was Ingrid’s turn to choose, so we got a Barbie movie.

It strikes me when I look at this photo how unconcerned both kids are about sitting on the floor. They are not at all bothered by wearing slightly dirty clothes almost all the time. The same with food stains etc.

For my own self, I draw a clear line between my “out” clothes and “home” clothes, and while I might well sit on a dirty floor in my “home” clothes, I set a higher standard for my “out” clothes. This has both benefits and costs of course.

We walked around in Funchal a bit and heard incredible amounts of grumbling about having to walk. I don’t think I’ve ever come home from a new city with as few photos as I have from this visit to Funchal.

We went whale- and dolphin-watching along the south coast of Madeira.
If either of the kids has any memories of this boat trip, it’ll be about feeling seasick all the way. Quite luckily they both managed to fall asleep rather than throw up.

Wants yoghurt. Grabs spoon from drawer. Done. Doesn’t even think about closing the drawer.
Eats yoghurt. Done. Discards the yoghurt pot right there.

It seems to me like kids (mine at least) have extreme tunnel vision. They don’t seem to notice anything outside their immediate focus zone. Things that I see as mess, they just don’t see at all.

Playing games with the kids.

Whenever we do play, games or otherwise, we’re always on the floor. Sitting on chairs around the dinner table just doesn’t have the same kind of feeling. I’ve occasionally thought about buying a sofa table but I think we all feel more comfortable on the carpet.

Things that will not wake a sleeping kid:

• Carrying them from one bed to another
• Leading them to the toilet and back to bed
• Rolling out of bed onto the floor
• Changing their pyjamas and the entire bedding

Things that will wake a sleeping mum:

• Sneezing in the room next door
• Anybody walking anywhere
• Touching the door handle