Sometimes the afternoon fruit snack is too far away and the kids need an emergency banana straight after school.

Fredagsmys, Friday night with movie and snacks.

I’m still working my way through the photos from Estonia. Meanwhile, here are some pictures from our three-day stay in the Stockholm archipelago with Eric’s father and his wife.

Ingrid’s top wish for this summer was to go camping. She had already slept in a tent that we put up in the garden and obviously really liked something about that experience, so now we did it for real.

Well… sort of. Since it’s Adrian’s first time and Ingrid’s second (and the first was so long ago that she doesn’t even remember it), we went for a very civilised camping experience rather than anything resembling real wilderness. We camped at a nature park in Ängsjö, just outside Stockholm. One of its major benefits is that there’s stuff for the kids to do: the nature park has a beach, a wooden fort and an adventure trail, etc.

It actually turned out even more civilised than I’d planned for, almost park-like in places. We’d been there with Ingrid’s scout group once, last autumn, but now in summer there was a nice café, the grass had been mown, etc. It wasn’t exactly what I normally picture when I think of camping, but nobody complained about the opportunity to eat cake at the café.

Ingrid got her wish: we did sleep in a tent. We also cooked dinner in foil packets over coals in a fire pit, and breakfast on an alcohol stove, and washed up in the lake. During the day went swimming in the lake several times, and rented a boat.

I hadn’t been out in a rowboat for many years. I was surprised at what an incredibly efficient means of transport this is: Ingrid rowed us all for a good bit without any major effort. It really made me understand how important shipping and good waterways must have been in earlier times.

I realised yet again that my body really isn’t made for sleeping on hard ground: I was so stiff and sore in the morning. Cramming four people in a tent made for three adults didn’t help. I like having lots of space when I sleep.

Ingrid, diving in

Adrian enjoyed the wet sand

Dinner

Our summer vacation started on Tuesday. We’ve been to the movies to see Alfons, gone shopping for underpants for Adrian and inline skates for Ingrid. Today we went to Old Town to visit the Royal Armoury and the Royal Coin Cabinet.

Old Town is a sight in and of itself. It may feel over-touristy and “been there, done that” to me but it was pretty interesting for the kids. We pass through one edge of it on our way to our Estonian playgroup every other Sunday but haven’t really visited the rest of it. “Oh look, an alleyway! Can we go inside?” and lots of fun little shop windows and the royal castle and all.

Ingrid was just the right age for a visit to the Royal Armoury, with all the dresses and swords and suits of armour (and for horses, too!) – and especially the child-sized versions. She liked the stories of kings dying in battle and being shot to death at masquerade balls, and royal weddings, and so on. We also talked about how modern-day princesses might live, and that it’s not quite like in the fairy tales any more.

There’s also a dress-up area for the kids which both Ingrid and Adrian enjoyed. Ingrid was a warrior princess, so Adrian wanted to be one, too.

I did not dress up but I did try out the replica Iron Throne that they had in the lobby. The current temporary exhibition is titled Maktspel (Power game) and explores themes of power, war and love in 16th century Europe in fact and fiction. On display are costumes from A Game of Thrones and two movies about Queen Elizabeth I, as well as actual clothing and armour that belonged to Sweden’s king Eric XIV who was contemporary with Elizabeth.

Jackpot in the game of yellow car: being first to remember the parking lot of the local post office and call the five yellow cars lined up there.

Two afternoons in a row.

You know how people say that becoming a parent has changed them, and that it has taught them new things about themselves? All sorts of life lessons, often deep and true.

It turns out that this also applies on the very lowest levels, the smallest things – such as sleep habits.

Adrian still sleeps with us. The actual position has varied – first it was me next to him, then Eric, now it’s my turn again. Most of the night Adrian is on his side and I am on mine and I don’t notice him much. But in the early hours of the morning, as he moves into lighter sleep, he wants body contact.

He likes to sleep with the soles of his feet pressed against me, for example, or even with his legs on top of me: as if he was supported from below when sitting or standing.

He also likes to put his hands inside his pyjamas, so his palms are against his neck and shoulder. Or he clasps his hands and then tucks them next to his neck.

I had never really thought about it much but I’ve noticed that I actually do kind of the same. I also like to press my feet against Eric (but not at 5 o’clock in the morning, and not against his ribs). And there is something oddly comfortable about putting my hand on my neck and shoulder when I’m sleeping on my side (or on my abdomen if I’m on my back). It’s as if an open loop was closed. I am grounded.

Ingrid is picky about the physical sensation of her sleeping arrangements. She needs everything to feel just right. She has a narrow comfort zone when it comes to temperature, for example. During the day she doesn’t care much, but at night it can take her a long while to find a good blanket solution. She tries one blanket, then the other, then the thinner one folded double… then puts her legs out, then just her feet… it’s either too warm or too cold, and needs to be adjusted until it’s right. And only then she can go to sleep.

The blanket needs to lie right as well before she can feel comfortable, and if I am holding my hand on her chest or stomach that also needs to be right: not too far up or too far down, and in the middle rather than to one side. And likewise her own arms and legs. She can’t just put them down and be comfortable – they need to be adjusted until they feel right.

Now I’m not too picky about blanket weight (I think) – my usual blanket is usually warm enough. But I do recognise this feeling of things being uncomfortable when they’re not just right. For me it comes and goes; sometimes I feel it much more strongly and then for a long time I may not notice it at all.

During a “sensitive” period I feel every wrinkle in the bedsheet, especially under my feet. It can really bother me if the blanket lies more heavily on one leg than the other, or if it touches me too lightly in some place. The blanket needs to come up to my shoulders but not touch my neck.

Ingrid made the medallion in our favourite colours – orange is mine, and the blue and green are there to represent turquoise which is Ingrid’s favourite. And she bought me roses for her pocket money. It is not often that I get a gift worth a week’s income.

The kids are gradually growing up and even Adrian is leaving the messy toddler phase. Washability is no longer the primary criterion when I buy new casual clothes for myself. I no longer rush to change out of my work outfit into child-proof clothes the moment I get home – I now allow myself to wear nice-looking things at home, too, including the occasional white item, and even wool cardigans that cannot be machine washed.

We went bowling today. It was the kids’ first time bowling, and I can’t say I’m an expert either – I think I’ve tried bowling maybe 5 times in my life.

I would have thought that Ingrid is too young for this (not to mention Adrian). But Ingrid mentioned at some point that one of her classmates had had his birthday party at a bowling alley. It turns out that many bowling alleys do kids’ birthday parties. The thing that makes it work is a technical fix: the kids get bumpers that make sure the ball doesn’t end up in the gutter.

So we tried bowling, and it worked out quite well. Adrian of course didn’t really understand any of it but was just happy to be on the show. He liked the balls with all their pretty colours, and wearing shoes that looked just like mine.

But he did try some bowling too. First with a ramp, but then he chose to play like us, with muscle power only. But his muscle power is pretty limited, especially when it comes to explosive strength… Once his ball actually ran out of speed completely and got stuck, close to the end of the lane, and a staff member had to go and poke it out. The best technique we came up with for him had him standing with his feet wide apart, with the ball on the floor in front of him, and then pushing the ball sort of kind of roughly straight ahead. Maybe.

Ingrid managed quite well and enjoyed it. She couldn’t roll the ball straight, so after a while she gave up and just planned her zig-zags. “If I zig to the left then it will probably bounce twice against the bumpers and end up at the left again,” that kind of calculations. It worked surprisingly well.

In the end we were all quite evenly matched, actually. Eric and I are both beginners with pretty unpredictable results: anything from total misses to the occasional strike. Ingrid had the bumpers to help her out. Adrian also had the bumpers and got very random results to begin with. But when he tired, Eric and I took turns bowling for him as well, when his turn came up, which further evened out the results.