I only use a few basic stitches, and the same handful of colours, and still every new embroidered blob looks different.

The hours I spend at the embroidery club are so focused on the stitches we’re exploring together that I make no progress on my other projects there. Since I started attaching the finished blobs to the skirt, the skirt is currently out of action. I need to get a move on and get the blobs done so that I can wear it again. It’s one of my 4 good winter skirts, so I need it!

The Nordic Museum had posted an invitation today, on their 150th birthday, to share memories of this day, in words and pictures, for the future. I’m posting here the photos I submitted to their collection as well.

The morning was gray and windy, just a few degrees above freezing, but there were glimpses of sun breaking through as I got to Spånga station.

Normally during rush hour the trains here are supposed to go eight times an hour, but the company currently running the commuter train service hasn’t managed to deliver that for quite a while. At least you can generally count on a train once every fifteen minutes. The train this morning was quite crowded but not too horribly crammed full.

I got off the train at Stockholm Central and walked from there to the tretton37 office in the Waterfront building. On the way I stopped by Coop at the lower floor of the station to buy lunch, because I was all out of leftovers at home.

I got a small green smoothie for breakfast 29 kr and a bouillabaisse for 79 kr, for a total of 108 kr.

Many supermarkets have replaced most of their manned checkouts with self-checkout stations. I like it when I only have one or two things to pay for and can get it done quickly, but their occasional random checks really annoy me when they happen.

The entrances to the Waterfront are all automated doors, just like the entrance and exit to the train stations and the supermarket.

The office was relatively empty today. Even though it was almost 9 o’clock when I got there, almost all desks were still empty and I could choose whichever seat I liked.

I didn’t even think of photographs or much else around me during the day as I was working. Then I stood up at five-ish and realized the sun was going down already, glinting off the skyscrapers next to Hötorget.

This street, Klarabergsgatan, used to see a lot more traffic. It has now mostly been closed off for everyone except public transport, and the pavements have been widened.

The folks in the office were gearing up for a Halloween-themed after-work event, with people dressed up as anything from kings to bananas, and a monthly company meeting. I was out of social energy and went home, and will watch a recording of the meeting some other day.

A blip of the SL Access card to take the train home. Costs me 39 kr for a one-way trip. After the most recent price hike, a monthly card costs 970 kr so it is generally not worth it if I only go to the office twice a week.

I got a seat on the train back to Spånga so I could crochet on the way. Much better than randomly scrolling social media. This piece of lace has been my travel project for literally years. I’ve gotten tired of waiting for it, so now I’m working on it more frequently during meetings and such so that I can get it done.

One of the station entrance doors has been broken for the last few days, and for some reason the staff has elected to leave it in the closed position, rather than having it always open. All the people getting off the train clump up in front of the entrance.

On Spånga Torg, the second-hand ladies’ wear shop has filled their windows with warm coats. The florist’s show windows are an odd mixture of Halloween, and pink for breast cancer awareness month.

The first to do when I got home was to feed Nysse.

Then to feed the rest of the family. They would not like pellets from a tin. I made a meal from a Linas Matkasse meal kit – a vegetarian bibimbap.

Reduced the amounts of all chillies and such by a factor of three or four, and some of it was still super spicy. We didn’t manage to eat all the spicy cabbage salad.

After dinner, Ingrid disappeared to her room, while Adrian & Eric watched season 2 of Loki, accompanied by potato chips for Adrian and some leftover lemon merengue pie for Eric.

Beautiful sunshine right now, but with the wall of cloud approaching there, things will change soon.

Ingrid’s actual birthday was a week ago, but that day was a party for the extended family and her and Adrian – rather than for her alone. To give her a celebration that was only for her, we had a family-only second birthday party for her today. With lemon merengue pie, of course!

It came out very lemony this time. Lemon is good, more lemon is better, but apparently there is a point where there is too much lemon in the pie.

I’ve embroidered all the pieces I was going to embroider, so today I started assembling the whole project by stitching the appliqué pieces to the skirt, both the embroidered wool and the patterned silk that was the starting point of the design.

The more I looked at the big picture, though, the more I started having second thoughts. Not about the embroidered appliqué pieces, that I had previously hesitated about. No, those actually go together well, in my opinion. It’s the silk pieces that I now don’t like. Compared to the rest, they look garish and loud.

I went on and started attaching the pieces, but the more I did, the less I liked it. I didn’t even get to the end of the seam around the first silk piece before I decided to kick them out of this project. I’ve got enough of the wool fabrics to make replacement pieces for the ones that were silk in my original design. It’s going to be better that way.

The Dasiphora really isn’t justifying its existence here, especially with its neighbours for contrast. Little to no growth since they were planted, easily squashed by winter snows, and no autumn colour. Bleh.

I’m hitting my flex bank limit at work, which I had planned to use for my usual autumn hike, but Nysse’s long convalescence made that impossible. Today was forecast to be sunny so I just took the day off and went for a walk. My initial plan was to continue hiking the Sörmlandsleden. However getting to the next stage would have required me to drive through all of Stockholm in the morning rush hour, and then another hour, and then do the same on my way back – which really did not appeal at all. So instead of going south, I went north, to Skokloster. Sweden’s largest private castle, now a museum, but unfortunately closed for the season. I can’t remember if I’ve ever been there, but if I have then it was decades ago and I’ve no memories of it.

The walk started right at by the castle and circled round to the back, providing some lovely views of it.

The forest south of the castle was a surprisingly wild one, all tangles and roots and fallen trees. Both these photos are taken straight along the path, which you can barely even see.

The path was well marked and followed the Upplandsleden trail for the most part. The orange signposts were familiar to me from Sörmlandsleden and were easy to spot.

When the trail curved inland away from the lake, there were some more open landscapes with beautiful autumn colours. This was another reason why I came here and didn’t walk somewhere closer to home: I really wanted some deciduous forest with pretty colours, instead of pine and spruce.

When the trail approached the castle again from the other side, there were signs of the grounds having a noble history. There were old water reservoirs for the castle’s fountains, now overgrown, and boulevards now leading to nowhere.

The land-facing side of the castle was impressive again. Though I found the remains of the park pretty underwhelming, like nearly all Swedish parks. This one barely deserved the name. A lawn, some gravel paths, and a few lines of trees, and that was it. All very large, very straight, and clearly meticulously tended, but so very basic.

The off-centre placement of that ornamental urn in front of the castle really bothered me. I guess only a photographer would pay attention to it.

I had my packed lunch on one of the benches in front of the castle. It felt a bit surreal, especially since there was nobody else around.

Around 15 km in total.

Nysse in his cardboard box cave under the sofa table.

The Great Annual Measuring.

Adrian is over 160 cm.

Ingrid is still growing and has passed me in height.