Petra celebrated her fifth birthday on Monday, and she had her very first “kid party” yesterday afternoon. She was proud nearly to bursting when she filled out and delivered the invitations, and when we set up the party scene out on the front porch. I think maybe the party itself was secondary to the joy… Read More Femårsdagen!

My mom arrived on Friday, which coincided nicely with the start of Olof’s vacation so that now we’ve got four weeks stretching before us with not much on the schedule besides rest and relaxation. I can’t speak for the others, but I know that I’ve been needing that.

Olof and I dragged ourselves out of bed bright and early this morning to go to what was probably the most pointless doctor’s appointment ever. A couple of weeks ago, at my one and only prenatal appointment to date (and that was only an intake, not a “real” appointment), I told the midwife that I… Read More Time-waster

The past few days have been more or less the same around here — lots of bright, warm sunshine and plenty of playing outdoors. Just what summer should be.

Tage is quite taken lately with jokes and riddles. His most recent favorite is “Why do birds fly south for the winter?” (A: because it’s too far to walk). Sometimes, just to keep us on our toes, he switches up the answer, saying it’s too far to run or too far to drive or that… Read More Riddle me this

I post one of these pictures every year, I know, but even though it’s my tenth summer here I still find it remarkable. This was taken off my front porch just after midnight last night, and as you can see, it’s broad daylight. It had been cloudy and raining off and on, which left things… Read More Solstice

So there was a biggish earthquake — 4-ish on the Richter scale — in our neck of the woods last night, and I missed it entirely, even though I was awake and up and about. It was all over the newspapers this morning, and I couldn’t help but feel a little ripped off. To hear… Read More All shook up

The weather gods must have sensed that I was reaching the end of my rope, because they sent down a couple of really gorgeous days. There was maybe just a little too much wind for my taste, but it was warm enough this afternoon that Olof and I drank our (iced!) coffee out on the… Read More At last!