Some strange time slip/time delay phenomenon seems to have occurred this past week. I cannot believe that the pictures I took last week were only a week ago. It seems like an age has passed since and I don’t really know why. Maybe it is because summer has finally arrived in Stockholm. Perhaps that change of season over the past few days makes last week part of last season and just so far away? I don’t know. But most of this week’s pictures do reflect the better weather than we are now enjoying.
Day 142:
Like crack for toddlers
Here in Sweden, Välling is the bedtime drink of choice for babies from 6 months and toddlers. It’s a milk-based drink with various grains in it that you typically give them as a bedtime drink. We give Little O the one without yoghurt, fruit or extra flavours as I don’t really want him having those just before bed. However, even without those, his excitement when he sees the bottle come out of the cupboard (he knows what to expect as this is the only time that he does not use a zippy cup) is unbelievable. He hops from foot to foot and calls out “Vee, vee, vee!” – his name for välling.God only knows what they are putting in the stuff to cause this kind of reaction. So, I decided to make this a week of change; not only would we attempt to cut back Little O’s dummy (pacifier) use to just nap and nighttime (more on this later, as it deserves a post of its own…), but we’d also start to mix the välling with warm milk to try and reduce his dependency on the välling. So far, this is going well. Cutting back on the dummy use, on the other hand, is a different story…
Day 143:
Dare to bare
Woo hoo, summer has arrived! Yes, I let out the toes for the first time this year.
Day 144:
Holding hands
Little O’s very cute new habit is holding hands with Baby E – this picture makes my heart melt.
Day 145:
Crack den chic
From the crack-like properties of välling on Monday, to crack den chic on Thursday. Much as I love the sunshine of a Stockholm summer, I do not love being woken by a playful baby at 4.25am because it is board daylight in the room. Yes, I could buy blinds, but seeing as we’ll be moving out in a few months, I decided to take the cheap way out and tape newspaper to the window panes. And if newspaper doesn’t cut the sunlight out, then I am quite happy to go the whole crack den route and resort to tin foil on the windows instead.
Day 146:
Birthday wish list
Husband, take note! I would very much like this book (A Guide to Stockholm’s Architecture: 400 buildings from 800 years) for my birthday next month!
Day 147:
Heja, heja, Sverige!
So, Saturday night, I settled down in front of the Eurovision Song Contest with the iPad in one hand to keep in contact with the CPH girls who used to attend my annual Eurovision parties and a glass of rose in the other. I have to admit that I was not a huge fan of Sweden’s entry, Euphoria by Loreen, but it was beginning to grow on me as I had heard it repeatedly over the previous few days…
Day 148:
“The world and Zlatan congratulate Loreen”
…and then she bloody well won the contest. Woo hoo! And apparently even Zlatan joined in with the rest of the world to congratulate her. Now Husband is just hoping that Loreen will have something to congratulate Zlatan for in just over a month’s time. We shall see…
In brief: English, living in Sweden, with my Swedish/Hungarian husband and our sons, Little O and Baby E, and trying to juggle all the different aspects of my new life - the me I was before, the me I am now and the me that I would like to be... 
