In a bid to one-up Olof’s taking-all-the-kids-out-for-supper move, I took all of them with me to town today to get Lydia’s hair cut. Not only was I gone twice as long as he was the other night–the haircut alone took close to an hour–but I made my way up two steep, scary flights of [...]

I’ve been writing and editing my little heart out today finally getting my Mosaic Minds work caught up. I edited seventeen articles this evening, and whipped up a little book column, too. Of course, I have only myself to blame for having to do so much today; if I’d done any of [...]

Tage has struggled with constipation for most of his life, often going days on end without pooping. Since he’s been potty-trained the situation has gotten quite a lot better, but there have been some emotional side effects and he’s a bit anal-retentive, in the very truest sense of the term. He’s so resistant [...]

As I’ve done every day for the past few weeks, I ruined my elder daughter’s life this afternoon by not buying her an mp3-player. Though she’s unable to come up with a single compelling reason for having one, she assures me that her interest has nothing–NOTHING, I say–to do with all of her friends [...]

Five years ago today, after traveling for nearly twenty-four hours, Lydia and I arrived at Arlanda airport outside Stockholm. The day had been so long and exhausting that I wasn’t even nervous about seeing Olof on the other side of the “Arrivals” door, though it would be our first face-to-face meeting. Truth be [...]

Lydia’s school is kitty-corner from our house. It’s a fairly large school, with several buildings accomodating students from kindergarten through grade 9, and though it’s technically just across the street it takes her a couple of minutes to get there. Most mornings I watch out the kitchen window as she makes her way [...]

I love words. I love everything about them. I love grammar and spelling and the art of putting words together so that the whole is more than the sum of its parts. I love all the different ways words can be used to express ideas and emotions. Sometimes when I’m reading [...]

I’m fighting a losing battle against clutter and toys and dirty laundry and dog hair. The mess in my house is making me claustrophobic; I feel in real danger of it swallowing me right up. I simply can’t clean fast enough to keep up with the disorder created by the rest of [...]