Laugarvatn, Soccer & Vacation Countdown
[Photos taken 02 – 11 July 2021, posted online 09 October 2021. We went to see the new Bond movie last night in a packed theater, almost felt normal.]
Our summer vacation window was a weird one this summer. First off, Bjarki’s summer job-school (i.e. weeding public spaces) went until 21 July, secondly Anna’s summer job (also of the gardening variety) stretched to the end of July, and thirdly, the schools started up on 19 and 25 August.
As a result, we ended up starting our vacation mid-July-ish, which meant the customary mental knuckling-through-July until the vacation began.
We did manage to do a few things. We visited Finnur’s parents’ summer house on a wonderfully warm day, I set some sort of personal record in most restaurants visited in one not-on-vacation-week, and Emma participate in the annual huge girls soccer meet in our town, and came away victorious! (70-ish images total)
Friday 02 July 2021
School Year Ends, Finally!
[Photos taken 01 – 07 June 2021, posted online 11 August 2021. I’ve spent the past few days remodeling Bjarki’s room, it’s now slowly looking more like the room of a teenager as opposed to a randomly thrown together collection of furniture from various stages of our lives. The weather has been gorgeous, and some wood-staining has happened.]
With June came the long-awaited end of the school year. Phew, we made it! (35-ish images total)
Tuesday 01 June 2021
Gymnastics, Family Park & Silfra Snorkeling
[Photos taken 22 – 31 May 2021, posted online 05 August 2021. Intermittent rain in the capitol area, am working up the nerve to ‘refresh’ Bjarki’s bedroom… or attack the weeds in the garden… or both..?]
Bjarki participated in a gymnastics meet, we visited the farm-animal and family park for the first time in a long while, masks were no longer required indoors (which was weird), my department at work went and snorkeled in Silfra, and then there was the usual gardening-library-garage-cleaning trifecta. (50-ish images total)
Saturday 22 May 2021
People Meets, Gardening & Vaccination #2
[Photos taken 07 – 21 May 2021, posted online 04 August 2021. Steady stream of covid-19 cases being diagnosed, situation is wait-and-see how sick the vaccinated folks get, and if the health system will cope. We went horse-back riding yesterday!]
As Covid-19 cases started going down after Easter (during which restrictions remained tight) the restrictions loosened enough for a gymnastics meets (every audience member masked, registered, and 2 m apart), and small parties were again a reality.
The garden kept demanding attention, and I got Pfizer dose #2. (55-ish images total)
Friday 07 May 2021
House #2, Confirmation Looms & Eruption!
[Photos taken 12-20 March 2021, posted online 19 July 2021. Heading to Húsafell on a couples trip, no children in tow!]
We went to check on house #2, enjoyed some good weather and northern lights, and then the main thing became planning and preparing Bjarki’s upcoming confirmation party on 21 March. Not surprisingly, due to all the preceding earthquakes, the ground opened up on 19 March, and a volcanic eruption began, which is still ongoing. (30-ish images total)
Friday 12 March 2021
Birthday, Office Dwelling & Confirmation Prep
[Photos taken 01-11 March 2021, posted online 16 July 2021. The adults have begun their summer vacations, but the teenagers have a bit to go before finishing up for the summer. Covid-19 is rearing its ugly head again, sounds like rules to enter the country are to be tightened, not sure about rules for life in general. We have 85% of 16+ year-olds fully vaccinated, and about 90% have gotten at least one shot. The 12-16 year-olds probably not vaccinated until late August.]
March began as always with my birthday (yay!), I went into the office for a whole week to do tests, and we began in earnest prepping for Bjarki’s upcoming confirmation on 21 March, as it was looking increasingly likely that we’d actually be able to go ahead with it on the originally scheduled date. (25-ish images total)
Monday 01 March 2021
Yule Ends, Socialization Begins
[Photos taken 01-14 January 2021, posted online 30 May 2021. After weeks of draught, we’re now looking at rain for the foreseeable future.]
Finally, the difficult year 2020 was over! We began 2021 relatively slowly, waiting anxiously to see if we’d get a post-holiday Covid-19 explosion, but as the days ticked by, it appeared that the much-touted yule-bubbles had worked their magic, and very few cases were diagnosed outside of quarantine. Slowly but surely, we began meeting people again…
All schools went back to in-person teaching, even Anna’s, although with quite a few restrictions such as masks for everybody older than 16 years old. I kept working from home, barely managed to keep going out for jogs/walks, ginger-bread cookies got decorated, the ginger-bread house got demolished, fireworks were lit, decorations packed away, and Bjarki’s confirmation classes began. (65-ish images total)
Friday 01 January 2021
Annual Photoshoot & Yule-Renovation-Madness Descends
[Photos taken 10 – 23 December 2020, posted online 13 May 2021. It’s ascension day and a public holiday. Two days ago I got my second Pfizer covid-19 shot, and spent most of yesterday in bed. Feeling much better now.]
For too many years to count, I’ve done a ‘photoshoot’ of the kids in November/December to put on the annual family photo-calendar. This year I decided to try using the new green wall in our bedroom as a backdrop, but had a harder-than-usual fight trying to get the lights to cooperate. Maybe I should finally watch those youtube videos I’ve been meaning to instead of trying to reinvent the wheel every time?
With Christmas looming, Emma’s “art-corner” under the stairs drew my ire, as it was an absolute horrible mess. Making things worse were the boxes and boxes of random stuff tucked under the stairs, that had been mostly untouched for almost 10 years. In a fit of apparent insanity, I pulled all the stuff out from under the stairs, nearly giving poor Finnur a heart-attack. Happily, the impending-yule adrenaline meant things got squared away before too long, and Emma got the entirety of the under-the-stairs-area as her domain.
As one piece of furniture from Emma’s room ended up under the stairs, her room no longer made any sense, so the renovation madness crept into her room as well… (60-ish images total)
Thursday 10 December 2020
Country Quarantining
[Photos taken 12 – 17 October 2020, posted online 30 March 2021. Sitting at a cafe being run as a restaurant, with servers. Every guest has to give their name, social ID, and phone number for possible contact tracing.]
A 8-10th grade teacher in Bjarki’s school was diagnosed with Covid-19. As the teacher had been in the cafeteria with the students, all of the 8-10th graders along with their teachers got sent into a week-long quarantine, ending with a covid-19 test.
We are ridiculously privileged in having access to house #2, so I could whisk Bjarki away from the rest of the family, meaning their life could go on as before, while the two of us holed up out in the country. (50-ish images total)
Monday 12 October 2020
Last Hurrahs Before Clampdowns
[Photos taken 01 – 11 October 2020, posted online 29 March 2021. Covid wave #4 is percolating, 10-people-max and school shut-downs restrictions were reinstated this past Thursday.]
After two weeks of a seemingly steady flow of 30-new-Covid-cases-per-day at the start of wave #3, the beginning of October brought a sharp uptick which flirted with exponential growth, and authorities finally clamped down hard: Junior colleges went back to distance teaching, and 20 people max were allowed per space in general. Masks also slowly became the general rule.
Right before the clampdown, there were two birthday parties! But as the clampdowns began I managed to go out on walks/jogs for a bit to make up for my now-stopped cafe-excursions. One week into October, we go the news one teacher at Bjarki’s level had Covid, which landed him (and me by extension) in quarantine. But that’s another post. (55-ish images total)
Thursday 01 October 2020
