[Photos taken 13-14 April 2022, posted online 11 20 August 2022. The first part of this was composed in Colorado, USA!]
The Wednesday had been designated “shopping day” for Anna and myself, so Finnur took the other kids to the aquarium. On Thursday we took the bus into the suburbs to go on a tree-hugging adventure course, which was great fun. (65-ish images total)
[Photos taken 11 – 12 April 2022, posted online 27 July 2022. It’s pouring with rain outside, the plants are happy.]
We hadn’t really planned what to do in Copenhagen before arrival, but thankfully a friend had told us about the Copenhagen Card, which gives you unlimited access to public transportation, and entrance to most of the main attractions in town.
With Copenhagen cards active in our phones, we spent the first day in the Tivoli Gardens. Day two was spent at the Experimentarium. (75-ish images total)
[Photos taken 01 – 10 April 2022, posted online 25 July 2022. The weather is calm.]
We took the big kids to see a year-end-themed comedy show that had been scheduled for late December. It was interesting that the audience-appetite for covid jokes was low, it seems like we kind of just want to be done with the whole thing.
Then spring began to really spring forward, and it was time for some gardening. Just before departing for Denmark, we managed to host the 2nd birthday party for Emma for my side of the family. Then we departed for Denmark as the Easter holiday was up on us! (50-ish images total)
[Photos taken 26 – 31 March 2022, posted online 21 July 2022. Anna and I replaced our old oven last night, feeling very adult!]
Emma managed to squeeze another trip to the bowling alley out of me, I went on an organized hike around Meðalfellsvatn, saw Stína in concert with friends, hosted a sewing club, shuttled kids, remembered that I have a big camera, and told the kids we were going to Denmark over the Easter break! (45-ish images total)
[Photos taken 19 – 25 March 2022, posted online 20 July 2022. The two living room walls are now painted, but I’m thinking the new white border around the little windows needs to go… Waiting for Finnur to opine. Have moved my focus to painting parts of the kitchen, and touched off by a broken dimmer knob, am replacing all the black electrical fronts with white ones.]
Every spring the music schools in the country host a series of concerts, dubbed Nótan (The Note), and each school sends an act to perform at one concert. This year, Bjarki’s school asked him and his play-together group (that had met like 5-6 times) to play. He was super nervous, but got through it in one piece.
Straight afterwards, Finnur and I drove out to the country to stay at a hotel out in the boondoggles, to make use of a gift-card I’d given Finnur for Christmas. It looked like 75% of the other guest were also there redeeming the same gift-card, hehe.
We managed to visit grandma on her birthday (very rare occurrence), there was some exercising, Emma got her classroom laser-tag birthday wish, Anna got started on summer plants, and people came for dinner, in our house!! (50-ish images total)
[Photos taken 11 – 18 March 2022, posted online 19 July 2022. Still working on the living room, the white wall has now got five coats of paint, six if you count the wrong white. This was not supposed to take four days!! Meanwhile, Finnur & Emma are in Laugarvatn, he’s helping his dad build a new deck.]
Slowly but surely, the covid-postponed events started actually happening, and life in general got busier!
First up was a Damon Albarn concert in Harpa. I’d bought two tickets in January 2020 for a June 2020 concert with a gift card I got from work on my 5th work anniversary, but hadn’t really decided on who to take with me (Finnur is not a concert-enthusiast). Not surprisingly, the concert got postponed to March 2021, and then 2022.
Happily, my cousin Ríkey was up for a cultural outing, and we even tried the new restaurant Hnoss, on the first floor of Harpa, which is run by people that were/are in charge of the cafeteria at work (Marel)!
Then it was time for a non-masked team-gym meet, there was a bit of shopping and gymming, Bjarki’s hair got cut, I went for a hike by the sea, Anna got dressed up for an outing with friends, snow kept falling, but at least the days were getting noticeably longer. (50-ish images total)
[Photos taken 01 – 09 March 2022, posted online 18 July 2022. Summer vacation has begun, and I’ve spent the first days painting the living room. Got the wrong white and ugh, lots of wasted work!]
We slowly but surely shook off Covid as the big domestic wave of infections began receding, and all restrictions were lifted. The vaccination campaign was a huge success, as very few people landed in hospital. However, the jury is still out on how Iceland’ll do with regards to long-covid.
We birthdays and our wedding anniversary, cleared away a lot of ice, went to house #2 in adventurous conditions, and I tracked my post-covid progress on the rowing machine at the gym. (30-ish images)
[Photos taken 17 – 28 February 2022, posted online 16 July 2022. I’m finally on vacation and celebrated by staying up until 4 am binge-speed-watching a whole season of a show on Netflix.]
With Covid-19 exploding around us, we didn’t make any grand plans for the two day winter-holiday, as I fully expected us to be sick in bed. Instead, we tried to do a few things locally with the kids: I was in charge of Thursday, and Finnur took Friday.
That weekend, three of us went to house #2 to hang out with friends (who’s children are also getting too old to want to tag along), but then Covid-19 caught up with Emma according to a home test, so I drove her to town for a formal test. She was all better the next day.
Two and three days later, both Finnur and I got Covid-19. Finnur was basically panting and horizontal for 3 days, while I experienced a slow decline, bottoming out at day 3 or 4 before starting to get better. All in all, every one of us had a different covid-course, go figure.
At this point in time the official PCR testing apparatus had gotten completely overwhelmed by the number of people needing tests, even as the authorities stopped asking people to test out of quarantine. Therefore it now took 3-4 days to get the result, instead of same-day.
This confused the whole health-system, because there had been a dedicated covid-center which had done telemonitoring and advice, but you only got into their system via the official test. Now it was taking so long to get results that the local health centers had to start taking on covid cases with what felt like very little preparation, and mid-week the covid-center essentially got disbanded. We muddled through somehow.
In addition, it. Just. Kept. Snowing. (75-ish images total)
[Photos taken 12 – 14 February 2022, posted online 10 July 2022. Sitting in rainy Borgarnes, on my way home after some house #2 time. Trying to get over feeling like a parental failure.]
Emma’s last single-digit birthday was super-legit, with a party and everything. Mindful of covid, we first had a party with just Finnur’s family, and then had some health-hiccups before we could get to mine.
The day after I went and bought cross-country skis for myself. It’s a thing middle-aged women do apparently. I even went out for a bit!
Snow kept falling in copious amounts, and Anna made bagels while on a school-break. (30-ish images total)
[Photos taken 01 – 11 February 2022, posted online 09 July 2022. Five working days left until summer holiday starts… to survive I’ve taken to re-reading trashy novels…]
I kept not getting Covid, while Bjarki and Anna recovered. Dad said hi from the parking lot for five minutes before dashing to the airport, and at long last, after I got the final negative PCR result releasing me from the ‘be-careful/quarantine-lite’, Finnur and Emma moved back home.
I went on walks in the cold while waiting on music school lessons to be over, we went to restaurants, but the biggest drama was my car not handling the copious amounts of snow that kept getting dumped on us. In the end I caved in and bought actual winter tires (not all-years), which transformed the car from useless to useable. Phew!
The hiking group resumed operations after the December-January hiatus, and I went on a nice walk in the dark. (75-ish images total)
