Wow! We've already been in Stockholm for two weeks! Our transitions have been smooth and for the most part, deeeelightful.

We've settled into a spacious three bedroom apartment in a lovely part of the city, Norrmalm, only a five minute walk from the boys' school and about 20 minutes from Doug's office at the Royal Institute of Technology. There is a lovely national park in our back yard with walking/biking trails, beautiful woods and a large lake. The weather has been very warm, with little snow and not much rain. Although our daylight is somewhat limited (around 7-1/2 to 8 hours now), the days have been generally beautiful . . . today we have brilliant sun and no wind, so Kristina and I took an hour-long walk in the park.

Noah and Jack are settled into their school, Rodabergskolan, and appear to be having lots of fun. The academics are quite easy compared to what they're used to. Interestingly, the kids have only three lessons/week in academic subjects (i.e., English, math, social studies, and science). The school day is also abbreviated compared to ours: the kids have one hour for lunch and although every day is different, they usually finish school around 2:00 PM. We're spending 1 to 2 hours in the evening doing math and science, plus a minimum of 1/2 hour reading-- Noah's reading classics at home, currently Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and Jack is reading Andrew Clements stories, having finished "Janitor's Boy" last night.

Noah is enjoying meeting new friends and the relative freedom of the Swedish school system as compared to the US. It's fun to watch the creative ways in which "electives" such as music and gym are handled here. For Noah, music involves teams of 7th graders who decide on a performance, practice together, then perform for their peers. Noah and four boys and one girl are practicing Eagles' "Hotel California", which they will perform for the entire 7th grade. Their "band" includes two guitars, piano, voice and drums. Similarly, Noah came home from gym last week complaining that two girls had led the entire class in ballroom dancing lessons -- horrors. Noah and another boy will teach basketball fundamentals to the 7th graders later in the semester.

On Jack's first day at school, we arrived in time for art. The 5th graders were making stained glass creations as part of a Medieval history unit. Aside from having met some really nice kids, Jack is particularly excited about "Clubben", an after school program where kids in 4th-6th grades can do homework, play table tennis, basketball and indoor soccer, etc. Doug and I really appreciate Clubben, as apartment life is quite different than living in a home with a yard where the kids can dash outside at the slightest whim (usually mine) to wear off their energy.

Doug is off to work every day where he is catching up on reading, beginning to learn the thermodynamic modeling program at the Institute and thinking about writing a couple of papers, as part of the usual academic backlog!

Kristina is blossoming, more lovely than ever and smart as a whip. She's got the appetite of a teenager and the disposition of a saint. She loves being with Mama on a non-stop basis, so we're in our own little groove here in Stockholm, with lots of good books and music, a few games, puzzles and toys, the great outdoors and an indoor Montessori gym in our apartment building! She's learning her letters and numbers, enjoys playing with magnets and puzzles, loves to listen to music and books and play educational games on the computer.

As for me, well, I am working out every day, playing with Kristina, keeping house and generally focusing on family stuff at this juncture in my life. And since I've never had "full-time mom, wife and housekeeper" as a job description, the adjustments have been, frankly, non-trivial. I was surprised the other day, for example, that one could spend an entire half-day (four hours) doing nothing but the family's laundry.

Well, that's all of our news for now . . . More about Stockholm, the city and city sights soon. Know that we are well and are enjoying this adventure very much, but miss family and friends! judy