Saturday, August 24

Mikael and Camilla are going to watch Juhan being sworn into his military service today, and so we are going to run their market stall. I met Mikael at 7:45 so he could explain the varieties of potatoes in the van to me, and then Auo and I drove the van to the market. Irma and Naa followed in our car.

Setting everything up was rendered easy by the fact that the girls have worked on the stall separately and together throughout the summer, so they knew all the conventions and secret rules. The market was quiet but we still sold a lot.

Irma has spent the afternoon preparing for the party this evening, and now we are sitting in the garden relaxing for a moment. We notice a parade of bubble cars drive towards the ferry and AUo and I run to the road to photograph them. There has been some sort of bubble car day out to Benita’s.

Sunshine will bring three water rats back to the garden, and under the kitchen shed, while we are sitting there.

At about 20:00 the Sundbäck family will return, get changed and arrive on mass to celebrate Auo, Irma and Naa’s birthdays. We will have a long and merry party in which conversations will take place in one, two or three languages at once.