5/7

A couple of words about my experience with the Swedish parental leave system.

In a nutshell, Sweden is one of the best places in the world to have children. The maternity / paternity leave is long and flexible, and staying home for several years is a societal standard rather than an exception.

So, basically, you get 480 paid days of parental leave (some of these days need to be taken out by the father - so it's not just the mother who gets to stay home with the child). You can take these days out in one big block, or you can stretch and divide them up in all sorts of ways if you want to work or study part-time. The latest change in Swedish laws lets even grandparents take out paid parental leave days (isn't that cool?). But the coolest thing is that you can delay taking out these days altogether until the child's 1st birthday. 

This is exactly what we decided to do. So my 480 days started ticking on 10th of November when L. turned one. Before that, well, we just lived on S's salary and savings. I liked that "experiment" for several reasons. First, because it really makes my leave a long one! But secondly, we have proven to ourselves that living on one modest salary is doable, and it is not a rocket science! In this context, I am so grateful for S. who is very responsible with money. We had no major expenses last year - we didn't travel almost at all, the car didn't break down, our teeth didn't need fixing lol. So it was just the most simple everyday expenses we had to cover and we managed to do that very well. If ever we need to survive like this again, we know it is possible.

Now that my maternity leave is paid, it almost feels like I am swimming in money! We can even afford an occasional cafe date haha!

Before L. was born I watched hundreds of reels about having a baby. I went properly down the rabbit hole, and the social media algorithms kept feeding me those videos. One of the topics that popped up all the time was breastfeeding and pumping and storing milk etc. For many women pumping is their reality and there were a lot of tips given how to do this and how to increase the milk supply and how to store milk properly. It was months after L. was born that it suddenly hit me - all these reels come from America, from a country where a lot of women go back to work two weeks after delivery. And if this is your reality, you really do need to know everything about pumping and storing milk. Uhh! Here in Scandinavia, it is hard to fathom such a life, a life where the government doesn't offer you any safety nets. Here you can just stay home. I do count my blessings.

We are trying to use every trick available in order to lengthen my maternity leave. If at all possible, I would like to be home until L. turns three. It is such a precious time for me - except for some very early and grumpy mornings I enjoy this phase in my life immensely! 

4/7 Book Business

It's been about half a year since my book was published in Estonia. 

The feedback has been lovely and warm so far. My favorite moments are those when I hear from someone whom I really didn't expect to hear from. The last two people who have contacted me and given me feedback have fallen precisely into that category. It was just last week when I got an unexpected phone call from a relative of mine. He is not a Christian but he called me to say that one of the sermons he had read recently really touched a nerve in him, and asked me where he could purchase my book for a friend of his. And about a month ago I got a message from a lady who is the general secretary of the Lutheran World Federation - we had brief contact when we were both members of the Estonian Council of Churches. I went on to become a local church pastor, she went on to, uhmmm, run the Lutheran church worldwide. She said she had picked up my book on her recent visit to Estonia and thought it was wonderful that a woman would write and publish such a book. I was so moved.  

I am completely new to publishing business so I don't really know what numbers they operate with or what is considered a success or a failure but my gut feeling tells me my book has done pretty well. Only one fifth of the books that were printed are still in stock, and I am praying and hoping that this sermon collection would find its way to many present piles under Christmas trees in December. Just the thought that it has and will reach people whom I would personally never reach makes my heart so very glad.

I also have some wonderful news - the publishing committee here in Sweden has read (the AI translation of) my book and decided that it is worth translating and publishing here, too. I am impatiently waiting for this process to set into motion now. If all goes well, I will hold a hard copy of the Swedish translation in my hand sometime next year. I can't wait!

The next (logical) big step would be finding someone who wanted to publish it in English. But here I am totally out of my depths, and I don't know exactly where to go or which doors to knock on. If you have any recommendations, I am open to them!   

3/7

I have always been a book person. I'd never felt much need to get into podcasts or movies or other forms of entertainment. But having a child changes the way one can use time, and when you are out walking for hours and hours with a sleeping baby, you simply don't read books. But this is exactly where podcasts come handy - eyes and hands are kept on the pram but ears can do a thing of their own. 

I know there are podcasts out there on every imaginable topic but I only listen to history podcasts. I don't know why. I didn't particularly love history classes in school - literature classes were always much more interesting for me. But I've grown to love history pods - the research, the stories, the depth, the generalisations, the details, the aha-moments, the drama... 

Interesting as they are, I still thought I'd be able to keep my cool and listen to them with a degree of emotional detachment. What I was not ready for was getting completely hooked on a podcast, always counting days in my head until the next episode. But this is what happened. It is not only that I like The Rest Is History but I am displaying traits of a teenage fan girl I didn't know I still had in me. I am listening to and reading every interview made with or about Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook, I stalk them on Twitter, and I am always secretly glad when it is Monday or Thursday when I can unwrap the new episode like a chocolate candy. These two historians have no idea how much I, a book-deprived young mother, have enjoyed their podcast over the past year. Their show has been an intellectual lifeline for me. 

There is other good stuff around, of course. I like to listen to Empire, or Legacy, or Instant Classics, or Journey Through Time. Solid historians, well-researched topics, brilliant guest historians, good dynamics between the hosts. But nothing will ever beat The Rest Is History. It is simultaneously very serious and absolutely hilarious, heavy and light, scholarly and entertaining. The hosts are real characters, and they complement each other like in no other podcast. 

Now I'm secretly hoping that a certain Santa (wink-wink) would get me a gift for Christmas I really want to have - The Rest Is History club membership.     

I still read books. With much slower pace than before and with a lot more interruptions, but I read them. My love for reading hasn't diminished. But I will also always remember - with nostalgia and joy - the endless hours of pram pushing, with The Rest Is History blasting in my ears.

If you aren't a friend of that show yet, do give it a try. You won't regret it. 

2/7

We were in Stockholm this Saturday evening - Samuel and me, that is. Maestro H. B. had invited us to listen to his concert so we spent a wonderful hour at Konserthuset, listening to Bruckner's 9th symphony, then said hi to H. B., walked around the city, marveled at the Christmas display on the windows of the fancy NK department store, and had a lovely dinner date. The clock, of course, was ticking the whole time. 

It ended up being the longest time I have ever been away from Lucas - 6,5 hours.

I've been thinking about this quite a lot. There are so many different realities and circumstances, possibilities and needs in different families, and without a slightest criticism toward other young moms I can say that I've never felt a need to be away from my child, to have a break, to do "my" things, to breathe "my" air. A lot of it comes down to the generous maternity leave system here in Scandinavia - I can literally drag out the time and stay home with my child for a good couple of years. Breastfeeding also plays a role - it puts very concrete boundaries to the ability of being away (unless one wants to mess with pumping - which I don't). The closeness - or absence - of grandparents or other possible babysitters affects the young parents, too. But all in all, other than reading in a cafe for an hour, I have never wanted to be away. Throughout L's first year of life, my "record" of being separated from him was four hours. It happened twice - once I attended a baby shower, once I sat in the emergency unit of a local hospital with a horrible breast inflammation. 

I know other moms who have different style of life. In one family (where the mother was not able to breastfeed) the baby has been dropped at grandparents' place for a night every Saturday evening ever since the baby was a month old. There was a serious case of postnatal depression in this family so that one free evening / night has been a lifeline for them. And I am glad it has work out so well for everyone, including the toting grandparents who love messing with bottles and nappies.

If I'm away from L. for more than two hours, I start getting separation anxiety. He, on the other hand, doesn't seem to care at all haha! He has just so much fun with farfar and farmor.

We will see what the next year brings. I am happy to continue my routine - with an occasional hour here and there, writing articles in the church office or reading a book in Cafe Chocolate. 

But our historic date night in Stockholm needed to be documented:

Waiting for the concert to start

NK's Christmas display is dedicated to Pippi

A date night - what a luxury!

1/7

I have this childhood friend M. with whom we played violin together and who is my greatest role model in the world of blogging. She has a brilliant blog, and it was her who encouraged me to start mine some 15 years ago. Every now and then M. does blogging marathons, writing every day for two weeks or a month. I'm always glad when she does that but I have never dared to do the same. What if I run out of things to say by, say, day four?

I have just written and recorded the morning devotionals for the Estonian National Radio. It means seven 5-minute reflections which are Christian in their content but still aimed at the regular listener (non-believer). They ask me to do this once a year and I always say yes and start with great enthusiasm. But usually by the fifth devotional, I am staring desperately at an empty Word document and scrolling through social media to gather ideas. It is a terrible thing to run out of things to say. 

But as this blog seems to be dying quietly, I will try to pump some life into it. So, I will write something every day for the next week. Let's see how this experiment turns out. 

--

When I think about what has happened lately over here, the main - earth shattering haha - news is that Lucas has turned one. What a year it has been! I don't think I've ever learned so much about life and myself in such a short period of time before. Having a child widens horizons, pushes you to emotional and physical limits, brings out the best and worst in you, and makes you look at your partner - the other parent - with new eyes. I've learnt a lot about newborns and their development, but equally much about myself. Whom I turn into when I haven't gotten more than 4 hours of sleep. How I react when an emergency happens (hint - not well). How I desperately want to hold on to the baby bubble and not come out. How much I appreciate Samuel and his calmness in the midst of a storm. How I love our daily routines. How I still wake up in the middle of a night to check if everything is well with L. and if he has a blanket on.

Five days before his birthday, L. started walking. S. had been jokingly telling him that he needed to get on his own feet before turning one, and he listened! I thought he'd need more time and get better at balancing so I wasn't expecting it to happen so soon. But one day he took a couple of shaky steps - which I dismissed as a coincidence - then slept the whole night, woke up the next morning, and was up on his feet. Now, after perfecting his skill for three weeks, he is everywhere. Everywhere. He also thinks he needs a new, more difficult challenge and has set his mind on climbing. *sigh* His new favourite thing is the little two-step IKEA kitchen stool which I've had to take away from the kitchen so that he could climb onto our guest bed. A little safer option. But he still has a nice big bruise on his forehead from this morning's climbing session. *double sigh*

Becoming a Person

Our little Mister Sunshine has turned 9 months old.

I have this conceptual scale in my head: vegetable - person. A newborn baby is more or less a vegetable. He just is, there is no meaningful interaction with the surrounding world. And a person in my mind is a child who is able to speak and who already has an opinion on different things. And amazingly enough, I think Lucas is right in the middle of the scale now. Of course, he is still far away from speaking, but he is equally far from being a passive, short-sighted, wrinkly newborn. The veggie days are over!

His development of late has been nothing short of mind-blowing. The list of "achievements" is a long one, but I try to list some that stick out most for me. So, here goes:

- Crawling. It is not the classical crawling yet, he kind of jumps on his belly but he works out very hard and is becoming more mobile by the day. As to the technical finesse, children mostly learn by observing and it is true that we have left him to figure it out by himself - we don't crawl around the house so he doesn't really know what it should look like. Hence the lack of proper technique.   

- Clapping hands.

- Putting the pacifier back in his mouth when it has fallen out.

- Going from crawling to sitting position and back.

- Eating all sorts of foods. Our current favorites are blueberries, omelette and kefir. 

- Sitting on a potty. We started using the potty a couple of months ago and after a bumpy start (it is very difficult to explain to a child why he needs to sit on this weird plastic thing with his bare bottom) he has gotten used to it. Now he sits there every time he wakes up, and the number of diapers we need every day has dropped significantly. The hardest thing with potty training was to get going with it - nowadays, the diapers are so comfortable and easy to use that you just get caught in the net of convenience as a parent. Unlike our parents' generation whose motivation for potty training came from the washing and drying and folding of cloth diapers, ours comes from... exactly nowhere. We're like fish hanging on a hook of comfort. Just last week I read an article about Swedish children being one of the last ones in the world to get diaper-free. In many places in the world, children are potty-trained by age two, here it is often three or four. We work hard here to swim against the tide lol. 

- Interest in the world. Over the last week or so, we have experienced a huge explosion in this area - suddenly he is interested in absolutely everything. Well, everything, except for his toys. It doesn't matter if it's a phone charger, a floor lamp, a bucket or a low drawer that catches his attention, he just hobbles right past his toy box as if it was nothing. I am beginning to suspect that Big Toy has sold us a lie and is just after our money. Or sometimes we sit at the living room window and look at (in the order of interest) 1) big children (meaning, the 4-year-olds) in the nearby kindergarten, 2) cars, 3) birds. The world fascinates him. His eyes are as big as balloons.   

And my eyes are almost as big as his - with an utmost fascination I observe this process of a vegetable becoming a person. Amazing stuff.   

Who needs a teddy bear?

Who needs a teddy bear? Vol 2

Training session

The Book Story

The story began exactly two years ago.

I had my doctoral defense in the end of April 2023. After the fog of exhaustion and relief began to lift - it took a couple of weeks - a question started to take shape in my head. What's the next big project? I asked. What's the next thing I am going to take on that is a little bit bigger and more permanent than just my daily cares and duties?

Somewhere deep inside I already knew the answer. I was not courageous enough to look the answer in the eye yet but I knew it nevertheless. Start writing. Write a book.

At that time, I happened to read John Mark Comer's book Garden City, a book about God's calling and work and why we are here on the Earth and what difference our lives make. And as I read, the conviction - or the answer, you might say - hit me again with a strong force. It is time to take up writing; it is time to put your sermons into a book. 

And still, I hesitated. And I thought to myself, if there is anyone who would confirm this calling, I promise to get going with it. But the next thought right after the first one was that of doubt - how could anyone confirm this calling? It is such a specific thing, no-one knows I have this idea in my head (not even S.), where could the confirmation possibly come from?

A couple of days later pastor D. came for a visit. He had married us a little less than a year before and as a pastoral person, he came to see how we were doing. We looked around in our apartment and did some small talk; we had not even sat down to have dinner together. And D. asked me about how I was doing. I said I had been terribly busy these last months - finishing up my Swedish studies, putting the finishing touches to my dissertation, surviving the 2,5 h defense, working in the church... I had had a lot on my plate. At least, I said, I was able to re-use my old sermon manuscripts as I really didn't have time to write new ones all the time. And D. said, as we stood in our living room, "Mervi, I have an idea for you. Whether you take it or leave it is up to you. But I think you should publish a book with your sermons." 

There it was.

Not "Have you thought about writing?" or anything vaguer, it was specific and concrete and simple. You should publish a sermon collection. 

I stared at D. and then at S., and then I had to explain to them what these words meant to me. How I had been waiting for a sign, not really believing it could come. But there it was.

This happened on a Friday evening. On Monday morning I opened my first sermon and started re-writing it. A promise is a promise.

Fast forward two years, and the book is finally published. 

It is a collection of 20 sermons which I have preached over the years, sermons which mean a lot to me personally, sermons which I have needed to hear and implement in my own life. They are about the fruit of the Spirit, forgiveness, God's calling, suffering, resting, carrying each others' burdens, and about many other things I find important as a follower of Jesus. I really hope they will touch the readers as these Bible texts the sermons are built on have touched me. 

Last weekend we had a little book release in Estonia. We barely ever have local authors publishing books, most of the stuff we publish in our church is translations. So we took the chance and had a book evening in Tartu church. I did some public reading from the book, we listened to beautiful music, there was a long conversation about what preaching and writing means to me, and in the end, everyone could purchase the book and get it signed. I was so touched to see how my old friends - and some strangers - had come from all over Estonia; the church hall was full and the queue for book signing was so long I could hardly see the end of it. 113 books were sold that evening, I later heard! The only thing I was sad about was that there was no time to mingle and have longer conversations. I would have loved to stay and talk but L., who had been so brave the whole long day, finally took up his favourite melody "Oh, great tiredness, sob sob, waah waah" and we had to get him to bed. Some other time, I promised myself, I will make up for these lost conversations. 

And now the book is on my living room table and each time I see it, a prayer comes up from my heart. That God would let it reach people I couldn't reach any other way! That the light of the Word would shine bright!