Katie sent me into the den to write a post, figuring that if she didn’t make me do it now, I’d completely waste the afternoon, possibly by cleaning gutters or putting away the rest of the camping stuff.  Instead, I’m diverted.  I looked in the draft folder, where I uploaded a bunch of photos 3 weeks ago but haven’t found the time to write, and there I saw this post.  Since we’re more than a month past Midsummer, it seems like maybe just maybe this post is becoming a bit untimely, so today’s the day.

Midsummer happened on June 26th.  Apparently it’s quite the cause for celebration in Sweden, and since I categorically refuse to partake in their fried fish egg culinary practices, a summer festival seemed an acceptable compromise.  Part of having an Au Pair live with us is supposed to be for the cultural exchange, after all.  We got Tim Tams from Laura, and Midsummer from Malin.  Apparently there were two separate groups putting on Midsummer celebrations, on two different weekends.  We went to the second one, down in Kenmore.  Malin had spent the night with Catrin in Issaquah, and we planned on meeting her there.

Katie slightly misunderstood the purpose of the celebration, and assumed that it must be time to tout her school pride vicariously through our children.  It isn’t the first time, and I’ve no doubt it won’t be the last. (You can see by the fit of the WSU onesies that it was the first and last time they would be worn.)

The first task was to raise the maypole.  This was done entirely manually.  I’m assuming that this is done early in the day because else wise the crowd could not be expected to remain sober enough to erect a maypole safely.

After the maypole went up, there was some dancing.

How very sad that 2 year old boys just weren’t quite ready to partake in a line dance, and we had to stay on the sidelines (whew!).

And then, Malin!

I’m assuming the crown of flowers is part of the whole experience, but it was almost as much fun watching Malin’s friend Angelica fight with the pollen that kept getting in her hair and on her clothes.  Kids these days.  Catrin made the crowns by hand.

And while no on was explicit on the matter, I’m assuming the flowers are only supposed to be worn by the girls.  By next year I’m sure our boys will start to resent such gender-skewed harassment, but they were good sports about it this year.

There was also live music by traditionally dressed performers.  It’s almost tempting to travel to Sweden just to see Malin all trussed up, but then there’s still those fried fish eggs.

Yes, that’s a ball.  We spent the entire bloody afternoon fighting with Dexter over that bloody thing.  No, Dexter, don’t th-.  Okay, this time I mean it, no mo-.  If you throw that ball one m-  I’m TIRED of fetching the ball, Dex – I’m not a -

<sigh>

Well, at least I got the pictures up before summer was officially over.  And since summer doesn’t officially start until June 24th, then MID summer really out to be somewhere around the first or second week of August, so honestly I think I’m correcting millenia of improper timekeeping, or at least a terrible misnomer.

I love rationalizing…