#daily norwegian

[bogkeep]

they found a girl at the beach

her words all washed away

still feeling waves against her legs

and whale skin at her touch

foam in her hair, salt in her veins

so

they tell her about the sea

[onenakedfarmer]

Daily Painting

Frits Thaulow TOWN BY MOONLIGHT (1897)

[burymeinwillow]

one of these days I'm gonna draw Joe riding Forest's horse, Askeladden... most annoying little fjord horse in all of Nevada (and probably the only one)

[palwaaktaardaily]

[astriiformes]

Cried in front of my Norwegian professor because I forgot that our big midterm project was due today and not tomorrow, and I went to him after class just to be like "I am so sorry I am so bad at homework. My life is on fire but I swear I like this class and am looking forward to next semester"

....and then I also very nearly cried in front of my favorite professor from last year because we met to talk about the possibility of me doing an independent study with him sometime before I graduate and he was so kind about wanting to put together something that would really help me refine my goals and have some ideas about where to go after undergrad, and also about the fact that my life is a mess and it's making it hard for me to think about the future.

TL;DR - I think somewhere down the line I may literally owe my career to some of my professors being so kind and understanding this time around despite everything else falling apart around me.

[nordic-language-love]

å yte (to provide)

yter - ytet, yta, ytte - har ytet, har yta, har ytt

"Vi må prate mer om hvordan vi skal ivareta de som yter omsorg for sine kjære."

We need to talk more about how we shall look after for those who provide care for their loved ones.

Article link.

[eruscreaminginthedistance]

0__0

[puppyexpressions]

Daily Cuteness: Norwegian Lundehund

[kavinjindal]

Reflecting on three books that impacted my perspective towards humanity

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Daily writing promptList three books that have had an impact on you. Why?View all responses I have read a lot of literature in the past few years varying across diverse genres. Books exploring the themes of crime, young romance, revenge and suicide. But out of the list comprising of the finished books, there are only a few that caused a heavy impact on me that I couldn’t stop pondering upon for…

[redgoldsparks]

My very last comic for The Nib! End of an era! Transcription below the cut. instagram / patreon / portfolio / etsy / my book / redbubble

The first event I went to with GENDER QUEER was in NYC in 2019 at the Javits Center.

So many of the people who came to my signing were librarians, and so many of them said the same thing: "I know exactly who I want to give this to!" Maia: "Thank you for helping readers find my book!" While working on the book, I was genuinely unsure if anyone outside of my family and close friends would read it. But the early support of librarians and two American Library Association awards helped sell two print runs in first year.

Since then, GENDER QUEER been published in 8 languages, with more on the way: Spanish, Czech, Polish, French, Italian, Norwegian, Portugese and Dutch.

It has also been the most banned book in the United States for the past two years. The American Library Association has tracked an astronomical increase in book challenges over the past few years. Most of these challenges are to books with diverse characters and LGBTQ themes. These challenges are coming unevenly across the US, in a pattern that mirrors the legislative attacks on LGBTQ people. The Brooklyn Public Library offered free eCards to anyone in the US aged 13-21, in an effort to make banned books more available to young readers. A teacher in Norman, Oklahoma gave her students the QR code for the free eCard and lost her job. Summer Boismeir is now working for the Brooklyn Public Library. Hoopla and Libby/Overdrive, apps used to access digital library books, are now banned in Mississippi to anyone under 18. Some libraries won’t allow anyone under 18 to get any kind of library card without parental permission. When librarians in Jamestown, Michigan refused to remove GENDER QUEER and several other books, the citizens of the town voted down the library’s funding in the fall 2022 election. Without funding, the library is due to close in mid-2024. My first event since covid hit was the American Library Association conference in June 2022 in Washington, DC. Once again, the librarians in my signing line all had similar stories for me: “Your book was challenged in our district" "It was returned to the shelf!" "It was removed from the shelf..." "It was moved to the adult section."

Over and over I said: "Thank you. Thank you for working so hard to keep my book in your library. I’m sorry you had to defend it, but thank you for trying, even if it didn't work." We are at a crossroads of freedom of speech and censorship. The future of libraries, both publicly funded and in schools, are at stake. This is massively impacting the daily lives of librarians, teachers, students, booksellers, and authors around the country. In May 2023, I read an article from the Washington Post analyzing nearly 1000 of the book challenges from the 2021-2022 school year. I was literally on route to a festival to talk about book bans when I read a startling statistic. 60% of the 1000 book challenges were submitted by just 11 people. One man alone was responsible for 92 challenges. These 11 people seem to have made submitting copy-cat book challenges their full-time hobby and their opinions are having an outsized ripple effect across the nation. WE NEED TO MAKE THE VOICES SUPPORTING DIVERSE BOOKS AND OPPOSING BOOK BANS EVEN LOUDER. If you are able too, show up for your library and school board meetings when book challenges are debated. Send supportive comments and emails about the Pride book display and Drag Queen story hours. If you see a display you like– for Banned Book Week, AAPI Month, Black History Month, Disability Awareness Month, Jewish holidays, Trans Day of Remembrance– compliment a librarian! Make sure they feel the love stronger than the hate <3

Maia Kobabe, 2023

The Nib

[onenakedfarmer]

Daily Painting

Harald Sohlberg STREET IN RØROS (1902)

[darkacademiacathedral]

I want to spend some time talking about Murakami's Norwegian Wood.

It would be an understatement to claim that this book is a mood of its own. Rather, I would dare to say that it is a whole range of moods compiled into one volume. There are so many hard-relates packed into this one volume of 400 pages. It is at once a book about mental health, dark academia (or maybe academia in general), erotica, human experience, and lazing around.

This book has a lot of nothing much happening, which I have come to realise and accept, is my favorite kind of fiction. Whether it was Mrs. Dalloway's reveries on the past, or the paralysis of the Dubliners, I enjoyed the nothingness, or the sheer plotlessness of these books by Virginia Woolf and James Joyce respectively.

Now I haven't finished Norwegian Wood yet, but I am at least deep enough into the book to be able to expect a discernible plot — but it is mostly vignettes from the first-person character Toru Watanabe's life. This doesn't take away from the book at all, rather places it in a different category of its own.

We find Watanabe deal with unexpected flings, and unplanned encounters with zany characters such as Storm Trooper, Midori, and Reiko. We find him occasionally reading fiction that we recognise, such as Thomas Mann's Magic Mountain and Faulkner's Light in August. We see him do all sorts of ordinary things, yet we find him to be detached from humanity. He is oddly Christ-like, uncannily good-natured, and strangely free from trouble.

The heart of humanity is not present in Watanabe's character at all; he seems almost robotic, like an automaton doing things he's programmed to do. Rather, the humanity of Murakami's masterpiece comes from the events and people that surround this character: the hypocritical revolutionaries, the card-carrying fanatics, the crippled and the ailing, the welcoming friend who is also a nymphomaniac, and those many people in Tokyo going about their daily business.

I really am enjoying this book, and I don't want it to end so soon.

[linguist-breakaribecca]

Today, in “I’ll take any good news I can find”:

A production of Romeo and Juliet with Deaf actors signing their lines has been referred to as bilingual! Not just “accessible” or “diverse” but also BILINGUAL!

This makes me happy because the general idea of ASL (and other signed languages) is that they’re just a manual version of the spoken language. By that logic, Norwegian is just a higher-latitude version of German. Signed languages are languages of their own! With unique vocabulary, grammar, and dialects!

[crystallinestars]

If They Were Your Pet Cat (Part 3)

This won the poll, so here is part 3. My HCs on what Gepard, Ratio, Dan Heng, and Sampo would be like as your pet cat.

I don't know what I'm doing anymore

Links to previous parts:

Part 1 (Genshin)

Part 2 (Aventurine, Argenti, Jing Yuan)

-------------

Gepard:

🛡️ Norwegian Forest cat

🛡️ Gepard is the most dog-like cat you have ever met. Much like a dog, he sees you off when you leave your house, and greets you when you return. He enjoys playing fetch more than chasing after a string, since it fetch gives him more of a workout. He’s also easy to train to perform tricks since he understands and obeys commands quickly. If you wanted, you could bring him to cat agility tournaments and do fairly well in the competition.

🛡️ He is incredibly loyal to you. While he’s welcoming and accepting of your loved ones and lets them pet him, he only listens to you. He doesn’t obey their commands the way he does yours. He might comply if your relative gave him an order to come here, but won’t do tricks and such for them. If you tell him to come here, roll over, play dead, etc… Gepard will comply without hesitation. He’s that trusting and loyal towards you.

🛡️ While to you Gepard appears harmless, in reality, he’s a force to be reckoned with, even for a house cat. If he sees you welcome someone into your home, he assumes the person is important to you, so he welcomes them in turn, albeit with some initial suspicion. That’s why he’s so accepting of your loved ones. However, if someone enters uninvited, especially if it’s someone he doesn’t know, Gepard won’t hesitate to growl and threaten the person to leave. His fur stands on end to make him look larger, and his teeth and claws are bared, showing that he means business. It’s usually enough to discourage anyone from trespassing. If not, then he’ll alert you with a loud yowl if you’re home, or go in for an attack. Furthermore, if someone makes you uncomfortable in your own home, Gepard senses your discomfort and is immediately at your side, ready to attack if the other person tries anything. He has no reservations about using his claws and teeth for the sake of protecting his owner.

🛡️ Due to his long and thick coat, Gepard requires regular grooming. Based on the somber expression on his cute little muzzle, you can tell he doesn’t enjoy being bathed and groomed, but he soldiers through it without struggle or complaint. As mentioned previously, he’s very loyal and trusting of you, so he understands that what you’re doing to him is not dangerous and is for his own benefit. Giving him praise about how much of a good boy he’s being, seems to help warm him up to the process.

🛡️ While he’s not a huge fan of being pet, but if you spend some time gently petting his head or brushing his fur, he will relax and accept the attention. He purrs and kneads at whatever is under him, clearly enjoying the experience. You try to give him gentle pets as a reward for waiting for you to come home and keeping watch of the house, and it works to deepen your bond with him.

🛡️ He’s vocal when with you. Gepard often communicates with you via chirps and low meows, using them as a means of calling you over for something. When you leave something cooking on the stove and forget about it, Gepard smells smoke and meows at you to come over and take care of it. If you haven’t unloaded the washing machine for a while, he calls on you to let you know its done. He just wants to help his owner stay on track.

🛡️ Once the two of you settle into a daily routine, Gepard expects you to maintain it. He’ll be unhappy if the pattern is broken. If you oversleep, Gepard is there to wake you up. He’ll meow and walk all over you until you get up and feed him. It’s great for when you sleep past you alarm since it prevents you from being late to work/school, but it’s not so fun on the weekends… Similarly, Gepard expects you to go to bed at the same time every night. He’s used to going to bed together with you, so if you stay up late, he’ll sit nearby and glare at you, tail twitching in dissatisfaction. If you don’t get his hint to abandon everything and head to bed already, then he’ll quietly meow to get your attention.

Ratio:

📘 Is a Bengal

📘 Ratio is an extremely intelligent cat, but he has a nasty attitude. He’s very prideful and stubborn, and despite your attempts to discipline and train him, he refuses to bend to your will. If anything, you’re the one bending to his. He’s not a troublemaker, but if you piss him off enough, Ratio can resort to knocking items off shelves or swatting at your face (with claws retracted, thankfully) in retaliation. If you scold him for his behaviour, he simply glares at you with his ears flattened to his head and tail flicking, as if daring you to say more. Everything about his body language screams he will swat you in the face if you say another word.

📘 If he messes up big time, such as breaking something important or accidentally nicking you with his claws, then Ratio accepts the scolding with a guilty expression. The flicking of his tail indicates he’s not happy to sit through your verbal lashing, but he’s smart enough to understand that what he did was bad for you. Despite his prideful attitude, the feline doesn’t want to cause you too much trouble, or so you like to think.

📘 You find out that Ratio is unusually intelligent for a cat soon after adopting him. He enjoys playing with cat toys that serve as a puzzle he must solve to get a treat. Ratio also observed how you open doors, and devised his own methods of opening them despite not having hands. He also likes to sit beside you on the bed or desk when you read books, in particular textbooks. As a cat, there’s no way he knows how to read, but you frequently catch him staring intently at the pages. It’s a mystery as to what is going through his mind during those moments, but it sometimes unnerves you how he seems to be studying the images. Aside from books, Ratio also enjoys watching TV, especially if it’s a documentary where he can observe various animals. He’s smart enough to know that what’s on TV is not in real life. If you bring something new home, Ratio takes time to thoroughly sniff and inspect whatever that something may be. He’s very curious and enjoys interacting with new things. That said, he also requires a lot of exercise. He’s a large and muscular cat for his breed, and requires ample space and playtime to run around and burn off excess energy.

📘 Despite being a cat, Ratio considers himself your equal, if not your superior. Back when you first got him, you had placed some cat food into a bowl on the floor for him while you sat at the table to eat. Ratio had expressed a clear dislike for this arrangement, climbing onto the table and angrily meowing at you. You expect him to eat kibble off the floor like a common cat, while you eat a freshly cooked meal at the table? Absolutely not. Know your place, human. After several consecutive sessions like that where he angrily yowled at you for constantly shooing him off the table, Ratio now eats at the table with you. He always waits to eat together with you, so if you skip on a meal or are late to eat, he’ll make his dissatisfaction with you known.

📘 On the topic of food, Ratio dislikes eating cheap cat food. He likes healthier cat food brands which usually end up being more expensive, but he especially likes it if you cook his meal yourself. Some cooked chicken, fish, or seafood make him a very happy cat. He’s a spoiled cat.

📘 Ratio dislikes loud noises, so if you have noisy guests over, he will usually hide. He developed a habit of sticking his head inside a small paper bag you had lying around, and wearing it on his head until the guests leave. You’re unsure if he’s trying to block out the noise or trying to hide, but one thing for certain is that he becomes very upset if you remove the paper bag from his head. The bag must stay.

📘 Ratio typically isn’t into being pet or cuddled, so such occasions with him are rare. He does, however, enjoy it when you scratch under his chin. He tends to close his eyes and purr when you lightly scratch under his chin. Another time he allows you to touch him freely is during baths. Ratio is probably the first cat you’ve ever met that loves baths. He seems to always be eager to hop into the tub and soak in the warm water. He lets you clean his body without complaint, seeming to enjoy the pampering. He’s patient while you dry and brush him, but he expects you to do a good job of grooming his fur. If you’re gentle enough with the brush, he might lean into it and purr in enjoyment.

Dan Heng:

🐉 Is a Dragon Li (I had to)

🐉 Dan Heng is a reserved cat. He prefers to spend time alone, away from the chatter and activity of people. You can often find him sitting by a window, pensively staring outside at the world beyond the glass. You can only wonder what he’s thinking about with such a somber expression. What kind of troubles do cats have on their minds?

🐉 If you have guests over, then Dan Heng hides. He dislikes crowds and loud noises, you’ve noticed. It’s rare for him to come out of hiding to meet guests. If he does, he tends to keep his distance and peers over the corner at whoever you have invited. Once his curiosity has been sated, he’ll leave without interacting with your guest at all.

🐉 Dan Heng is pretty antisocial, but he’s more amicable around you. While he doesn’t humor your guests when they try to play with him, when you’re the one dangling the cat toys or laser, Dan Heng engages in play with you. He also lets you get away with more than you think. He tolerates it when you play with his paws or rub his belly, even though he doesn’t actually like it. You’re also the only one he allows to pick him up.

🐉 Despite purchasing him a cat bed, Dan Heng doesn’t sleep in it. He acts a bit awkward around it, as if not knowing if it’s for him or not. He prefers to sleep on the floor, usually on a comfy rug. With some time and patience, you can coax him to sleep on your bed but know that he won’t snuggle up to you. Dan Heng will keep some distance between you and will lay at your feet. Even then, he’ll only lay on your bed if you’re settling in to sleep. During the day, he still naps on the floor.

🐉 Sometimes, you notice Dan Heng’s legs twitch and ears flatten when he sleeps, his fur standing on end as if he were terrified of something in his dreams. You’re uncertain if cats can have bad dreams, but Dan Heng’s reaction makes you think he’s having a nightmare. He seems dazed when he wakes from such episodes, and you wonder if he dreamed about something horrible from his days when he was a stray. You try to comfort him through these episodes by checking in on him and speaking gently, which seems to help calm him down. He follows you around for a bit after that, as if wanting to remain in your presence for a bit longer.

🐉 Despite how aloof Dan Heng is, you still know he cares about your well-being. If you’re having a bad day, he softens up to you. As if sensing your sadness, he comes out of hiding and remains by your side, sometimes even lying on your lap or chest. He allows you to pet and cuddle him if you need the comfort, and stays with you until you feel better. If you take medication, Dan Heng reminds you to take it on time if you forget.

🐉 Dan Heng keeps himself quite clean, and only needs an occasional bath and claw trim from you to keep him in perfect condition. He's surprisingly tolerant of baths. You thought he might struggle and run, but Dan Heng calmly handles the entire bathing process without so much as a peep. If you make fun of him for looking like a wet cat, Dan Heng will give you the most unamused look you’ve ever seen from a cat, and proceed to give you the cold shoulder for the rest of the day.

Sampo:

💣 Korat breed

💣 Cats are renowned for how quietly they walk, to the point their owners don’t hear them approach. It’s an amazing skill, yet somehow, Sampo manages to surpass the average cat in terms of stealth. While most cats still make noise when they accidentally knock something over when walking along cluttered surfaces or running around the house, Sampo doesn’t. He’s silent and careful about the way he moves, putting his feline brethren to shame. This skill of his comes at a detriment, however. You don’t hear him trail behind you when you do chores at home, and sometimes trip over him or step on his tail on accident. Sampo still hasn’t forgiven you for squashing his tail.

💣 He's a very intelligent and mischievous cat. Sure, he can do tricks in exchange for treats like a dog, but his intelligence goes far beyond that. Back when you first got him, there was a time when you were having dinner and Sampo came up to you and started to rub himself against your legs. He was very responsive when you leaned down to pet him, purring up a storm as you cooed at him. You were so engrossed with how cute and affectionate Sampo was acting, that you didn’t mind when he climbed up onto your lap for more affection. That was your mistake. While you were distracted with petting him, the furry scoundrel took the opportunity to snatch some food off your plate and made a run for it.

💣 He tried to use the same trick on you again, but it didn’t work a second time. However, he uses it fairly often on your guests. Despite your warning to not fall for his false charms, Sampo always manages to win your guests over and then unceremoniously yoinks their food from their plates when they least expect it. He has now been banned from the dining area when guests are over.

💣 Sampo has proven his cunning in other ways, too. Since the same tactic doesn’t work on you twice, the little furball devised another plan. He learned that you respond very effectively to his calls of distress, and so now when you have a meal, he goes into another room in the house and yowls in the most pitiful manner you have ever heard. His distressed meows make you abandon your food in favor of searching for your cat, concerned that something might be wrong with him. While you’re busy searching for him, Sampo slinks past you to where you were eating. By the time you come back after a fruitless search, you discover that half your food has gone missing.

💣 Sampo’s antics don’t end there. Once when you came home, you found your pantry raided and fridge open and emptied. The culprit was none other than your feline fiend of a pet—Sampo. You can’t fathom how, but he figured out how to open the fridge, among other types of doors. Of course, you gave him the scolding of a lifetime. He immediately started begging for your forgiveness by rubbing against your legs and staring at you with his big, green eyes as if begging you to not be angry at little ol’ Sampo. Despite sucking up to you, Sampo continued to steal food from the pantry, but in smaller quantities this time to not get caught. You still caught him in the act, though, and now have locks on all your cabinets and fridge to keep him out.

💣 Aside from food theft and manipulation, Sampo also has a habit of collecting various knickknacks around the house. He squirrels away anything that catches his fancy and that isn’t securely stored away where he can’t get into. He keeps his “treasures” in a small nook where he suspects you won’t find them, such as under your bed, behind the couch, or in a cluttered spot inside the closet. You only discover his secret stash when you do a deep cleaning of your home. There, in the dusty corner, are your missing hair ties, jewelry, candy wrappers, random string and other junk that you lost track of long ago. Sampo will be very upset if you confiscate these items.

💣 You can’t force Sampo to do something he doesn’t want. If you want bathe him and he hears the water running in the tub, he vanishes without a trace. If it’s time to go to the vet and he sees you get out the cat carrier, he disappears like smoke. He’s right next to you one moment, and then gone the next. No amount of “pspsps” or cat treats will coax him out of hiding. You can even turn the entire place upside down and still not find him.

[nordic-language-love]

hmmmm starting to think n4 exam in july was maaaaybe a bit ambitious but i’ve committed now so i guess i have no choice but to do my best

[copper-16]

She Feels Safe With You

Ingrid comes to a realization about her wife as a mother after a particularly hard day with a fussy, upset baby.

(a/n: this was requested by someone on ao3! It's honestly half coherent but life I am riding the struggle bus a tad bit ust wanted to write something soft and sweet about these three, hence this!)

Mapi never really considered herself a crier, not just as a general rule. 

She did not cry when she got hurt, or when she was frustrated, or when she watched a sad movie. 

She cried occasionally, sure, but it wasn’t a daily, or weekly, or even monthly occurrence. 

The Spaniard had cried when Ingrid had walked down the aisle, when she had resigned from the national team. She had cried when she got the notification that Spain had won the World Cup, an event she was not present for. 

When they found out they were pregnant, Mapi cried. Ingrid had been in too much disbelief to cry at first, not truly believing that it had worked, not after two failed transfers. 

But the center back had cried instantly, fat, bumble bee like tears rolling down her cheeks as she thought about the fact that they were actually going to be having a baby. 

It probably should have been a sign of what was to come, in the future. 

Mapi cried at nearly every ultrasound, tears springing to her eyes whenever they simply wheeled the doppler in, practically. Ingrid had begun to joke that her wife had turned into Pavlov’s dog, except it was listening to their baby's heartbeat at the appointments. It earns her a withering glance, as Mapi roughly shoved her tears away. 

“Are you going to cry every time you hold her? What is going to happen when you hear her heartbeat when she is no longer inside of me?” Ingrid sassed, though Mapi does not dignify her with a response. 

The Norwegian has a relatively easy pregnancy, thank god. She keeps waiting for the wild emotional highs and lows, or the cravings, but neither really come. She had her moments, sure, but in the large percentage of the time, she felt normal. 

What had been more fun, honestly, was to watch her wife turn into a complete and utter pile of mush, emotionally. 

She had never seen Mapi cry as much as she did in the lead up to Elena’s birth. Sometimes she would walk out of their bedroom to see Mapi sitting on the couch, tears running down her face as she looked straight ahead, not even really looking at anything in particular. 

“What are you crying about?” Ingrid had asked, her head cocked to the side in confusion. The Spaniard looked back toward her, her brows furrowed in confusion as she shook her head. 

“I’m not really…I’m not really sure?” Mapi asked, her words a question rather than a statement. She took Ingrid in for a second, the swell of her stomach, and couldn’t help the fresh wave of tears that overtook her once more. 

“We’re having a daughter,” she breathed out, her words slightly gasping over the wavering of emotion in her voice. Ingrid made her way over to the couch, settling next to her wife as she curled into her. 

Mapi moved to wrap her arms around Ingrid, as she usually did, but the dark haired woman stopped her, softly. Instead, she took her wife's hands gently in her own, pressing a kiss to each of her palms before she placed them over her belly. 

Ingrid relished in the way that her wife let out the tiniest little sigh of relief, even as more tears dripped down her face. 

“That’s your daughter in there,” Ingrid insisted, her voice soft. A tiny kick pressed against the center back’s hand, as if to punctuate the defender’s point. Mapi closed her eyes, even more tears leaking out of her eyes as she nodded. 

The Spaniard was terrified that she wouldn’t be connected to Elena, because she wasn’t the one who carried her. She was terrified that she wouldn’t love her daughter, or be a good parent, that she wouldn’t do or say the right things. 

It was easy for Ingrid to know that Mapi was going to be a good parent. Because the reality of the matter was that her wife cared, deeply, and that already made her a hell of a better parent than a lot of people out there. 

But Mapi still struggled to see that, no matter how much she was reminded. 

————

Mapi cried when Elena was born. She cried as she held her little baby, as she pressed the pad of her pointer finger to her little nose. Elena stayed firmly asleep when she was in Mapi’s arms, never once fussing until she was passed around. 

It became a bit of a theme, their daughter sleeping on Mapi. 

Ingrid didn’t notice it at first, not when she was a baby. She was so little after all, all she did was sleep, practically. 

But still, Ingrid snapped a million photos of her daughter, and so she got a fair bit of Elena sleeping against Mapi. It was where her daughter always seemed happiest, and as much as the Spaniard panicked and turned to Ingrid when the baby was fussing, it was her who was the best at calming Elena. 

It was only when Elena got a little bit older, that Ingrid finally pieced it together. 

The baby was a little bit older, a little bit more alert. She was nearly a year old when she began to resist sleeping, not as easy to put down, waking up early, becoming fussy. 

Ingrid had been at her wits end all morning. The baby wouldn’t stop crying, and her head hurt, and she was tired. 

She wanted nothing more than to go into her bedroom, curl up with her wife, and sleep for more than two hours at a time. But she couldn’t do that, not with her baby here, not when Elena needed her. 

When the doorbell rang, the Norwegian honestly wanted to scream. Elena looked as though she was just about to fall asleep, but the baby jerked awake as soon as the doorbell rang, her nap forgotten. 

The crying was back, and Ingrid held the baby to her chest as she ripped the door open, lashing out at whatever was closest. 

The culprit just happened to be Frido. 

“Fridolina Rolfö I swear to GOD–” Ingrid started, only to be cut off before she could say something she truly regretted. 

“Ingrid.” 

The voice was soft, and probably shouldn’t have been audible over the crying of their daughter, but Ingrid would never not hear her wife. The defender turned around, finding Mapi standing behind her with a sympathetic look on her face. 

The Spaniard had just gotten off the phone from a brand meeting, just a few minutes prior. But she had called Frido before the meeting started, telling the Swede that she needed to come steal Ingrid for a bit. Feed her, let her nap in peace, get away from the house for a bit. 

The Norwegian looked back at her wife with confusion. She hadn’t made plans with Frido, and she knew that she couldn’t leave Elena like this. 

But the Spaniard reached for the baby regardless, taking her from Ingrid. The dark haired woman looked over her wifes face. There was exhaustion present, lines written into her face, bags under her eyes. 

But there was also understanding there. Some nerves, but understanding nonetheless. 

“I called Frido to come take you back to her house for a bit, to have a little bit of a break. Eat a proper meal. Get some sleep without a crying baby around. Rest for a while, princesa. We will be here when you return,” Mapi promised, leaning forward to kiss Ingrid’s cheek. The Norwegian panicked, looking from Frido to her wife. 

“But–” Ingrid started, knowing how nervous it made Mapi to be left alone with the baby. 

Still, even all these months later, she worried that she was struggling to connect with her daughter. All of Ingrid’s movements seemed so natural, so perfected. And somehow still, hers felt awkward and stinted, never quite right, never as maternal or as easy as she wanted them to be. 

She wanted to do better, though, for her daughter and her wife, who was clearly exhausted. Not that the center back wasn’t equally as tired, she just couldn’t very well do anything about it right this very second. But she could do something about Ingrid’s exhaustion. 

“No, we will be fine, Ingrid. Take a few hours, amor, you are exhausted,” Mapi soothed, gently pressing the Norwegian out of the door with a soft hand, allowing Frido to lead her away. 

It turned out, Ingrid needed it more than she thought humanly possible. When she got back to the Swede’s house, there was Sodd waiting for her on the table, and she practically collapsed into the bowl she ate so quickly. 

She napped in Frido’s guest bedroom, sleeping for four straight hours. 

When she awoke, she felt like a new woman. She emerged from the bedroom with a small, sheepish smile. 

“I am SO sorry for snapping at you this morning,” Ingrid apologized, even as Frido held up her hand. 

“Ingrid, you were exhausted and carrying a screaming baby, if I had been you I would have been roundhouse kicking someone,” Frido admitted, and the defender couldn’t help the tiny laugh that she released at the thought. As she came back to herself, she couldn’t help but straighten, a thought racing through her mind. 

“Oh my god, Mapi is still home with the baby…can you take me back?” Ingrid asked in a slight panic, and her Swedish teammate quickly sprung into action to grab her car keys. 

“She is still so worried that she is not doing a good job with Elena,” the Norwegian admitted as they drove, her heart punctuated with worry. 

“Still?” Frido asked, well aware of the struggles that the center back had during the first few months of Elena’s life. 

“Not as much now, but still. It does not come as naturally to her as she wants it to be, but she still does such a good job, somehow. I do not know how she doesn’t see it, really,” Ingrid revealed, and Frido let out a small, sad sigh. 

“She is so hard on herself,” the Swede commented, and Ingrid could only cringe as she nodded, her agreement weighing on the car heavily. 

Frido parked the car in the car park of their apartment building, coming up with Ingrid to check on Mapi and Elena. They were both expecting to still hear crying as they unlocked the door, but the house was…quiet. 

Ingrid looked toward her teammate in confusion before they walked into the house, both of them searching for the Spaniard. 

“Mapi?” Frido called out softly as she checked the kitchen, only to hear the Norwegian call out to her in the living room. 

When the blonde walked into the room, she stopped next to Ingrid, surprise coating her expression. 

Mapi was fast asleep on the couch, with Elena curled into her chest. Mapi was only in a sports bra, her shirt discarded on the floor. The baby was stripped down to her diaper, pressed into her Mami’s chest comfortably, completely asleep as well. 

Frido looked from the Spaniard to the Norwegian, her eyebrow raised. 

“I don’t know, looks pretty natural to me,” she shrugged, and Ingrid softened as she nodded, unable to tear her eyes away from the sight. She pulled her phone out, snapping a photo and placing it in an album on her phone that she was well acquainted with. 

Ingrid left the two of them, seeing Frido out before she returned to the living room. She sat on the floor, simply staring up at the two of them as they slept. Elena was completely safe, engulfed by Mapi’s arms. 

How Mapi could keep her daughter so safe and secure, and still question whether she was a good parent, Ingrid sometimes did not know. It seemed so blatantly obvious to the dark haired woman, that her wife was an amazing parent. 

She only wished that the brunette could see it herself. 

It was only another half hour before Elena began to fuss, and Ingrid quickly plucked the baby from her wife’s arms, going to feed and change her. The Spaniard was dead to the world, and Ingrid decided to simply let her sleep. 

Lord knows the woman could use it, just as she had needed it. 

But even after Elena was fed and changed, she continued to fuss. She cried softly, not very loudly or in a grumpy way, but as though she was not completely happy. 

Ingrid tried everything. She bounced the baby, she walked her around, she made faces at her, she covered her in blankets, she laid her down. 

Nothing seemed to appease her daughter. Not even when Ingrid stripped her own shirt off, wondering if maybe she just enjoyed the skin to skin contact. 

But still Elena kicked her little legs, letting out a weak, tired cry. The defender held her baby out in front of her, her eyebrows furrowed. 

“What do you need?” Ingrid asked aloud, though she wasn’t really expecting an answer. Still Elena let out a frustrated cry, wriggling slightly. The Norwegian paused for a moment, before turning around and heading for the living room to test a theory that was beginning to form. 

And sure enough, as soon as the baby was laid on her Mami’s chest, she quieted instantly. 

The brunette shifted in her sleep, wrapping her arms protectively around Elena, mumbling incoherently as she snuggled into her. Ingrid sat down on the couch next to her, cuddling into her wife as she slept, and helping to keep their daughter held securely as she slept. 

Mapi awoke when Elena started fussing again, waking gently as she wrapped her arms around her daughter, her attention completely on Elena even as she woke up. 

“Shh shh mi sol, esta bien, esta bien,” Mapi murmured, picking Elena up and going to sit up, at which point she registered Ingrid next to her. 

“Oh, hello princesa,” the Spaniard murmured, settling their daughter in her arms before she leaned over to deposit a kiss on her wife’s cheek. She paused though, when she found Ingrid crying, her phone in hand. 

“Ingrid? Is everything okay?” Mapi asked softly, her voice thick with sleep but still filled with concern. The Norwegian nodded easily, running her hand over Elena’s back as she set her phone down on the couch. 

“You are the best Mami,” she replied simply, watching as a flicker of doubt overtook the Spaniard’s face before she nodded, trying her hardest to look encouraged. The Norwegian looked at her wife for a moment before she reached for their daughter. 

“Here, give me Elena,” Ingrid said gently, taking the baby and going to put her down for an actual nap. 

When Ingrid returned, she found the center back sitting on the couch, her knees pulled up to her chest. 

“I realized something, when I came back from Frido’s,” the defender began as she sat back down, reaching for her phone once more. Mapi turned to look at her, quiet and more than a little curious. 

“Ever since Elena was born, I’ve kept an album on my phone that is just pictures of her sleeping on you. And whenever I feel sad, or upset, or I just need a little pick me up, I always look at it. It’s my two favorite people in the world, after all,” Ingrid explained, and her words are so gentle that Mapi can’t help but smile shyly, even after all these years. 

“She’s always loved sleeping on you, María. You are the best at calming her down, you are the first to get her to sleep. She feels safe sleeping on you, amor,” Ingrid argued softly, though Mapi looked immediately posed to disagree. 

“Look,” Ingrid insisted, pressing her phone into the hands of her wife. The album is already pulled up, simply waiting for the Spaniard. 

Hundreds of pictures. 

Thousands of pictures, even. 

All of Elena snuggled into her Mami, fast asleep. They started when she was a newborn, so tiny that Mapi had struggled to even hold her without feeling fear. 

As the little girl grew, so did the Spaniard’s resolve to be there for her daughter. Her confidence grew as well, her worry subsided a little bit. 

But more than anything, over the last year, her love for the little girl grew immensely. Tears slid down her cheeks as she scrolled through the album, through the actual, physical proof that just served to show how much she had come to care for their daughter. 

The brunette still had no clue how she could hold so much love for someone so incredibly small, but she did.

The Spaniard stood suddenly, handing Ingrid’s phone back to her before she walked back into their apartment. It was the number one rule, not to move a sleeping baby, but Mapi did not care, not right now. 

She picked Elena up from her crib, tucking her daughter into her arms tightly, praying that she could always protect her from the world as much as she could right now. 

The baby stayed fast asleep, little hot puffs of air hitting her in the chest, where Elena was positioned. Mapi bowed her head downward, her tears dripping from her nose and onto her daughter's perfect little head as she pressed kiss after kiss to the crown of her head. 

“Te amo mucho,” Mapi murmured, as she wondered if finally, finally, she was enough. 

“She feels safe with you,” Ingrid commented from her spot leaning against the doorway of the nursery. The center back looked up for a moment, her eyes thick with tears. “She is always falling asleep with you, always soothed by you. She feels safe with you, amor. She feels safe with her Mami, and that is enough, you are enough,” Ingrid emphasized, and Mapi struggles to keep her composure as her lungs spasm, burning from the effort of keeping her cries quiet. 

Elena opens her eyes carefully, blinking up at Mapi with sleep ridden eyes. 

“Mami,” she rasps, reaching out for the Spaniard. Mapi cradles her daughter close to her, pressing her face into Elena’s skin as the little girl giggles lightly, reaching out to pull at a lock of brunette hair. 

The Spaniard cannot bring herself to care as she pulls the little girl back, looking her firmly in the eyes. Elena smiles back at her, content and happy, safe and secure. 

“Te amo tanto. No puedo vivir sin ti,” Mapi murmured to her daughter, as she felt a part of her heart settle. 

Maybe it hadn’t always been the most natural thing to her, to hold a child or change a diaper or play with a baby. 

But what she made up for in lack of skill in the beginning, she had made up for with an entirely overwhelming amount of love. Because no matter what she did not know, there was absolutely nothing that Mapi would not do for her little girl. 

And maybe, at its core, that had always been enough. 

Maybe all they needed for everything to make sense was a little love, and a very long nap.