Wishing you a festive easter and spring holiday! Hopefully there will be some fresh air and outside time, but also a few indulgences here and there too! Back after the holiday!
We’re settling into the long Easter break, and it looks like we’re going to get lucky on the weather this year. As the whole break is five days long and since we don’t have a summer allotment or seaside cottage to open up, we’ll be in the area, which is having me think about various things we can do out and about that will help us enjoy whatever we can get of the early springtime sun. All the of the seasonal things to do in Copenhagen aren’t quite open but a good number of them open up or have special events for Easter break - like the Frilandsmuseet in Lyngby.
The Frilandsmuseet, or Open Air Museum, is just outside of town (and not too far from us) and is mainly a collection of different types of Danish houses from different time periods, with a few windmills throw in for spice. We go relatively often during the summer (when these photos are from) and Christmastime so we’ll be eager to see our favorites over this Easter break.
But the real winner here is the sheer amount of vast outdoor space with trails and paths that let your little ones run wild - the houses are just mostly historical artifacts for you to admire on the horizon as you try and figure out where your children ran off to before you could tell them to slow down.
There are a few animals about, and sometimes people milling around in historical costumes for various talks or demonstrations as well. From what I can tell in google translate, they’ll also be operating the kitchen to demonstrate historical Danish foods associated with the holiday - as usual, Danes have a specific dish to go with everything!
Carriage rides look like they’ll be open and typically, the ponies should be out as well - the website mentions a bit of a scavenger hunt but just a heads up, in our experience, these are typically Danish only so bring your dictionary!
The museum is open this Thursday through Monday and then again after May 1, so this is a chance to get a bit of a jump start some fresh air and an opportunity to convince yourself that spring is just around the corner!
Holidays are a big thing in Denmark, no matter what the season and right about now we are full in Easter and spring time mode. The kiddies at forest school have been busy - I thought I’d share just a few pictures of their recent creations before the upcoming break.
Easter is a huge holiday here in Denmark and although religious in origin, it is now mostly secular. There are still eggs and chocolates and all the forbidden fruits that children love so dearly, but on the whole, I have to say that Easter is much simpler. Which is bit funny since we get so much time off - 5 days to be precise. And it’s one of the few times the school is closed…
Although the religious components here are nearly gone, the sense of holiday is not. In general, it really does symbolize the transition to spring here (whether the weather is cooperating or not) and so there are lots of decorations of nests and eggs and spring time chicks and birds and bunnies and anything else that symbolizes starting anew. The kids built little moss lined nests to hold a single egg, which they had been dying in various root vegetables in the previous week. Little eggs were painted, and springtime teaser notes cut out. I didn’t get snaps of all of them but a few of the recent ones.
For us, we’ve become acclimatized enough to life here to know that the best way to celebrate something like this is to take it easy. We’re excited to have family in town and personally, I’m excited to have 5 days off of work. We have a few outings and a few walks planned and some special meals here and there but mostly, we’re just looking forward to being together, with no obligations other than to enjoy home, enjoy the weather, and enjoy each other. Isn’t that a real holiday after all?
A plague seems to be upon our house - this weekend wasn’t the best. Not one but two sick kids and not sure if it was a stomach thing or a food poisoning thing or what. We hunkered down for the weekend for everyone to rest and get better, and gave our tot the day off from school today to recuperate, but three days indoors will have you craving the outdoors in no time at all.
Spring is a little slow in coming but it IS coming (right? RIGHT?) so we whittled away a few hours by making a list of some of the favorite playgrounds we’ve seen to start thinking about where to go back as the days warm up. I realized that we hadn’t shared yet our outing to Hundested Harbor, and the playground there, right in the middle of the harbor, is pretty cool.
Not that you only need warm days for playgrounds. The great thing about Denmark is that you’ll find kids on them without much regard for the weather, but we do like to get out and about outside of the city, especially to the seaside towns, and we make more time for that in the summer. Hundested is effectively at the end of the Danish Riviera and we finally made it there at the tail end of the summer (though you wouldn’t have known it by our need of sweaters and puffer vests). It’s home to a little harbor, a small collection of artists stores and residences, a few waterside eateries (including a great little brewery restaurant) and this pretty cool playground.
It’s not huge but it is pretty lovely. And funny. I mean, whoever built this life-sized lobster trap (eel trap?) for kids is a winner in my book. I don’t think this kind of thing flies in the US, but it had me double over laughing. The kids all climb in it but since they’re all moving around to keep their balance, the trap keeps rolling around like one of those old-school bingo ball baskets. So the kids are playing, and balancing, but they’re also hopefully learning a little bit about what used to be the mainstay of the former economy of the town. Bonus says the international economics degree holder.
Next up, the carved, wooden sculptures/climbing structures of other lobster-type bottom dwelling crustaceans. No garish primary colors on this one - just structures that through their natural shape gave kids plenty of places to climb on, and natural color complements all the painted vacation rental houses behind the playground. She fell of these lobster prawn things a lot since they were rather slippery, but when she finally made it to the top, we had a hard time prying her off of it. I loved the little brass plaques on the structures saying who carved each one and when… Maybe I’m a bit hokey but it felt kind of nice to think that your child was playing on something that was clearly thought through and built by an actual person.
Swings…sandbox…those are more standard…
Ropes are also pretty standard around here…first kids learn balance just by walking on them and holding on to the higher one. But it doesn’t take very long for them to figure out how to climb up and down them, scurrying around like little castaway rats trying to hitch a ride into the next port. Also, given that our daughter can now basically stand on one while lifting herself up on to the other one as both ropes move was a sore reminder to myself that perhaps some sit ups are in order. Not for her, for me. I can only dream to have that kind of core strength one day.
In the end of the day, playgrounds here have what all good playgrounds have - lots of fun and lots of places to play. 
As a parent, that’s all you can ask for - but a lovely view of the boats coming into the harbor doesn’t hurt either!
