The other afternoon, after snack time, my son suddenly turned to me and said that he would make a surprise. You can be in the kitchen dad, but don’t look, he said. Promise that you don’t look. So while I was preparing dinner I could see him in the corner of my eye working intensely with pens and papers at the dining table. Then I saw him run around the house, back and forth, up and down, before declaring to me that he was finished. I have made a treasure hunt for you, he said. Start is there, and he pointed to a piece of paper attached to a chair.
I made my way to the start and saw an arrow on the paper with the word skatjakt (with one t to few it read magpie hunt instead of treasure hunt – how cute) and following the arrow I found another piece of paper with a clue written on it. He took me to look at so many places – inside a lamp, inside the refrigerator, up the stairs, down again, to the toilet, behind the TV. Finally I ended up looking behind the clock on the wall and when I did the treasure fell out – a reflective bracelet he had got at a restaurant a few months back.
We have been doing these kind of games now and then for the past year, and it is so fun to see that my son is enjoying playing with the Swedish language and that he wants to create games to share with me. Last night he did a Star Wars drawing competition for his parents. And now I am very curious what he will come up with next.