Name of the game

People really loved our post with Isabella saying Ansi and Johan's name and now the request for their names is coming so well keep working on her and the way she is going she will be saying the alphabet soon so keep sending us request and we'll post them as she learns.

Meditation Retreat

As I promised here are the pictures from the Chamma Ling retreat I went to last week. It was an amazing experience that stays with you for a long time.

A view to kill. Taken from right outside the retreat center.

From a different angle
Michele not feeling so "hot" in the emergency room after getting sick with elevation sickness and a bug.

Me and Andrea on the last day doing our practice outside at the creek

The all participants waiting at the creek for the Lama

And he arrives

Andrea in a powerful meditation across from It was rough for three yoga teachers to sit so much so here we're attempting some yoga in our tiny room.

A holy Indian grounds where we hung our prayer flags, following hundreds others before us.

We tied our three flags together so we could stretch it across the grounds

Happy to have done this together

View from the grounds where we hung the flags

Talking... and missing Ansi and Johan

In the past 60 days since we left Sweden, Isabella's vocabulary has started to explode. She is understanding most of what we say now and new words (Swedish and English) are coming every day.

Ansi and Johan are Isabella's Swedish Grandparents. Since our summer vacation in Stockholm we've been working on getting Isabella to say Ansi and Johan.

Two months ago in Sweden, when we left Isabella was just starting to say "Ansi"... but "Johan" wasn't even close. Ansi was so proud!!! Johan was... well let's just say has been waiting for the proud day that she can say this name...

So... I have three clips that are kind of fun because they show her language progression over the past 60 days... (Johan is going to be so proud :-)

Sept 22, 2008

Sept 6, 2008

Aug 10, 2008

I'm baaaack...

I have returned from the Colorado mountains where I spend 4 days on a meditation retreat. It was great and pictures will follow as soon as I get break. It's been crazy since I returned last night. We had a great time ( went with two friends, Michele and Andrea) however Michele got super sick and had to be taken to the emergency room, one hour away. Not fun for her but other than that I had a great time but missed Isabella and James terrible. My phone did not work up there so I had no contact with them and THAT was hard.

Four Busy Days with Mom in Denver

Fredrica went to Denver this week for 4+ days for a yoga and meditation retreat. This was the first time Isabella and I were on our own for several days in a row. We did great... and Isabella was a great helper. The weather was really warm so we kept up on watering the garden... twice a day. Luckily Isabella was a great helper.


We also ate really well. Mom cooked up a storm the few days before she left so there was lots of food to eat. Pumpkin raviolis, chili, tofu and scalloped potatos. We actually ate like a king and queen. What a great mom!!!





Thursday at work was a fun day... We had a team offsite for team building. We did a "Top Chef" style cooking competition. We broke the product management team into 3 teams and we each prepared a meal... appetizer, main course and desert. Our menu included a steak, asparagus tips, smashed potatos and a chocolate creme brule. I was on the same team as my boss Barry... He is looking over the potatos here.

Elizabeth was in charge of the cream brule. Here she is tourching the sugar on the brules. It was by first time to use a fire in cooking... wow it was a ton of fun. We gotta get one of these at home!!!

I was in charge of the asparagus. Drizzled in olive oil with some salt and pepper they came out great (but I could have used a touch less salt).

We had four people from other teams show up a 2pm to be the judges. All the teams went all out! We sequenced the serving. We 'plated' the food for the judges so it looked great! We won a prize for overall pair of food with the wine we served... but didn't win overall. But it was super fun, one of the best team building days I've ever participated in.

We also had a drink competition. Don't worry, I didn't drink much my 'first day on the job' alone with Isabella. I'm not big on foo-foo drinks anyway, but the wine we served with our meal was on the the best wines I ever tasted. After we plated the food for the judges we all brought the rest of our food up to the kitchen table and everyone served themselves. All the food was really fabulous. I was so full that night I didn't even eat dinner!


Saturday morning my good friend Seth game over. He and Isabella had a ton of fun together. Seth shared Isabella love of legos so they made lots of fun things together!







After Isabella's naps on Saturday we went up to Sandy's house (my Aunt who Isabella's middle name is for). Isabella was faciniated by Kinoa's scotter so we lowered the handle bars and I carefully pushed her around. Once she got a taste of it there was almost no getting her off it. She had a ton of fun and even started getting the hange of landing with one foot and pushing with the other. I can't believe how fast she learns!!!



She loved playing with my cousin Cindy. Fascinated as ever with buttons and snaps.









Sandy's house has a big back yard and Cindy took her out exploring. Isabella got super excited when she found pine cones. Just like in Sweden, she really remembers things! She took Cindy all around collecting pine cones. I wasn't sure I'd ever get her to leave she was having so much fun!





My parents had given Richard and Kinoa an electronically controled surf board... It is capable of going out in the ocean surf and catching waves. Here is Richard testing it in the pool. Isabella found this absolutely fascinating as we drove in all around the pool!


On Sunday morning my parents came down for a visit. Isabella also loves to grab "Grean Eggs and Spam" and have grandma read it to her. I think it's the way grandma reads it... she just loves it!






After going through lots of her books she decided it was grandpas turn... She had fun running back and forth getting more books to read. It gave me some valuable time to do some laundry so Fredrica could return to a nice and tidy house and we could start the week off relaxed after her long trip home!



After playing at home we went over to Anthony's Fish Grotto restaurant. I didn't even realize this was close to our home. Once we got there I immediately recognized it as a place my parents had often taken me when I was a kid... I had wonderful memories of the place. There is a big man-make lake outside the restaurant. We really went over just to feed and play with the ducks. Isabella really got the hang of throwing the seeds out and having the ducks swim over.



Isabella thought this was so much fun... she kept saying "more... more" each time we used up all the seeds grandpa bought. This is a picture looking back at the restaurant... the ducks are swimming around!



We hadn't planned to stay for lunch but I was surprised by how nice the kids menu was. Vegetarian options and every meal came with vegetables. I will have to go off on a rant later about how almost every restaurant we go to has a kids menu devote of any fruit or vegetables... and when we ask for vegetables the waiters/waitresses usually look at us like its the first time they've ever been asked the question!! Isabella ate great and we had a nice early lunch.



Well... we've had a fun four and a half days. Each morning Isabella was surprised not to find Mom in the bed and went looking around the house for her. Finally by this morning I think she understood that mom is coming home tonight. We leave in a few hours to pick her up at the airport. It will be nice to be back together again as a family and I'm sure Isabella will be so excited to see her!

Oh how I love my IPhone

My phone started to brake down a couple of months ago and James began campaign Fredrica and the IPhone. I was not really into it and when I heard the price I really did not want one. James is very much a gadgets guy and always picks advance cell phone with all kinds of special features. Then he got a IPhone and played with it all the time. I was not very impressed. When he suggested getting me one I said a stern"NO". Well in August I got a phone call from a woman announcing that my IPhone was ready!!!! James admitted he got me one and by then he brought into my house and switched my service over so really I had no choice. But I was not happy. So how has it gone since??? I love, love LOVE my phone. It's great for someone like me who is always on the move. It's easy to sms, call and I have all these fun features like I can check and send email, use map, surf Internet ect. What is not to love? What happened to my old phone? Isabella always wanted to play with it so now it's hers to keep.

Isabella's first day of school

I know she is really too young to start school already but the school is special since it's a Swedish school http://www.svenskaskolansd.org/. We meet once a week for about an hour, playing and singing all in Swedish.

So last week was first day and since it was a big day both Aunt Jessica and Daddy came along. It's all the way up in Carlsbad which is about 40 minutes from here and very close to her nap time so it's a stretch but something we really wanted. The wait to get in is pretty long so we got lucky.

Isabella all pretty for first day of school, more interested in going outside since they had a nice big pool there.

I know we live in sunny San Diego where the sun always shine but do you need sunglasses inside really??? Or are you just making a fashion statement?

Isabella's first taste of Art and Science

Sunday's are our family day of fun. Today we went to Balboa Park for a stroll and ended up going to the museum of Photography and the Ruben H Fleet Space Center.

The later was really fun for Isabella since they had a special kids part where she could play and have fun. During our walk in the photography museum she had a bit of lunch while enjoying all the photos. We also had time to walk through the botanical garden and smell some beautiful flowers.


Here are some pictures from today and from yesterday when we went over to Mission Bay to play around. The pictures were shot on our iPhone so the pictures are a bit hazy.

Talk about weird science

Having lots of fun with mom matching cubes and squares through the holes

Special stroller parking, watch out so you don't get towed

Well we kind of knew she had the gene for computers but she can spot a computer a mile away

Luckily daddy's breakfast did not repeat its self

We don't know were she get this from, she's a clean freak and have to inspect all toes for sand before she can put shoe back on a get on with the playing.

Whohoooo!! Being a dare devil at daddy's expense. The way she is going, he will have a heart attack before 40.

It's fun to dream of living on the island.

Going over to Coronado Island is becoming a favorite weekend activity...We love going here early in the morning> what can I say we now have retired our old alarm clocks because our new alarm (Isabella) gets us up early 6am. We absolutely love this island and if we could afford to buy a house any where, here would be a top choice.Here are a few pictures from the morning

Running down the beach with San Diego Skyline in the background

The water is so warm... about 70F (21C) so even the most timid viking (that's Isabella & Fredrica) join me in the water.

Isabella and Dad doing their morning yoga... Isabella reaching to the sky asana

Time for some light yoga..Boy it's hard to balance in the water

There just couldn't be a more beautiful setting to do it!

Labor Day Weekend in San Francisco

Ah... San Francisco. One of the most beautiful cities in the world We took advantage of the long Labor Day weekend and all three of us got up to the city. You can see Alcatraz (the island) on the left and Coit Tower on the right... this is a view from my hotel room!!!

(Remember you can click on the pictures to see them bigger)

I actually went to San Francisco a few days before Fredrica and Isabella. I recently received a promotion to Director of Product Management... yeah! This got me an invitation to Intuit's annual Leadership Conference in San Francisco... It was a lot of fun!


Trolley's make San Francisco extra specially. They were constantly going by where I was staying.




So... Fredrica did her first air travel with Isabella alone! She did great but it was a challenge for sure. I was super happy to see them both when they arrived!







We got Isabella these little duck slippers... she loved them and ran around the house stomping her feet like a duck :-)








We stayed with Alexandra and Mark... it was a special time to be with them as they are off to Switzerland (to Alexandra's family's home) to be married in a few weeks!



On Sunday we got over to see Susie and Adam, our long-time friends from San Francisco.







We got to be part of Jarad's 7th birthday!







When we got back into San Diego, Annie (Isabella's day care provider) took Isabella for her first Pedicure. Isabella was so excited to get her toes done after watching Annie get her's done. After painting each little toe, Isabella would look down and explain "Pretty"!!! I wish I had a video :-(