Blogging to stay in touch

A perfect Friday night

A glass of cheap champagne, knitting and some good music on the iPod. Can a Friday night be better..?
We don't think so.

Testing Tiger (no hidden dragons this time)

Tiger, originally uploaded by Froken Fraken.

This tiger is just for testing my newly discovered option to upload pictures from my Flickr account to the blog. Don't know how useful it's going to be, but as it's a lot quicker to upload pictures to Flickr that to Typepad, it might be a good thing.

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after viewing it - not so happy with that black frame and the fact that the picture gets cropped. maybe there's a way to fix that too. we'll see.

Decluttering and preparing for guests

Ok, you see the situation, but it should still be possible to manage to get one – only one – blog post up before March is over. As you can see, I have a few other little things to take care of these days. Since the fire in our basement, actually exactly one year (!) ago today, our office room has been serving as a stand-in basement, but now's really the time to change that! Auntie Becca and her friend Karen are arriving in 10 days, and the cleaning project is much farther ahead than what you see in these pictures (believe me :). As I have a tough time doing things half-hearted (often to the extent of stupidity, but still), cleaning this room started a whole process for me, and I'm now spending my nights studying Feng Shui, meanwhile trying to clear my life from clutter...
(It actually already started at the studio a few weeks ago, and I will try to take some pictures from there tomorrow.)

Well, we'll see how it goes, but it's very relieving – and really – the biggest inspiration is to turn that room into a nice guest room for, at first, Becca & Karen, and later this spring, for our former neighbors CC & Vanessa from Brooklyn. I hope these pictures won't discourage you, guys – or any other of you who have been thinking of coming to visit... But trust me, we can't wait to use this room for much better reasons than keeping tables underneath the tables, and red plastic sleds in! That's definitely not feng shui from what I've learned so far.

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The days are finally getting longer and brighter. Now it's daylight until almost 8 pm, and the bright nights will steadily be longer. By the time CC and Vanessa arrives, it won't get dark until 10.30-11 pm. And probably, the light might also be a reason for bringing out the spring cleaning spirits!

A slippery adventure, and some more excitements

Leo watching a random sled rider (above) and checking out the scene (below), just before entering the ice skating rink at Stortorget ("The Large/Grande... Square") in the middle of the city, on Sunday night.

Ezra, who tried out skating already last year, got to be pretty steady on his feet by the end of the night. Here he is, practicing in daddy's firm arms.

Börje Salming or Foppa?
At first we thought that Leo at his young age wouldn't be at all interested in skating, but after hearing him angrily wining "Meeee toooo" about three hundred times in a very persistent way that's typical for Leo, I gave in and rented him a way too big pair of skates, the smallest ones they had. And on his Bambi legs, he skated happily ever after.

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The holidays have been really nice and relaxing. Although we've been taking turns working, we've had a lot of time together the four of us, and a lot to celebrate! I wish that I'd sent everybody a personal thank you note for all the beautiful gifts and cards that have kept popping into our mail box; first for Hanukkah, then for Christmas, then for our 6-year (!) anniversary, then for New Years, and finally for Joshua's birthday... But I haven't gotten around to it yet, so – instead – BIG THANKS & lots of hugs and smooches for everybody & Happy New Year!

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ps 1. Another thing that has made me thrilled – and a very slow blogger – lately, is my brand new Nikon D-40X camera! It's definitely an upswing from what I've been working with up till now, and I'm very excited to finally learn manual photography. I also finally opened a Flick'r account, which has been my plan since about when I started this blog more than two years ago. I'm afraid that the photo feed over there is going to be pretty slow though, as the time I have on my hand is limited, and I seem to be a slow learner when it comes to shutter speed and focal length, but I'm looking forward to the process of learning, and to try something new!

ps 2. Just got to know through the great design blog Poppytalk that Blueprint Magazine folded, although the blog is apparently staying. So I have a modest question, and I promise to pay back with interest... Is there anybody over there, in Brooklyn or Philly or so... who might pass by a newsstand, and who wouldn't mind picking up a copy of the very last issue for me, I'd be delighted! If they haven't all already been swept up by  interior design geeks all over the country.

Inspired by wood

It's fall for real now, and yesterday the brisk wind made at least myself go straight home, after a walk in the park, and have a huge bowl of green tea (directly imported from Japan by J!). The kids preferred having popsicles—outside!!! Below some pictures from a cold, sunny afternoon in the park by Malmö Konsthall (the art museum), where Joshua checked out the David Shrigley exhibition while Ezra, Leo and I climbed the monkey bars.

After a bunch of pictures of these busy boys—Ezra, burying a chestnut i  a huge pile of leaves "so it can rest there over the winter, and grow up to a new chestnut tree in spring"—I can't resist thinking of incorporating the fall theme to our home with these great Japanese "wooden" fabrics from the awesome, LA-based, Japanese-run shop Tortoise ...

 

 

...or with this beautiful sofa, by Swedish designer Yngve Ekström. I can totally see it fitting very well into my living room. Time to get inside and get cozy!

 

Japanese train decoration..?

Our man in Japan keeps us posted with lots and lots of fun, nice and interesting photos every day. This one is from today's Tokyo trip—I suppose..?  At first I thought it was a billboard, but the more I look at it, I do think it's inside of a real train and not a view made up for a photo shoot... An art installation or some sort of "ad" campaign maybe? I need help here from our crowd in Japan!

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Back home, we're enjoying the little pleasures of every day life, such as bedtime stories. Tonight, the third night with Daddy reading stories from the CD-player, gave the-always-a-favorite "Norman the Doorman" (another great literary gift from Suzie). Last night we heard The Sneetches by Dr. Seuss, and the first night, Finders Keepers.

A day at the museum

A day at the museum. When tired of the aquarium, the art installations ("New York City" according to Ez), and the antique furniture ("from India" – Ez-the-expert again), you can always look out the windows on the second floor and watch the sheep grazing on the hill (yeah, it's in the middle of the city). And when you're done with that, go ahead, follow your own heart, and check something else out!

/the mom is just sitting lazily on the steps, behind the beautiful wooden banister, enjoying the sun, the mid-October light, and her boyz./

A day filled with treasures

Fall is here for sure, and the past couple of days have been amazingly beautiful. The ground is covered with shiny brown, beautiful chestnuts – and it's covered to the point where we almost can't push the stroller on the paths along the canal on our way to preschool. But there's lots of fun things to do with all these "treasures" of the fall. Earlier today Leo went to the park with preschool, and he came home with a brown paper bag, filled with the beauties above that he picked all by himself. They're now making a beautiful still life on a little "silver" tray (thrifted in Brooklyn) on the window sill in our kitchen.

On the way back from preschool, Ezra and his friend C (he says that he's going to merry her, so things changed from a few weeks ago...) also had fun with the ubiquitous chestnuts (the amount which they appear in make me think of one of our favorite books "Cloudy with a chance of meatballs"), and threw tons of them - and almost themselves - into the canal.

Earlier this afternoon, Ezra stayed in and drew dinosaurs...

...and when we got back home this afternoon (after spending a looong time at the playground, enjoying the last (?) days of pleasing weather), there was a package with a late birthday gift from Leo's godfather Nuno (The gift has been going back and forth over the Atlantic ocean a couple of times, explaining why it was late, so absolutely no blame on the best godfather ever!). As you can see below the gifts were very appreciated - down to the very cute card. Look at this stylish guy in the awesome outfit from Paulina Quintana! He wanted to change from his old clothes within a second from opening the package... What would you do without godfathers with a great sense of style! (By the way, this LA-based designer have some amazing diaper bags as well. Also check out the Hobo diaper bag under accessories, if interested in these kind of items:) For a very rich Mama or maybe for my fourth child or so...

Nuno - Thank you so much + hugs & kisses + we miss you,
from Leo & co

PS. life has changed a little bit lately - maybe just temporarily - but still, it's worth mentioning:

1. We've barely worked a night after the kids have fallen asleep for more than a week now. (Normally working is standard late night occupation). It's amazing how few other things that are getting done still though... It might have to do with the fact that we've joined the Swedish equivalent to Netflix - Lovefilm. But hey, it's nice - even though I fell asleep ten minutes into the first movie, and we had to shut down the second one when there was still an hour left to go :)

2. The office renovation is finally close(r) to being done. This past Monday we had the last part of the floor  put in so now we can dance barefoot on the smooth pine floor. I'll be back with more (better) pictures.

3. And finally the biggest change - last Saturday the kids let us stay in bed until 9.30 am - even if they were up and about!! They watched a movie (well, well...), drank yogurt, and played with each other for real, which is also a new thing that deserves it's own post on the list! Oh my, this is VERY special, and they're so amazingly cute. Not only because they let us sleep in last Saturday morning :)

ps. Congrat's to Lisa & David, who we know have their first post-Olivia's-birth date tonight! I hope you'll enjoy yourselves, relax & have fun! Here's Olivia & her parents from our get-together in Baltimore this past summer. It was so much fun seeing them, hopefully we'll see them again not in too long!

Who's afraid of the little cute ghost...

We're all in to ghosts right now. Ezra's first movie at the movie theatre, a few weeks ago, was about Spöket Laban (Laban, the ghost), and he has lots of thoughts on if ghosts might be flying above his bed when he's asleep.Tonight a ghost walked through our living room..?


...hm, somehow familiar to my childhood favorite fairy tale character Plupp (oh, he even has his own web site these days!) up there in the North... (The main purpose of the stories on Plupp was to educate the kids in the 70's on nature and animals in the northern parts of Sweden.)


...but even more familiar with a special young son of ours, who these days not only knows how to play ghost and dress up, but also – almost – knows how to eat with a spoon...

...and he's pretty satisfied about himself for this newly achieved skill of his – but he still mostly just take to the fingers (even with mashed potatoes and yogurt) because it goes faster.

When uploading these photos, I happened to run into one of the very first pictures on this blog. It's from when Ezra was just about as old as Leo is now, and Leo was just about ten days if I remember correctly. Pretty amazing. It's actually the first time that I can see a similarity between the two.

And finally, today's inspiration:

Art & Design: Unfortunately this exhibition with Maira Kalman, a fantastic illustrator, is long gone but I figure a few of you would be interested in at least seeing some pictures of her embroideries. Pretty cool stuff. Just like the book Ezra got from Suzie recently.

Music/What I listen to when working right now: Two very different, but very powerful women: Norweigan Ane Brun, beautiful with sometimes painful lyrics & Bettye Lavette, just so cool.

ps. another little source of inspiration to me is also the little blue chair that can be seen in the background of the very first photo of this post. I found it in our courtyard in Brooklyn after somebody had thrown it out and it instantly made it to my living room. Who would think that an abandoned old chair would make it all the way to Sweden... Sometimes things take unexpected turns. Even for a chair. Good night.