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Last Saturday, on May 12, 2012 my Grandma Winwood passed away just shy of the age of 92. It’s funny the memories that immediately come to mind when you get news like this. Right away I thought of the Bert & Ernie pillows she made me and I had on my bed for years. I thought of how she would save us the peanuts from the airplane when she flew from Ontario to Saskatchewan to see us. I thought of the fact that I never failed to get a birthday card from her in 36 years, no matter where I was living, and I wish I still had them all. I thought of some of the crazy shirts I got from her for Christmas. Mostly I’ve been thinking about how happy she was every time she saw me.

It’s always sad when you lose someone you love. I wish I would have seen her again more recently. I wish she could have met Anna and Molly. I wish I would have written one more letter and sent one more picture. But at the same time I am happy that she lived a long, healthy life and that she left comfortably, at peace and secure in where she was going. What more could you ask?

If you ask me, my Grandma lived a great life. She never traveled the world or got her name on a building, but she loved her children, her grandchildren and her great-grandchildren, and we all knew that. She stood up for what she believed in and she was always willing to help someone in need. Those are the types of things that make the biggest difference and we can all learn from her. I know that she had a picture of Molly in her room and she showed it to everyone. Molly never got to meet her great-grandmother but I guarantee that she will know about her, and the cards she sent her will be cherished.

So Grandma, I love you and I will miss you. Thank you for always making me feel special and important. Thank you for passing on a legacy of honoring your family and the people you love, and for how thoughtful you were. We will see you again.

I thought I’d throw some pictures up of a little outing we had last weekend in Karlskrona with Disa, Hedda, Ines and the parents. We went to the playland and had a great time on the slides, trampolines, and all the fun climbing stuff. Molly has been talking about it all week so we’re going to have to make a return trip. All the girls were completely worn out after, and we topped it off by a greasy meal at Max Hamburgers where Molly took care of two orders of fries dipped in ketchup. We’ve had a pretty good week here just working and taking care of business, and we’re looking forward to doing very little this weekend.

In other news, we have found a new apartment that we’ll be moving to in July, I will probably be making a quick trip to Texas in June, and we are looking at hopefully all of us going over for a spell in the fall if we can make it happen.

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I really don’t know where the last month went, but somehow it is May and I haven’t updated here for too long. I guess we have kind of settled into a routine without a lot of significant highlights, but it’s time I got back to it. Molly has settled into playschool and she likes it a lot once she gets past the first couple minutes of Pappa leaving her there. It’s probably harder for me than it is for her. She is there now from 9-2 every weekday and she is making friends with both her “classmates” and teachers. It gives me some time during the day to get some work done, but it’s always fun to go pick her up again. The weather is getting nicer here now so we usually go to the park after I pick her up, and then go home to see Mamma when she gets home from work. Molly is really into buses, motorcycles, cars, tractors, bikes and airplanes lately and she points out every one she sees. When we are walking she also makes sure I see every flower, stone, bird, tree and dog. For all of these things she’ll say them in either Swedish or English. She’s very smart according to me. She really loves books too, right now her favourite is Whinnie The Pooh, and she still gets her daily fix of Mow (Mickey Mouse) DVDs. Overall, we are just busy with daily life and we look forward to weekends when we can all hang out. Along with the pictures below I added a new video that you can see HERE on the video page. It’s from G&G’s house before we left.

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Happy Easter everybody (Glad Påsk)! It doesn’t feel much like spring here right now with cold, rainy weather and a chance of snow overnight, but we’re enjoying Anna being home for 4 days and hanging out with friends. Today we had an Easter feast with the cousins and our friends Pete, Emma and Ines. We braved the cold weather and grilled some meat. Tomorrow, weather permitting we are heading to Vimmerby to see the Dickinsons. Molly is starting to make progress getting adjusted to playschool, so we are hoping that in the near future she will be happy staying there for a few hours a day. It’s taking her a little while to warm up to the people there and venture away from Dad, but she’s coming along. This year I learned that in Sweden instead of an Easter egg hunt kinds dress up as witches (!?) and go door to door to get candy. Sounds more like Halloween to me but I can’t really explain the Easter bunny either. Let’s just remember the real meaning behind this weekend.

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Last week Molly started playschool, her and I go everyday for two hours for a while as she adjusts. Eventually she’ll be going 3 days a week for 5 hours. She seems to enjoy it, although she doesn’t want Pappa to venture too far away. The school seems great, nice teachers working there and all the food is organic. They have lots of fun toys including a slide, swings, tricycles and a sandbox. So she has a lot of fun there but it seems like it will take some time before she is comfortable staying there by herself. We’re looking forward to when we can drop her off and I can have some time to work, but for now we’re having fun there together.

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We have been back in Sweden for about a week and a half now. For some reason the jet lag hit us really hard this time, and Molly has had a cold, so it took a while to get our feet under us after the trip. The trip went well though, we ended up getting an entire row of 4 seats for the long flight so it was as comfortable as possible. Anna went back to work last week and Molly will be starting daycare this coming week. She will be going 3 days a week for 5 hours. So there are a lot of new adjustments we are going through right now and it’s really busy. I have a couple clients I picked up in TX that I am doing work for which will hopefully lead to more. Molly and her cousins picked up right where they left off and they have been having fun playing together, and the weather has been decent for March in Sweden, so we have been going to the park everyday. Molly loves the “schlide” and the swing. If you ask her what we say on the swing she will answer “Veeeeeee!”

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Well another travel day is upon us. We head to the airport in a few hours for a flight to Chicago and then one to Copenhagen before the train ride to Ronneby. I notice that it is -2 there compared to 19 here so that will be an adjustment. It goes without saying that we are sad to leave Grandma and Grandpa and some other friends we have made here, but also looking forward to seeing Anna’s family again. Besides the grandparents, there is a few other things that Molly is sure to miss. One is her daily routine of watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse while eating breakfast, and the other is her very good pal Ziggy the dog. Ziggy belongs to our good friend Ronnie up the street and him and Molly have gotten to be quite close friends. Anyways, we’ll be in touch again in a couple days from the other side of the ocean.

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It’s our last night in Texas for this trip. It’s been a busy last few days trying to get all the last minute stuff done and get packed. It’s been an awesome time here, especially the last month, and I’ll write more about that later on in a few days. Our last evening here has been a typical one. Molly wanted to eat cheesecake for dinner instead of her real food. Then she has been entertaining all of us until bedtime when Grandpa reads her a story and puts her down. Mom and Anna having fika and watching a house buying show on HGTV. So yeah, we’re just packing and relaxing before a big travel day tomorrow. Here are some pictures from the last few days, more coming tomorrow.

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Well we finally made it to an NHL game here in Dallas today. Anna, my Dad and me went down to the American Airlines Center for an afternoon game between the Stars and the Vancouver Canucks. It was an entertaining game between the hot Stars and the best team in the NHL, plus getting to see some big name Swedish players made it even cooler for Anna. It’s a great rink and was a fun game to watch even though we were cheering for Vancouver. Dallas tied the game at 2 with under a minute left and then Swede Louis Eriksson scored the OT winner. The Sedins looked good but couldn’t light the lamp. We’ll definitely be going to as many games as possible in future trips here.

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We always look forward to the weekends when Grandpa is off work and we can do some fun stuff together and get some projects done around the house. Lately we’ve been kicking off weekends by eating out on Friday night. This weekend was an awesome seafood place called Fish City. After dinner we usually head over to the outdoor mall area and hang out at Barnes & Noble. Last weekend the project was IKEA to pick out some new living room furniture for Grandma and of course some Swedish meatballs for lunch. This weekend we’ve been chipping away at the dining room furniture we are trying to get re-finished in the garage. It’s a big job. Molly also volunteered her time on Saturday to help Grandpa organize some paperwork, as you can see below. She likes to help with projects. We’ve also gotten out this weekend to do some shopping (while Anna got a massage) and had dinner last night at Lemme’s, and have been outside today enjoying the nice weather.

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