Happy Halloween!

Back in Seattle - a little (actually very) jet-lagged but still happy to celebrate the holiday with cousin Clara (who was definitely not jet-lagged!)

Breakfast time...

Another rainy weekend in Valencia...

But we decided to visit the new BioParc anyway.

The best part? Having the lemurs all to ourselves!

Visiting Isabella (and Kiki) at the guarderia...

Out the door, on the bike, every morning at 9:20 am... (the horn was a "first day of school" present. Isabella loves it but I'm sure our neighbors hate it...:-).

The "headmistress" allowed me to sneak in and and watch while Isabella's class took their turn on the patio during "recess"...
...I felt better once I saw one of her new friends, Johan, approach.

And finally - all aboard!

Isabella reading?

I was in the kitchen and heard Isabella "talking" to someone- turned out she was "reading" out loud...

The weather has been lousy (lots of rain but still very hot & muggy) so we've been reading a lot of books lately. This one has been a favorite, a gift from Odo - Breatrix Potter.

Road trip to Alicante...

Since Papa is in San Diego Isabella & I decided to take a day trip to Alicante to catch some of the Volvo in-shore racing, one week before the start of the 2008-09 Volvo Ocean Race. The weather was perfect and it was a great opportunity to catch up with some former OWC teammates. Besides, neither Isabella or I had ever been to Alicante. Visiting the Volvo village was great fun, complete with a Moors & Christians parade but the hill top castle was closed. We will just have to go back!

A little pre-parade pre-functioning?

No fiesta in Spain is complete without Moors, Christians and, of course, fireworks...

A hint of what is to come... this years Volvo includes a stop over in India. Should be interesting!

Back in Valencia & Isabella's first day of "playschool"

The uniform is still too big but that didn't seem to bother Isabella (now 20 months/9.3Kg/20.5lbs) as she headed out the door for her first day at the local guardería, Colegio Ingles – 2 hours a day and hopefully the opportunity to learn a bit of Spanish…