June 2017

Potpourri
—Brownies become Juniors: Annika’s Girl Scout troop had their bridging ceremony in a park near our house, followed by a pool party at the troop leader’s house (the only dry cookout I’ve ever been to … ). She’s not 100% sure she wants to do GS next year, but it was a fun day and the girls & families were all really proud of their growth over this past year.
—Back to the Emergency Room: After years of being allergy-free for milk and egg, Lukas had a reaction to something he ate one evening — the sudden attack of sneezing and welts all over his body was concerning enough to send us to the ER, but as with the other times we’ve seen this, we dosed him with Benadryl and in all the hours waiting to be seen by a doctor, he improved on his own, and so we left without getting him any treatment.
—First belt test: We missed the official belt test night because we were in Hawaii, but on return, we were informed that there was another opportunity to test, so the kids took a private karate lesson to be sure they were ready. We went to the make-up date — and they both got their new belts! They really did so well, and it was such fun to see them demonstrate the skills they’d learned since they started. 

School year ends
The school year was the usual insane blur of activities, with hardly a regular full day in the last month; Annika’s class went to the 3rd grade pool party (at a cabana club pool near campus), I chaperoned the TK/kinder park day (at Parma Park, which had the big advantages of shade and bathrooms, heh), and of course the last day of school was another wild one — short day, with maaaaybe a few tears on leaving Ms. Bingham’s class, followed by our usual treat of ice cream in Willow Glen. 

Hawaii
The biggest event of the summer started just two days after school let out: our two- week trip to Hawaii! There was a bit of drama upon arrival, as the baggage from our flight was delayed by a couple of hours. We ended up borrowing booster seats from the car rental place, and eventually we had all our bags — then it was home to the cation house. We spent almost all of our days at the beach club: I made my long-overdue return to snorkeling (I even bought my own rig, assuming it was going to work out; I needed Annika to swim with me and had to breathe through some would-be panic attacks, but by the end of the two weeks, I was back!). Lukas had his own rig as well, but the red pencil urchins in the water freaked him out completely, so we shelved his snorkeling days for next year. We saw a bunch of turtles sunning themselves on the rocky beach at the Fairmont, and had the rare treat of an in-water turtle sighting at our own little bay. We spent a few days at Hapuna Beach, jumping the waves and swimming in that clear warm water before leaving around lunchtime just as the sun got to full power and the waves got rougher. Thanks to Pokémon GO!, we finally ventured out for a family walk on the fishpond paths near the beach club — that was so cool! Fishponds, weird little cabins, cool plants, different views, and of course, captured lots of new Pokemon. I rented a SUP rig one day and took each of the kids out on it; another day we rented a kayak and paddled around for quite awhile. Annika got sick one night; we tried a new restaurant (The Blue Room) for dinner and stumbled onto a surprise hula show in the shopping center, which was a nice night’s entertainment. We celebrated Father’s Day with cards the kids had made back home, plus a breakfast of donuts from the local grocery. For the first time, we ventured upcountry a bit … and ended up with one of the best dinners of the entire vacation at a place called Pueo Osteria. We spent two mornings building an absolutely epic sandcastle town around our cabana. We had fantastic weather for most of the trip, minus one rainy dinner attempt at the Fairmont … and when we got home, we closed out the trip with a perfect pool day at our house, including a truly gigantic giant pink peacock (quickly named “Peaky” by the kids) R. bought at the pool store that morning. One of the best trips ever … 

Quotable
—Lukas: “Ma-jeek is Spanish for magic!”