June 2019
Last week of school
Hardly had a minute to spare in that last week, which kicked off with Reid’s birthday pool party and our first legit pool day (the first time it was warm enough to even try, and also not raining). Then came the various theme days: Pajama Day and game day for Lukas’s class, and the all-day Golfland field trip for Annika’s (I was a parent driver, but they didn’t ask for chaperones at the venue). The whole school had free dress the very last day, and we capped it all off with a trip to Willow Glen Creamery for ice cream with the Patels … then home so I could finish packing for:
Hardly had a minute to spare in that last week, which kicked off with Reid’s birthday pool party and our first legit pool day (the first time it was warm enough to even try, and also not raining). Then came the various theme days: Pajama Day and game day for Lukas’s class, and the all-day Golfland field trip for Annika’s (I was a parent driver, but they didn’t ask for chaperones at the venue). The whole school had free dress the very last day, and we capped it all off with a trip to Willow Glen Creamery for ice cream with the Patels … then home so I could finish packing for:
HAWAII 2019!
We flew out the morning after school ended — no buffer zone! Heh. So this year, we booked it a little later and couldn’t get our usual condo; as it turned out, we realized pretty quickly that the one we did get? Shared a wall with the unit we stayed in when Annika was two! The landscaping had grown up around it, but we took a couple of pics the last day to compare with the ones we took way back then. We had dinner at a new place nearby (Foster’s Kitchen), which quickly won us over; it partly made up for the closure of one of our other faves, the Blue Room. Our first day was of course at the beach club, where it was surprisingly uncrowded (and stayed that way the whole time; it was never hard to get a cabana). We swam and snorkeled (Lukas even did some time off of the boogie board), we grilled a lot of dinners, we ate all our breakfasts on the lanai, Lukas kept saying “I gotta haaahhhdrate!” like Guy Fieri or something, we had fabulous meals at Tommy Bahama and Pueo’s Osteria, took a few walks through the fishponds, saw the sunsets at Hale Kai on the Fairmont grounds, spent several days at Hapuna (I even tried boogie boarding! gaaaahhh that was fun!) with lunch at Kohala Burger & Taco and shave ice afterward. With just four days left, our friends the Grants arrived, and that made for a really fun shakeup to the routine; the kids had friends to bomb around with, and it was great to see the place through someone else’s eyes (they were as impressed and instantly in love with the beach club as we were!). On the very last day, at the beach club (per tradition), we had an epic snorkeling outing (Annika and Alana went out to the deep, looking for sharks; their terrified adult companion — me — spent most of that time fighting a panic attack), and the kids all worked together to build a sandcastle city complete with looming volcano. As ever, we hated hated hated to leave, but that’s just how it is. Goodbye till next year!
We flew out the morning after school ended — no buffer zone! Heh. So this year, we booked it a little later and couldn’t get our usual condo; as it turned out, we realized pretty quickly that the one we did get? Shared a wall with the unit we stayed in when Annika was two! The landscaping had grown up around it, but we took a couple of pics the last day to compare with the ones we took way back then. We had dinner at a new place nearby (Foster’s Kitchen), which quickly won us over; it partly made up for the closure of one of our other faves, the Blue Room. Our first day was of course at the beach club, where it was surprisingly uncrowded (and stayed that way the whole time; it was never hard to get a cabana). We swam and snorkeled (Lukas even did some time off of the boogie board), we grilled a lot of dinners, we ate all our breakfasts on the lanai, Lukas kept saying “I gotta haaahhhdrate!” like Guy Fieri or something, we had fabulous meals at Tommy Bahama and Pueo’s Osteria, took a few walks through the fishponds, saw the sunsets at Hale Kai on the Fairmont grounds, spent several days at Hapuna (I even tried boogie boarding! gaaaahhh that was fun!) with lunch at Kohala Burger & Taco and shave ice afterward. With just four days left, our friends the Grants arrived, and that made for a really fun shakeup to the routine; the kids had friends to bomb around with, and it was great to see the place through someone else’s eyes (they were as impressed and instantly in love with the beach club as we were!). On the very last day, at the beach club (per tradition), we had an epic snorkeling outing (Annika and Alana went out to the deep, looking for sharks; their terrified adult companion — me — spent most of that time fighting a panic attack), and the kids all worked together to build a sandcastle city complete with looming volcano. As ever, we hated hated hated to leave, but that’s just how it is. Goodbye till next year!
Jumping right back into summer
We got home on Tuesday afternoon, and the very next day, R. went back to work and the kids and I started in on our summer plans. First, off to the farmers’ market in the old OSH parking lot — small but full of good stuff. The kids tried a bunch of different fruit, willingly, and we ended up buying a lot of things (including two tiny succulents for them to raise). We made our own goat cheese and strawberry jam (the strawberries were fantastic, I felt like we had to use them asap). We had joined the library’s summer reading program, which kicked off on June 1, so everyone did some reading. That Friday evening, we went to my friend K’s summer solstice party, where Lukas had a blast using their old-school diving board and water slide, and Annika … tolerated the situation. Heh. The next day, Lukas had a classmate’s birthday party at Billy Beez, and the day after that was Niamh’s birthday party — a pool party to which Lukas was also invited “so Lawson won’t be as annoying.” Lukas had a week of sprint intensive swim lessons (designed to bring kids to the next level); we also had a spontaneous afternoon swim at the Patels’, and went bowling with the Marshalls and another family (where Annika got one of the best scores of her bowling career so far). We ended the month with a pool Saturday, a movie night featuring Captain Marvel, then a day of relative quiet in which Annika had Niamh over and Lukas went to Lawson’s.
We got home on Tuesday afternoon, and the very next day, R. went back to work and the kids and I started in on our summer plans. First, off to the farmers’ market in the old OSH parking lot — small but full of good stuff. The kids tried a bunch of different fruit, willingly, and we ended up buying a lot of things (including two tiny succulents for them to raise). We made our own goat cheese and strawberry jam (the strawberries were fantastic, I felt like we had to use them asap). We had joined the library’s summer reading program, which kicked off on June 1, so everyone did some reading. That Friday evening, we went to my friend K’s summer solstice party, where Lukas had a blast using their old-school diving board and water slide, and Annika … tolerated the situation. Heh. The next day, Lukas had a classmate’s birthday party at Billy Beez, and the day after that was Niamh’s birthday party — a pool party to which Lukas was also invited “so Lawson won’t be as annoying.” Lukas had a week of sprint intensive swim lessons (designed to bring kids to the next level); we also had a spontaneous afternoon swim at the Patels’, and went bowling with the Marshalls and another family (where Annika got one of the best scores of her bowling career so far). We ended the month with a pool Saturday, a movie night featuring Captain Marvel, then a day of relative quiet in which Annika had Niamh over and Lukas went to Lawson’s.
Quotable
—“Every TV show or movie where somebody wears glasses, they’re gonna say ‘according to my calculations.’” —Lukas, makin observations
—“They call me Mr. Cuphands.” —Lukas, declining to specify who “they” are
—“Every TV show or movie where somebody wears glasses, they’re gonna say ‘according to my calculations.’” —Lukas, makin observations
—“They call me Mr. Cuphands.” —Lukas, declining to specify who “they” are
posted by One of the Grownups @ 2:42 PM
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