the summer of fun!

how is it that it's evan's first day of cornerstone preschool and summer is already over? this was the amazing summer of fun. i've been trying to focus on the mantra of "don't be sad that it's over, be happy that it happened". that couldn't ring more true.

we did a lot this summer:
-weekend trips to carmel - comfort inn and at the santuaryee. fun july 4th with free food in downtown carmel. of course they would have fresh fruit, and fresh blueberries in their lemonade. dylan chatting up a storm with the woman with her kids at the campfire by the beach. we have our family pass down to the aquarium (and even bough passes to gilroy gardens too). discovered great italian and nachos with the yees, and every time we head down there it reinforces the dream of carmel house.

-weekend trip to sacramento:
wanted to take Dylan to a gold mine and pan for gold since he learned about the history of CA in summer school. really enjoyed the train museum and the closest gold mine had a quick tour and seeded some stones for us to find, but still really educational and fun to take the boys. discovered the great bacon and butter breakfast joint that was amazing! somewhat inappropriately dressed for the fancy place dudley recommended for dinner - but still an experience nonetheless.

-weekend trip to legoland:
couldn't believe that it took us 3 hours to drive down there, and we also went to the waterpark on day 1 (a little unprepared without towels), but the boys still had fun. day 2 we got the access wristbands which we put to good use. dylan's favorite was the technics rollercoaster and evan's was the dragon one. although i think he was a little scared of the coasters. bbq is always good... but the bees or the hornets, whatever they were were stressful. the hotel we stayed in was not bad - had good food (b ordered some late night bites)and was walking distance to the park. i'm not sure i would stay at the legoland hotel. seems kind of crazy - altho the sheraton next door with its own entrance might be a good option next time.

-summer school:
it was such a joy to be able to walk/take dylan to and from summer school. he just learned to whistle this summer, so we would walk, talk and he would often whistle home. Tutu was often taken aback when she saw me in the pick up line, like all the other moms from years past. sometimes austin would come with me, sometimes not. part of my exercise regimen included waling to los lomitas to pick up dylan, or walking the dish 2ish times a week (coordinated with picking up evan from cornerstone summer school). i started walking the dish about 8 weeks postpartum, i think the first week dylan went to summer school. still wasn't ready for soul cycle or more strenuous exercise, so took advantage of studio rincon's groupon deal and walked a ton

-hawaii:
dylan declared that new work and hawaii were his favorite places to go to, and evan said new york and seal beach were his favorites. my boys were so tan! dylan was dark chocolate, evan was milk chocolate and austin was caramel. poor dylan was burned a bit on his face. we didn't reapply often enough. i was burned pretty badly along the gap between my underwear and my rash shirt. the sun is so dangerous and damaging. (another lesson in balance - i really enjoyed taking walks, picking up dylan from school, walking the dish...but the tradeoff is that i think my skin was more sun-damaged than ever this summer. *sigh. you can never win). all the boys were great on the flight. fortunately brian flew back - missed his original flight - but made it so that we could all fly out together from LAX. always great to land in hawaii - and see the palm trees, breathe in the balmy air - and so we land with all our glorious luggage. 2 car seats, booster, stroller, 2 large suitcases, 2 carry ons, and the boys had their backpack and i had my large black travel bag. it was a lot. getting the rental car was a joke, considering the fact that brian and dylan took a cab to the rental car office and austin and i were melting outside with all our luggage. at the very least they upgraded our car, and i believe the rental was pretty much free. we were so thirsty that we had to get off the freeway to buy waters before heading out to the hotel. not just any hotel - but the four seasons. i think this is my third four seasons experience. first being the one in vegas for mumford's 60th bday, the brooklyn location and now oahu. our room wasn't ready yet so we ordered food by the pool. it started raining, and it was kind of funny to see the staff try to stuff towels between the break in between 2 umbrellas and we did appreciate the service of them hustling us to the bar and getting an umbrella to walk austin and me there. we had a handicap room, but the views were amazing - the bathroom was ridiculously large. they had the boys' names spelled out with sponges and whale stuffed animals, along with candy and a handwritten note for us. nice touches. of course they had the kids robes and i ordered 2 baby kits, aftersun cream and the nail kit - per belinda's direction. i also helped myself to some baby wipes they had at the diaper changing stations. that is one of the reasons why b likes the 4Cs. they don't nickel and dime you along the way. they had complimentary sunscreen, the snorkeling gear and paddle boards were all free for us to use. they gave us a really nice bag when we asked for a bag to put our wet bathing suits in. the best part was when belinda had arranged for birthday cake to be delivered to our room, but since we had our privacy sign on, they didn't bring it. they did end up bringing to the lounge area, where they coincidentally had an art show with wine, passed appetizers, and a live band by the pool. sweet dylan thought that it was all for him. love that boy to pieces.

it was so nice to hang out with belin's family and to have extra sets of hands. hard to believe that isa is starting high school. we hung out by the pool, the beach, enjoyed their nice buffet spread, went into town to take them to sasbune. not sure the girls enjoyed it...but it was delicious as always. it went by too quickly - and although i did have a chance to enjoy their spa, and had one of the best massages ever - ranked up there with mykonos grand, i left dad's fancy korean shampoo at the spa when i raced in there to use the facilities once more before heading to the airport. glad that we decided to not stay aulani. it looked pretty crowded and b ran into a family who only lasted 1 night - checked out and came to 4C instead.

it was so nice to read on vacation. i had borrowed "ready player one" from christine and finished "big little lies" over the summer.

boys were again great on the plan to maui and it was a late night. drama with checking in because for whatever reason, they didn't have in there notes that i had paid for the 2 bedroom upgrade. the nerve of them wanting to charge me another $2k for the room. not happening. what a dramatic chance in view - as we had a view of the concrete parking lot - but i wasn't going to cause a fuss, the manager wasn't there and the boys were sleeping in the lobby (almost midnight). this time - we were roped into the timeshare presentation. net net, brian's interest level was a 3 and i said mine was a 6 to hopefully get invited again. it was pretty windy the first 2 days, but the boys had a great time at the pool. we hit baby beach a few times, snorkeled, dylan took to boogie boarding pretty well again and comes home telling everything that he swam halfway to molokai. evan snorkeled a little bit, and austin was perfectly mellow in the ocean and in the pool on this trip. mama's fish house was lovely - and it was great to go in the afternoon since the views were incredible, and the reservations we had at star noodle was perfect. we squeezed in a last minute pineapple dole whip run in lahaina on our last night as well, and the boys remembered that we saw the crabs on the sand when we went there for tommy's wedding. pretty incredible.

the downside of the trip - besides spending way too long at the timeshare presentation, was that b was super stressed. he didn't get approval for his permit for the practice, the contractor came back with costs more than $400k over the original estimate and our loan, and a person he hired, that was supposed to be training, decided not to come back after 2 days. it was so sad to see him so distracted and stressed...not much anyone could do, including himself being out in hawaii. hopefully he had 5% of the fun the boys had...and that would be a good time. and there's always the downside of coming home from hawaii. i had wanted to get some exercise in and i can't believe that i didn't make it island vintage coffee...but i did run out to the beach in front of our hotel to stick my feet in the ocean one last time before heading back to the airport...

-concerts:
my man john mayer. incredible. again. loved how he divided his sets into his full band, acoustic, john mayer trio, back to full band and his encore was him whistling and playing piano. HE ALSO PLAYS PIANO. could not love him even more. was so nice to catch up with christine that night. and we book ended our socal trip with ed sheeran. dylan and i had great seats. we had 2 different groups of people wanting to take video/pictures of dylan dancing. ed was incredible but his set was so short. about an hour. john played for 2 hours. if i had to call it...i would still be team john.