Summer break!

The big day finally arrived - THE LAST DAY OF SCHOOL!!

Last year, I was admitted to our school's secret society of Parents With Odd (Or No) Work Schedules Who Can Goof Off Weekday Afternoons, so I knew who to ask about last day of school festivities. When the last bell rang, I stuffed in as many kids as the Subaru will legally hold and headed to Ocean Beach -

- where we joined a large number of other families in commandeering the lawn at the Park Chalet. Weirdly, the restaurant was booked for a wedding that evening (Friday of Memorial Day Weekend?), and they warned us the downstairs food and bar service would close in an hour - but...we could go upstairs to the Beach Chalet and place orders.  While they may have meant to be discouraging, I think you could argue it was a tactical error on the manager's part, as this was the scene well after the downstairs service was closed:

Most of the first week of summer break was spent in Truckee.  Our last visit was Easter, and we were anxious to see what shape everything was in now that the snow was gone.

But turns out we will have to wait a bit longer:

Grandpa Uwe and Grambo came to visit.  After a long day of grill assembly and deck and door maintenance, we hooked Grandpa up with a G&T and the Viking King Chair.

We made sure Grambo finally got to see Lake Tahoe (other than from an airplane window) and have a nice lunch in Carnelian Bay.

And of course, there was pool time:

I hooked up the somewhat unreliable looking strap-mount bike rack, so the kids could go for rides.  Unfortunately, the house is about 2/3 of the way up a fairly big hill, so most "let's go for a bike ride" options finish with a long and sometimes steep climb.  I did manage to convince them to get the climb out of the way at the outset, and rode up to the top of Ski Slope Way to look at Donner Lake:

Back in the city, we spent quality time with friends -

Re-upped at the SF Zoo, since we wanted to see the tarantulas -

Did a little city (playground) biking, to prep for graduation from the current Big Brother Hand-me-Down to her own big girl bike (hopefully coming soon)-

And we battled a stubborn baby tooth.  Lucie had injured her front tooth as a toddler, and when it started to get wiggly we were excited for both the Tooth Fairy payout and a new, healthy big tooth to take it's place.  Weeks passed, and it just continued to wiggle, even after the new tooth started to poke through behind it.  One night after teeth-brushing, Daddy thought it might be time to check in with the dentist.  Dr. Rothman said that old tooth had to go, and Lucie was very brave for both the novocaine injection and tooth extraction.  We would have to do some "exercises" to get the new tooth into a better spot (aka, lean on it several times a day with a tongue depressor), but we'd intervened in time to avoid complicated work.  Whew.  So here's her new smile: