Pictures: The Swedes and Canadians in So Cal; Reuben's new chin; Yosemite; Yosemite; Yosemite; backyard family; Don and Kristen Penner; LA girl.
Doesn't a year go fast? It has for us and it appears we'll be here a while longer unless anyone wants a family of four to move in with them for a few months in 2011. We've rented our house for another year and plan to be in Davis until some time next summer. We've been making progress on the workfront but have also experienced some discouraging setbacks.
Here's a look at what we've been up to.
- The summer has been wonderful. According to all Californians it was a very strange one weatherwise. I was dreading the heat in the beginning but it ended up being a moderate summer with only a few days in the 100s. Every single day was, and still is, a beautiful sunny day. We have about 2 more months before that changes
- We spent 2 weeks' vacation in So Cal with some friends from Sweden. We checked out Legoland and Seaworld, ate lots of sushi, started (and have just about finished) the Girl with the Dragon Tatoo series and bumped into the Vice President of the US, at least 24's version of him
- Gabbi and Reuben enjoyed several weeks of swimming lessons and a week of camp
- We enjoyed a 3-day visit from Don and Kristen Penner. While they were here we had dinner with Angie and Joe Mercier in San Francisco
- Before school started we went to Yosemite National Park for a long weekend. This was the closest our family gets to camping (we stayed at a nice lodge in the mountainous wilderness). We enjoyed hiking and mountain biking, stripping down and swimming across an icy cold pool of water above a waterfall. Reuben made a new best friend - a former SF Giants pitcher
- Gabbi and Reuben started back to school on August 25 aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
- Reuben started playing AYSO soccer and Gabbi continues with piano (Reuben is having 'a break' from piano)
- Two days after school started, Reuben split his chin open while attempting a fast downhill entry onto a ramp at the local bmx park. He got 5 stitches and lots of attention
- We spent a night at our Canadian neighbour's Tahoe area cottage
Here's what we still enjoy very much about living here:
- Biking everywhere
- Being no more than two hours away from 100s of amazing places
- Davis Farmers Market
- Hot days and cool nights
- Californians' intolerance of bad food
- Great produce
