Hawaii - Day Three

Sunday in Hawaii was spent on the beach, soaking up the sun

and splashing in the waves.

We also went shopping in the international village market and went to a steak place for supper. Darcy had steak he could cut with his fork and I tried Wild Boar pasta. Tastes like ham. Where else can you try wild boar?

Hawaii - Day Two

Breakfast was included in our hotel package. They gave us a lunch kit and we went down on the pool deck to grab breakfast-to-go (lots of fresh pineapple all week long - yummy!) and went down and had breakfast on the beach. (How cool is that!?)

The birds there were very brave. When we were eating breakfast one came up and pecked Darcy's toe!

We walked on the beach some

and saw some very cool trees.

A local told us we could walk from our hotel up to Diamond Head in about half an hour so we tried it. Along the way we saw Hawaiian Christmas trees

and great views.

Apparently there are two ways up Diamond Head - we followed the signs, but it ended up being the long way. A "half hour" walk turned into 2 hours! And that was just to the bottom! We got there just as they were closing and they told us to hurry up or we wouldn't make it out before they locked up. But they let us in for free. So we hustled up the mountain for another hour or so. After just walking for 2 hours. Kinda tiring, to say the least!

But the view from up top was amazing!

Not very volcano-ish, though. I don't know what I was expecting, but that wasn't it.

On the way down we met some nice people who offered us a ride back to our hotel in their mustang convertable. First time in a convertable, and what a great place to go for a ride!

One thing that was weird about Hawaii was their moon. A quarter moon at home is either a sliver of light on the left or the right, but in Hawaii it was "upside-down"! Not a great picture, but you get the idea.

Stay tuned for more...

Hawaii - Day One

For those of you who don't know, Darcy and I just got back from a fabulous week in Hawaii - without the kids (thanks to grandparents who volunteered to babysit!) We flew out on Friday the 7th at 2:00pm on a 6+ hour flight - and my usually motion-sick hubby did great! I found some non-drowsy Gravol and he didn't feel sick at all (which is a minor miracle, considering every other time we've flown he's been completely out of it - and those were only hour-long flights!)!

We got off the plane around 7pm Hawaiian time (9pm here) and one of the first things I noticed (after we walked passed the bus fumes and cigarette smoke) was the smell of the warm tropical sea air. The last time I was anywhere near a warm climate was in California 20 years ago (gosh, that makes me sound OLD!), so I guess I must have recognized the smell from the tropical butterfly room at the aquarium. So glad to finally smell the real thing :-)

It was also amazing how everywhere we went there were open-air buildings. This is our hotel lobby. You can see the trees next to the hotel across the street. So foreign to us on the Wet Coast but perfect for Hawaii!

We hopped on a shuttle bus that took us to our hotel

right across the street from the beach. This was what our room looked like,

and here's the view from our balcony.

That night we walked up and down the main strip and grabbed a very late supper (I think it was about 11pm back home) at Cheeseburger in Paradise, which claimed to have the world's best cheeseburgers, but clearly they've never had mine.

More to come about the rest of the trip.

Second Christmas

Yesterday we had "second" Christmas with Darcy's family. After waffles for brunch we opened some gifts. Naturally, there were lots of presents for the kids.

Grandma really liked the calendar we made for her.

Jaden and Grandpa liked the Magna-Doodle. And Mommy likes that Jaden can draw, but not on everything!

Jaden found a new Christmas decoration to hang on the tree.

That night the kids wore new PJ's to bed.

Merry "second" Christmas!

First Christmas

This year we're having two Christmases - the first was on the 25th and the second will be tomorrow, on the 28th. The girls were so excited Christmas morning, while Jaden still had the, "Why did you wake me up?" look about him.

He figured it out pretty fast, and then he was excited, too.

Rachael and Kaitlyn helped Jaden get his presents started for him. That way it was almost like opening even more presents!

Jaden's favorite presents were the digger that makes noise and the box it came in. I decided to take the digger out of the original packaging before wrapping it and am I ever glad I did! It took about half an hour to get it out of the box!

After breakfast we went to Gramps and Grams house for more Christmas fun with the cousins.

Jaden and Johnathan are all set for sand box fun with their new digger sets.

The kids also got a new toboggan! Now all we need is snow. Or not - I'm fine with that, too.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Christmas Time

I'm not sure what it is, but something about these mugs of hot chocolate I made for the girls and their friends seems festive. I came down from doing laundry and found the mugs all neatly placed on the napkins and it looked Christmas-y. (OK, I straightened the chairs, but still!) Rachael can't ask for a dog this Christmas! She still loves Caspian, but he's a lot of work and still very much a puppy, which can be annoying sometimes. Jaden is riding his Christmas train with all his favorite things - his blanket, Hobbes, Bear and Piwow (pillow). Being the curious boy that he is we couldn't put the presents under the tree early this year unless we wanted them all opened! He'll be much more into opening presents than he was last year. Christmas is so much more fun when you can spend it with little kids.

Nov 28

Yesterday the Granparents came over to celebrate Kaitlyn's birthday with us.

Kaitlyn also wanted to set up the Christmas tree, even though it wasn't quite after her birthday yet. Here she is posing in her new dress from Grandma.

Rachael is somewhat less cooperative in her new outfit from Grandma.

Jaden didn't get a new outfit, but wanted lots of pictures with Hobbes in front of the tree. Who can resist?

Kaitlyn's 7th Birthday Party

Kaitlyn had her 7th birthday party yesterday. How could she possibly be 7 already?

They played a few games like Musical Pillows

and Clean Your Room - the sock fight game.

Then they watched How To Train Your Dragon.

Auntie Kendra made a Tinkerbell cake for Kaitlyn this year. It even sparkled!

And of course there were presents.

Everyone had fun, especially the birthday girl.

O Christmas Tree

Since we have a busy weekend with Kaitlyn's birthday, and there's no school today we decided to go out in the snow and pick out our Christmas tree today.

Jaden wanted this little guy,

but the rest of us opted for a big one. Good thing Daddy came with us to carry it! We won't decorate it until after Kaitlyn's birthday but now we've got it!