Here kitty, kitty, kitty....

When Ry sent this, my first thought was, "Seriously? Someone shipped their golf clubs? And they're trying to find their lost golf ball?" LOL. Then Ry told me what really happened. These were inherited from the group that Ry and his guys replaced. These two soldiers on trying to track down a Camel Spider which was hanging around--that is twice the size of Ry's fists. :-0!

Swap Meet

Really, one can't come to Hawaii and NOT visit the Swap Meet. The kids were looking forward to the yummy smoothies there (mine is always peach/mango with fresh bananas while they favor strawberry with banana). Here we are at the smoothie joint waiting for ours.

Julia's last Activity Days meeting was about modesty. She came home asking for a pair of long board shorts to wear over her swimsuit so that she could still be modest while swimming. So we looked for some there. We were ALL excited when she found this pair--they're Michigan colors!

Jacob was looking for another hat. He really likes the palm trees on this one.

Of course, Evelyn was ALL about the ear rings! She picked out two pairs. One for when she can finally switch out the pair that she's wearing now (around her birthday) and then when she can remove her ear rings for certain periods of time (around Christmas). It's kinda hard to see, but she picked out flower ones.

Jorjann came with us since she's never been. She and Julia were looking at jewelry.

It was sooooo muggy and hot that day. It rained quite a bit, too. But I think we still had fun. It took about two hours to wander around the full circle. Julia got two pairs of board shorts and a pair of ear rings, Jacob got his hat, Evelyn some ear rings, and Sarah bought a really cool pair of sea turtle ear rings (which Evelyn insisted on cleaning as soon as we got home so that Sarah could put them in). :)

It had been a long week by this time (last Saturday) and Sarah and I needed a break from the kiddos. So that evening we left them with my babysitter and met Jorjann in Mililani for sushi and a movie (Inception....it blew our minds!). Love Girls Night Out!

Surprise!

I really do have the best husband in the world. :) He sent me flowers--just because. They're BEAUTIFUL and fill my kitchen with a lovely aroma. Thanks, Ry!

Ice Palace

While we were nursing our fading sunburns the next day, we headed over to the Ice Palace to cool off and have fun.

This was the very first time Marcus has ever gone. He LOVED using the walker. He was slipping and sliding all over the place, but the walker helped keep him upright.

Then he ditched it and wanted to try out the bigger area. He finally figured out that if he just keeps his legs straight up and down, that we'd pull him along. Worked out great and everyone had a blast. Marcus now asks to go ice skating EVERY DAY.

Jacob was all over the rink, ice skating on his own without help. Julia, too.

How bad were the sunburns? Well, check out Julia's line here (she had a bandaid there).

She was actually quite tan to begin with....that strip of white was a nice dark tan....and all around was a burn. The burn faded into a deep tan by the next day (all of our burns did). Julia went to Bellows a few days ago and didn't put on enough sunscreen--that white strip is completely gone now. Completely burned again...and will hopefully tan in a day or two...AGAIN. Joycelyn, I'm betting that she's darker than you at this point.

Waimea Beach

We decided to hit up Waimea--and it was GORGEOUS that day! We went around 11am and ended up parking at the church up the hill. It was when we were grabbing all our stuff that Evelyn mentioned she "forgot" her shoes. So I grabbed all her stuff and Sarah carried her down to the beach. We ended staying off to the right--next to the hill. It was PERFECT.

We used the boogie boards while in the water...the entire time. Evelyn enjoyed laying out on hers in the water and Marcus hung on to enjoy the ride.

We'd planned on making a day of it...so I packed sandwiches, chips, and a jug of ice water.

Someone was getting pooped out after almost 4 hours...

I was trying so hard NOT to get a sunburn on my head. But the sun at Waimea is brutal (I swear I ended up with a blistered head).

Playing with a stick he found.

We reaaaaallllly lathered up on the sunscreen before getting in the water. Well, we lathered our faces and shoulders and backs. Forgot to take into account that they girls would be laying out on their stomachs. Guess who came home red?

No sunburn for this guy though. I had so much sunscreen on his upper body that it wouldn't rub away. :)

And the best way to cool off? Head on over to Aoiki's for some shaved ice. :) Sarah and I both got the mango/pineapple with ice cream. YUM!

So once we got home, we assessed everyone to see what sunburns we acquired. Julia's legs, and arms. A bit on my shoulders and the backs of my legs and thighs. Evelyn's legs and a bit of her rear end. A bit of Sarah's arms. The backs of Jacob and Marcus's legs.

Dude, we had been to Ko'Olina just the day before and hadn't needed much sunscreen. I really think that the sun is harsher at this beach. Everyone I know who goes there always leaves with burns. Of course, we were there during the harshest hours (11-3). Nonetheless, we had a BLAST.

News Alert!

The girl who swore off reading ("It's BORING, Mom!), who refused to read anything that didn't have pictures (and even then it was iffy), who made it feel like I was trying to pull teeth to get her to read ANYTHING....is now reading! Julia has the complete How To Train Your Dragon series (which she has read over and over), Diary of a Wimpy Kid series (read over and over, too), and just today, I convinced her to pick up Percy Jackson and the Olympians Lightning Thief. She came tearing into the kitchen "MOM! This book is soooooo good! Oh, wait--OH NO! I'm becoming a bookworm just like YOU!"

Bwhahahahahahahaha!

Random pix

Since my van started the next day, we headed out to Ko'Olina. I forgot my camera in the car though. :( Afterwards, we went back to the house for showers, lunch, and then to the church building for Jacob's cub scout meeting. We were supposed to pick up another boy at the highschool, but I don't think he showed. Dude, there are huge speed bumps, like, every 20 feet in that parking lot. We were green with motion sickness by the time we go to church. We had planned to head over to Mililani during Jacob's meeting, but instead we ended up trying to catch our equilibrium on the floor of the nursery. We also were nursing our wounds...we ALL got stung by jellyfish at Ko'Olina! We couldn't figure out why our arms hurt soooo bad and had some funky stickiness to certain parts of them. And on top of that, Julia got stung by a dead bee floating in the water. ???? This place is gorgeous and complete kid friendly. I was shocked.

And of course, Evelyn and Marcus took our cameras and went camera happy on us.
Literally, we just layed on the floor to make the motion sickness go away.

Marcus had Sarah's camera...which, Sarah, you really need to upload those pix. She has some on there from over TWO YEARS ago!

When it rains, it pours

My friend, Sarah (who I was roommates with at BYU) came to visit this past week. It started off pretty hectic--I stayed up late finishing laundry and then woke up early to make sure everything was put away. I went to jump in the shower....no hot water. My thermometer was barely reading 80. COOOOLD! I was a bit freaked out about that....thank goodness the kids had taken baths the night before. But me? No, and I needed one. So after a very quick and very cold shower, I called the maintenance people. The lady taking calls was extremely sympathetic towards us and decided that this was urgent. A dude came within the hour...which was a good thing, cause it was about that time that I needed to leave and high tail it to the airport to pick Sarah up. After hustling all the kids into the car, we were ready to go.....but when I went to turn the car on, the engine just kept rolling over and not starting. Needless to say, I was almost in tears and freaking out. My van hasn't EVER given me problems. And of all days it decides to start? Yeah, whatever! I remembered when I visited Sarah a few years ago, one of her friends always had to pump the gas pedal before starting her car. I tried to do that--and it worked! A quick prayer of thanks and we were off to walmart to pick up a lei. But when we got out of walmart, the car wouldn't start again. I tried pumping the gas again...nothing. Again with the gas pedal....nothing. A quick and desparate prayer to Heavenly Father and pumping the pedal....turned on. Whew! We went straight to the airport and arrived 30 min early. I went ahead and parked, but stayed in the car. I turned it off but kept turning it back on every 2-3 min to make sure it didn't die on me. Ugh. I decided we should go and wait for Sarah in the airport when we had about 15 min before her flight was due. It was a good thing too, since apparently it had landed just a couple minutes before! Julia met Sarah at the door and gave her a lei of stars. Miraculously, my car started for the way home. I explained to Sarah (who was very easy going about it all) and we agreed that I should drop my car off at the Firestone on post to have it checked out. Just as I was about to pull out of the drive way, Elder and Sister Webster pulled up. These missionaries are sent here to work with the military members on the island (it's a military relations mission). Especially the families of deployed soldiers. Elder Webster said he couldn't shake the feeling that they needed to check on me. :) He took a look under the hood and was concerned with how my battery was connected. He volunteered to follow us to Firestone to make sure we got there ok (I tried to show him the funky noise my car was making when I tried to start it up--of course, my engine turned on JUST FINE then. Go figure. Actually, we figured it did cause it was all warmed up from the drive to the airport and back). So we all went to Firestone and Elder Webster told the guy at the desk what he thought was wrong with the van. They said they could fix that no problem(the diagnostic dude was gone and wouldn't be back til the next day). But they were backed up, so they'd call me when the van was ready. After much thanks to the missionaries (and trying to convince them that we'd be ok walking back home) we headed back.

About 2 hours later, they called to say that the battery was running low and they could put a new one in. I agreed. Then they called back within 30 min to say it was ready. We walked back (the kids weren't exactly happy with me at this point...it was probably a mile and a half walk both ways). The van started right up. :):):):) More prayers of thanks were given. What a relief! I felt so bad--my van not working when Sarah first gets here....I was thinking of renting a car just so that we could go around the island. But thank goodness for answered prayers and those who are willing to listen to the Spirit and be answers to prayers. :)