Hawaii-Thursday

For Mother's Day, my brother, Todd gifted his wife Savannah, our mom, and me with a trip to Hawaii. (Marie was invited, but couldn't make it.) It was such a fun trip.

 Mom and I flew to SLC, then to LAX (worst airport ever), then to Maui. ^This is our first picture in Hawaii just after landing.

Savannah had arrived before us, so she had already gotten the rental car and we were out of there pretty quick. She took us to a beach right by the airport for our first beach/ocean view in Hawaii.

 Let the adventures begin!

We stayed at an airbnb condo at the Kealia Resort at the very north end of Kihei. It was perfect. This picture was taken from our back porch.

 If you follow that sidewalk down about 30 yards you are at the beach and 5 steps further you are in the ocean.

We went to bed still on Mountain Standard Time and woke up really early, Hawaii time. It gave the two runners (not me) a chance for a run on the beach and a relaxing morning before we went on our first adventure: kayaking.

 Savannah got her very own kayak, while Mom and I shared. The weather was perfect with no wind and a very calm ocean, so it was perfect for us first-time kayakers.

 I thought I would be sore the next day from using muscles I don't usually use, but I wasn't really at all.

 We kayaked to a few places our guide knew were good to find sea life and finally settled on one where we dropped anchor and put on our snorkeling gear. There were sea turtles swimming so close, just chilling by the coral reef.

 This guy was drifting so close to us that we had to back up. The current was pushing him towards us and apparently it is against the law to touch a Hawaiian Green Sea Turtle, as they're protected, but it looked like he was trying to touch us.

 The ocean floor was pretty close here and we could see some cool fish, pokey sea urchins (or something) and cool brain-like coral.

 It really is a whole different world down there. So cool!

Snorkeling was so fun, though I kept getting salt water in my mouth. I would dive down to see something under water, and forget that I couldn't breathe like normal down there. Apparently I need more practice.

When we got tired we hopped back in our kayaks and paddled back to where we had begun. It was a super fun experience.

Our early morning caught up with us, so we went back to our place for a nap, then headed over to Lehaina for some Shave Ice and to find some cold medicine. I got a scratchy throat the day before we left for Hawaii. Thankfully the congestion held off until after we went snorkeling, but it hit pretty hard that afternoon. Once the medicine kicked in, though, it helped a lot. And the cold was a lot quicker than I had worried it would be. A lot of prayers and in a day and a half I was past the worst of it.

 The Shave Ice (not shaved ice) was delicous. And a lot bigger than we thought it would be. But it was perfect as the heat was picking up and the humidity was a lot more than us Arizonans are used to.

From Lehaina we continued on around the west end of the island to go see the Nakalele blowhole where water shoots up a little hole in the lava rock as the surf pounds the rocks.

 You can see the blowhole shooting up water in these two pictures.

 The view towards the east from here was beautiful.

 Little did we know that the road continuing on in that direction (instead of turning around and heading back to Lehaina) was insane. Most of it was one lane with a cliff down to the ocean on the left side and a mountain rising sharply on the right side. It was very curvy, too. And when I say it was one lane, I mean one car with maybe a foot or two on each side. It was nerve-wracking watching ahead for cars coming the other direction. Savannah drove it like a champion, though. And eventually we made it back to civilization and ate at Da Kitchen in Kahului. It was good food, but I wasn't feeling great because of my cold, so I was more than ready to get back to our place and crash for the night.

Field trip

Megan is at that fun age of screaming and tantrums. Our family rule is you can scream in the bathroom or your bedroom, so when she (or the other kids) are screaming or throwing a tantrum we escort them to the bathroom until they're done. At Grandma and Grandpa's house last week while Grandpa was babysitting she was sent to the bathroom to finish screaming and when he came back to check on her this is what he found:

 Today when I got home from a church meeting, I found her asleep on the bathroom floor at our house. She doesn't take naps most days, but I find it very amusing that when she really needs one (as manifested by her tantrum-throwing), the bathroom is the only place that a nap will happen.

Last week I got to go on a field trip with Rachel's class. My parents are angels and babysit often so I can volunteer in Rachel's and Annie's classes weekly, and go on fun things like field trips. I appreciate them so much.

Rachel and her two best friends got to be in a group. Daryne and Madison are pretty fun.

 We went to the International Wildlife Museum. Rachel may have turned into a goat for part of the trip.

 There was one room with art made out of buttons. It was amazing. This bear was all out of buttons shaped around plastic containers that were recycled.

 A fun time was had by all. :)

Young Women happenings

In August the Tucson LDS Temple is going to be dedicated. We are getting pretty excited about it. There is an open house where it will be open to the public June 3-24. After it is dedicated, it will be a place where church members in good standing are allowed in to perform special ordinances like being sealed as an eternal family rather than just "until death do us part," or baptisms for our deceased ancestors who didn't have a chance to be baptized while they were still alive. My kids have been looking forward to the temple as we've stopped by a few times during construction to see the progress. Megan talks often about "when the temple is done we can go inside!" And now it's almost time!

 I am extra blessed to be working in the Young Women program at church right now. It is an exciting (and super busy) time. In conjunction with the temple dedication there is a cultural celebration that the youth in the area get to participate in. It involves a lot of singing and dancing and highlights some of the history/cultural ties of the church in our area. We are starting to practice next week and it will take up most of our weekly activities for the next few months. With Girls' Camp coming up in July, as well, we have had a busy month or so with Girls Camp kickoff, Cultural Celebration kickoff, ward YW campout to do fire/cooking certifications that we can't do at camp, all on top of our regular weekly activities. But I'm happy to be a part of it.

And actually, now that I think about it, our YW campout turned into an un-campout.

 We went to set up tents to claim our campsite that morning, then were planning on returning in the evening with the YW. The wind was so strong we decided to just stake them down, then when we returned in the evening the girls could put the poles in and erect the tents fully. But as we were almost done staking down all the tents some ominous clouds had rolled in and it looked like it would rain. We decided the tents would fend off water better if they were erect, so we put the poles in one and as soon as we were done a gust of wind came, ripped out half the stakes, and turned half the tent inside the other half. We gave up on the poles and went with our original plan, leaving them just staked down.
When we got home I checked the weather, and the wind wasn't supposed to start dying down until 10:00, getting manageable around midnight. Besides the problems with the tents blowing around, we were worried about fires, since the Sawmill Fire was still burning south of Tucson, and we didn't want to start a new fire on the north side. Skipping the fire would thwart the whole purpose of our campout, which was to do the fire certification and camp cooking that can't happen at Girls' Camp (because of the cooking facilities, and because fire restrictions in the summer often don't allow for fires at Girls' Camp). All the preparation for the campout was already done by our awesome camp director and her assistant, but after much debate and discussion we decided to skip the camping part of it. Luckily one of the leaders had a great connection who had a farm with green grass and a big metal firepit that served our purposes just fine. We had a great evening out there, went home to sleep in our own beds (yay!), then got together in the morning to cook breakfast on camp stoves then head out on a nice in beautiful weather.

April

We recently got our floors downstairs redone. The carpet in the front room had been stained since we moved in, and the laminate in the kitchen/family room was starting to get some holes in it, so it was time to replace them. And as long as we were doing 2/3 of the downstairs, we figured we might as well do it all (except the laundry room and bathroom) and make it look nice. The guy who gave us an estimate on price told me it'd be 2-3 days. The installer laughed when I told him that's what I had been told. It took 9 days. Which wouldn't have been so bad if that's what I had been expecting, but it did throw a few plans for a loop.

 It was sure nice to be done and have our floors look beautiful and our house back to ourselves. And in moving everything downstairs I actually got a lot of decluttering and cleaning done, which was a bonus.

 Annie, Ryan, and Megan have been taking swim lessons for a bit over a month. The session just ended and Ryan and Annie have made great progress. Annie can swim freestyle across the pool, and is starting to get side breathing down. Ryan can swim well as long as he remembers to keep his eyes down--when he tries to look forward his feet drop and he stops making any progress. But he can swim across the pool short ways really well, and could swim the long way if he were a little less nervous when it got to the deep end.

  Megan is super comfortable in the water, and I think if her teacher would push her a little, she would be swimming. She can float on her back pretty much all on her own. And when she's swimming with me I can let her go near the edge and she'll kick with her face in until she reaches the side.

We got to go see Annie's egg drop project. Her egg survived. She had the egg in a butter container which was taped to her umbrella.

 Here's her class with their egg drop projects.

 Speaking of school, Annie finished her Reading Fair Project. She did it on Junie B. Jones and the Stupid, Smelly Bus. She did a good job.

March Catch Up

We went camping at Parker Canyon Lake the last weekend of Spring Break.  Friday morning, Colette and the kids went to reserve a spot for us.  The Allen family came for Friday but did not stay the night.  The kids spent a good part of Friday by the lake learning to skip rocks and playing in the water.


 

 
Rachel and Maryanne were brave enough to get in the water.  They said it was really cold.

I arrived at dinner time and we had a lovely meal of tin foil dinners.  We roasted marshmallows and Starbursts for a treat.  The Allens left Friday evening before it was dark and we had a long cold night in our tent.

 

Saturday morning we huddled around the fire and sipped hot cocoa.

Later that morning we went for a walk around the lake.



 

The kids discovered the perfect climbing rock.


We decided to take some family pictures while we were on the rock.





All in all, it was a nice campout.  Next time we'll bring more blankets.

Here are some other random pictures from March.

Megan and Colette have complimentary outfits.




Ryan went to Kindergarten preview.  He is SO excited to go to Kindergarten.


Colette and Rachel were driving home from some activity and the sunset was spectacular.  Rachel tried to take pictures from the inside of the 4runner.



You can't beat Arizona sunsets.

Ryan is 5!

Ryan turned 5 last month. We kicked things off with Lucky Charms for breakfast, and family presents in the morning. Ryan mostly got new clothes (which he really needed).

 But he also got a special surprise (that he knew was coming).

 A new bike!

He's been riding a two wheeler for over a year, but it was a small one, so he would pedal so fast, but with the small tires, he couldn't keep up with us no matter how hard he tried.

He was a little cautious at first on the new bike, but after a few trials, he was as fast as ever.

Later that day he had friends over for his birthday party. 

 He had been talking about watching Phineas and Ferb: The Movie all week, but changed his mind that morning to Moana.

The movie took up all the time we had planned, and more, so we paused it part way through in case people had to leave when the party was supposed to end, and had cake and presents, before going back to finish the last 15 minutes of the movie.

 Cars, rescue bots and other fun stuff were all big hits.

Ryan is a typical 5-year-old boy. He loves going fast, or anything that goes fast, like airplanes, motorcycles, or cars. He is a great big brother and often helps Megan learn how to play a game, or do something she's having a hard time with, or calm down when she's throwing a 2-year-old fit. He does sometimes provoke a fit, however, instead. Ryan and Annie are not the full time enemies they once were. They play well together for large stretches of time sometimes. And other times not so much. Ryan is starting to read, but prefers sight words to words he has to sound out. He just doesn't have the patience for that. Though he is starting to want to sound out words for fun sometimes. More than words, though, he loves numbers, counting, adding, etc. He also very much loves to figure out how things work. He is in heaven when someone is working with tools to take apart or put something together. He'll sit nearby and is just captivated, asking questions and talking their ear off. He's got "the knack."