Last of Hawaii pics

Just a few days left to complete the Hawaii vacation. Actually, now that I've written about it, I'm "re"enjoying it sooo much! What a fun break it was -- one of those that I feel like I appreciate even MORE now that it's over.

Day 6:

We explored the other side of the island that day, which turned out to be a lot of fun. First, we visited another gorgeous waterfall overlook...

Then we went to watch a big blow hole. It made some great gurgling noises that were fun to listen to, as well. And, the guide book warned us NOT to go close (duh), and told about several people who had been sucked in and died, plus one really fortunate man who was sucked in, then blown right out again, phew!

Then we went to a great botanical garden. Brian found out his ethobotany teacher from BYU is one of the head botanists there -- Paul Cox. It was great to look around, and we went late enough we had the whole garden to ourselves...

Ever wonder what real cocoa plants look like? Here it is, folks -- the REAL source of chocolate...

I think Adam and Eve would have been wise to use these (below), instead of just puny little fig leaves, no??

Black pepper plant... I just thought it was neat to see how pepper corns grow. Who knew?

Lovely pink plumeria. Of course, we didn't have to go to the botanical gardens to see it growing, but they sure had some beautiful specimens..

Also bananas (below) were growing EVERYWHERE, even just wild, right in front of our condo. And yet, in their grocery stores, bananas were selling for $1.19 a pound. You heard right! And to think they're only 46 cents a pound at our local Wal*mart in Idaho. Crazy!

Some pretty flowers...

And more nameless flowers...

After the botanical gardens, we peeked in at some of the fancy hotels on the South side. Call us quirky, but it seems both Brian and I love to look at the really swanky places, just to see what they're like. So, we had fun strolling the immaculate grounds and taking a few pics here and there. This one (below) is the Marriott, I think...

Our favorite was the Grand Hyatt! It was MASSIVE, and the grounds were exquisite, including a salt water lazy-river type pool, and a tiki restaurant over the water. Wow...

From the back, looking up at the lobby area...

The beach swing we "borrowed" for a few minutes..

And, I'm sure this is a bit much, but I couldn't resist taking a quick pic of the "waiting area" inside the ladies room. Pretty posh!!

Day 7:

We kayaked the Hanalei River for a few hours, which was really relaxing and fun (except for the headwind on the way upriver). It's the mildest of the rivers on Kauai (and was the closest and most accessible for us). We got a two-person kayak, and, yes Mom, even *I* helped row the boat!!

Me and the boat... (again no shots of Brian, as he was the camera man, risking our camera by taking all these shots FROM the water)...

We saw tons of turtles, sunning themselves on rocks and branches. But as we'd get close enough to take a picture, they'd slip off into the water and we hardly ever got a good shot. But I thought this was a nice one...

After some good eats and naps that afternoon, we went back down to the Queen's Bath to swim and snorkel a bit at sunset. It wasn't as full as it had been on Sunday night, but I felt "safer" -- with less water flowing in and out. It was a perfect swim...

And a gorgeous sunset, once again...

Day 8:

Our last day (sniff, sniff). We woke up early and went snorkeling one last time. We found the BEST beach, and it was so close to our condo...

If only we had found it sooner. It was gorgeous and secluded, with TONS of fish and coral...

The pathway down (which is hard to see), was really steep and rickety, which probably helps keep it a secluded beach. And the view from the top (with my head included) was lovely...

One last shot of our lovely Hanalei Bay...

Then we packed up and headed out. We stopped and saw the Kilawaea Lighthouse and wildlife preserve...

One of those "rocks" down there is actually a monk seal (which I kept accidentally calling a monk squirrel ??). Can you find it?

They wouldn't actually let us go up inside the lighthouse, but we got to walk around and look at the water crashing on the cliffs below...

The views were spectacular, and it was such a clear day, too!

On our drive back toward the airport, I had Brian stop so we could take a picture of the Police Station. Ha! Looks intimidating, doesn't it?!

And Brian had us stop so he could take a picture of the Kapa'a LDS chapel, very quaint and lovely...

We spent the rest of the afternoon buying cheap souvenirs and delicious chocolate, then snooped around some more fancy resorts near the airport. Here's another Marriott, I think...

A clever sign, I thought. ha ha...

And, one more picture of the two of us, I thought it turned out nice...

We flew home through the night, a long night but not too bad. We were VERY excited to see our kiddos. And they were excited to see us, too. And the toy train at the airport, too...

Ah, what fun memories this trip will be as time goes by, huh?

Hawaiian Pics and Update

Remember back in mid-May when I wrote a little blurb about a trip to Hawaii? Well, that actually was a REAL trip. And finally, I'm taking time to add some of the highlight pictures, because, well, it was AWESOME!!

Brian and I found some great airfare to Kauai, and booked some reasonable accommodations for a little getaway -- celebrating our 6th anniversary (coming up in just a few weeks), and the fact that we have only two kids for just a little while longer. We left Samantha and Spencer with Brian's wonderful parents and had a perfect little holiday for a week! yay!!

Day 1:

Arrived at noon, got a sweet red Ford focus for our rental car (ha!), and checked into our condo for the night. Our view from the balcony of our room...

And, from the inside...

We lounged on the beach for a bit, then in our pool...

Then went for a drive to check out the shops and see a nearby waterfall, Wailua Falls, I think...

This was the sign at the top of the falls... not sure what it meant, but we sensed it was warning us of DANGER...

Back to our hotel for more beach lounging and an early night, after flying alllll day...

Day 2:

Went for a drive up Waimea Canyon (sp?), which rumor has it Mark Twain once called "the Grand Canyon of the Pacific." (Guide book said it wasn't really Mark Twain who called it that, but I like to think he MIGHT have.)

It started out looking like this... (excuse the wind-blown preggie look... I was both wind-blown and pregnant, what can I say?)

Three quarters of the way up it looked like this...

And from the top, it was like this, most of the time... Lots of rain and mist. We ate our picnic sandwiches and strawberries in the car in a heavy drizzle.

But when the mist cleared, the view was totally worth the rain and the waiting...

Pictures really don't do it justice, but here's one more...

On the way down, it was like this, again... a different view (with the same wind-blown look). Disclaimer -- Brian had the camera most of the time, so you will mainly just see pics of scenery and/or me...

And, we saw lots of wild chickens... They were everywhere, because there are no big predators that eat chickens in Hawaii. How nice, huh?

Day 3:

I think this was the day we checked into our new condo (or the night before?), lounged at our pool half the day, drove around our little village of Hanalei, and ate junk food in bed for hours while we watched television (watched all three Superman movies, among other things.) So, um, not too many pics. But here are just a few, starting with our fun pool with waterfalls and sandy bottom...

It was a lovely pool... I thought we got a picture of the waterfalls? but I can't seem to find it...

Our path/tunnel down to the beach, very overgrown and secluded...

There was this pair of cute little red birds that would come sit on our balcony while we ate breakfast each morning. I finally caved and fed them a little granola so I could get a picture...

The view from the lobby of our condo/resort...

Our beach (below). It was a bit more of a walk than the first place, but it had great sand (brought in by the swanky place next door that shared the beach with us), and snorkeling. We didn't actually snorkel there, but we heard it was a great place for that...

And here I am, on the balcony at that swanky place next door...

We couldn't resist having a peek at all their finery. It's one of the most expensive places to stay on Kauai... St Regis of Princeville. Their list prices were about $550 per night! But we checked online and it looks like you could Hotwire it for $400 -- a steal. ha! (The real steal was the $3 brownie in their coffee shop, which we shared.)

Day 4:

I think this may have been my favorite day. We hiked part of the famous Kalalau Trail. It's the trail that goes up along the famous Na Pali coast, where there are no roads. Gorgeous...

Here's the same view, with me (below). I was a good hiker, I have to say! After three+ months of nausea and lethargy, I was proud of myself for being able to do it at ALL! Brian kept saying, "If it gets to be too much, we can turn around." But we didn't.

Brian was a good hiker too... It doesn't look as steep and muddy and slick as it really was.

We hiked two miles (on a path labelled "strenuous" on our guidebook), down to a secluded beach with wicked riptides (no swimming allowed).

We crossed a little creek right as we got down to the beach. It was gorgeous, and the water was the perfect temperature. Then we were wishing we would have brought our swim suits, oh well...

Another view of the stream, just because we thought it was so beautiful...

The beach was nice,though small. There were signs everywhere telling people not to swim or go in the water because so many people had died there. Doesn't look that dangerous, but we didn't chance it...

We were going to eat our picnic lunch on the beach before hiking back....

But it started raining just as we got there, so we ended up on the lava rocks for our lunch, sheltered by a little overhang...

After we finished our hike, we snorkeled at a great beach for an hour or so, before heading back to our condo. We got delicious burritos on the way back that were sooo spicy, but soooo good... just like the guidebook said they would be. ha!

Day 5:

Happy Mother's Day!

My present was a GIANT chocolate chip cookie with chocolate frosting, and an orchid corsage from church. Oh, and a trip to Hawaii! :)

We called our moms in the morning (their afternoon), then went to church. We stayed for a very nice Sacrament Meeting where a young husband spoke then his wife sang. We were close behind their family of four little boys, and I felt so bad for the mom while she sang, with her boys yelling out "Mommmmmy!!!" and the newborn crying, etc. Ah, the realities of motherhood. ha!

After our church service ended, we went to this quaint little church nearby, for another service. It's the oldest Christian church on the island (their flyer said). We loved all the singing in Hawaiian -- they had a great choir!

And of course, Brian got some lovely shots of their stained glass. I'm just including one, but you can imagine the other 20 pics on our computer, right??

I confess, I was extremely tired, sore, and grumpy on Sunday. I think the hike wore me out a bit more than I expected... and poor Brian had to put up with me (his real Mothers Day present to me). We napped some, lounged on the beach and read, then napped some more.

In the evening, we walked to a secret tidepool (that's not such a secret now that it's in the guidebook), and watched the sun set...

The tide pool is called Queens Bath, and was really beautiful and big enough to swim in (which we did a few days later)...

A nice couple took our picture with the sun setting behind us...

And that, my friends, is where I will leave this blog, for now. It's taken me three days to get this far (and my kids are still in jammies at 11 a.m. on this Saturday morning). But I DO plan to write the concluding Hawaii details in the next few days. Promise.

Up and Down

For some reason, blogging just isn't my thing right now. Terrible, huh? I mean, I have hundreds of pictures that I'd like to have posted, just so I can enjoy looking at them and remembering a lot of fun things we've been doing around here lately.

But --- [big, long, involuntary sigh]. It just isn't happening.

Sorry.

Today is a down day for me. Probably a day I'd be better off steering clear of the blog, or the computer in general. Especially when I've been offline for ages. Yesterday was a down day too. And Saturday was an "on-the-way-down" day, if that makes sense to anyone?

But see, before the "down" time, I was having an incredible surge of "up-ness." For several days in a row, I was energetic, productive, and pretty much on top of things around here. (Except for blogging, of course.) I felt really good, I was sleeping good, and just getting so much done.

The short list of things I got done while I was "up":

-- cleaned out the fridge

-- did a major grocery shopping trip

-- cleaned out the laundry room (a major accomplishment, as it hasn't been cleaned for about a year -- the DEEP kind of clean-out)

-- swept and sprayed down the back porch for cobwebs

-- took the kids to the library, paid our fine for the book we lost last December, and renewed our card so we can start borrowing again.

-- picnic lunch at the park. TWICE in a row!

-- cleaned out all FOUR of our kids' toy boxes,

-- bought and planted REAL flowers in our pots in front of the house (so the silk flowers can stay in storage until some other unproductive time, I hope!)

-- got up and went walking with a friend three different times at 6:30 a.m.

-- read multiple books, multiple times on multiple days with my kids, even helping Samantha to sound out the letters on some of them!

-- visited our aging neighbor (something I've said I need to do every day for the last five months or so)

-- did a real princess hair-do on Samantha.

-- cleaned out the tupperware cupboard and the canning jars/toaster cupboard.

Whew! Can you believe I felt so accomplished as I climbed into bed several nights in a row?! -- with a smile on my face!!?

Well, right now, on my not-so-uppity day, just writing the list is making me tired. I guess the ups and downs are necessary -- one helps me appreciate the other, right?

But then, my "wondering" of the day is the same thing I've wondered countless times before, on countless down days in my past: why don't I just go ahead and CHOOSE to be "up," instead of feeling all grumpy and irritable and sludgy-- yes, sludgy describes it pretty well. See, just last night I was reading through an old journal, one that I wrote way back in college, more than a decade ago. Can you believe, I was struggling with the very same "wondering!??" I stated it a bit differently there, eventually vowing to do better at just being happy all the time whether I felt like it or not.

But as I read through more journal pages, I could see my resolve didn't really change my mood or my frustrations at the time. And I pretty much just had to weather the down days and try to find things to be grateful for, keeping me feeling somewhat positive, despite the haze. Not much has changed in all these years, I guess! It just seems to be a cycle I go through... a challenge I still haven't learned how to deal with properly. Hmm...

I guess life continues through the down days, too, right? And yes, I'm still accomplishing things, though they don't seem quite so fulfilling today:

-- showered and dressed and didn't forget to put on my wedding rings.

-- made our bed, and Samantha's too.

-- washed and dried a load of laundry, including Spencer's indispensable blanket.

-- held and comforted (and threatened to spank) a screaming, inconsolable Spencer who would NOT be placated, the ENTIRE time his blanket was in the wash. (actually Brian helped with this for awhile until he had to leave)

-- watered the tomatoes that are sitting on the counter, still waiting to be planted.

-- indulged the kids with chocolate milk and Doritos as part of their lunch.

Well, that's my feel-good list for today. And maybe tomorrow I'll get back on top of my game! Then, maybe, just MAYBE, I'll blog for REAL!

:)

Samantha was right!

Well, for those of you who have been patiently waiting for our next baby news, here it is...

We're having a GIRL! Yay!

I've been waiting to post the news so I could scan the cute little pics we have of her. But... that's taken way too long now. So, I'm just sharing without pictures, and will maybe add them later (or snag some off the internet because don't they all look a lot alike from the inside-out angle? ha!)

Anyway, we had our 20-week scan last week, and Brian relented and said we could go ahead and find out what kind of baby we were having. (He's very into the "surprise" thing -- for those who don't remember, Samantha was a surprise, at Brian's insistence. I told him we can have another surprise with the NEXT baby. one at a time, please.) We took Samantha with us, because I thought she'd be interested since she asked me almost every day whether it's a boy or girl. She was really cute about it, although, after the first 2 mins, I think she might have been more interested in the Cinderella book she found under her chair.

When the first shot of the baby's profile came up on the screen, Sam said, "Oh! I KNEW it was a girl!!" We smiled and told her it's pretty hard to tell whether it's a boy or girl, just by looking at it's face. She studied the image some more and said, "No. I'm sure it's a girl. Her face does not look at ALL like a boy." We had to laugh. And we laughed even more when Brian said to her, "Well, I guess it's not a puppy after all." And she replied, "That's silly Daddy!! Are you teasing? Because puppies only come from mama dogs, not from people mamas." (She's so smart, no?!)

Later, when we actually saw the "girl parts," Samantha got a better clue of how this all works. She told us, "well, that is for SURE is a girl, because there aren't any of those BOY parts like Spencer has!" Looks like she was right, smarty pants. Maybe she has a future as an ultrasound technician. Just think -- if she can actually tell just from the profile shot... I see big money here, folks! ha!

We also brought Spence, just because I was lazy about getting a sitter. Yeah... he didn't care one bit. But he was hoppin' mad when I accidentally bumped his ear into the doctor's counter while giving him a "horsey ride" on my knee. Oops. It actually put a slice right through the top of his ear, poor thing. I think he'll opt to stay home from future ultrasound/dr visits!

Well, we're really excited to welcome number three, and especially excited to give Sammie and Spencer a sister! Let the name discussions begin. Samantha prefers Abigail, Gabriella, or Candice. And she says "I'm not really crazy with Emma (one of her dad's top picks)" -- meaning, she doesn't like it; she's heard Brian say "I'm not crazy about [insert favorite name of mine]" so many times, I guess she figures that's the polite way to say NO, THANKS!

I have more updates to write (more Hawaii, Sam's ballet recital, etc.) Will have to promise to be back sooner, I guess!! Bye for now.