my tan

 I have a tan.  The high today was 34 degrees and it hasn't stopped snowing at my house.  I'm covered head to toe in clothing, but underneath it all I'm tan.  More than my tan, I'm glowing.  I'm refreshed.  I'm on a post vacation high.  Not ready for a reality check.  Even the reality check's that have come our way since coming home can't get me down.

Piled up bills & mail.  Who cares.
TV's not working.  Big deal.
Kids whining about stuff.  Love them so much.

It seems that nothing can get me down right now.  After a full nights rest in my own bed after 8 nights away, I woke up this morning feeling like the past week was a dream.  As my kids hopped up on our bed asking for milk and breakfast I was certain last week didn't happen.  As I showered, in my very own shower, I noticed the scrapes on my leg.  Must have been from the coral reef on the ocean floor.  As the thought crossed my mind, I realized how dreamy that sounded.  I also noticed the blister on my toe.  I remembered that it was from my flippers.  Just 24 hours earlier I had been snorkeling.

Now I was in my own home, my own bed and my own shower feeling like it was all a dream.  For Tim & I it was a dream come true.  8 days away in Hawaii.  Spending time together.  Laughing with our friends.  Waking up to palm trees and perfect weather.  Going to sleep to palm trees and perfect weather.  Lots of sand, ocean, food, fun and friends in between.  All while our children were happily at home being taken care of.  Being in the middle of our child rearing years, I honestly felt like this day would never come.  It was a huge sacrifice for my Mother-in-Law who cared so well for our kids all week.  We know it's not something we get to do every day so we enjoyed every second of our time away.

It was a dream and I'm not ready to wake up.  Thank goodness I have a tan.  I hope that as it fades my memory of our Hawaiian days will not.  I took lots of pictures with "my heart."  Thanks to my cute friends suggestion.  I also took plenty of pictures with my camera.  I'll be posting those just as soon as the laundry is done!

home sweet home

After 5 or 6 hours in the air, we had a brief layover in LA and then headed home to Salt Lake City. The red eye flight was brutal. Tim hated it much worse than I did, but neither one of us was able to sleep much. We arrived in Salt Lake to this. Ugh...

And home to this...

But it was so worth it because of this...

My older boys wouldn't take two seconds to pose for the camera.  They were so busy throwing snowballs, building forts and sledding.  They were in heaven!

I was happy to be back in my awesome neighborhood with more great friends and the gorgeous weather that Utah has to offer.  Truly, I was feeling beyond blessed and grateful today!

Tim had to catch up on some work, but we mostly soaked up every second with our kids today.  I didn't even bother unpacking until Saturday morning.  I was so happy to be with my boys.  I definitely feel so re energized.  I'm on a Hawaiian high that I'm not sure I'll come down from anytime soon. 

I love that Cooper spent the afternoon asking how to write "Hawaiian" words.  He is too cute!

Hawaii - day eight

How could it possibly be the last day of our trip?  I woke up on our last day feeling sad.  I was NOT ready to leave.  Sure, I wanted to get home and see my boys, but they were having so much fun with Grandma I still really wasn't worried about them or missing them terribly bad.  I thought about just having them fly to Hawaii and meet us.  Then I realized that all good things must eventually come to an end.  It's always great to leave on a high note, right?  The weather was beyond perfect.  The food was amazing.  Our company was fabulous.  This was the most fun that Tim and I have ever had on a trip.  (Maybe we just don't get out enough?!?)

I ran through the resort on the last day and took a lot of "pictures with my heart" plus a few with my camera.  Another gorgeous sunrise...

The lava rocks that surrounded the entire resort...

The beautiful golf course club house...

After we packed up all of our stuff and stored it in the car for the day, we headed over to A bay again per my request to do some more snorkeling.

More snorkel nerdyness...

I stared at this scene realizing how much I was going to miss this in just a short 24 hours.  Sitting by the beach, soaking up some sun, great conversation, sand between my toes, saltwater stinging my throat and palm trees swaying in the wind. 

Tim used a bad mask the first day and had a bad experience, he gave it another try today and loved it this time.  We rented the gear for half a day today.  Tim and I spent most of this time exploring the water.  My friends loved making fun of me as I would get beached up onto the shore by a crashing wave and call out for Tim to come collect the seashells from me that I had just found on the ocean floor.  They were not that impressed with my new found snorkeling skills, but it did provide them a morning of entertainment!

After spending the morning on the beach, we headed back to our resort for lunch.  I'm glad we finally ate here because the food was really good!  One last picture of the group.  Tim & Josh are "smiling with their eyes" or doing a "pedismile" as they so observantly named it.  Creepy.

After lunch (and a super long debate about legalizing marijuana, which Tim, Melissa and myself removed ourselves from) we spent our last day in our favorite spot in the pool.  Tim & I played some one on one volleyball, while Melissa chatted it up on the beach chairs with one of our new friends.  When the rest of the crew was finished with their debate, we had a water slide contest.  Yes, we were very juvenile and it felt amazing!  Annie dominated that contest and then proceeded to give the rest of us water slide technique lessons.  Who knew.  As 4:00 pm rolled around we knew it was time to get showered up.  Boo.  Did I mention that I was not ready for this day or this week to end?  Ever.  Luckily, in another moment of awesome serendipity,  our resort was having a Hula show (a luau show without the huge buffet of food) that evening.  After we got all ready, we were able to watch an amazing show.  I took more video than I did pictures, but trust me, it was awesome!  The perfect way to end our fabulous Hawaiian adventure.  Tim, Jordan & Josh even got to join in the show and dance.  They've got some skillz.    

I took one last picture of the resort as we headed to our car.  Goodbye paradise...

Tim getting to hold Hallie one last time... 

We made a couple stops then ended up at the airport.  As soon as we arrived there, I was ready to be home.  Unfortunately, there was 10 hours between this airport and home.  We were so sad to say goodbye to our friends.  I hate goodbyes.  We were ready to rejoin our family at home though.  This Hawaiian adventure was unforgettable and would not have been the same without our awesome friends.  Tim and I felt so blessed to be there and to be with some really great people who we learned some much from and enjoyed laughing so hard with.  

Aloha.  

Mahalo.  

And anything else that might mean thank you, thank you, thank you and goodbye :(

hawaii - day seven

Why can't I start every single day like this?

Here we are on our seventh day in Hawaii and this place just keeps getting better and better.  Look at this picture.  No words.  (Okay, of course I have words, because I always have words.)  Oh my goodness!  This divine place is called Anaeho’omalu Bay, say that three times.  Or don't.  You can just refer to it as A Bay.  I learned that from the guy who rented me some snorkel gear.  I'm sure he saw this gleaming white girl and didn't even want to bother with the name.  A Bay it is.  Tim and I found this cute little place on one of our early morning runs.  We're sort of kicking ourselves that we didn't find this gem earlier in the week because we were in love.       

Here is trooper Annie lugging her stroller through the sand.  Luckily she's got a diet coke in her hand to keep her going. 

Snorkel nerds...

But the picture of me below is totally cool, no nerdyness whatsoever.  Why would someone ever post this picture of themselves, you ask?  This was right before a moment that changed my life forever.  The moment that I jumped in the ocean and almost had a panic attack because I couldn't get used to breathing through my mouth realized I was part mermaid.  After figuring out how to breath through my mouth ONLY I immediately fell in love with snorkeling.  I really wanted to spend all day here and was so mad that we only had one hour before we had to head out on our adventure day.  I seriously considered kissing Akaka Falls and the Volcano goodbye and staying at the Beach, but I knew I would regret it.

Just to make sure we are clear, snorkeling was amazing.  As soon as you put your face in the water it feels like you've entered a whole new world.  (Cue the Little Mermaid music).  I loved it.  It was fun to see the sea turtles swimming underneath and we watched one swim to the surface to get a little fresh air.  The fish schools swimming all around you. The beautiful coral reef.  It was awesome!   

After my amazing adventure snorkeling, we got ready for the day and headed out on an adventure to see the other side of the Island.  I'm pretty sure it's mandatory that you take lots of pictures of the gorgeous scenery.  It's breathtaking!  Over there is Waipi'o Valley.  We didn't actually drive into the valley, but we wish we would have had time. The view from over here was amazing. Jordan would be so disappointed if I didn't document his favorite part of the trip, which was stopping to eat lunch and Malasadas at TEX Drive-In.  I loved my BLT more than the donuts, but don't tell Jordan that!   

Tim thought he was so clever taking a picture of Melissa breaking the rules right next to the posted sign!

This is Umauma Falls (or just below it).  We needed to hike further up the hill for the really awesome falls, but we didn't realize this until we got back to the car.  Oh well...we headed onto another amazing waterfall.

Our next destination was Akaka Falls.  The world famous 424 foot water fall.  The surrounding tropical gardens around the falls were incredible!

After Akaka Falls we had another long drive in the car to get to Volcano National Park.  We were so excited to finally get there.  We left the resort at 10:30 am and didn't get to the Volcano until 3:30 pm.  It was a long trek.  We were so excited to see this amazing Volcano Park especially since it was currently erupting.

You can see the smoke coming from the crater (I hope that's the right terminology.  Rader would be so disappointed if it wasn't.)  This sight is eerily familiar to us.  It looks like one of our Herriman Wildfires.

It was fun to walk through and do some silly posing in the Lava Tube.  My favorite part about the Lava Tube's was walking around outside of them.  The birds were so loud.  It was truly so beautiful, but seemed surreal as if someone was playing some really loud ambient music.  I now know where the theme parks get their music from!

We also walked around and saw the steam vents.  Accompanied with more awesome posing!

We had heard that the Volcano was really cool at night.  We were getting antsy to get back to the resort.  Annie and the baby stayed back at the resort and I think we all felt anxious to get back to her.  Plus, we'd been driving all day and Jordan really wanted to make it back to Tex's for some more Malasadas before they closed for the evening.  However, we ran into a ranger named Rader and he convinced us that we just had to stay and see the volcano when it lights up the entire crater and looks like a "glowing amphitheater."  Rader did a really great presentation about Volcano's, but as the sun began to set it was getting super cold.  Like Utah cold.  We only had little sweaters and were starting to freeze our buns off.  We knew that we needed to stay, but we barely had the desire to do so.  Even after Rader's dramatic speech about how the first time he saw the Volcano he cried.  We waited in the car with the heater on until Melissa gave us notice, "it's dark enough."  We all jumped out of the van.  Snapped a picture of the "glowing amphitheater" and hopped back in the car.  We are so lame!  There was a line of cars waiting for our coveted parking spot.  If we would have stayed for another hour I'm sure it would have been 10x more amazing, but we were all tired and hungry.  Rader would be so disappointed in us.

When we got to the nearest town, Hilo, we stopped at Cafe 100 which we found in the guidebook.  It said that it was the best local spot.  Cheap food and lots of it.  Oh boy were they right.  This is what Josh ordered and ate.  Fried spam, little weenies, a fried egg and chili over rice plus a nice coleslaw salad on the sad.  The rest of our orders were similar...mine was chicken, egg, gravy over rice.  We really, really, really must have been hungry because I ate half of mine before I even realized how disgusting it was.  I also made Tim walk me to the bathroom and wait outside the door.  It was a little scary there.  The locals seemed to stare at us like we were crazy tourists.  (Oh wait, I guess we were.)

We took the long trek back to our resort and found Annie all rested after her fun day alone with baby Hallie.  This really was a crazy adventurous day.  Glad we did it.  Happy that I don't ever have to do it again kind of a thing?!