Tiki Island

Not two blocks from where we were staying on the Marine Base, there was a little 

rec place called Tiki Island. 

James was entranced. It looked like the funnest place he had ever seen. Sadly, it was also closed.

We checked on the internet - open on weekends only. He waited patiently for Friday. (...and by patiently, I mean asking daily if it was Friday yet and if now we were going to Tiki Island to ride the bumper boats.!?!)

It was nice when Friday came and I could finally say 'Yes!'

And, not only did we get to go to TIKI ISLAND!!, it was their opening day, fun fair, buy-a-bracelet-and-get-to-ride-everything day! Excellent timing. (The big, sometimes boring kids opted out, and, since it was right by 'home', that was fine. Sometimes it's nice to be party-pooper-free.)

Balloon Monsoon was there. They made us POKEMON!
It turns out, three out of four Romero children prefer pikachus to other balloon animals.

So, we got 3 pickachus (though, where my James picture is...?) and a bear on a heart for Cozette.

There was a little boy next to us in line who had two kissing doves on a balloon heart. I asked him if it was for his sweetheart, and got an "Ugh! No! It's for my parents!" Funny!....to me...if not to the boy.

We waited in line forever for bumper boats (not theme park forever waiting...15/20 minutes).

The kids said it was worth it. I'll have to take their word for it, because I opted to stay on the sidelines for that one.

Annika was a sport and took Cozy with her...

...while Jon seemed to have a squirt-gun vendetta against Annika.

SO glad I sat that one out. They were so wet.

They dried off, jumping in the bouncy houses...

...and riding the pirate ship.

(Notice we aren't carrying our balloons around everywhere? That's the nice thing about being right by your house. We walked home and put them away....and tried to entice the big kids out of their cave, with tales of floats and bumper boats. Alas, to no avail.

So we returned. And after we ate hotdogs and rootbeer floats (Yea! I don't have to make dinner!), I decided we should do something calm, like mini golf.

Even as I'm writing this, James is looking over my shoulder and offering Cozette mini golf advice. :)

"You should hit your ball to the high part Cozy. Then it will roll down to the hole"

Tiki Island. Land where childhood dreams come true.

Waimanalo

The next day, we drove down to the beach at Waimanalo. I may have had ulterior motives. Yes, Dave's Ice Cream happened to be on the way.

 Little kids waste their Hawaiian ice cream choices on silly things like chocolate or rainbow sherbert. 

I thought I could at least talk Cozy into Ube, since it's purple as purple can be. 

Nope. I got Kulolo and Coconut.

While Sofia and I were, respectively, navigating and driving our way to the beach, Anthony protested, "Ugh, quit saying all of those Hawaiian words! It bugs me!" 

Ha! He had to deal with it, because they were all street names!

The beach:

None of my kids are too big to enjoy splashing and playing in the waves.

Our one boogie board got plenty of use.

In addition to blue water and blue skies, Waimanalo also had lots of bluebottles (otherwise known as Portuguese man o'wars). (I'm sure it was just poor timing on our part, as we were there as the tide was coming in)

Jon, who got the worst of everything on our vacation, was the one stung. (Also my child who is most likely to get hives as an allergic reaction to a sting...or other unidentifiable pathogens. That came later in the day.)

A little vinegar and he felt somewhat better, but was justifiably unhappy about still being at the beach. 

Everyone else was still willing to risk the stings, and Jon eventually joined them again in the water.

When beach bathing, Cozy requires regular mermaid breaks, to warm up.

And, um....amazing.

Annika, once again winning the contest for best vacation picture.

When I wasn't on drowning prevention duty (swimming with kids), I just sat in the sand, enjoying the vitamin D and sense of well-being, while trying not to feel guilty about the sun exposure. Ah.

Waimea Falls

This was our townhome in Kaneohe. It wasn't fancy, but it had enough beds for everyone! Plus having a kitchen and laundry room was huge. With all of our swimming, we made quite a bit of laundry.

...and the maids made our beds and took out the trash every day. Bonus.

Next door were much cuter, newer apartments. I like to think they were small. :)

My first big outing with the kids was hiking to Waimea Falls.

(Yes, I posted Dole and the PCC grossly out of order, chronologically.)

Cozy was holding our newly-purchased bird guide, so that we could put names to all of the cute, feathery things we came across. (Waimea has a great gift shop!)

BUT FIRST, one must fortify oneself with Hawaiian Ices. Tradition. (No one ate the melon flavored ice.)

The first birds we saw - Jungle Fowl (otherwise known as chickens). There always seemed to be a chicken or two everywhere we went - even at McDonald's, often with broods of fluffy chicks following them around. Sofia wanted to kidnap a couple of chicks and bring them home as souvenirs. (And she would've gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for her meddling Mom!)

If it wasn't up hill, I would have called it a "stroll through a lovely botanical garden" instead of a "hike".

Hey, at least we didn't take the tram. What a shame it would have been to miss out on all of the beautiful trees and plants. Many of them are so amazing they look like they couldn't possibly be real.

Little zebra doves, scurrying around after crumbs and hiding behind leaves.

And...the waterfall. It looked much bigger in person. I swear.

The last time we visited this waterfall (roughly a decade ago), they had a hula show and cliff divers. 

No more. However, before, the time you had to swim in the lagoon was pretty limited. Now they have life jackets available and you can swim as long as you like! Yay!

I didn't swim....something about hiking back down in wet swimgear...

So, the big children each got paired with a little child, and I got to sit back and watch.

The one rule (not even my rule - an actual, real, posted rule!) was not to stand up in the waterfall (an injury avoidance thing), which one of my children immediately did. :)

Aside from that one infraction, they were all lovely and played nicely, only occasionally forcing each other under the waterfall. 

Cozy, taking a break. The water was pretty chilly, and Cozy hasn't got much body fat to keep her warm. Poor dear. I'm sure it won't last, but in the mean time, she gets blue-lipped from swimming.

Annika, in the ideal vacation shot. I should have made everyone sit there for pictures! Alas, too lazy.

One the hike back to the car, we stopped and looked (probably a bit too closely) at some of the interpretive sites. (Please be recreations and not actual ancient ruins!)

...and posed as the Avengers for a group photo.

Lovely outing.

Hannah's Doll Quilt

Finally, that whole project is wrapped up and no longer in my house. It only took about a year too. ;)

Jonathan is one who decided what Hannah's doll quilt would look like

...because he couldn't stop playing with my scraps. 

I got the top together at my Mom's house, so that I'd have something to work on during my trip home (during down-time that mostly didn't exist.) Lucky  for me it was a small project.

I backed it in the same roses that were in the border and one of the squares.

I hand-quilted around the squares, the diamonds, and the border.

Then I whipped out a tiny pillow case once I got home. 

FYI: don't leave those tiny pillowcases around to be accidentally vacuumed up by inattentive Moms. I nearly destroyed my vacuum cleaner with one....recently.

...and the horse pillow I bought for Hannah last year...that Cozy found and tried to claim.

I'm a mean mom, I know.

...and a real pillow case to match Hannah's quilt....because I have trouble walking away from a project.

Can't wait to show you what I've been up to lately. Obsessing about headbands!

Hannah's Cowgirl Quilt

This Hawaii stuff is just taking forever. (Not helping that, until recently, most of my Hawaii pictures were still in Hawaii, on my husband's laptop.) I just have to break it up with a sewing post.

I haven't been sewing much this year. 

It's been sad.

I've just been alternating between too busy and too tired.

So, I brought a couple of projects on the road with me this summer, hoping to finish something or another.

My little sister gave me some cute cowgirl fabric...

...(with one of her horse-crazy girls in mind) for a doll quilt. Remember back in the day, when I was making those all of the time?

Well, it ended up being more of a lap quilt (with the doll quilt made from it's scraps).

The back isn't too Christmasy looking, right?

One thing I didn't bring with me on our summer trek - my sewing machine. I thought I'd be pretty safe bumming off my mom and sister. Nope. When I spent a week in Oregon, not doing much and hoping to quilt this baby, my sister had all of her sewing machines at girls camp with her. Thus, the cowgirl quilt is tied and hand-quilted. With love in all of the stitches, Hannah! :)

Polynesian Cultural Center

My lovely children, at the Polynesian Cultural Center.

It took us two tries to see the PCC. The first time we attempted it, Jon was complaining about not feeling well. Nothing new. And, being the wonderful mother that I am, I decided we would go anyhow. (We had already bought our tickets...and I was tired of sitting around indoors in Hawaii!)

That trip lasted about half an hour. We went to 'Samoa', watched a cute boy (with an awesome 6-pack description from Sofia) climb a coconut tree, and got to see the whole husking, opening, and shredding of the coconut. But Jon spent the whole time lying on a rock wall, holding his head in agony.

I mustered some sympathy and took everyone home.

Take two: everyone feeling better and we made it to most of the cool things.

In 'New Zealand' earned that Cozette is very afraid of the Haka and some poi ball basics. (We came home with one pair of poi balls, from the flea market...and then Tony brought us 2 more, from Target!)

James was the most enthusiastic. Sofia kept hurting herself with them. :)

'Tahiti' will always win the award for best native dances. Sofi was bummed that she wasn't chosen to go on stage and dance with the Tahitian guy. At least she got a picture with him afterwards. Dream fulfilled.

Annika and Cozy on the canoe ride.

Anthony, not complaining. Yea!

The guy pushing our boat was very funny and we managed to keep Cozy from falling out. She and James want pet ducklings.

We saw a bunch of them in 'Fiji".

James and Cozette, holding hands with the tiki for one last picture.

Success! No one puked or had a migraine! 

Annika, Sofia, and I came back for the show that evening (sans whiny, tired kids).