For our 'Furlough Friday' activity through MOMS Club, we went to the Menehune chocolate factory for a tour. I had never heard of this place before someone set up the tour, but it was pretty great. The kids got a little talk about how chocolate is made and where macadamia nuts come from, etc. Then each kid got dressed up in an apron and hair cover and went to work making their own chocolate covered macademia nuts. Then, they had all the free samples you could eat. It was kind of like torture for me since I gave up chocolate for Lent, but they did have a few non-chocolate things I could sample! I would highly recommend the tour, it is worth it just for the samples! They put the kids' candies they made in the freezer and then before we left, each child got their candies back all boxed and shrink-wrapped. Pretty awesome!
Showing the 10lb chocolate bricks that they get in to make the candies with... Getting ready to make their own box of candies... A whole room full of kids in aprons and hair nets is pretty cute! Chef Adam and Chef Cole Now we're on to the sampling part. It turns out, if you let my kids eat as much chocolate as they want, eventually they stop eating it on their own before they get sick. I was actually surprised... The rows of sample bins... The finished masterpieces. So if you happen to be on Oahu, take the tour!
My sister Connie and her husband Steve came to thaw out in February from frozen North Dakota. So we had a good time being tourists around the island for a few days. We only seem to make it out to do these things when people come to visit. We headed out to the west side of the island for a nice sunset. At Dole plantation to see the pineapples... Visited the beach on the North Shore. Cole decided to make some snow angels (the poor deprived kids - they can't make snow angels) And Adam caught a pretty good wave on the bodyboard Adam had his birthday while they were visiting too. My baby is 6! We took a hike up to Makapuu lighthouse to see the sights on the windward side of the island and do some whalewatching. I actually saw some whales this time, but they were far out and so hard to get a picture of. So we'll have to see who we can get to come out and visit us next.
We did a hike up to Likeke falls in February. We hadn't tried the trail before and it took a little hunting around before we found the trailhead. Once we were on the trail it was a nice, easy to navigate trail. The vegetation along the trail was beautiful, lots of wild ginger and heliconia. Here is us early on in the hike. The trail was nice and even and not muddy at all. So it was a very pleasant hike. I think the falls were about 0.75 mi into the hike. We checked out the falls and then continued on the trail for a ways to see what was ahead. There were more gorgeous plants, plus some stands of bamboo if I remember correctly. We turned around so the kids wouldn't get too tired on the way back out. We probably hiked a little over 2 miles in total. Here is a picture of the falls, not large but very pretty. Adam enjoying himself on the hike. Dan and Cole Some of the ginger that grows wild all along the trail. We'll have to try to check out some more new trails again sometime. Oahu has so many different trails I'm sure we could live here for a long time and not try them all. Just have to get the mileage up of what the kids are willing to do now.
We've been enjoying winter here, Hawaii style. Cole and I were out trimming the palms in the yard and Cole started playing with one of the big fronds. I told him he looked like a peacock, so he started posing for me. Here is my little peacock... With MOMS Club we went to Moanalua Gardens. It is a nice little park, very quiet and secluded and they also had a very nice koi pond. I think the group of us fed the fish at least 10lbs of koi food that a couple of the moms had brought. The fish actually stopped begging for food the kids fed them so much. Also in Moanalua gardens is the 'Hitachi Tree'. This tree is the actual one used in the Hitachi ads (http://www.hitachi.com/hitachitree/en/). Apparently they pay royalties to the owner of the tree for use in the ads. Tour buses come full of tourists from Japan and they all get their pictures taken with it. It is a lovely tree, but I'm not sure what the big deal is all about. Some days here can be a little chilly here (I can hear you laughing!). When I say chilly, I mean that you might not want to put on your swimsuit and stand in the breeze while you're wet. You're probably ok if you're not just coming out of the water :) It was warm enough this day to break out the slip n slide. Maybe the pictures can thaw you out just looking at them... Adam's been taking tennis lessons for a couple of sessions now, but he still hasn't made it out of the beginner class. His coach said that his swing is now good enough but he has to get a little more focus. He's the one who is usually looking at the birds flying by rather than the coach. He is just not my little athlete. That's ok, I certainly was no athlete when i was a kid either - at least not in the 'organized sports' capacity. Cole will start the same beginner class next session, so we'll see how they do together. Maybe a little brotherly competition will give Adam some motivation to pay attention. :) Well I have a bunch of good photos still to post, I'll try to get busy and post more. For now, I think I need to get some shut-eye. Night all!
For the past couple of weeks, Adam's class has been practicing doing 'Green Eggs and Ham' by Dr. Suess. On Friday, they had their big debut. It really was cute. Adam's line was 'I do not like them Sam I Am'. Since that comes up several times in the story, he gets to say it several times. He did a great job, all the kids did. There was an outside dramatic arts program that came in and worked with the kids. One of their big goals was to get the kids to step out of their comfort zone and get past their fear. So none of the kids looked scared or talked soft when they got up, so the people must have done a good job with them.
I really, really don't know where time goes some months. Here it is, more than a month from my last post. Well I got a new computer, so that ate up some of my time getting things transferred and everything set up just the way I like it. I have no idea what I did for the 3 weeks before that. Let see... I did a parent-child preschool class with Cole during winter quarter. He had a really good time being in a classroom with other kids. Part of the program was a field trip and we went to a watercress farm. It was really interesting. Watercress is a salad-type green that grows in (surprise, surprise) water. It has an interesting flavor, it kind of reminds me of radishes. It is tasty stuff, fairly popular around here. Anyways, on the tour we got to see how they grow and harvest the watercress and got a bunch at the end to take home.
Adam really wanted to go to the Children's Discovery center, so one Furlough Friday we headed down there. We spent four full hours there and I'm sure they would have stayed longer but the place was closing. Below are Adam and Cole doing winter - Hawaii style (sledding and ice fishing). They had tons of dress-up, role play areas for the kids. Here is Adam passing judgement on Cole (I'm sure the verdict was guilty...) And here are my two little news anchors They had a ship that you could raise and lower the flags on, load and unload cargo with a working hoist, ring the bell, it was great fun for them. Adam enjoyed the Japan theme area We've been keeping plenty busy,I'll certainly try to update more soon!
So I am SERIOUSLY delinquent on updating the blog. Life happens. And I don't always have time to blog about it!
Let's see, what has gone on since I last posted... Thanksgiving... we had a nice Thanksgiving dinner with our friends in the neighborhood. It was a great meal and we didn't have to eat turkey for a week straight since we split up the leftovers.
December was the busy month. Barb and Steve came to visit. We had a good time being tourists with them. I think we showed them a good time around the island, and I'm sure we thawed them out a little from their Colorado winter. I have a ton of great pictures, here are some of them:
Then about a week after their visit we left for a vacation on the Big Island of Hawaii. I had a really good time on that trip. We stayed at the Hilton Waikoloa which had fabulous pools and an ocean fed lagoon where you could snorkel with turtles and fish. We took some road trips from the Hilton and spent a couple of days just enjoying the resort. The hotel was so huge that they had a tram and a boat to take from one end of the place to another. So the boys loved it (do you want to take the train or the boat back to the room??).
After a few days on the Kailua-Kona side of the island, we drove around the south end of the island over to the Hilo side. We saw the volcano national park, which was really impressive. I could have spent a few days hiking there if we didn't have a couple of small kids with us :) But we had a good time exploring what we could that was not too far from the road. We drove down to see the ocean entry point for the active lava flow. We hiked about 0.75 mi across a lava bed to the edge where we could see the lava entering the ocean (quite a distance away). As the sun set, you could see the orange glow of the lava. After the volcano we spent one night in Hilo and then flew out the next morning. We came back a couple of days before Christmas. Here are the photos from our Big Island vacation..
For Christmas we were supposed to get together with friends again, but their son came down with strep throat and so we were on our own for Christmas dinner. I went out to try to find a chicken to roast for dinner but ended up with turkey. I picked a small one so we wouldn't have to eat turkey and turkey and turkey. We had a nice day at home.
We had a typical New Year's at our house. I went to bed early :) Then I got up to watch the neighborhood fireworks at midnight. It wasn't as bad as last year, it was breezy so the smoke didn't build up so much. I happened to find this video on YouTube of a New Year's video in Kunia (the neighborhood we live in) from this year. Skip to about 2:45 into the video to see what folks here do for New Year's....
You can see the 10ft strings of firecrackers they set off and the huge aerials that people light off. Remember these are all RESIDENTS lighting these off. And the aerials can be seen in every direction... People have money to burn, literally!!
Well Happy New Year everyone and I'll try to update the blog a little more frequently...
We went to the school's fundraiser fair tonight, the Ohana (family) fun fair. They had a big inflated slide and bounce houses along with some rides. There were a bunch of games that the kids could play too and win little prizes. The kids both had a good time. Cole surprised me though, there was one ride there that had a really long line. Adam didn't want to wait in the line but Cole decided that he wanted to ride that ride. He stood in line with me and waited patiently for probably a half an hour. He never complained once or even asked when it would be our turn. When we first got in the back of the line I even tried to talk him out of it, but he wanted to ride THAT RIDE. So I waited in that line with him the whole time. I had planned on riding with him, but the lady running the ride said most adults are pretty squashed in there, so I grabbed Adam and he got to ride with Cole. He had the biggest grin on his face the WHOLE time.
Here we are, getting ready for the big candy event of the year... We met up with two other families and headed out around the neighborhood in search of sugar. They were all so cute and they really had a good time going door to door and walking the neighborhood seeing all the other kids dressed up. Now what do we do with all this candy? They each filled a gallon ziploc bag when we got home. I've found a few prize pieces in their bags (Andes orange chocolates, among others, Mmmm). It's all downhill from here calorie-wise. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas. That's why we all make new year's resolutions!!
Since Adam was off school (again!) we went to the Bishop museum to see the Dinosaurs exhibit. It was a lot like the exhibit that we saw back in St. Louis before we moved. There were lots of animatronic dinosaurs along with some smaller fossilized pieces. Adam thought it was great, but Cole was not quite so sure. Some of them he would check out and others he gave this suspicious look at or ran away. There were quite a lot of moving, roaring dinosaurs in one section, so he was a little freaked out. Then today we went to the MOMS Club Halloween party, so I dressed up the little monsters for the party (ok, so they were a skeleton and a robot, and they didn't act too monstrous today). But Adam managed to find something to be mad about even on his way to the party, and thus the grumpy picture. Oh well. Now on to the real candy-fest tomorrow - - Halloween! We're heading out to trick-or-treat the neighborhood with friends. It should be a good time.
Getting ready to make their own box of candies...
A whole room full of kids in aprons and hair nets is pretty cute!
Chef Adam and Chef Cole
Now we're on to the sampling part. It turns out, if you let my kids eat as much chocolate as they want, eventually they stop eating it on their own before they get sick. I was actually surprised...
The rows of sample bins...
The finished masterpieces. 
So if you happen to be on Oahu, take the tour! 
