Mahalo

A humble thank you to the many, many things that have made this month wonderful: the ocean, sand, sea turtles, 80 degree days, tropical night showers, the sun, the full moon--twice--the 150 feet we walk every day to the most beautiful beach, the pineapples, shave ice, gin and toncis after an afternoon spent playing in the waves, my sister, my parents, the kids, jason, the baristas at Kalapawai Market, the windsurfers who didn't plow us down or run over my dad during his twice daily swim, the lovely cottages on the Big Island, the lava, the Honolulu Advertiser with its hard-hitting stories about the surf, the North shore, aloe vera after-sun lotion, sushi, FM 105.1, ("your Hawaaiian music station") and so on and so on..Mahalo.

Tomorrow, the midwest.

The Perlings

For the past two weeks our family friends, the Perlins (nicknamed "the perlings" by the kids), have been in Hawaii with us. They have added a great deal of laughter and fun to this trip, allowing us to break out of our traditional family roles. The kids LOVE them and we all benefit from Terry's games (after the 12th round of Uno he was overheard asking Ruby if she'd gotten an advanced degree from "Uno University" in the study of "Uno-ism") and Roberta's inspired shopping (Lexy and I have new jeans, dresses and jewelry to show all encouraged by her personal shopping acumen).

Other highlights include: Blue Hawaii, knitting bracelets, date nights for the seniors, Oxford updates, shopping, shopping, shopping, and many never before heard tales of their 40+ year long marriage ("12 good ones" according to Berta). Needless to say, we are all thrilled that they were able to join us, and we look forward to future trips, perhaps their children and soon-to-be grandaughter will join.

Realtime Hula

Here is the hula lesson. Did I really upload to youtube? you bet. Maybe their lesson will become the next Mentos sensation...

Poynesian style

Today was a parade of fun. Highlights:tempura tattoos, tree climber, fishing and hula lessons. When I figure out how to connect a Quicktime movie to this blog, I'll include a short of Lexy and Ruby's hula lesson.
For now, here is a link to a couple of more pics.

And then they were 4

Jason left on Sunday and we miss him a lot. Today's paper (the Honolulu Advertiser) has an article on the benefits of vacation (supported by research!) and I'm hoping he's feeling some of them now that he's back to the real world.

The kids and I continue our vacation...yesterday we returned to Lanakai Beach (near the site of last week's shark attack) for some wave-free swimming. The afternoon was spent with a bit of Webkinz, a trip to the Kalaps with Baba (the primo quickie marekt, Hawaiian-style) for ice cream and then lots of library books, all so I could continue my Harry Potter quest to the end of book 7 (accomplished this morning at 1:15 a.m. and yes, Jason, I very seriously considered calling you to discuss as I knew you'd be up in Ohio).

Updates directly from the kids:

Luca- My board game is very, very, very good because I made it (it being "Luca-opoloy" cut from cardboard and based on the original Mon-op). I won.

Zachary- We played "Simon Says" with the Perlings (editor: actually the Perlins, my parents' friends who are also here from Oxford). Terry is funny at the game. He always wants to be Simon. I'm wearing my monkey shirt. Monkey hates it (jealous) I just remembered that. The Perlings gave me a ball.

Ruby- Today we're going to the Polynesian Cultural Center. I hope we get to see hula dancing. After you left (Jason) I went to Pearl Harbor. Zach and Luca wanted to go but mommy said they weren't old enough. And, it's about World War II. I miss daddy.

OK- So that's the update. More later. I have to pack the swim bag and get ready for Mormon-supported fun.

Aloha

Well, I'm out of here. This trip has been awesome - I've been gone from work long enough I feel positively European (even though any self-respecting Frenchman or Spaniard would be horrified at a 2 & 1/2 week vacation). I am not looking forward to a) flying all day tomorrow and being at work in 28 hours and b) being away from Alison and the kids for the next 10 days, by far the longest I've ever been apart from the kiddos.

We had a great day today, with multiple, shark-free trips to the ocean.

The boys capped it off with soccer in a short, but torrential, tropical downpour.

Jaws

So, there we were, swimming at Lanakai, one beach west of Kailua, when suddenly word traveled down the beach that a swimmer and several sea turtles had been attacked by a tiger shark. Needless to say we gathered our things and packed our bag and headed home... It's the first windward-side shark attack on a human in 49 years. We stayed off the beach that afternoon and the next day. Today we venture back...

The other event of note this week was our appointment with Kristi from Pineapple Prints. She came to Kailua and snapped two disks worth of photos of our family on the beach. We will post highlights later. Perhaps we will just move to LA and let the kids start earning their keep.