Swashbucklin' fun - My baby's 3!

I can’t believe he’s three! It seems like yesterday he was born, learned how to crawl, walk and how to talk. He’s grown so much and while he sometimes drives me bananas, he has a heart of gold, he is so loving and affectionate, and he is deeply curious and full of life. He loves to laugh and ask a million questions (sometimes the same question over and over again. Lol.) He truly brightens our lives. (Thanks, Ash for the beautiful aloha clothes he is wearing!)

Elijah offered the opening prayer at his party and told Heavenly Father how he went to the Zoo and saw chickens (actually ducks), it was pretty funny. Thanks, Grandpa!! Aaron's dad offered to take Elijah and Elise out all morning to the Zoo and for icecream with our awesome cousins, Koa and Kai, while we set up and finished up making the food.
Elijah’s party was a huge success, much mahalos to party planner extraordinaire, JACE!

Jace and Kawena

Above: Aaron, Elise, Elijah & Jackie

Below: Elise & Koa, Keisha, Elijah, Ka`anela, Aaron

Below: Shawny, Wasatch, Brett & Eric

Jace created all the beautiful decorations, soda bottles full of sand and toys.

She also made a pirate party bag for each kid to take home, AND planned a treasure hunt for the kids, which included games like a coin and ring toss, ending with Elijah fighting a shark (Kai) and finding a treasure chest in the pool. Then everybody jumped in the pool!

Elijah fighting man-shark, Kai.

I made the food, with the wonderful help of my mother-in-law, Lala and Keisha. I made homemade spaghetti sauce and the girls helped decorate the pizzas. We used fruit from Gramma Noe's yard for the fruit salad, and Aaron's mom chopped all the veggies for the green salad. Plus, I made a big pirate ship cake (box cakes, with homemade buttercream frosting) for the birthday boy! (Thank you FamilyFun for the idea!) All the kids loved the cake.Thanks to everyone, it was truly a day that Elijah will remember.

Top left: Lala & Keisha. Lower left: Keisha

Top right, under balloons: The Kapus

Lower right: Aunty Milani, Aunty Boopie, Gramma Noe

Maui Obon Festival

One of the reasons I am grateful to be back in Hawaii is that we are with/nearby our family. Another reason I love being back is that we are closer to our cultural roots! Aaron is Hawaiian-Chinese-Irish, possibly with a little Maori (New Zealand) and I am full Okinawan.
My parents are learning so much about our heritage it is really inspiring. We now have a new family tradition. We are trying to make it back to Maui each year in August to celebrate the Okinawan Obon Festival. My parents are involved with the music for the festival - they are learning how to play the sanshin, which is similar to the Japanese shamisen and often likened to a banjo, but it is a traditional Okinawan instrument. Here are some of my favorite pictures from when we went to the festival this year. My parents completely spoiled the kids. My dad made it really special for them by setting up a wading pool, tent and surprised them with lights in the tree house. They loved playing in the sand, with their googles and flashlights, picking and eating their own mangoes. : )

Here is a slideshow with highlights from our trip. Thanks, Grandma and Grandpa Maui (as the kids call them)!

Rotten Pumpkins & Trunk-Or-Treat

We loved the fall tradition on the east coast of going to a farm and picking out perfectly plump pumpkins and crisp apples for pies. We were not to be able to go to a pumpkin patch this year, but we tried to carry on part of the tradition by carving our pumpkins. I knew we wouldn't be able to leave the pumpkins out on the porch for weeks like we could in colder climates, so I got ours two days before Halloween. Sadly, they did not make it... Note to self: pumpkins sitting in a tropical environment will melt/rot within 24 hours and will attract a multitude of unwanted bugs. Next year, I will definitely opt for the fake pumpkins I saw in Ben Franklin that you can carve.

We are not pumpkin carving geniuses like our friends Tiana & family, but we were pleased with how our spider and pirate turned out. We were always so inspired by Tiana's creations! Elijah's chose the pirate design and Elise wanted the spider. It was fun while it lasted.

My mother sent us these great costumes. If you didn't know, my mother is an avidly thrifty shopper and finds all kinds of deals at thrift stores. These costumes were perfect! Elise was a sweet Snow White and Elijah was a ferocious lion. My mom even sent a princess dress for me - isn't she thoughtful? : ) Lol - she is wonderful.

We met up with some friends for the neighborhood Trunk-0r-Treat which was great fun, safe, and well attended. As always there is more candy than anyone could ever eat. Afterwards, we went to one of the kids' favorite Auntie's house for hot cocoa and biscuits. Delicious!

Hope your Halloween was great fun too!

Black & White: Elise's 1st Girls' Nite

Hilo puts on this great festival called "Black & White Night" that showcases all the different businesses in town, as well as various musicians. The stores offer all sorts of free treats and sweet deals. I wanted to get to know the town a little and my SIL wanted to hear the music.
They call it the 'Hilo's biggest strolling party' because everyone just walks all over to the different shops, listening to great bands along the way. We had a blast listening to jazz, sipping on lemonade, and getting our face painted for free! Elise was thrilled to be out with the girls' and has had some issues going to sleep since. She now knows we have fun after she goes to bed! We went with Jacelyn, Aaron's sister and Lala, our cousin.

Elise won 20 dollars in the keiki (kay-key) or children's costume division. True, there were only 4 contestants, but it was a highlight of our night. She won second and an amazing little guy who dressed and danced like Micheal Jackson won first prize.

After the festivities, we ate at Cosmic Cones a local diner and then went to a Dollar Theater. We had a wonderful time and it was fun to be out with the girls, including my sweet girl.

Beaches, Honu, and Mo`o

It makes me nostalgic to see the changing of the leaves and cold weather clothes in everyone else's blogs. However, we're grateful that we can go to go to the beach still, even though we don't make it as often as we would like.

The kids are learning various Hawaiian words.

Honu means turtle. Pau (Pow) means done, finished. Pahipahilima (Pah-he-pah-he-lee-mah) means to clap. A`ole (Ah-oh-lay) means no.

Sometimes we'll pack a lunch and Aaron will go fishing. It's such a relaxing, fun family activity. I wish we had time to do this more often.

This beach is only about a mile from where we live and it's really child-friendly. It's sandy, only gets about 3 feet deep, and there is a man-made rock barrier so there is virtually no surf.

We love examining the tide pools full of opihi (salt water limpets), manini (small, striped surgeon fish), and other little crustaceans.

Mo`o is the name for gekko. Randomly, this one was sitting on my head after I dove into the pool. Elise is the one who pointed it out to me, and basically I freaked out. The kids were fascinated by it though!

Jace's new baby... (grand)

It's been a dream of my very talented, musical SIL to have her very own baby grand piano. So when the opportunity arose and a friend of a relative was giving one away for FREE, she was overwhelmed with joy. The joke in the family now is that it's Jace's new baby. My mom-in-law hired a man to tune the piano, but that it!

Below is the process of moving the baby grand in. I am proud to say that even though I was the smallest one, it was my legs that pushed the piano out of the trunk. I'm sure a lot had to do with the angle of the push and the fact that Aaron's cousin Baba stood behind me to give me something to push against.
Elise and Elijah immersed themselves in the task of polishing the wood. They did a fine job!

They polished every surface...
and then we attached the legs to the piano.

Here's the brawn. Aaron and his good friend, Gavin and cousin, Baba (in the yellow shirt), Aaron's dad, Jace and me all flipped the baby over. (Aaron and Gavin just finished playing some basketball.)

And the finished product!

We are now blessed by the musical talents of Jace and Aaron quite often. Aaron, has a beautiful voice and Jace plays jazz, classical, contemporary - you name it. She's a gifted improv artist and sight reads music really well.

Sweet & Silly Sayings

I don't know about your kids, but our kids' prayers turn into kind of travelogues. Elijah always starts out, "Heavenly Father... Daddy come home. Mommy stay here, with us..." and tonight he added "Elise go on adventure (but it sounded like ab-benture)."

Lately, Elise is much more expressive in her prayers. It's humorous to hear what she comes up with, although I wonder if she knows what she is saying... Recently she's prayed, "We're so grateful to pray and to listen and listen to pray." During FHE, "We're so grateful to pray about Jesus with all of our friends..." and tonight before dinner, she prayed after much rambling, " to make good choices."

One night before bed I told Elijah I loved him. It's not what he said so much as how he said it. Matter-of-factly, he exclaimed brightly, "That's right! You love me. And you love Elise!" Whew, I got that one right! He still has an adorable little lisp.

When we sing songs before bed, I like to hear the kids' version of songs... At the end of 'I love to see the Temple' Elise used to sweetly sing, "my sleeping beauty" instead of "my sacred duty." After much coaching she's evolved into saying, "my sleeping duty." Ah well, we're getting there. : )

Kona Hawaii Temple

Getting to the Kona Temple for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints takes about a 2 hour drive one way but I can't complain - at least there is one on the Big Island. The grounds are simply beautiful! I think I may have found a couple willing to make the drive with us and do a babysitting swap/picnic sometime. As you can see we got up so early for this trip that Elise never got out of her pajamas...

1st day at Pre-School & 1st Haircut

On her first day of pre-school at Haili Christian, Elise was really excited. She smiled with Gramma Lynette and Elijah pre-haircut. As you can see, Elijah can't wait to go school too! Elise and her wonderful teacher, "Aunty" Pam. Right now they are practicing writing letters and numbers and learning phonetics. She also teaches the kids songs about Jesus. Before bed the other night, Elise said, "Let me teach you a song about Jesus." Then she sang all the lyrics to: "Jesus loves me yes I know for the bible tells me so." I know that song, but I've never sang that with her for some reason.

Elise immediately started playing and making new friends. I felt kind of lost because she was so at ease in her new classroom. Joyschool must have prepared her for this.

So while Elise was at school, we took Elijah to get his first professional haircut with Daddy. I think they look so handsome! When we picked Elise up from school, we all went out to eat to celebrate since they released the kids early on the first day. Normally she goes from 8 to 2:15 every day. She loves it! I hope to get Elijah invovled with "Keiki Steps" a free pre-school program for toddlers and their parents soon...