The Aloha Spirit...

Hold on to your seats, folks, I am finally posting a bunch of our Hawaiian vacation pictures. Feel free to breeze through these and enjoy!

Here we are on the flight to Hawaii.

Our friend, Keenan, loves to take pictures and for this I am thankful, otherwise I don't think I would have any pictures of me in Hawaii since I'm the one always taking them of our family!
We actually took this picture in front of Chinaman's Hat on our last day in Hawaii but it embodies how beautiful the island is and how much fun we had.

Quinton and Miss M were VERY quick to go exploring the grounds of the awesome house where we stayed. Keenan was also quick to teach Quinton how to make the Hawaiian aloha salute or "shaka" sign with your pinky and thumb stretched out.

And this must be the universal monkey sign of funny kids, everywhere!

Staying at the house was such a better alternative to staying in a hotel because we were all able to hang out. Not to mention how much money we saved by not eating out!

Keenan's breakfasts were WAY better than any restaurant we could have eaten at on the island! This was the super delish breakfast he made for his daughter's, Miss M's 5th birthday and our 9th anniversary. Thanks, Keenan!

Here is a sample of the sunrise you could see from the house.

This is one of Matt's favorite pictures from our vacation. Rebekeh snapped this shot and it's awesome! Quinton loved, loved, LOVED catching waves on the boogie board and didn't mind getting tossed by the waves.

Like two peas in a pod Miss M and Quinton were never far from each other...even if that meant they were quarreling like brother and sister!

One day, we buried Miss M and made her sand body look like a mermaid. It was pretty cute! I think Miss M was enjoying her minute in the sun!

Ah, my sweet little fish boy!

One of the best parts about our vacation was that we didn't really plan anything. This was great because instead of running around trying to be tourists, we puttered around the island stopping at different beaches.

One of our favorite places was Shark's Cove.

We were able to snorkel and the kids were able to play on the shallow sandbars way out in the middle of the cove.

We saw an eel, spiny sea urchins, angel fish and all kinds of other sea life in this cove.

Here is the "top" view of Shark's Cove.

Beautiful, isn't it?

After Shark's Cove, we drove to a nearby town called Haleiwa. Now, I was pronouncing it totally wrong so it's not "ha-li-wa", it's pronounced "holly-ava," you have to love to Hawaiian language!
In Haliewa, we found a local favorite for burgers and sandwiches and we struck gold!

This was my avocado and turkey sandwich.

I was so surprised to find half of an avocado on my sandwich and let me tell you, it was super delish! We went back to this place later in the week and I was a little bummed because they had run out of avocados!

Quinton and Marlee horsing around our new favorite burger place!

After sandwiches, we went to the world famous Matsumoto's for shaved ice. It was beyond good! Quinton, Miss M and Miss A LOVED their shaved ice and so did the adults! Matt, Quinton and I snuck back to Matsumoto's a couple days later when we couldn't dream of going back to the mainland without having another delicious shaved ice!

Quinton is a fool for his shaved ice!

Yeah, Matt's a stud.

Matt really enjoyed getting away from work for a week, but getting back into our daily routine has been a little hard for Quinton because we all had so much fun hanging out together.

And what kid wouldn't want to do this all day?

Heck, I'm not a kid anymore and I wouldn't mind spending my days like this!

For Miss M's birthday, we spent a little time at the aquarium in Waikiki. I was a little worried it would be an all day affair since the aquarium in Chicago is huge, but much to my relief, the aquarium was pretty small and was perfect for attention spans of our 5 and under crowd.

This was Quinton's second trip to Matsumoto's which, as you can see, was just as delicious as his first trip.

Quinton snapped this picture of Matt stealing a bite of his shaved ice!

On one of our last days in Hawaii, we were able to go to the Polynesian Cultural Center. We were barely able to see much of the entire center because there was so much to see!

Quinton had more fun climbing the rocks behind him, in this picture, than actually watching the canoe pageant going on while we played on the rocks.

We were able to enjoy some of the pageant before Quinton became too restless.

Quinton did enjoy some of the hands-on activities designed for kids.

He likes watching the ladies make these cool leaf headbands with matching bird attached.

Here, Matt and Quinton are playing shuffleboard Tahitian style.

Matt didn't want to miss out on all of the fashion fun...

Quinton's other favorite activity of the day was none other than SPEAR THROWING!

Yep, they give spears to little kids and let 'em loose!

Matt also enjoyed the spear throwing but shhhhhh, I think Quinton's throw actually came closer to the target than Matt's!

At the PCC, we were also able to take part in a pig roast luau and watch the big dance show, Horizons, which was fantastic!

During our stay, we also spent a day (or two) looking for deals at the Aloha stadium swap meet. We had a lot of fun looking at everything and trying ice cold coconut juice.

Me and Miss R hanging out at our friends' condo.

While in Hawaii, we were able to meet a lot of our friend, Keenan's, family. It's cute in Hawaii that the nieces and nephews affectionately call friends of their parents, "Auntie" and "Uncle", even if you aren't their aunt or uncle. Keenan's nieces and nephews are so cute and Quinton was easily adopted as a another one of the cousins.

Here is Quinton with all of his new cousins after a fun night of bowling.

Look!

Quinton is wearing the Chinaman's Hat!

So, in our adventures of flying back to Chicago, we unexpectedly spent a night in a Waikiki hotel which Quinton and I made the most of an enjoyed the view.

And there you have it!

Hope you made it through this whole post without falling asleep and that you enjoyed seeing our family's most recent adventure!

Friends in High Places

We are lucky enough to have very nice friends in Chicago who work for United and like us enough to invite us to go with them to Hawaii! We've been talking about this trip for MONTHS and it was so hard for me to fall asleep Friday night.

Saturday morning, we were up at the crack of dawn to head to the airport to fly standby on United to Oahu. We were SO lucky that all 7 in our party were able to get on the direct flight from Chicago to Honolulu!

The mother of our friend, Keenan, who is from Hawaii, met us at the airport with beautiful leis!

I love leis!

Quinton was so awed by his lei, all he could say was, "What the heck?"

Once we arrived, our friends Keenan, Rebekeh and their daughters Miss M and Miss A went with Keenan's mom to see their niece and nephew in a play. Matt, Quinton and I went straight to the house we'd rented in the "country" on the north west side of the island. The drive to the house was breathtaking. If you have ever been to Oahu, we are about 10 minutes north of Chinaman's Hat. Our first glimpses of the ocean along Kamehameha highway were so tempting. We practically hat to sit on Quinton to keep him from jumping out of the car to go to the beach! The whole drive he was begging to go to the beach and I couldn't blame him!

Here is Matt loungin on the back porch of our Hawaii house, whiich Quinton has declared he likes better than our Chicago house!

It took Quinton about 1 minute to figure out that the private outdoor shower had a hose to wash stuff off with and that he could play in it to his heart's content. He totally forgot about going to the beach while he was playing with the hose!

Sunday morning, Matt and Quinton went out on a nearby hike. The town we are staying in is Hauula and Matt found a nice hike on the internet. He and Quinton were gone for about 3 hours but Matt says Quinton was a champ and walked almost the entire hike! I was able to go for a nice run, too. I was SO excited to be jogging very close to the beach!
The view from the hike.

We can hardly wait to see what adventures the rest of our trip hold for our traveling party!

Quinton-rella

BEING on vacation is the best thing ever but before we went on vacation, of course there is all kinds of stuff that needs to be done.

Lucky for me, I have Quinton to pick up my slack!

Here is Quinton cleaning the house so it's spic and span when we get back from vacation:

Quinton loves the Swiffer, so I am happy to let him help!
And here is Quinton helping me pack!
He is so mindful of everything I need to bring!

Let's hope he doesn't find out about allowance for a very long time!

Birthdays, Mother's Day and Other Days

I must admit I've been pretty lazy about the whole blog thing. As the temperatures are getting warmer, I find that it's more fun to go out and play on the trampoline than blog.

Can you blame me?

So here are a few pictures from the past month or so:

Of course Quinton was DYING to see Monsters vs. Aliens the weekend it came out and Matt and I were happy to oblige.

Here are Matt and Quinton being goofy:

I had a very fun birthday in April. One of the things I like best about my birthday is the phone calls I receive from all of my family and friends (even if it is a week later, Rachel!). The funny thing was that Quinton hijacked a bunch of my birthday calls. This is Quinton talking to my dad, aka Silly Grandpa. On my Blackberry, I have pictures of people that pop up when they call so Quinton thinks that when people call on my Blackberry, that they can SEE him. So here Quinton is showing Silly Grandpa the bday present I received from my little sister, Jessi.

Later that evening we had a few friends over for a chilly BBQ outside.
To top it off, we had my favorite, ice cream cake! Perfect when it's like 52 degrees outside!

This is Quinton trying to bring my balloons in the house. It was really funny to watch him try to open the door and pull the balloons in at the same time.

Mother's Day was fabulous!

Quinton and Matt made me my favorite crepes:

Nutella, strawberries, bananas and whip cream

and Turkey with spinach, swiss and ranch...oh so yummy!

At church, they had the children get up and sing two songs for the moms. This was Quinton's first time singing up in front of everyone and I really wasn't sure how he would do but it true Q form, he did awesome!

When Quinton found s spot in front, he waved to me and when they sang, even though he didn't know all of the words he moved his mouth and bobbed his head to the music. It was the BEST Mother's Day present, ever!

And this was Mother's Day dinner with our friends.

We hope you all had a great Mother's Day as well!

Stay tuned for vacation pictures in t-minus 2 days!!!!