Mele Kalikimaka!

We started off the Christmas season spending a week in our favorite place on earth, Hawaii! Three years ago we went the first week of December also, but we left Coleman home with the Ashbys and Grammy and Grampy. This time, we all went and had a wonderful time.

Jonny took us to the airport for our early AM flight, which went smoothly. The plane had a small TV for each seat with movies and games, and the kids also watched "Santa Buddies" on our mini DVD player. In no time at all, we got off the plane in paradise. We rented a car, drove to the resort, and were playing on the beach by mid afternoon! We ate dinner at the restaurant over looking the beach and the kids went to bed early (so did we). We stayed at the Ko'Olina resort on Oahu.

The next morning, we drove to the nearby town and ate breakfast at McDonald's. Jono loves to eat here in Hawaii because they serve Portuguese sausage and rice, a typical Hawaiian breakfast. Then, we shopped for food at a nice grocery store we discovered on our last trip. Our room has a full kitchen and dining room, washer and dryer, a family room with a sleeper couch for the boys and a cot for Rosie. Jono and I have our own room and we all share a big bathroom. We love to cook, and so we stocked up on groceries for the week. We bought lots of our favorite Hawaiian fruit; pineapple and papaya, yum!

The beach at our resort is perfect for families. It is a man-made cove with very small surf, we bought tubes for the kids and they floated all around. I brought a life jacket with us, which Coleman wore almost all the time. The kids also loved playing in the sand; burying each other and making sand castles. When we buried Bud, Jono wrote a "U" in the sand. When it was Coleman's turn to be buried, he wanted a "Y". Jono refused. The cove has a rocked wall on either end with black crabs crawling on the rocks and Rosie loved exploring for little shells.

We quickly settled into a daily routine. Breakfast in our room or at McDonalds and then we played at the beach until lunch. After a quick dip in the hot tub to get all the sand off, we ate ham, tomato and avacado sandwiches on french bread in our room. After, we when exploring other sites in the car or played in the waterfalls and waterslide at the resort swimming pool. Then, we would head back to the beach, which was our favorite place to be.

Most afternoons, Jono and Bud went golfing at the Ko'Olina golf course across the street. They both brought their clubs and had a great time on the beautiful course. One afternoon Rosie, Coleman and I walked over and played a few holes with them, we brought a few clubs for both of them, too. It was so fun for our whole family to be on the course together, reminiscent of the golfing trips Jono took with his family growing up. On our way back to the clubhouse, Jono was driving the cart and I was walking with Coleman. As Jono went by, Coleman ran to the cart to get in. Jono didn't see him and Coleman was knocked to the ground. He was not hurt, but he cried, "Daddy ran me over and didn't stop!" The kids had fun afterwards playing on the huge putting course near the clubhouse. Jono had all his favorite things in one place: he was in Hawaii, on a golf course, with his family!

In the evenings, we grilled at the outside barbeque or cooked dinner in our room. The kids went right to sleep every night after such a full day of fun activities! This was just when the news about Tiger Woods was breaking, and Jono and I watched it all unfold at night. The news from home was that the temperature was in the single digits, our Hawaii weather was 82 degrees and perfect!

Our favorite outing was Turtle Beach. It is a cove on the North Shore where turtles swim in to rest from the ocean. They come onshore and sit in the sun. It is so amazing to see these big turtles up close! During the week, Oahu had the biggest waves since 1969, and we saw part of the Quicksilver in Memory of Eddie Aikau surfing competition in Waiamea Bay. The waves in our resort also got bigger and the kids had fun playing in the surf.

One morning, we went to the Dole Pineapple Plantation and rode the Pineapple Express. Coleman loved it, he loves trains! Rosie whispered to me, "I'm bored". I said, "You are riding a train, in Hawaii, at a pineapple plantation, be excited!" The kids entertained themselves in the car by playing the alphabet game, a game we played on trips when I was young. They also did a little reading. We were lucky that their teachers excused them from school work.

One morning, we drove to the JW Marriott hotel adjacent to our resort and fed fish in the ocean. Then we walked to a beautiful beach nearby that the Pulsiphers told us about. It had many tide pools and a rocky plateau to climb on. The waves would crash onto the plateau and every once in a while, a giant wave would crash up and over, flooding the rocks with water. We all climbed up and Rosie and Coleman loved it when the giant waves would swirl around our legs. Bud, on the other hand, was so nervous and would grab onto Jono's shirt every time the waves hit!

Another Pulipher recommendation was to shop at the bi-weekly swap meet at Aloha Stadium. It was very fun! There were more booths of Hawaiian treasures than we had the energy or time to see. Rosie got two swimsuits, a turtle necklace, a backpack and bracelets for her friends. Bud got a t-shirt and sweatshirt, and Coleman got a swimsuit, t-shirt and puzzle. I got a swimsuit and Jono bought no-show socks, can you believe it!

I am used to spending the most time with Coleman, but everyone else was amazed at the amount of talking Coleman does in one day. He talks almost non-stop and is always asking "why?". I try to answer each and every one of his questions, and it is tiring by the of the day! One afternoon in the hot tub, Coleman started talking to an unsuspecting woman. He told her his name, his last name, spelled it for her, and his middle name. He told her his address and phone number. He told her how old he was, how old he will be turning, the date of his birthday, and what kind of party he wants to have. He told her the names of everyone in our family and that Jono and Bud were golfing. He started to tell her all the names of his friends when she decided to leave. He is a talker!

The only way home from Hawaii is the red-eye flight, which gives you one extra day in Hawaii. On our last night, the resort had a luau. The kids got Hawaii tatoos and tried to start a fire with wooden sticks. They also posed for pictures with very large Hawaiian dancers who taught Coleman the "hang loose" sign. On the flight home, the kids slept all the way. It was a fabulous trip!

On the golf course is a giant waterfall and pond. Jono and Bud threw coins in the water and made wishes. Bud wished for a scholarship to play basketball at the University of Utah and Jono wished to come back soon to Hawaii. Here's to wishes coming true!