Random stuff

Lately we've been having lots of periods of rain.  It's not the season for it and it didn't rain during the winter when it should have been raining.  I'm really hoping it stops before all our stuff gets put in crates.  But it makes for beautiful rainbows which I love!

Some of the homeschooled kids that live on our street (this is by no means all of them!) came by and asked if they could wash my car.  Since I was their 5th customer I got a dollar off the asking price.  It was a good spent $4.

The most trees are putting out new leaves and you can see the plumeria in the background starting to bloom too.

More rainbows.

Will found this little gecko outside the ice cream shop.  He asked me if I wanted to eat it!!

We shipped Justin's car last week.  I had an appointment to get it detailed (a requirement) but it was cancelled.  So in the drizzling rain I did it myself.  Thank goodness for good products that I borrowed from my neighbor.  The Norwex cleaning paste got the red dirt out so easily!

On May 4th Eric thought we needed cake to celebrate 'May the 4th be with you day'.  So we did!  I used some icing left over from fall birthdays that I found in the freezer.  We all had a piece and then the neighbors came and had some as well.  It was gone that night!

So please with himself!

I also found this gem when cleaning up a few months back.  Julie Terry and us girls.

Submarine tour

One Sunday we went down to Waikiki with another family to go on the submarine tour.  It's one of those we are leaving Hawaii soon and we need to do this type of thing.  So the ticket office on post was offering a special that each adult ticket got a free kid ticket.  Win!
No one got sea sick and it was a neat experience.
View of Diamond Head from the ferry boat before loading onto the sub.

Waikiki

There were artificial reefs set up so we could see fish.  We have seen all the same fish when we have been out snorkeling.

The thing below is where seaweed is grown.  It's not growing well anymore because the rise in sea temperatures.  (had to have the save the planet message in there!)

Caroline really enjoys taking pictures so most of them are ones she took.  I really like the one of the 2 of us!

Eric also wanted to take pictures.  This is Eric and his buddy Lincoln.

We did get to see a reef shark but didn't get a good picture of it.

We deepest we went was just over 100 ft.  No ear popping either.  The neat thing was how the colors were effected.  Caroline's red striped dress lost all of it's red.  And you can see the color of our lips changed too.

 Eric busy taking pictures.

 And that's the sub we went on loading up with another group.

Yoga, honor roll, and super heroes

Eric likes watching me do yoga and most times joins me for part of it.  This time Miles joined in!

Eric is getting so very tall!  I had 3 people that see him on a fairly regular basis tell me how tall he is getting in one day!  It's hard to tell how much they are really growing when they never wear pants.

These two are still big buddies!  Pretty soon he's going to be too long for her to carry him.  He still hasn't gained but about 5-6 lbs in the past 3 years.

Caroline made the A/B honor roll again (every quarter this year!).  I had to go to physical therapy that morning so Justin went.

The community center hosts events on a pretty regular basis.  This time there was a person painting faces.  Will was first in line (shocker) and got the super hero trend going.  Our street was filled with Capt. Americas, hulk, spiderman, and others.  Then there was a big nerf battle (not uncommon around here).

The blue of the paint matched the blue of his eyes.  I tried to get a picture of it but it was too sunny.

Admirals barge tour

The morning that Grandma and Grandpa left (Thursday April, 14) Justin sponsored us on the Admirals Barge Tour around Pearl Harbor.  It was a great tour and a unique way to see the usual tourist and obscure sights around the famous island.

The boat below is for the 4 star and presidents.  Although the 1st Bush didn't because it was being repaired.  W then didn't want to upstage his dad and also took a different boat.  It was fancy!

That's the boat the Bush's took.

This is the USS Utah Memorial with the NOAA building on the right side.

We also got to go on the USS Arizona memorial.  You can see the dark oil spots in the water.  There is still oil leaking all these years later.

Another neat fact is that the bridge to get onto Ford Island is retractable.  Part of it sits on hollow concrete supports that then can be slid under another part to make way for ships passing through.  It only opens a couple times a year.

Punchbowl Cemetary

The National Memorial cemetery of the Pacific is in an extinct volcano tuff cone.  I took Grandma and Grandpa after dropping Eric off at school.  I had not ever been before and it was a beautiful location for a cemetery.

There were several of these very detailed mosaics depicting all battles.  It was neat.

The over look with Diamond Head in the background.

Molokai

Monday (day after Justin's race) Justin and I went to Molokai by ourselves.  Grandma and Grandpa took care of getting the kids to school and practice for us.  It was a wonderful day full of adventure and beauty.  We started the day by watching the sun rise from the plane and then on the way home saw a circle rainbow.  It's a quick 25 minute flight and on clear days you can see Molokai from Bellows beach.

Flying over Diamond Head

Sunrise was beautiful

First thing we did was ride a mule down the highest sea cliffs in the world.

See how there's no one in front of me?  Yep, I got to lead the way down!!

That's the area of land that they put all the people suffering from Leprosy (Hansen's Disease).

My mule's name was stripes!

 Beautiful cliffs on a beautiful morning

 That's what we come down!

 We also drove around to the east side to the Halawa valley.

 It was cloudy and very windy on this side.

 The mules like to walk close to the edge!

 Stripes liked to move pretty fast and I got WAY out in front of the group.  So far ahead that I couldn't hear or see anyone on the 22 switchbacks.  The guide did come and check on me though!

 One of the switchbacks!

 There were momma and baby goats on the path.

 The water was gorgeous.

The disappointing part of the day was that we didn't get to tour the leper colony.  The tour company that handles that didn't have a driver and no one told the mule company until we had reached the bottom.  Oh well.  It was still a great morning adventure.

Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for watching the kids so we could go!!