Finally after almost a YEAR of living in Hawaii we have a visitor! My sister, Stephanie, hopped a flight to come hang out for a couple of weeks.
You gotta love late night flights… especially ones that get delayed… It was a late night for all of us!
It’s been SO fun showing her around the island!
I received word from a fellow military spouse about Air Force Captain Reid Nishizuka who, along with three others, was killed in a plane crash in Afghanistan. Nishizuka was a local boy from Kailua and would be coming back to the island to be laid to rest at Punchbowl.
My friend and I took our kids and lined up along with hundreds of others to welcome him home and to thank him for the ultimate sacrifice.
Miss Mckenna has been taking piano lessons for a few months now with a private teacher who we just LOVE. Her teacher got together with some other music teachers in the area to have a mini recital for all the kids.
Mckenna was SUPER nervous about playing in front of people but I thought it would be really good for her.
She was so nervous she didn’t even smile the entire time. It didn’t help that this was the first time she had played on a grand piano! She is used to a keyboard at home and an upright at the piano teachers! She did great!
All the kids who participated also received a certificate which I thought was very sweet. I am looking forward to attending many more recitals!
So I kinda hate Mother’s Day. It’s kind of like Valentine’s in that there is this big set up on what SHOULD happen… you are supposed to get pampered and spoiled and what have you and if you don’t then you are resentful and disappointed. It’s just weird. Honestly the only Mother’s Day request I ever have is that I just don’t want to cook or clean. And that pretty much never happens because I can’t stay out of the kitchen if someone else is poking around in there!
This year I ended up having a pretty great day. I invited a few of my fellow spouseless girlfriends over for brunch. I guess I don’t really mind cooking THAT much! Everyone brought over food and wine. Oh yes. Plenty of wine…
You know it’s going to be a good day when all three of you supply Moscato.
Silly kids (I get the giggles every time I look at Omar’s pepperoni eyes)
And even sillier mamas…
(I am seriously SO blessed with the friends I have far and especially near to keep me from going crazy during this deployment!)
Mimosas were had. And had some more. Oh one more wouldn’t hurt…
And I even managed to snap a picture with each one of my crazies on Mother’s Day.
(and yes my ELEVEN year old is almost as tall as I am. Scary!)
May Day is a holiday in Hawaii to celebrate Hawaiian culture. The schools embrace this by having the kids learn a hula and elect a royal court. The Royal Court goes back to the Hawaiian monarchy and is a pretty big deal. So we were proud of Omar for being elected to kindergarten prince. (Even if it meant after school practices for WEEKS!)
So this proud mama was super excited to see what the kids had been up to!
I found Mckenna waiting for everything to start, as usual gossiping with her friends!
The entrance for the Royal Court
The conch shell blowers signalling the arrival of the Royal Court
Guess who was up FIRST?! Prince Omar and Princess Sienna representing the island of Kaho’olawe. (I was in the perfect seat!) He didn’t even see me he was so focused.
They were SO adorable walking down all by themselves. I was so proud of them!
The rest of the court did the same thing, one pair from each grade representing an island. Then came the crown bearers for the King and Queen.
And the Kahili bearers
And finally the King and Queen
Here is the assembled Court.
Each grade then did their hula which was great, they all did an amazing job!
And of course I have Mckenna’s recorded for your viewing pleasure!
Then the Royal Court performed their own hula. Omar did so well!
And here is Omar showing off his lei that his princesses mom gave him (how sweet is she? I totally failed at parenting that day!) The volunteers did an AMAZING job decorating!
My cuties that did an EXCELLENT job!
Saturday some friends and I ran the Jamba Juice Banana Man Chase 5K. This is a super fun race held in Ala Moana park in downtown Honolulu.
I was super excited. This was my FIRST 5K and something I have been wanting to do for years. It was also pretty cool that they were doing a keiki run (kid’s run) as well so the kids could participate. Running has NEVER been something I’ve liked to do, but I would love for my kids to grow up thinking that running in races is a common event.
I was very happy that I had some friends to do it with so I wasn’t all alone. I could see myself bailing out because I was nervous!
First up, the grown folk!
We got a good spot at the head of the pack where I prepared myself to get passed by a million people. My two girlfriends I ran with are WAY faster than me but are such good motivation!
The race went really well, I’ve only run a 5K on a treadmill before and running outside is so different. My only real goal was to run it without stopping which I accomplished. I wasn’t a huge fan of this course, while it was beautiful along the water I hardly paid attention and there were quite a few places where we had to run on a sidewalk all squished together.
I ended up running in 36 something which was right about where I thought I would be… My speedy friends were done in about 30!
The kids were up next and were doing a 500 meter run along the water. They had them grouped by age which was great. Mckenna got to go first with the 11-13 year olds, look at her go (she is in blue)!
When she was done she was a little bummed she didn’t run faster, she thought it was going to be longer than it was so she was pacing herself. She says next year she is going to be faster!
Omar ran a couple of heats later, and ended up running the whole thing as well! I was so proud of him!
Best thing? We all got smoothies when we were done and the kids got medals!
Can’t wait until Omar is back home and we can all run in races together! It was great to get a congratulatory phone call from him later that morning!
Sink Or Swim 