Tag Archives: Hawaii

So, yeah, this happened…

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I finally went to the doctor today to get my finger looked at. It was the same finger that I had jammed in our last game and I kept telling myself that I just needed to give it time to heal. Well it just wasn’t feeling any better, it was still swollen and every time I tried to straighten it or hit it on something it still hurt like hell.

So off to get it checked, got some x-rays taken, doc tells me that it’s fractured for sure, there is a chip somewhere. So just great. I have never broken anything in my life, but I guess a finger isn’t a bad bone to break! So all was fine up until I got turned over to a corpsman to have it splinted. He made sure that finger got as straight as possible. I. Almost. Died. And I have a pretty high pain tolerance. So now I’m all wrapped up for a few weeks, hopefully my finger is normal after this.

I will say, I never realized how much you use your ring finger until every time I try to use it, it hurts! I can’t put my hair up, type, wash dishes, open jars! It’s terrible! My husband told me I should send his ship a red cross message so he can come home and help me! I can’t do anything, I am broken!

Robotics Regionals

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On Saturday Mckenna had her regional competition for her robotics team. She has been working after school for two months with a team of students to program a lego robot.  Finally it was time to see if all that work would pay off…

I had to take her to the local high school where the competition was taking place at 7:45am (love waking up early on Saturdays!) dropped her off with her team and then Omar and I had some time to go eat breakfast and he had a soccer game (to WIN, ’cause he’s awesome!). We ended up coming back to her competition around noon, just when the actual competing was going to start.

The competition, it was pretty cool!

It was pretty exciting. The teams went head to head with a two and a half minute time limit to have their robots perform as many programmed tasks as possible. There were three rounds and the highest score was the only one that counted. Mckenna had two different teams from her school enter, and only the top 5 teams get to continue on to state so there was a lot of pressure.

In the first round their robot didn’t do too well, they had a couple of mistakes and weren’t able to get too many tasks completed. Mckenna was pretty bummed at this point because their score put them in 14th place out of 19 teams. Thankfully there were two more rounds and her team did much better, getting up to 5th place. We then had to wait for the judges to tally the rest of the scores, there was a skit, a teamwork score, and robot design.

Well, Mckenna’s school did AWESOME! Both teams made it into the top five which means that both teams go onto state next month.

Terrible cell pic, sorry, if you look close you can see Shafterbots came in first and fifth!

Mckenna’s team also won a best design! This was a huge accomplishment and I am SO proud of her awesome team!

Go Shafterbots Silver!

So onto State! The teams are excited and determined to do just as well!

Oh and here is a bonus, during some downtime the (incredible!) A/V students at Moanaloa h.s. had the teams come down and dance. It was hilarious!

Hawaiian Pumpkin Patch

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So a couple of weeks ago I got to go on a field trip with Omar’s class to the pumpkin patch. I was pretty surprised that there was even a pumpkin patch on the island but it was a really nice local farm that also grown watermelon, corn, onions, bananas, eggplant and sunflowers.

Listening to our speaker tell us all about the produce they grow as well as how to properly pick a pumpkin. {Twist, twist, pull!}

 

The hayride was great, we got to tour the farm and see the variety of produce they grow. Also? Carpet over the hay? Genius, especially since we were all wearing shorts!

What does your pumpkin patch not also grow bananas?

Sweet corn… I couldn’t resist buying farm fresh corn!

 

“My” kids…

 

I don’t know how I ended up with such a great group of kids. They all stayed with me. And listened! I wish it was because the teacher loves me but it was totally random and I was assigned the 5 kids standing closest to me!

 

Now off to picking. I have never been to a pumpkin patch where you actually got to pick your pumpkin off the vine. It was a really cool experience. Except the fact that I was with a very particular bunch of kids. It took us the longest to get our pumpkins!

 

Success!

 

 

One quick pic with mama to prove I was there!

The sunflowers reminded me of Spain. There are a million sunflower fields in bloom around where we lived. So then I was all sad and nostalgic and missing Spain. But I do love it here so very much.

After everyone had a pumpkin in hand we rounded them all back onto the bus and went to the park for lunch. It was beautiful and peaceful and quiet (well it was until our school got there…)

 

And can I put a PSA out there from all teachers and field trip chaperones? For God’s sake, don’t send lunchables on field trips unless your kid can open them! We spend 10 minutes just opening those!

 

We also got to feed some koi. It was a bit insane but the kids loved it.

And this just because. If this picture doesn’t accurately describe my son I don’t know what does…

 

 

Happy Halloween!

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We had a GREAT Halloween this year… It was Omar’s first Halloween in America. Wait I lied, he did have one before when he was a month old.  We did celebrate in Spain on base but it was not quite the same. So this year he was SUPER excited.  He dressed as Darth Vader and then decided the mask was too annoying to wear the entire night but at least I got a picture with it on.

Mckenna was a dark fairy. This is our homemade costume this year, I had a lot of fun making it and she loved it.

I also tried my best with her makeup. I am NOT artistic or good with makeup but she thought it looked great and that’s all that matters!

Although I did it a few hours prior and it did get smudged and had to be fixed before we headed out.

Me, I was pretty boring this year and did a cop out with a witch had and some awesome feathery eyelashes…

And then was irritated because the breeze kept blowing my hat the whole time we were out, AND I carried a light saber that SOMEONE just couldn’t carry.

I can’t post the aftermath sorting of candy because Omar stripped as soon as we walked in the door and sorted in his underwear. Sounds about right.

Also? People are getting WAY too stingy with the chocolate. Keep your Laffy Taffy and Twizzlers, mama wants Snickers and Reese’s!

Oh I had to go snooping for pictures from Halloween past. I can’t believe how much my babies have grown over the past few years!

Crossing another natural disaster off my bucket list…

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After a super busy Saturday looking forward to a relaxing evening at home. Nope, minutes after walking in the door a post about a tsunami warning for Hawaii pops up on my Facebook news feed. Thank goodness for social media because I hardly ever watch tv and I couldn’t hear the sirens in my house.

Thankfully we should be fine, in an area that is high enough that we have a nice buffer. It shouldn’t even be too bad because of the type of earthquake that caused it… So while other people are having tsunami parties I am sitting here tsunami cleaning. I don’t know why, it just seems like a good idea…

Kids are passed out so now it is just me, the news and trying to ignore dozens of frantic postings on Facebook (omg! What do I do?! We’re all going to die) waiting out this warning for another 20 minutes.

And really? The news having to warn you to stay away from the water? Seems like that is just natural selection at work.

Inadvertent Animal Rescue

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So I wasn’t reaaaaalllly planning on getting anymore animals anytime soon but I kinda stumbled over this guy this morning.

 

Literally. I was out walking the dog this morning after taking the kids to school. On our way back, right in front of our house, I saw this little guy in the grass. It took Bowser a second to notice him and then he tried to eat him.

Couldn’t just leave him there, we have TONS of cats in the area and I couldn’t see a nest (it’s a huge tree). So I brought him inside and stuck him in an old check box.  Found a wild bird rescue place on island but they pretty much just gave instructions and then said if you can’t get him back into the nest or you don’t see the parents, have fun raising your bird!

I did stick him out in the tree for an hour in a makeshift nest to see if mom or dad came and I didn’t see anyone. So back inside he came and I had to go on the hunt for baby bird formula. (Moanaloa Pets FTW!) So far he is eating and hopping around in his box. I texted a picture to the bird people and they think he is a dove.  After looking online I agree, and it looks like he is maybe 14 days old?

Thankfully I have some baby bird handfeeding experience from the old days of working at a pet store.

The kids think he’s adorable and I just have to keep the dog from eating him. Gotta love an unexpected houseguest! Find a baby bird yourself? Take a peek at this chart to see what to do with it!

I found a baby bird – now what?