Dole Plantation

We did the Dole Plantation in a couple of days.  The first day we were so hot and tired from walking through the maze that we didn't take pictures and left after having pineapple ice cream.  So, we had to go back and use our tickets we bought for the train ride.  The weather was awesome and we had a really fun time on the train.

Waiting for the train:

On the train waiting to go:

Some weiws from the train

Hanauma Bay

Our first outing was Hanauma Bay.  It was really pretty and had a huge reef.  The kids had a blast snorkeling.  It was a great place to learn.  Gini had a full faced mask that we all tried.  It worked so nice and you could get a lot more air with it.  Then she ordered us some as a gift.  Thanks Gini!  They will get a lot of use. :)

A couple offered to take our pic.  They were really nice.  I was still way too tired to take pictures.  I'm glad Bo had these two.

On Our Way Out

  

A couple of nights before we left the business had a party at Squealers.  It was a really fun time for everyone.  At the end we got a group shot with our business partners.  Jackson was hiding behind us.  He wasn't in the mood for pictures.  

But, I just have to say we love this family!  Kris and Kendra have been awesome and we will miss them.  We've been in business together for 9 1/2 years and it's been a great almost 10 years!  I can't believe it's been that long!  Thanks for all the help you gave to help us move and for the support!  

Here we are saying goodbye to my parents:

Here are the kids as we are backing out of my parents house to head to Boise!

We left last Saturday for Boise.  The drive went very smooth until we were 20 miles out. There was a really bad accident and we were not moving.  I was so exhausted at this point the only thing that kept me from crying was the fact that we weren't in the wreck.  

We decided to get off the freeway and took a weird detour through a military facility on a gravel road. I will admit at this point there were a few tears.  But, with the hour and fifteen minutes detour I think we still made better time.  It ended up taking a little under 6 hours to get there instead of 4. 

We met Earle for a goodbye dinner.  He was so nice to give us an airplane survival pack with goodies packed individually for each of us.  I wish we had remembered to take a picture! :(

After that we had to go through bags one more time to make sure everything weighed under 50 pounds per bag.  

Here is a picture with our 21 bags for everyone. Whew!  I don't think I've ever been as tired as I was at that moment.  I have to add also that we pretty much moved out the week before.  My phone had me averaging 4 miles a day but I didn't have it two days of packing.  It was a of work. 

Here are a some pictures from the flight.  The kids did pretty well.  I was so happy to land.  Although was a bumpy landing.  On the way in we'd hit some turbulence and then all the kids on the flight would scream and then laugh.  (I was screaming and not laughing on the inside. )  I was a very long day the kids ended being up for 20 hours.  

Thanks to Gini for flying with us to help us move and spending the week with a bunch of tired grumpy kids (and parents).  I'm sure you've seen a side of me that isn't pretty.  Your next visit should be a bit happier. :)

Thank you to everyone who helped us move out, fed us, had our kids over to play, and just stopped by to say goodbye. Also, thanks Mom for making me go shopping so I actually had something to wear when I got here :) and to Mom and Dad for taking the kids a lot our last week and for letting us stay with you after we got out of our house. 

Jackson's 7th Birthday

 I'm a little late blogging Jackson's birthday.  It was June 18th.  Jackson's birthday was kinda crazy too.  Bo was in China so we had to do things differently.  He said he wanted to wait open presents until Sunday when Bo got back.  Above he is opening his one present.  Later that day he and two friends went to Squealers.   They had a lot of fun.  Jack didn't love the go carts, but he had fun golfing and just hanging out with his friends.

After Squealers Jack changed his mind and decided he wanted to open his presents.  Here he is opening them.  He chose to have Reeses peanut butter Chocolate cupcakes that night.  We decided to have another party on Sunday when Bo got back, but Jackson was really sick with the flu that day so we had to move the party to Tuesday.  He had a baseball game and we had cake and ice cream.  My parents came that night too.  It was fun.  

We love you Jack!

At Seven Jackson Loves:

• Pokemon Cards
• Riding bikes
• Baseball
• Caleb (a little too much ) :)
• RZR Riding
• Hamburgers
• Pancakes and waffles with peanut butter

We Love:

• How sweet Jack can be with his younger brothers
• His personality
• Watching his grow and learn
• His cute freckles
• How he likes to help out and please people
• How great he is in school

WE FOUND A PLACE!

Relief doesn't begin to explain how we feel.  We finally found a place to rent in Hawaii! We've been looking for a place for months.  A couple of places have come up in nearby towns but nothing has come up in Laie and nobody would let us fill out an application until we saw the place in person.

But, at the family reunion in boise we were talking to a cousins wife, Marilyn.  She said she had some friends who moved to Laie to teach at BYUH and thought maybe they could help.  She gave them our number and Betsy gave me a call.  We had a great talk and she gave me some phone numbers and Facebook pages to post in.  We had done this earlier with no luck but she gave me a couple of others pages to post in so I decided to try again. We were in luck!

Katy, who is living in the house at the moment messaged me and said we could rent the place they're in but we'd need to buy their furnishings.  I was like. Sure!  How nice would that be to not have to furnish when we get there.  Laie is a very small place.  You can't buy anything like that there.  She then messaged Choon, the landlord.

Choon already had a couple of people interested.  But since it helped Katy and us she chose us.  It took a couple of days but she let us fill out an application. This all happened about a week ago and we just found out today we are good to go and get to sign the contact in the next few days!

I know the Lord had his hand in all this.  The timing of everything was too perfect and this house better than anything we have been looking at and is in the town we were wanting!  It was in his own time for sure.   But I am so grateful for his hand in our lives and getting an answer to our many prayers.