With Daddy

 You know the Primary song, "My daddy is my favorite pal, and I help him every day..?"  I think this song was written for Jeff and our kids.  They adore their daddy (and, as a matter of fact, so do I.)  The best part of the whole day is when daddy walks in the door.  Squeals of delight and shouts of excitement are heard throughout the house as little feet race toward daddy's waiting open arms.

 As far as we're concerned, there is no one cooler than our dad.  No really, how many dads take their boys for carnival-type rides in the bucket of the excavator?  As my boys were spinning round and round through the air in the bucket, were they completely safe?  Um...probably not.  But did they think their dad was a rockstar?  Heck yes.

 The best part of all is that Jeff really is as amazing as the kids think he is.  He goes to extensive amounts of work and effort to include them in everything he does.  "...It's plain to see I want to be like him in every way..."  As the three of them headed off to join the cattle drive, I was happy to remain in a habitable temperature with no sub zero wind blowing in my face.  Not my kids.  They were thrilled to be on horseback with their dad.

"...He teaches me that honesty is best in all I do..."  This shot was taken one night during family scripture study.  Yes...poor lonely mom was left all alone with two sofas all to herself while the kids piled on dad and each other in his one-man-chair.  This is not uncommon.  And I'm lovin' every minute of it.  I love that my kids get to hear their dad read the Book of Mormon to them, and help them read it aloud.  I love that he explains things and shares his testimony as he goes.  I love the special relationship he has with them.  I love that he shows me how to be a better parent.  "...I'm very glad that he's my dad, and I know he loves me too."

Ho, Ho, Ho, Who Wouldn't Go?

 As soon as we returned from Hawaii, Christmas was in full swing.  We had family home evening the next night with our friends, the Bosh's.  The kids reenacted the Nativity.  Isaac was a lowly shepherd.

 While the thespian skills may have been less than professional, the effort was dazzling.

 Daisy was our official gift wrapper this year.  Each day with a to-do list a mile long, I would delegate wrapping to Daisy.  She was careful to make sure the wrapping paper and custom designed bow were ideal for the recipient.  I was thankful for her help!

 One of our Christmas traditions includes going to see the lights in Spanish Fork and visiting Grandma Jean. Grandma wraps $10 bills around candy canes that she places on her Christmas tree, then each of the kids get to choose a candy cane.  I think it is one of their favorite Christmas traditions. They love going to the store and looking at all the toys and choosing something all by themselves.  This sometimes backfires since Levi chose a rifle that shoots rubber bullets at CAL Ranch and then came home and shot his sister in the eye.  No, I'm not kidding.

 We start the night at Pizza Factory and end it, where else?  Cold Stone.  Of course.

 On Christmas Eve, we had another Nativity rendition.  This one was a little less reverent since the kids were all so excited to open their gifts from Grandpa and Grandma.

 Isaac was thrilled with more "big trucks."...and big brother was a little jealous until....

 ...he opened this Spiderman shooter from his cousin Davis in Ohio (thanks a lot, Rachel hehe.)  Now he is the real Spiderman, so watch out.  Lucky Grandma had web ALL over her kitchen and living room.

 Daisy was so excited about her PillowPet, and some "not-skinny jeans."

 Daisy's Christmas list included a new baby sister, an iPod, and a Hilary Weeks Barbie.  Luckily she was happy with this mP3 player.

 When you asked Isaac what Santa was going to bring him, all he ever said was "treats" and "I nice."  So on Christmas morning when he found candy, that's all he cared about.  He didn't even look at the rest of his gifts until Daisy and Levi did it for him.

 Jeff fell in love with Grape Crush in Hawaii (since he abandoned his Dew addiction.)  Only we can't buy Grape Crush anywhere in our village.  So when Daisy and I found this when we were Christmas shopping we knew it would be his favorite gift.

Christmas this year was different from any other Christmas of my entire life.  After we opened gifts Christmas morning, we got ready for church.  My family drove up from Cedar and went to church with us since I was speaking.  After church was over, we made Christmas dinner.  While it was cooking, my dad and Daisy and I did something that we've never done on Christmas day before.  We tried to spread some Christmas cheer.  We visited our neighbor who was spending her first Christmas as a widow.  We visited our friend who was spending her first Christmas with cancer and was just given a year to live.  It was a good way to spend Christmas afternoon.  After we returned home and enjoyed our Christmas dinner, we loaded up and headed to Cedar City where we Skyped with my sister who lives in Korea.  Then we opened gifts at Grandma's house.

 Grandma Jones exceeded all Christmas expectations with this Bumblebee suit.  What more could a 5-year-old want?

 Isaac was hilarious opening gifts.  He would scream because he was so excited and then jump up and down because he couldn't contain himself.  He liked to help everyone else open their gifts too.

 New clothes were exactly what Daisy needed, and she was happy to put them on right away.

 Santa brought the two older kids tickets to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra.  I was so excited to take them to Salt Lake for the show.  I just knew it would be the perfect way to conclude the holiday, besides, the Trans-Siberian Orchestra was sure to be the perfect mix of cultural experience and fun for the kids.  Jeff doubted me a little when he saw the price of the tickets, but I reassured him this would be well worth it.  The kids were excited to ride Trax into downtown.

 Then the excitement ended.  This is Levi enthralled with the concert...

 ...and Daisy too.  Jeff just kept looking at me rolling his eyes beaming "I told you so" as loud as a silent glare can scream.  I just shrugged my shoulders.

After they played one, yes one, song we recognized, the kids were rudely awoken when Trans-Siberian Orchestra shifted into Megadeath Rejects Live.  I've never been to an ACDC concert (for a reason) but I'm pretty sure it would have been something like this.  Where was the "orchestra?" Who knows?  All we saw were leather-clad long-haired head-banging electric-guitar wielding scarries on the stage. So we cut our losses and got out of there fast.  I was so mad that I had wasted so much money on tickets!  We could have gone to a good concert for that price.  Just warning you in case you ever think you want to see the Trans-Siberian Megadeath Concert.  You don't.

 Next stop:  Temple Square.  My kids had never been here before.  It was amazing how the contrast between the feeling at the concert and the feeling on Temple Square was so pronounced.  We all felt so much better at Temple Square.  This was the perfect conclusion to the holiday that I was looking for (and it was FREE!)

Bonus to visiting Temple Square on a weeknight after Christmas: not crowded.  I've never been to see the lights at Temple Square that I didn't feel like a sardine.  But this time?  We could walk around and enjoy it as we pleased.

We enjoyed every minute of our Christmas break this year.  Having both Jeff and Daisy out of school was so much fun.  We stayed up late, we slept in, we made big breakfasts and played with all of our new toys.  We had no place to go and nothing to do except hang out with each other.  And that is just the way we like it.

Trip of the Decade: Final Edition

 There is only one main road on the entire island in Kauai, and it isn't connected, which means that you drive until you get to the end of the road at the NaPali coast, and then turn around and drive until you get to the other end.  On Friday, we drove to the end of the road to hike the most famous hike in all of Hawaii, the Kalalau Trail on the NaPali coast.

 The trail, like all the others we had encountered, was super slippery and muddy...and awesome.

 The entire hike across the NaPali coast is an overnighter and requires a permit.  We opted for the shorter 4hour down and back version.  We hiked to Hanakapi'ai Beach where we ran into some hippies with dreadlocks smoking something besides tobacco.  We sat on the beach and ate our picnic and laughed at the people who would put their stuff down in the sand and then walk off to take pictures and then race after their things as a wave was washing it out to sea. 

When we finished hiking, we stopped at Tunnels Beach and Ke'e Beach.  They are famous for surfing (think Soul Surfer) but we just enjoyed the sand and the sun.  Then we shopped around Hanalei.  It was the most eclectic town we had been to.  We loved the shopping and the food and the live musicians.  Hanalei really has an end-of-the-road feeling and it was fun to spend the afternoon there.

 There was a high surf advisory that day, but we really wanted to get some more snorkeling in if we could.  After Tunnels and Ke'e didn't provide any snorkeling, we decided to give it one last shot and hiked down to Sea Lodge Beach to try our luck.  No snorkeling, but we did find the beach completely deserted.  No, really, Jeff and I had an entire beach in Kauai all to ourselves.  Sounds like a dream, doesn't it?  It was.

 The hike to Sea Lodge Beach required some tricky trapezing over the rocks you see on the right, which may have dissuaded the casual beach goer, especially with the high surf.  We were glad they were dissuaded.

 The next morning we awoke to our last day on the island.  We made breakfast together and ate on the lanai with the chickens (since everything you do in Kauai is with the chickens.)  Then we locked up our condo for the last time and bid farewell.  We stopped at the Kilauea Lighthouse on our way to the airport.

 The lighthouse is actually more of a bird sanctuary than a lighthouse now, but the view is postcard perfect.

 The women in Hawaii wears flowers - live flowers - in their hair or around their necks like every day.  The flowers are everywhere in every color.  I think locals must wake up in the morning, walk outside (since there isn't a real distinction between indoors and outdoors there) and choose a flower for the day just like I choose which earrings to wear.

And that was it.  We stopped and bought some snacks for the dreadfully long flight ahead, turned in our rental car, and checked in at the airport.  These are our sad faces that we had to leave.  We landed in Vegas at midnight and found an In-N-Out Burger stat, which I must say did a lot to relieve my sadness.  Then we crashed.  The next day was day 10, the last day of our Trip of the Decade, the end of our months and months of planning, saving, and anticipation.  But it wasn't really the end.  Now we have the memories...and many more wonderful decades to go.

Trip of the Decade: Part V

 By day 7 I had this vacation thing down pat.  No make-up.  No bra (because I was wearing a swim suit.)  No kids.  No worries.  We hiked down to Queen's Bath on the North shore.

 We couldn't believe how nothing was crowded or busy.  Every where we went, we felt like we owned the island, like we were the only ones there.

 These tiny little shells were everywhere between the rocks.  Jeff pried one off and all sorts of legs and antennae sprung out.  We left them alone after that and just tried not to step on them.

 The surf was too high to swim or snorkel at Queen's Bath, but the ocean was putting on an amazing show.  We sat on the rocks and just watched.

 We decided to hike down to Hideaways Beach to see if the snorkeling was any better there.  Neither of us had ever snorkeled before, and we weren't sure what to expect.  I'm not a super strong swimmer and, like I said, the surf was high that day.  We waded out into knee-deep water where Jeff put his underwater camera into the water and snapped this shot just to see if there was anything under there.  When he showed me the picture I was grabbing for the snorkel gear.  I couldn't wait to see more!

 The sand was different at each beach we went to.  Sometimes it was small and grainy and hard to wash off.  Other times it was coarse and easy to walk in.  At Hideaways it was multicolored like a billion tiny shells all broken and rounded off by the water.

 Hideaways was such a nice place to snorkel because the reef was so close to the surface.  In fact, there were a couple times that a wave came and bashed me into it.  I had the bruises and bloody cuts as evidence.  But the beating was totally worth the experience.

 I got brave and swam out to where the surf was breaking when I came across these.  Oh yeah.  Sea turtles.  And me.  Together.  Swimming in the ocean.  In Hawaii.

 I stayed out as long as my legs could take it and then swam back in to tell Jeff what I found.  He was ready to relax on the beach for a while but I insisted he go in and swim with the turtles.  And yes, he thanked me later.

 On the way back from Hideaways we stopped at this Farmer's Market.  Everything in Kauai was so expensive...except the Farmer's Market.  The produce was exotic and really well priced.  We bought a bunch for snacks and breakfast.

 I couldn't get over the fact that these tropical wonders were being sold out of the back of a pickup truck for a buck.

 One nice thing about vacationing in Hawaii is that you are still in the United States.  We called the kids every day and visited with them about everything we were doing and everything they were doing.  This helped us from missing them too much.

 After the Farmer's Market we wanted to stop at the Kilauea Lighthouse, but it is a state park which means it closes at, like, 4:00.  So we snapped so pictures and postponed the Lighthouse to another day.

 Ice cold coconuts were being sold out of coolers and storefronts everywhere.  Not big fans of coconut milk, we never imbibed, but thought they were cool just the same.

We did, however, take advantage of the shave ice.  And what they say is true.  Hawaiian style shave ice is like nothing you've ever had before.  It, like everything in Kauai, was paradise.