SoOo sick of sick

 We had a five day weekend last weekend and I spent every day of it knocked off my feet sick. The girls were both sick as well. Aaron stepped up Monday morning and woke up with the girls, made them French toast, included “protein carrots,” and even cleaned up the mess! I couldn’t even get out of bed until almost 10:00am! 

Travis and Maddix began lifting weights in the evenings. 

Maddix and I had mutual, and Aaron had activity days, so travis actually had an evening with just the girls and then a quick minute to play video games by himself. 

Thursday we had a bunch of snow come. Aaron had his friend, Kaleb come over for an hour and then I took them both to the school skate night. This resulted in them spending tons of money on tokens, purchasing pure sugar for dinner, and then finally skating for all of ten minutes before they ran to cash in all the tickets and head home! I’m so glad they had fun. 

Friday night travis and I took the boys out to the Stebbens Children Theater to see Chronicles of Narnia with a friend and her daughter, who will be moving soon. 

Saturday Travis and Maddix went out to play ball in the morning. Aaron had a friend come into town to spend the night. Travis and I ran errands and purchased a stand up freezer for our food storage! Hello easy to rotate freezer food! Goodbye freezer chest! Then the boys played video games. Then they started a late movie with giant bowls of popcorn while travis and I laid blankets and pillows in front of the fire and watched the iPad for our date night. 

Today was so nice. The sun was out. There was finally some warmth. Church was wonderful and uplifting. We had quiet times and set up the freezer. Susan came over to catch up. Then we got invited to the Broadhead’s for homemade ice cream. They both served their missions in Russia and I enjoyed our conversations and their insights to Russia in regards to this Ukrainian situation. It’s just so sad what is happening. 

My heart is aching for the turmoils of the world and those who suffer (especially children). I cannot do all the good in the world, but I can give the world my good! I can love my family. Care for those in my community. Serve the members I go to church with. Pray for those I can’t reach. And I can thank God for all the good in my life. We need to see the good. When we are actively finding the good around us, we start to realize just how much food is out there! 

… The End 

Hawaii to Home

Saturday/Sunday: 

Well the beloved airlines changed our flight so that we had to leave Hawaii earlier and have an extended layover in Seattle, so we had to cancel our trip to Pearl Harbor and spend more time in airports. It was also a struggle to watch it get later and later as we lost time coming back. We were so tired by the time we landed in MSP at 6am (2am, Hawaii time). We went to breakfast to try and perk up before the final 2hr drive back to Mason. Thankfully the kids were all at church when we got home and it gave us a moment I get everything inside, say hi to the dogs, and pass out on the couch. Then we were greeted with endless love and essentially we each had a child in our arms/on our laps the rest of the day.  Also, did I mention it was snowy and 15 degrees when we landed?? It was inevitable, we were back in winter. 

Back to Reality:  

I’m so glad we had kids to come home to, otherwise I would be 100 percent sad to be back.. instead I’m just 80 percent sad! 

But we came home and quickly jumped back into Dr.’s apts (Aaron got his boot off, hurray!), sports, lessons, The super bowl, Valentine’s Day, exercising, having some surprise friends spend the weekend with us (including their puppy), trying to fight back a house that looked like a bomb went off after the surprise friends stayed for the weekend, and of course… SICKNESSES. Hello sickness my old friend…. You’ve come to hang with us again…. 

Yesterday Avery had a terrible stomach flu/constant fever. 

Today Maddix and I are achy sick and I have a sore throat. Boo. And it’s supposed to be the kickoff to our fun four day weekend. We even stayed up with the boys last night and they used their points to watch Free Guy. 

Have I ever mentioned how much I hate that from Nov-Mar? Every year Mason City just passed around a never ending stream of illnesses! 

Ugh, I also can’t stand that summer is another four months away. 

Take me back to Hawaii!! 

Hawaii, Part 3: Wed-fri.

Wednesday: My Birthday/Hanauma Bay day!! 

I had MUCH hesitation over this day at all after my last experience; in fact, we almost didn’t go! But man, I’m glad we did!! 

This was hands down the most beautiful place on the WHOLE island and a MUST DO for anyone traveling to the island. The sand area was perfect for small kids to play (and endless girls to take thousands of pics of themselves), the water nearest the sand was full of dead coral so you could practice swimming around it and not stress of you bumped into it or had to stop and put your feet down (though we did our best not to disturb it, of course), and no matter where you looked there were incredible fish to find. I could have stayed there all day! And we practically did, I ended up so burned because of it! 

We had to take Travis’s phone to be fixed (it shattered In a parking lot while I was chasing him… oops), and while we waited we had my birthday lunch/dinner at this Japanese restaurant that was a whole new experience for us; and oh it was delicious! 

We stopped and explored a few more places along the drive back, and eventually ended up out at the pool at the hotel. It was too cold for the pool. It was too hot in the hot tub for my sunburn. We ended up playing volleyball against a Canadian couple before going to grab a shaved ice and watch a movie. 

Thursday: 

This was more of a low key day. Travis did a little work while I hit the gym. 

We golfed along the ocean; some of us better than others! Man I stink. 

We had a delicious lunch over in the market outside the PCC, I napped! 

Then we went for a sunset horseback ride. That was a cool experience. 

Travis fell asleep at the beginning of movie one and snored all through the second movie and ended up sleeping 12hrs straight! 

 

Friday: Our last full day!! 

We brought all our gear and rented bikes from Turtle Bay so that we could do some mountain biking. Unfortunately it was an 8mile bike ride just to reach the trails, including the STEEPEST hill! We were exhausted by the time we got there and ended up bickering most of the ride. The coolest part was this rest area in this middle of nowhere that we stumbled on. Then it was an 8 mile ride home. We ended up biking 20 miles and gaining 1,116 ft in elevation… and all that elevation was pretty much within that 2miles of hill!! 

Lunch at Kahuku farms was ALL I WANTED! When we got there we just laid flat in the grass, unable to move, and in no hurry to finish and have to leave; still is easily my favorite place on the island. And their body cream we ended up buying… oh come on: uh-mazing! 

Na’ha recommended a beach she grew up going to and it’s just a locals spot for our boogie boarding outing. When we got there the left half of the beach was just fir the Hawaiian locals and the right side was for the transplanted locals; it eas an interesting dynamic. I ended up too tired to boogie board for too long and I just enjoyed watching all the life going on around me instead, while cheering Travis on out in the waves. And just like that, the sun was setting on our last day in paradise. We ate dinner at the hotel and just sat in the booth listening to the live band for as long as we could. We then snagged our final shaved ice of the trip (we are totally hooked now), did laundry and packed while watching movies.