Aloha!

Well,

That's it. Hawaii came and went quickly. Now we're back in Seattle enjoying "warm" 64-degree sunny weather. We said "aloha" on Friday, May 4th and flew back to Seattle that afternoon. But not after enjoying our time on Oahu. Since the last blog entry we have done lots by some measures and not much by others. Mostly we continued to go to the beach, see Grandma and Grandpa (and their pool), and go on a couple of mini-adventures. It was sad to see Nana (the kids' great grandmother) pass away but we are happy we got to see her and talk with her one more time.  

Hadden finds a dead fish on Lanikai Beach. Hooray.

Leslie and Madeline visit...again!
Auntie Leslie and Cousin Madeline came back for a second visit at the end of April. It was lots of fun to have them come back. The kids adore Madeline and gave her rock start treatment all week. There were lots of arguments over who got to sit next to hear at meal time. Madeline was a good sport about all the attention. Leslie "got" to stay an extra day at the end because she (along with Hadden) was sick. Yucky.

Yvonne, Hadden, Leslie and Madeline stand on the shore looking for sea turtles. In this part of Lanikai, they come to within about 5 feet of shore. 

Clara plays with her lei that Steve and Hadden got her.

Madeline wears her plumeria in the right ear (meaning: she's "taken").
Not sure what the snot oozing down from the nose means.  

Nana passes away
I had to leave the island for 2 days for a meeting in Sacramento. I got back at noon on April 26th. Nana, age 96 (almost 97) passed away that day around 11:30 a.m. at Castle Hospital. Nana is my dad's mother. It was a sad day, but not too sad - it was her time and she had lived a long and good life. I am glad that the kids got to see her and talk to her one last time while here and am also happy that I got to do the same. We will miss Nana. When I told Hadden he said, "Daddy, I wished you didn't tell me that because now I'm sad."


Adventure to Kahana Beach Park
One morning we started out with the intention to go to He'eia Kea boat ramp to play and sample the General Store food there (supposed to be quite good). When we got there we didn't find an acceptable beach area so kept on driving. Before we knew it we were in Ka'a'awa and headed towards Laie. We finally stopped at Kahana State Beach Park, which is just around the bend from the over-hyped Crouching Lion Inn. The beach park was nice and, for the most part, deserted. We briefly met a surf instructor there with his class. He calls himself "Professor Surf" and "Big Z" (after the character in "Surf's Up"). Hadden really liked the Big Z name. Turns out he is a local boy - played for Dread Ashanti in the 1990s. I'm sure Yvonne and I saw him when we were dating back then.

Anyway, we spent plenty of time running from the surf. At first we just did the normal "woah, the water can't get me!" kind of thing. Then we decided to run backwards (backpedal) and found that it's quite hard to backpedal quickly without falling. Fortunately, falling is fun.

Everyone run from the surf!

Falling is equally as fun as running.

Three Muenches and a beach.

After the fun at the beach park is was time for lunch. Or, more appropriately, past time for lunch. We headed back to He'eia Kea pier to sample the General Store and Deli food. They had rather standard plate lunch stuff (beef broccoli, guava chicken, hamburger steak with gravy) with the usual rice and mac salad. But the ingredients were local and really, really tasty. Definitely a cut above the standard plate lunch place.

We get our plate lunches and dig in. Ono grinds.

A Favorite Tradition
Just like Kash and Haze before them, the kids LOVED looking for bugs to feed the lizards in Grandma and Grandpa's yard. Grandpa would "help" them find and catch some bugs (usually cockroaches) and then take them outside the kitchen to feed to waiting lizards. Kind of gruesome for the bug but entertaining for others - not unlike events in the Roman Colosseum.

Watching a bug just before its death.

Adventures with Mommy Gone
In the middle of all this Yvonne had to fly back to Seattle for some meetings. Rather inconvenient (she flew out on 30 April in the evening and back on 2 May in the evening - we flew back to Seattle on 4 May) but we "handled" (versus "canna handle"). The last day of preschool was May 1st and the kids said good bye to all their preschool friends. I made banana bread for each class. It was great having them in preschool while in Hawaii at the Cole Academy. Great school, very loving. We will miss all our "Hawaii preschool" friends and teachers.

The next day we went to the USS Bowfin memorial in the morning (at Pearl Harbor). It's a WW II submarine that you can tour. I sort of showed the kids what I used to do - even though my old submarine wasn't as old as this one. Everyone was very brave going on board and down belowdecks.

Look at us dad!

Hadden mans the 5-inch deck gun on the Bowfin.

Back on shore, the kids man the 40 mm quads. I'd just like to see any
airplanes penetrate this defense.

Clara womans the 5-inch gun at the Bowfin.

Daddy, were do you look? 

Oh...here. 

The family portrait at He'eia Kea pier taken by Leslie using a nicely painted container door as the backdrop. Once again, it's nearly impossible to get everyone to smile/pose at once. 

One of the last few late afternoons on Lanikai Beach. We were right across the street from this scene every day. The house we stayed in was fantastic and it never gets old walking down the beach in the early evening watching all the Lanikai Canoe Club paddlers in the water.

Well, that's it. Aloha,

Steve