i'm dreaming of a white christmas

because by this time next week we'll be in utah!! it will be the first time i'll be experiencing a real white christmas so i'm stoked. we leave hawaii monday night and return on new years eve. since this will be our first trip since our honeymoon together, brandon & i are so excited to spend time with family and friends that we haven't seen in a while and to also show ahonui a whole new world! my good friend, tali, is getting married in the oquirrh mountain temple and that is one of the main reasons we decided to make the financial sacrifice and finally take a much needed break. airfare for three people and SNOW will be our christmas gift to ourselves this year...


so from our 'ohana to yours...merry Christmas!

it's been a while...

...a long while, i know. i would like to say that a lot has happened since the last post, but that's not quite the case. life has been zooming by lately and our little one doesn't seem so little anymore. he is officially potty trained, we can pretty much decipher what he's saying, and finally - he is now able to keep himself busy & safe most of the time without constant supervision. woohoo!

so here's what we've been up to since the last time...
we had too much fun this past halloween. brandon requested off from work about 5 months prior to october 31st, so pcc had no room to hold him back from his fatherly duties on halloween night this year. i bought ahonui's halloween costume ("super why" - for those of you that don't know, he's a storybook-reading-superhero that somehow saves the day via changing classic well known stories. sassy.) from amazon probably back in july or august because he was very much into the cartoon way back when. of course as i should have known, his attention quickly turned to the 'ol "toy story" phenomenon and so by october his obsession with woody & buzz lightyear would've really appreciated a halloween costume as such. it's a good thing he's only two years old and seemed grateful for the cheesy superhero costume we had waiting for him.

brandon & i celebrated our 4th anniversary on november 3rd. i didn't realize it when we planned our wedding date, but i've grown to really favor the timing of our anniversary each year. it's right after halloween, and a few weeks before thanksgiving...which is pretty much the beginning of the holiday season. it feels like so much joy and excitement happens around this time of the year and so i've gotta say that i'm quite thrilled that the celebration of our love for each other is included during this special time every year. anyway, in observation of our love day, we went window shopping at windward mall and then ate a scrumptious dinner at ala moana's macaroni grill - our favorite! as always, we end up talking about ahonui almost the whole time we are on date nights and we were missing him so much that we felt it necessary that we surprise him with an anniversary gift as well. this little guy scored a fully loaded buzz lightyear action figure which prompted quite a bit 'o squeals of delight upon the opening of the toy. happy anniversary to ahonui!

now that i finish work at 2pm-ish, my list of things to do each day doesn't seem quite so overwhelming. and despite my long list of daily chores that i create for myself, somehow...someway...when i put ahonui down for a nap, i often end up putting MYSELF down for a nap as well. totally counter-productive for my list.


so i think that's about it for now. mostly because i'm falling asleep as i type...and also because ahonui is throwing things at the tv - just for kicks.

we actually paid to be scared

yup, it's that time of the year. pcc is holding it's annual haunted lagoon attraction again. we anticipated the long line that we would have to wait in, so brandon & i met up with a few of his brothers & sisters, and a few of mine - plus my mom! the 2 hour wait passed pretty quickly with all 12 of us there to keep each other company.

from left: brandon, his bro hina, his sisters kamalani, mahea, brie, kelly, and bro jeremy up front.

and my fam: bro tane, brandon, bro marcus, tane's wife angela, and my mom.

love the rules & precautions. supposedly a past rider got so scared that he punched one of the volunteers. perhaps since i went last year, i was more prepared this time around. i was indeed scared, but definitely handled it better since last time. maybe because i had a lot more family on the canoe to protect me from the "lagoon lady". check it out if you dare!

turning of that new leaf

i know...it's been over a month. i could say that i've been so busy, but that would be a lie. because honestly, i have been quite the opposite -- and i LOVE IT!!! my days have been filled, that's definitely true. but i'm not stressed to the point that i want to pull my hair out each and every day. and that's a good thing, right?

i began working only 30 hours a week on august 31st which has impacted our family in several ways...

• i finish work at 2pm every day so i get way more time with my little buddy. some days we spend the afternoon at the beach...

• other days when he goes down for his nap, i get to clean our apartment more thoroughly. i also have him keep me company when i go to walmart & costco during the week instead of fighting crowds on busy saturdays.
• brandon & i have more time for date nights. we also don't have to come home so late at night because we can leave earlier! it's oh so awesome to spend that alone time with my love. even a trip to foodland together is exciting to me. we take turns going on that blood pressure tester near the pharmacy and we compare results...hey, it's free!

• for those of you that know me well, it has always been a challenge for me to be "on time" going anywhere...especially work. yes, it's embarrassing. but i must be a great employee if they've kept me this long without meeting a minimum expectation of being prompt every day. ha!! ANYWAY, i am proud to say that i've finally programmed my body to wake up earlier to be at work on time! what an accomplishment, aye? lol.
• i make conscious decisions of what i eat and put into my body every day. not a diet, but a healthy lifestyle change. i've been doing well for the past month or so, and i am slowly losing weight. i do realize that in order to drop pounds faster, i've got to do more physical activity. and that's what mondays are for...goal starting.
• with 10 less hours that i'm getting paid for each week, our budget was cut drastically. a lot more careful spending, and cutting out things that were simply unnecessary.

so i suppose you could say that our lives have been simplified and we are now focusing on the more important things in life. priorities have been altered, disposable income has decreased, family time has increased, and my tan has definitely improved. life is good.

update on the boy

it's been a while since we've updated everyone on our little one...which means we've got a lot of catching up to do!

• we are almost done with potty training! i bought him a pack of elmo/sesame street undies a few weeks ago, but we actually just began using them last week. i expected a lot more accidents and scrubbing of carpets - but he has been great with the whole thing so far. he says "toydet" when he's gotta go, and he knows to put a diaper on before naptime and bedtime. hopefully we won't have to worry about any more tinkle accidents after this week. cross your fingers!
• he requests to watch "toy story 2" at least 3 times a day. i'm pretty sure he has memorized almost the whole movie by now.
• he still refuses to eat bread, but loves triscuit crackers. his favorite foods include oatmeal, yogurt, bananas, pancakes, cereal, carrots, and scrambled eggs. so in other words, he eats really well for breakfast -- not so much for lunch or dinner...but that's what health experts & nutritionists advise us to do anyway, right? i kid, i kid
• during long drives, he tells me which station to listen to on the radio so he can lip sync the songs that he knows by heart. the little guy is all about pretending that he is will.i.am with his hand for a microphone during black eyed peas "i gotta feeling" and bobbing his head to miley cyrus' "party in the usa". tell me about it.
• when he does something he knows he's not supposed to, he looks up at us as says "naughty..." or "seeeeeee, wah-happenn". so kolohe.
• every night, he takes my hand in his and tells me "bet, mommy" and proceeds to guide me to our bedroom. i get him ready to go to sleep, lie down next to him, he then moves in close to me and says, "cuddo, mommy." although it's a daily and almost constant challenge to keep patient with the boy, at the end of each trying day he knows exactly how to melt mama's heart with an "i nuffyoo, mommy."

haaaaaa: breath of life

watched the new night show at pcc for a third time last week.

i know only from a musician's wife's point of view that many, many long days & nights and strenuous hours have been put into the long-awaited production. so i may be a tad biased when i say that the new show is awesome. i've heard mixed reviews, and it's always helpful to hear other's critiques.

i'm just happy that i've got my husband home by 9pm instead of 2 in the morning. months and months of seeing my spouse for just a few minutes a day was just not cutting it.

any other opinions from those who have seen it? good, bad, whatevah - let's hear it!

i doubt this could save me 15%

i had use the toilet. so i walk into the bathroom and was greeted by a lovely, long-tailed wild lizard sitting his butt on our toilet paper roll. i swear he was ready to pounce on my face (lindsey lohan's "parent trap" evil step-mother image popped into my head at that moment) so naturally i ran the heck outta there and screamed for brandon's help.

of course as most big, burly men of his type tend to think that we women enjoy indulging ourselves in little fits of drama here and there, brandon muttered something under his breath to the effect of: it's just a lizard, what's the big deal?

the big deal, my dear husband, is that my toilet paper roll (nor any other surface in the comforts that i call "home") is not the place for a small reptile to set up shop. i suppose he understood this notion of mine without me actually verbalizing it, because he immediately strolled into the bathroom to rescue his damsel in distress.

when he finally caught hold of it, he had to make sure that he "didn't hurt it" and set it free out in our front yard. nice.

oh, but my story does not end there...no siree.

my to-do list for that same day (probably just hours after the last incident) included washing the dishes. so i began putting cans & bottles into our recycling bag, and emptying out half-filled cups in the sink...and what comes sliding out of one of ahonui's juice cups?

yeeeeah. (sorry for the graphic pic, but you had to see it to feel what i felt). again, my dear husband came to my rescue -- this time without so much drama. just a lot of shivers and squiggles and washing of my hands.

lifestyles of the rich and relaxed

every so often my cousins from the mainland fly on down to hawaii for a visit and they invite the whole family (and i mean the WHOLE family...cousins, aunties, uncles, brothers, sisters) over for dinner and just to hang out. i'm always eager to see them and to catch up, and i especially enjoy the homes they vacation in!!

everytime we come over to one of their vacation homes, i am simply in awe. it's almost like as soon as i step outside on the lanai -- the stresses of life just automatically melt away...as if it's a requirement to relax! and i am definitely not one to decline that kind of opportunity.
 

there are also usually a ton of kids playing and running around, so ahonui expends quite a bit of his energy resources during our visit. so by the end of the day, he is knocked out and has had a day full of adventure.

looking forward to more good food, good company, and the good life!

a brief glimpse of my future

i had to leave work early today. mostly because i reached 40 hours by 2pm, and we aren't allowed to get overtime - but also because i didn't really feel like staying til 5pm! hehehe.

just a little update, i have decided (with brandon's permission, of course) to reduce my hours at work to 30 a week beginning this monday. this transition will result in my job description being altered quite a bit. i will be handling the walk-in students rather than taking appointments and counseling one on one with students. it may take some getting used to as with any other change we are faced with, but i'm thrilled for the new schedule! i plan on getting off of work at 2pm every day to have more time with ahonui and take care of the home. yessssssss!!!

so anyway, i figured today was a great a day as any to begin the new schedule. i dropped brandon off at work and headed home for some lunch. following the grindage (my made-up word that will be an upcoming laie slang - mark my words! lol) , i plopped myself on the couch and began my usual daily to-do list. realistic tasks such as "empty trash" and "pay bills" accompanied unlikely errands such as "wash car" or "complete power 90" on the piece of paper.

once i was done with my list, i picked up ahonui in kahuku and ran a few errands. he requested to watch "doweee" (translation: toy story 2) so i popped in the dvd. i sat with him for a bit while he watched and thought to myself... "i should probably get going on that list."

about an hour later, i woke up on the bed with ahonui crashed out next to me. i sure hope getting less hours at work will benefit our family with more than just an afternoon nap for me. something i'll need to work on, i guess. that's going on tomorrow's list (wink, wink).

dental crisis averted

i switched dentists. mainly because when my head felt like it was seriously going to explode from horrendous pain (explained in previous post), my last dentist's office simply gave me the runaround and treated me similar to how a child is treated when she has a scrape on her knee. after contacting my dentist a third time for the pain, they finally took an x-ray and determined that i needed TWO root canals done. what spectacular news! i knew i couldn't go back there after that visit.

i asked almost everyone i knew for dentist referrals. two of my fellow financial aid counselors (who are quite particular, by the way) go to the same dentist and referred me to dr. kumasaka in kaneohe. i promptly made an appointment with him and he accepted the task to do the root canals. i went in a few days later and right off requested the laughing gas. (when the last dentist numbed me to release the pressure in my mouth, i was shaking, crying, and felt like passing out from the pain that shot throughout my body - i wasn't about to experience that again). dr. kumasaka didn't think i needed it, but i told him that i have a very low pain tolerance so he hooked me up - literally.

didn't feel a thing after that point. the root canals were completed without so much as a hiccup and i am happy to report that i am now drug free! oh yeah, be wary of dentists that treat you like you need a band-aid for massive pain in your mouth & head.

introducing sarah

a little late on announcing this, i know. the freshest & newest nikora arrived on thursday evening, july 23rd. she has been named sarah uakea waimarama nikora, and is just so precious. i know this for a fact, even though she is sleeping every time i see her. congratulations marcus & nue!

self-portrait

serious -- i found this in my photo library on my phone, and no one has fessed up to taking it. so i have a hunch who the culprit may be...

 

out of it...

...not only with the blogging world, but also with reality. since friday, i've had vicodin, valium, motrin, excedrine, and amoxicillin pumping through my system. extreme pain in my mouth had me heading to the dentist friday morning, then to the byuh health center friday afternoon. sad to say...i still have no official diagnosis of what the heck is going on!

much mahalo to my dear mother, who allowed brandon to bring home the bacon (along with lots of overtime, YAYERR!!) instead of carting me everywhere and catering to my every need. she took me to both appointments, picked up my meds from the pharmacist, and brought me sustenance at the snap of a finger. also, to my in-laws who kept ahonui out of my hair (literally - he now enjoys getting his toy helicopter tangled in the nest atop my head) until brandon came home at 1:30am...aka - a SIXTEEN hour work day for my poor hubs.

i'm hoping my second appointment at the dentist tomorrow will shed some much needed light and relief on this seemingly endless pain. i reeeally want to save our family from those horrendous ER bills.

so i thought...

brandon & i FINALLY scheduled a summer vacation for our family for next month. actually, all we did was schedule time off from work. since we haven't taken off more than a day or two from work since our honeymoon, we are stoked for the upcoming break! however, we don't want to blow all of our savings on a week of fun, so we have decided to stay on-island during the vacay. i was very reluctant about not going anywhere "exciting" during our time off, but brandon always has a way of putting things back into perspective.

i used to be under the impression that a real vacation needed to include reservations at a big, fancy resort...or a week of excitement at a roller-coaster infested theme park. but mostly i thought it should be a hop, skip, and a plane ride over to the mainland... aka - off the rock of o'ahu. but we are staying home during our vacation. i know, "hooooome" can sound depressing when you aren't planning to go anywhere else on vacation time from work. but duh! our home IS on one of the biggest vacation hot-spots in the world!!! what was i thinking? yes...i was thinking i see this stuff every day (or at least almost every weekend).

...i was thinking the beach would be just another weekend type day for our son.



...i was thinking we'd end up wasting our days off in front of the tube.


but, thanks to my practical, money-saving hubs, i have since come to the realization that vacations are as wonderful as you make them to be - no matter where you are or what you do. and this is the list that we came up with for our 11 day vacation...

• hit up the bishop museum to see the "backyard monsters" insect exhibit.
• visit the children's discovery center so ahonui can freely explore without me worrying.
• take ahonui to the honolulu zoo for the first time!
• check out the waikiki aquarium to show ahonui what nemo really looks like.
• go to wet'n'wild hawaii (previously known as hawaiian adventures waterpark) for some fun in the sun
• soak up some world war II history at the pearl harbor memorial
• enjoy a day at waimea beach and some local kine shave ice at matsumotos.

i think it's safe to say that our days won't be wasted. any other suggestions?

would you like some butter with that?

a few lessons that i'm quickly learning...

• don't take your eyes off your two year old son for more than thirty seconds. and if you do, use your ears as your eyes. if it's too quiet, start running to check on the trouble that he's getting himself into.

• blocks of butter need to be stored in the VERY BACK of the refrigerator instead of on the door.

• a rug doctor just might be a good investment.

the nikora ohana future

it's been a few months since my entire fam got together. all of my bros and their families have been on vacations, and tane & ange (with their two bebes) finally came home last week from nauvoo, illinois. so we had a little barbeque with big time grindz the other night at marcus & nue's. i love catching up with everyone and seeing how grown up my little nieces & nephews have become. of course, my mom especially loves that cuddle time she gets with all of her grandbabies.


these are just a few of the many reasons why i don't know if i could handle living in the mainland. aren't they just darling?

as luck would have it...

...the sun is out and brighter than ever, and the heat & humidity every day would officially label our weather as PERFECT beach days. but we have to work!!

i have a theory...that when the weekend swings around again in four days - the clouds will magically reappear in the sky and all of a sudden the wind will kick up out of nowhere.

perhaps i'm being saved from skin cancer. yes, that must be it.

isn't it ironic?

the six week mark rolled around yesterday when brandon was finally off on a saturday. we began making plans early in the week to go to kakelas and just relax the entire day there together...after all, EVERY DAY during this past week was sunny, humid, and blazing hot. we had no reason to believe that saturday's weather would turn out otherwise.

our saturday plans included activities that we love and rarely get to do: sleeping in, breakfast from hukilau cafe, packing up lunch from mcdonalds, and heading off to kakelas as a family. when we woke up at about 10:30am, i looked out the window and what did i see? clouds covering the previous day's blue sky and the coconut trees swaying from side to side from blustery winds. soooo not fair.

i tried to keep a positive attitude for the day - i mean, both of us were still free from our daily work duties and we had the entire day ahead of us to spend together. so on we trudged with our lazy saturday plans...picked up breakfast from our local hukilau cafe diner, put a load of laundry in the washer at my mom's, packed up a beach bag, slathered on some sunblock, went to mcdonalds drive thru for lunch later, and off we went to the beach!

when we got to kakela, we found a nice clear spot near a tree and set our things down on the sand. the waves were choppy, the wind was blowing, and the clouds were still out bringing down my mood. but we let ahonui run free and play in a sandhill right in front of us while brandon & i ate our double cheeseburgers. the day improved as we swam with our boy in the ocean, dried off on our lavalavas, and watched the little guy shove a taro pie into his mouth.
i was just thinking...isn't it ironic that when you finally have the opportunity to enjoy a day of fun outdoors, the clouds come along to rain on your parade? we'll be praying that in six weeks from now, the sun will be shining and the ocean will be a little more accomodating for the little family that has such little time to spend there.

a hot date

i had a hot date on friday night - with two hot guys!

we went to dinner at windward mall's ruby tuesday's and then took ahonui to his first big screen movie to see disney pixar's 'up'. highly recommended (don't wanna ruin the story for those of you who haven't seen it yet)!

so since ahonui is so in love with 'ratatouille' and 'finding nemo' we just HAD to take advantage of a brand new pixar film in theaters. it would've been awesome to get to experience the 3D version, but i figured the little man wouldn't be able to keep those 3D glasses on for long. it was just adorable to watch his reactions and to hear him laugh with the rest of the audience throughout the movie. makes me anxious to take him to disneyland one day...

a big-time bonus: two year olds get in free!!

the kind of day i dreamed about

summertime is here.

i know what you're probably thinking..."summertime is here year-round in hawaii!" okay, yes - it is for the most part beautiful weather here on our little rock. but it has been so incredibly hot & humid these last few weeks that i feel like i'm constantly in a sauna when i'm not in my AC workplace.

anyway, back in my younger days (since today is my 28th. lol!) when life was simple and carefree, going to the beach was an almost daily scribble on my mental list of things to do. go to class? naaah, beach with the girls. work at pcc? "boss, i think the sniffles are coming on"...so of course, the only cure for that ailment was the medicinal ocean!

horrible habits, i know. rest assured, once marriage and a little one came into my eternal picture, so did the responsibilities and adjusting of priorities. i must admit though, when i look back -- i can't say that i regret those days. i loved the spontaneity of driving to mililani's walmart at 2am, or packing up the girls and heading to kaneohe zippys after a school dance, or simply just walking across the street to the beach in the middle of the weekday. that was the impulsive life i led with my friends. and although my priorities have shifted a complete one-eighty since my earlier years, it never obliterated that desire in me to spend hours at one of my favorite places in the entire world.

sooo, basically - we went to the beach last thursday -- and today...and hopefully again on saturday. which means i'm a happy camper. thursday was brandon's day off, and since he was scheduled to work today (my birthday) my boss let me leave work early to celebrate as a family. i packed up a one bag full of towels, sunscreen, extra clothes, lavalavas, beach toys - and another full of musubi, water, hot dogs, chips, and pake cake - for a full day of fun at hukilau.

not quite spontaneous, i realize...but watching the joy on my family's faces as they splashed in the clear blue water, or enjoying a few peaceful moments as they dug their sand holes together, or even admiring my hubby's beautiful bulging biceps (yowza!) - is better than any dream i could ask for.

*that boat you see in the distance is actually the hawaiian voyaging canoe: IOSEPA. ain't it a beaut?*

that vague, blurry line

it was a loong, hot, muggy, tiring night lastnight. for all of us.

after ahonui grew out of his colicky stage at 4 months i didn't expect another night like that until baby number 2 came along. granted, we've had our fair share of middle-of-the-night "mommy/daddy, hold me" episodes. but this particular incident began from 8:15pm....i know!

brandon was still at work, so i was left all alone with my little one who fell asleep on our way home from kahuku. he awoke an hour later crying and in the worst of moods (which he often does if he's not fully rested). i went into the bedroom to pick him up and cradle all 34 lbs. of him. but he wasn't havin' any of that.

hungry, son? screams.
want me to hold you? throws himself on floor.
sippy? nemo? au-au? daddy? cries hysterically with no audible dialogue.
okay, go night-night then. kicks AND screams.

oh well, i tried, right? after a few disciplinary reprimands, i let him wallow in his unyielding grief (aka: time out) for a few minutes before going back in to check on him. he looked at me with those bright, red eyes and tear-stained face that would break any mother's heart. so i go over to pick him up again -- only to experience the same tantrum with ear-piercing screams from my little boy's mouth.

hmmm...i anticipated that this glorious time of my son's first adolescence would come. however, i expected it to arrive a lot earlier than this. after all, he is now about two and a half years old.

then again, i always seem to question the centuries old studies of child rearing whenever it comes to my only child. is this normal? is he SUPPOSED to be acting like this? where do i draw the line to distinguish NORMAL wildly active toddler behavior from a just plain disobedient, undisciplined boy? i have a hunch that i'll be questioning things like this for quite a while...at least until i'm a well-seasoned mother of four. yikes!

to put your minds at ease, after we picked up brandon from work, the little guy settled down - a bit. my genius of a husband suggested that we take advantage of the beautiful hawaiian night and go for a walk around laie with our previously mentioned jogging stroller. once we got out into the cool evening air, it seemed as though all of our spirits were refreshed. when we returned home, we laid next to ahonui on the bed, and promptly fell asleep.

although ahonui woke up throughout the night in irritable moods, i tried to remember that this is just a chapter in all of our lives. tantrums are thrown, tempers will rise, boys will be boys, and lines will continue to be blurred. and although i understand that this phase won't last forever, any advice & tips from you "well-seasoned" (or even not-so-seasoned) people out there will definitely be appreciated!

stuck but chillin'

rumor had it that there was an oil spill in waiahole and so the police closed the road both ways. i had left work early for dentist & haircut appointments in town and was on my way home when i ran into what seemed like an endless line of cars.

it's times like these that i'm so grateful for the beauty of modern technology & drive thru windows...i can be caught in 2-3 hours of traffic on kam. hwy. without feeling a constant impulse to pull my hair out. thanks to my iphone, a KFC meal, and a lovely caribbean passion by my side, i was a happy camper during the long wait. i was able to play a few games, make a few calls, finish my lunch, and fill my belly all within the comfort of my mom's nissan. thank goodness for traffic jams!

easter excitement

we didn't do much to celebrate easter this year, but ahonui sure did! last saturday morning my in-laws picked up ahonui and took him to the annual gunstock ranch easter egg hunt in kahuku - while brandon went to work, and i stayed home to clean.

apparently, there was quite the crowd this year. but i'm so happy ahonui was able to take part in the activities: a big time easter egg hunt, pony rides, petting zoo, and who could forget getting nice & dirty in the mud?

he came home a few hours later with mud-covered reminders that i am supposed to clean the house at the end of the day - not the beginning!

*in case you were wondering...this is my sister-in-law's feet - not ahonui's. lol.

 

i was a little surprised that he didn't knock out after a good scrub in the bathtub and a yummy lunch, but it was fine with me because we had an easter party to celebrate at the nikora home!

ahonui & i met up with my family for an easter egg hunt and a huge easter feast. now that gramps has passed away, it's sad that we don't have big extended family gatherings anymore. i'm hoping that this past easter will be a forecast of many more awesome family get-togethers in the future. our kids were able to enjoy each other's company decorating eggs prior to the easter bunny's arrival.

once the easter bunny had completed it's annual duties in my family's backyard, all the kiddies ran outside for some happy hunting. ahonui caught on quick to the task at hand.

 

and i just couldn't resist showing off the cutest and newest nikoras...yes, they're FIRST cousins! i love it. on the left is baby j and on the right, little gabby. they're only one month apart in age.

 

i ended the night with a little hunt myself - searching for my son, that is. i found these two hiding & playing in one of my mom's cabinets. i have a hunch that royal & ahonui will be partners in crime for a long time. when we went to pick brandon up from work, ahonui's head began drooping as soon as we passed the temple. i think limiting his consumption of easter candy from that day was a good idea, retrospectively.

wheels, meals, and deals

luck was on our side the other week when my brother, tane, told us about a friend of his who was selling EVERYTHING he owned. tane emailed me a list of all the items up for sale and i had to restrain myself from buying it all. since i've been on a long and laborious hunt for a jogging stroller, and ahonui had not yet had a meal in his own high chair, we bought only those two things from the long list.

ahonui loves to climb into his high chair, even when we're not eating. brandon taught him how to properly hold utensils, so he has really improved at eating without our help.

as far as the jogging stroller goes...every day i vow to use it after work - but it's still folded up in a corner of the apartment. hehehe. but at least we now have the option to go running with ahonui! monday is always a chance for a new beginning with new goals. another attempt at getting in shape starts up again!

the chin dimple culprit

when ahonui was born, brandon & i noticed that he had a slight "chin dimple" or as we hawaiians call it - " 'okole chin". we have always thought it was the cutest thing, especially since neither brandon nor myself seemed to have one of these on our own chins. both of us have since wondered which extended family member he may have inherited this physical trait from.

ahonui - at 2 months old - sporting his lovely " 'okole chin".

after a little visit to our local zippy's restaurant and a few smiles for mommy, we have come to the realization that daddy's chin is the culprit of ahonui's chin dimple!! it only took us two years to figure it out. how funny is THAT?

my life according to flickr

tagged by mary...

1. go to flickr.com
2. enter your answer in the "search" box to each question below
3. use the first picture that comes up from the search results
4. copy the html and paste!

what's your name?

what's your favorite food?

favorite color?

favorite drink?

dream vacation?

favorite dessert?

what do you want to be when you grow up?

what do you love most in life?

one word to describe you?

what do you dream about?

again, anyone who is curious to see what flickr has to offer, or is bored, or needs to update their blog - this one's for you!