Things to remember

Flowers outside our condo

Red-headed bird

Snail at the temple

An abundance of frogs!

The Bus

Blueberry streusel

Dang egg!

Our Hawaii trip was such a blast! There are a few things that I wanted to note so that I'll always remember how much fun we had and what it was like during our stay. Turtle Bay was such an amazing place for us to stay! We were so grateful to be staying there as it's so beautiful and we felt very safe there--minus the SECURITY issue one of the nights. The grounds within Turtle Bay are immaculate, just like the temple grounds. Every morning, we'd wake up to people outside sweeping, mowing, and cleaning. It is such a beautiful place! We were so central to everything from Laie to Hale'iwa and the beach was within walking distance. A couple of mornings we woke up and walked to the fruit market where we got pineapple, mango, coconut, etc which was the most delicious fruit I've ever tasted! Now that I'm home, I wish we'd have gone more.

Our condo was absolutely perfect for us and I would go back there in a heartbeat! Jen and I roomed upstairs while Shellee and Tahna roomed together downstairs. It was such a great growing experience for me as I was able to get to know the girls a lot better and we were able to experience something so new and different. The culture is so different from Utah as everyone just kinda bums around and kicks back. Everyone seems so stress-free and just out to relax. We often saw homeless people and many younger people (as in 16-25ish) who just never got ready. Mostly everyone there lives at the beach and they look like it!

One highlight of our trip that made it very unique and personal to us was watching Gilmore Girls. Now, some would say that that's such a waste of time since we were in Hawaii; however, we don't view it that way. Our purpose was to go out, relax, and just do whatever we wanted to. We had a whole month there so that allowed us to do and see most everything we wanted as well as watch Gillies. Throughout our stay, we would watch Gilmore Girls during breakfast, at random breaks in the day, and during dinner. We ate it up and I have great memories of watching it with the girls! Our Gilmore watching is something I'll never forget!

After being in Hawaii for about a day, we were all craving treats and that started the downhill for us on healthy eating. We hadn't bought many ingredients for treats as we didn't think we'd care too much for them--WOAH were we wrong! We ended up going to the store multiple times to buy ingredients for cookies, blueberry muffin mix, monkey bread (i.e. sticky buns), and to buy peanut butter and pretzel M&M's. Shellee made us coconut cake one night which was delicious and we also had popcorn dipped in condensed milk which was quite yummy!  Jen found a yummy streusel recipe on the internet and thought that it would be good on the blueberry muffin mix so we tried it and...she was right! It was heaven! We had so many treats! We all giggled about our sweet's addiction and it grew to be a topic of laughter on a daily basis!

As mentioned in previous posts, The Bus was one of our most favorite experiences in Hawaii! We had so many times where we were laughing hysterically on the bus which is something that I'll always remember. The most strange people ride the bus, some normal, many not. There were people who seemed to be schizophrenic, bums, fights broke out, insane bus drivers, etc. You name it, it happened on the bus!

One thing that was very new to us was the craze of insects and reptiles at night. There are huge frogs jumping around everywhere at night which is cool, but also a little creepy because they get super close to you. We could hear them all around as we walked to the pools. Another things that was just crazy to us was the size of the snails there. GINORMOUS! We saw a snail with the most beautiful shell! The shell was about the size of a lemon and it was white with brown designs all over it. I've never seen anything like it! There were many slugs roaming around as well as geckos that get inside the house which was not my cup of tea. We ended up having two baby geckos in the condo and cocroaches are just inevitable. Luckily we were on the top floor so we didn't have as many, but I still never really got used to them. I had many nights where I would wake up on the hour to check for bugs on the walls or in my bed. That is something I don't miss at all! Each night before getting in bed, I would pull my covers up and check in my pillows for centipede's as we heard that they light to nestle up in the wrinkles on blankets. Lucky for me I never found one, but I'd hate to think of what would've happened if I had! Whenever there was a cocroach we had a system. Shellee would kill it, then Jen would scoop it up and flush it, while I stood far away and observed like a big coward. Thanks girls!

Some funny events to remember...On about  the second morning that we were in Hawaii, I woke up at about 6:00 am and went down to exercise. A while later, Jen and Shellee got up and decided to go for a run so by the time they returned, we were all finished with our exercising. Shellee started trying to do man push-ups so Jen decided to see if she could do one as well. As she's getting into position--WHAM! She smacks her head hard on the tile floor which sounded awful! Shellee and I just busted! We laughed so hard I couldn't even get it together. Jen luckily wasn't too hurt and started cracking up as well and we got a laugh out of that the entire trip. Another funny moment we had was on the bus where this guy stands up to get off at a stop and a girl about our age stops him and hands him a piece of paper. He took it with the most confused look on his face, seeming a little hesitant, and the girl said, "It's my sisters number". The guy still seemed thoroughly confused and just said, "Thanks" and then walked off the bus. You probably had to be there to think it was funny, but we got a kick out of it!

One of our other laughing moments was when we were making cookie dough and I lightly cracked an egg--ONCE! All of a sudden a tiny part on the top of the egg fell off and the whole egg came running out onto the counter. It happened so fast and was so bizar! We got into a laughing fit with that one! Also, the first Sunday we went to church, we were sitting in Relief Society and the RS presidency stands up to sing a hymn for us. At first we thought it was sweet, but then one of the girls in the presidency starts beat boxing to the hymn! We were shocked! You would never see that in a ward in Utah that's for sure! That was quite hilarious, but also something that we didn't really agree with. We just got through it and luckily never experienced it again.

There were many moments of laughter on our trip which made it so fun! Some of our highlights were shave ice, Dole whip ice cream, Pearl Harbor (moreso one of my favorites), the fruit stand, Zumba, Gilmore Girls, reading books on the beach (I read Worth Dying For by Lee Child and started 1776 by David McCullough), the Huki Lau Cafe, The Bus, our good friend Susan (Grant is something to remember I guess), the Laie temple, and many other things. My two cravings while in Hawaii were pizza and Starbursts which is weird because I never care about starbursts normally. Jen and Shellee seemed to like coconut m&m's and Shellee was also craving pizza.

We saw many red-headed birds both big and small. Jen really took a liking to the small ones which we mostly saw on our walk to the Turtle Bay beach. They were definitely interesting birds! One other thing that we enjoyed was watching everyone do the Shocka (not sure how to spell that?) to each other. The Shocka is what people in Utah would call the "Hang loose" sign. The Hawaiians don't do the sign while wiggling their hand like people in Utah; rather, they just hold it up as they go by. It was fun to see what a big part of the culture that was. Also, the word Aina means "the spirit of the land" or the feeling of the culture type deal (i.e. things specific to that culture).

What a wonderful experience for us to go over and be in Hawaii for so long. The North Shore is beautiful and fun and I would love to go back some day. I'm very grateful for Jen, Shellee, and Tahna. They're great friends and so much fun to vacation with. It was great to get to know them and share these fun memories together. Thanks girls!