Playing Dress-Up

The last of the Hawaii Pictures

 Top to bottom:

1.  Getting ready to go down the tube slide.

2.  Sand castles with Daddy, so much fun!

3.  Finally learned to make a "shaka" sign.  That was HARD, as usually you use your thumb to hold down the other fingers.

The Aulani Luau

  Disney's Aulani went to great lengths to celebrate Hawaiian history, culture and traditions.  The majority of the activities Anthony did at Aunty's beach house were Hawaiian themed, such as making me my beautiful lei (I made his!) and constructing outrigger canoes for canoe races.  He took a hula lesson and once heard music in a restaurant and announced, "We sang this at Aunty's."

  The evening program was no exception.  The show was just amazing, but we enjoyed the activities before, also.  Anthony spotted a game of ulu maika (polynesian bowling) and proceeded to show off how he'd learned it earlier that day.  He was better than me!

Neighborhood Picnic

   Last Sunday was our neighborhood's annual picnic.  Anthony had a great time with the water balloons, he could even fill his own.  At some point he discovered that he could fill the orange cones with water and have even more fun!

  We left shortly after the drenching.  I heard a few people comment on how people had really gotten Anthony during the water balloon play.  They laughed when I said it was all self-inflicted.

Austin's Birthday Party

 Yesterday was Austin's birthday party.  It was held at one of those bounce house places.  The kids had a WONDERFUL time.  It was also more than a little bit loud!

Firefighter's Pancake Breakfast

    This morning was the firefighter's annual pancake breakfast.  Anthony refused to actually eat the pancakes.  While pancakes are his favorite breakfast food by far, evidently the only ones worth eating are mine, cooked from scratch.  (They are pretty good.)

  We enjoyed all the activities.  Anthony was pretty impressed with the rescue demonstrations.  Afterwards the kids had a chance to use a real fire extinguisher to put out a fire.  As you can see, Anthony was pretty intimidated by the noise.  He much preferred spraying the water from a real firehose.

 He was also happy to learn how to do CPR.  Well, really only kinda sorta.

  We ended our day there with a visit to the "safety house."  We went inside, the firefighter taught everyone how to dial 911 (but does A know how to use our phone???) and then the kids were encouraged to spot safety problems.  I was pretty proud when Anthony raised his hand and pointed out the pot holder on the stove.  At the end the kids crawled through a smoke filled room, climbed out the window and did their "stop, drop and roll."

Space Shuttle

 While I was at work, Bob loaded up the Highlander (it is a seven person car) with our neighbors and headed off to Moffett Field (home of Nasa-Ames) for a fly-by of the space shuttle Endeavor on its way to Los Angeles.

  They had a pretty long wait, but fortunately there were all sorts of activities to keep everyone entertained--climbing on space shuttle tires, a space themed angry birds game…

  Evidently the shuttle did a direct fly-by of my work, too.  Unfortunately I missed it--there was no published route, nor reasonable updates of the time.  We just didn't see the point of standing outside for an hour in hopes of seeing it.  A few of my co-workers did see it, as they were walking back to our building after a meeting.  Oh well.

Breakfast with Micky Mouse

   Our first morning at the resort Anthony spied the character breakfast in action.  Boy did he want to have breakfast with Micky Mouse.  Fortunately I had already booked it for later in our trip.

  While Micky greeted us upon arrival, breakfast was actually hosted by Aunty, the Hawaiian woman who hosts the resort and takes care of the keiki at her beach house while their parents play.

  We enjoyed the breakfast immensely, but it was loud.  In addition to a few characters coming around to say Hi, Aunty would round up the kids for parades.  She led one of the keiki parades by banging on a frying pan with a spoon while the children played other percussion instruments.  She also celebrated everyone's birthdays, or in our case, anniversaries.  (Our wedding was a very public one in Yosemite, it was kind of fun having a public anniversary.)

Casa de Pineapple

   Anthony is not one for car rides and our trip was no exception.  (He generally has about 30 minutes of patience on a good day.)  On our way to the north shore we took a car break at the Dole Pineapple Plantation.  Its a tourist trap only rivaled by Casa de Fruta on Hwy. 152.  Anthony loved it, though was very disappointed I wouldn't let him buy anything.  He didn't even know what it was, he just wanted to buy it.

  I did buy him a Dole Whip (pineapple soft serve) and tickets for the three of us to ride the Pineapple Express.  We actually learned a few things at the Dole Plantation, most notably that pineapples do NOT grow on trees.  I think I'd envisioned them growing on something like palm trees.  No sirree-Bob, they grow on little bushes that sprout from the top of a pineapple.

Waterplay at the Hotel

   Our resort had a pretty fabulous water play area.  Anthony spent a lot less time at the kids club than we had expected, mostly because we were having so much fun playing together as a family!

  Anthony spent a little time playing in the Menehune adventure area, running through the water spray, standing under buckets dumping water and going down the kiddie water slides.

Then he discovered the two grown-up water slides.  One was a tube slide, one a body slide.  He was just in heaven.  I was kind of surprised how much he loved the body slide.  It was FAST and completely dark.  Of course, while adults came out with a huge splash, he just plopped in the water and swam to the edge.

 He did have to be rescued off the tube slide once.  "Rescued" is a bit of a strong word choice.  He was so small and lacking momentum that he got stuck in the first turn and a lifeguard had to swim down and give him a push.

"Swimming with the Fishies"

Anthony was very excited about the idea of swimming with the fishies on our trip.  We called it that because every time I used the word "snorkel", he responded by snorting.

  The resort had a small artificial snorkeling reef, about the size of a backyard swimming pool.  Anthony didn't really like the snorkel mask, one picture was tops.  Then we tried to take him in the snorkel pool without a mask.  FAILURE!  Turns out he was absolutely terrified of the fish.  We had long conversations with the lifeguard on duty about what fish eat (lettuce, small pieces of shrimp) and what they don't eat (people of any size).  He was also reassured that there were no sharks or octopusses in their pool.  Irregardless, he was unwilling to get in.

  Bob and I had already decided that he wasn't invited on our sail/snorkel expedition.  While the snorkeling wasn't as great as in Playa del Carmen a few years ago, it was still a lot of fun.  We saw two juvenile sea turtles and an octopus.  Bob got to hold the octopus (tako to sushi lovers) and I got to touch him.  While he struggled and inked up a storm while the guide was catching him, he sure held on tight.

   The bottom picture is Bob holding a sea anenomae, one of the few you can pick up.

Beach Fun

 I just loved playing on the beach.  Such a different experience than the beaches here where it is cold and gray.  And cold, very cold.

  Most of the time we just did the free activities provided by the resort.  They had sand toys and boogie boards to borrow.  Our last beach day we took a stand-up paddle board out for a spin.  We were pretty comfortable paddling Anthony around the lagoon on our knees.  Standing up was a lot trickier.  I was able to get up on my first try, but staying up was trickier.