Sunday, August 22, 2010

Happy Birthday, Handsome Husband!

We celebrated the Handsome Husband's birthday with our good friends at a restaurant called Mozambique in Laguna Flats. We had a great time! Bob is seen here in a new shirt the little girls got him. Alyssa gave him the wii fit and I gave him a new golf club.
Tom and Karen Caulfield
Shawn and Marlene Garland
Us


Thursday, August 19, 2010

College Move in Day

I have to commend CSUF for the great job they did organizing move in day. We got free carts to unload our cars with and parking close to the dorms. The dorms are new and are in a green, serene, setting. I wish I had more pictures of the whole place, but I forgot my camera in the morning and Katie took these pics for me when she went back that night because she forgot her keys.

The kitchen

Delaney's bed. It was so hard finding non-teen, wild bedding. This is so Delaney.
Luckily, she is not a clothes horse. Basics for her.
More pictures have been ordered for the bullentin board. The desk is the only other piece of furniture in the room.
The living room. On the other side of those curtains they have a huge balcony. Like 15x5.
The bathroom that two girls will share. There is another bathroom that is a little bigger next to the living room.

Monday, August 16, 2010

I can't believe my baby is 24 - Happy Birthday, Alyssa!

We started off with a tablescape reminiscent of her favorite island in Italy, Capri.

Her favorite color for a long time, has been yellow.
No birthday is complete without presents.
Katie and Delaney gave her this dress and necklace.
Barbara and Floyd gave her a new watch and a beautiful cuff bracelet and a cooking class.
She received this dress from us along with some make-up and nailpolish.

We then played "Celebrity". Some of the funniest moments were when Greg said "He's made of bacon" when describing Porky Pig and when Barbara was describing a super model, Tommy said "Giselle Bunchen" is a Joey "how you doing" voice. We were dying.

No birthday would be complete without a trip down memory lane.
1 yr. old
4 years old
3rd grade, 8 or 9
12 years old
16 years old
23 years old

WE LOVE YOU!!!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Friday, July 30, 2010

Road to Hana


Ah, the Road to Hana. Everyone talks about it, it is a must do and very scenic. Take a boxed lunch and stop at all the sights. Waterfalls and gorgeous views at every hairpin, narrow, death drop turn. Actually, it is not that bad when everyone is patient and in no hurry. The average speed limit is 15 mph. That is why it takes about 3 hours (with no stops) to go 30 miles.
All the bridges are one car only, so you have to yield to oncoming traffic. Everyone thinks THEY are oncoming traffic! The road will be two lanes and then all of a sudden, turn into one for a short time. The locals drive the road at break neck speed, which the Handsome Husband considered a challenge on the way back. It took us only two hours to drive back and I was a nervous wreck. Locals passed us (and 4 or 5 other cars at once) going at least 30 on the wrong side of the road and took turns in that lane. So lucky no one was coming the other way, because it would have been a head on catastrophe.
Okay, enough of the road and on to the sights. First stop was Twin Falls, it will be the only one I name because all the others had Hawaiian names that I can't remember and didn't write down. It was an easy 20 minute hike back to the falls. The girls found this little hut.

Ah, we found it at last. Not much of a fall, just a little trickle, but a nice inviting pool of water to refresh yourself in.
HH did just that.
Stunning views
There are lots of road side stands selling fruit, homemade ice-cream, leis and coconut juice. This was Coconut Glenn's. Glenn himself served us. We had homemade coconut and jack fruit ice-cream. Jack fruit is the fruit flavor used in Juicy Fruit gum. It was really good. Just to keep it real, this is where I believe I received all my bug bites. I slapped a good 10 mosquitos and left the little shack, but by the time I got back to the hotel, I had over 15.
I got a quick picture of this guy, when we first saw him, he was with two other little pigs.
One of the most stunning stops was this National Park. It contained a black sand beach and fresh water caves.

Notice the Warning signs (because my family never does).
So beautiful.
Went down to the black sand beach, which was really little rocks. Katie was disappointed because she though it would be fine black sand. I'm glad she choose not to go in because of all the warning signs for heavy current, man-o-war jelly fish and regular jelly fish. There were a lot of people in the water.
We then decided to see the fresh water caves. Some local boys were there and they showed us where to jump in and where the secret tunnels were. This was the favorite thing everyone did.
Katie
Delaney
They had so much fun here.
This side of the island definately is more tropical and jungle-y. Its what you think of when you think of Hawaii.

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Haleakala

We were heading out to Lahaina when we saw the sign for Haleakala, so we decided to go. Haleakala is a volcano on the island and the top is at 10000 feet. We drove up through some beautiful prairie and pine trees.
We eventually drove up above the clouds

We finally arrived at the top of the crater after an hour...
and boy was it cold!!! It was about 40 degrees. Everyone was dressed in long pants and jackets. We couldn't even stay out longer than 10 minutes in our shorts and tank tops. It was amazing to see.
Inside the crater there was a alien landscape in hues of red, orange and black.

We really enjoyed the scenery on this trip. It was very interesting.