Florida Valentines Week

 Hey we went on a trip to Florida - a little get away for Valentine’s week and it was fun!

JV wrestling champ

 Connor has had a great season wrestling season this year. He has gotten faster and stronger and looks pretty tough out there. 

I have tried not to yell weird things while cheering my boy on but I get so excited! It is so nerve racking to see your kid out there and worried he is going to break an arm or leg (because I’ve seen this happen!!)

Connor said wrestling JV was pretty easy-  he didn’t lose 

It was really fun to watch the final match for JV champs Connor wrestled really tough and beat the guy from Mililani so we were all cheering that for that!!

Updated family photos

As part of our Hawaii goodbye tour- I wanted to update our family photos with ocean backdrop. It’s always stressful trying to find suitable clothing options for this big family of ours what will fit and what will look good and I seem to struggle the most with what to wear luckily, been trying to find a dress for Brielle. Our cute neighbor had a dress that fit me perfectly!! Yay for borrowing!!

 

Everyone was in an OK mood but right at the very beginning after only just a few photos had been taken a rogue wave came up and splashed us and got us all wet!! Brecon didn’t appreciate that and from then on he stayed back from the ocean and wasn’t in the rest of the group shots

We took these photos, the end of Christmas break before Cael went back to college in Idaho

Funny boy

 Cannon on the way to school as we were dropping him off at the gate. He says mom you know when you were yelling at me “hurry up cannon you’re gonna be late”— well I was having a funny face contest with myself and you won. 

😂😂

This kid has been quite the character lately! In addition to his sense of humor, he has had quite the growth spurt!! His church clothes no longer fit him - the jacket and pants shrunk too small. 

Also he has been having to wear an eyepatch when he woke up one morning with double vision. So he just takes turns moving the eye patch from one side to the other so he isn’t  seeing double 😬. we’re hoping to get some answers about why this would happen and how we can help him get  better. Hopefully soon!

Japan trip last day

Leaving our last traditional house — this place was okay- but not our favorite. At least the grocery store wasn’t too far away!

Walking into Disney Sea and feeling pretty good about ourselves - there wasn’t even a line… but apparently it was because the park had already opened and we were the late stragglers 

The tower of terror line— the kids were actually pretty disappointed that we waited for 60 minutes for the shortest elevator ride. 😬😬😂. “That’s it??”

Waiting for a very long time at theme parks is not my favorite… but what else were we going to do?

Brielle was so excited to find the alien dumplings— mochi balls with chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry. We all thought vanilla was the best!

Sausage and roll— we got a big kick out of how this looked. It wasn’t too bad for a snack to keep us going a little bit longer 

Leaving the park with the whole gang- we needed to stop for dinner on our way to the airport. Another adventure on its own when me and the kids made it through security and Ben’s tickets was cancelled. Thankfully he was able to call someone and get another ticket home- just on another airline and arriving an hour before we landed. It actually worked out because then could drop off his luggage and come back to the airport with our van to pick us all up easy breezy

One funny thing that happened as we were in the airport, we stopped at one of the last places to buy some souvenirs and Cael was in charge of one of our carryon suitcases and so we grabbed our items and purchased them and walked all the way to the end of the long hallway to get to our gate where we waiting for 45 minute before it was time to board. As they started calling the first section to start boarding the plane—  we were loading up our bags and I asked where is that silver Carry-on suitcase?? the last place I could remember was back in the shop and so I said “Connor ran as fast as you can!! And he booked it down there. As the last people were getting in line to board the airplane— I was trying to look like we were ready but also trying to delay as much as possible to give Connor the time he needed to get back. It was very nerve-racking trying to and hoping that the suitcase was still there and also feeling frustrated that Cael  left it in the shop. Thankfully someone had just put our suitcase in the closet and so when Connor asked if it was there, they quickly grabbed it from him and he was able to run all the way back and board the plane. Just as the last few passengers  were checking in and walking  through. Talk about a funny story we will never forget! Also the fact that Connor ran back to get it and not Cael— seriously should have made Cael go get it!!

 After our all night flight we landed back on our island! Cannon said he watched 4 movies and when there was 2 hrs left on the flight he tried to sleep. When we did get back home he and Brecon both crashed while the rest of us got on our church clothes and made it just in time to share all of our adventures on our trip with them. 

It always feels good to be back home!

Here we go JAPAN!!

I was feeling so nervous about this upcoming trip, not quite having a good travel itinerary, being nervous about the language of having a fear of how we were gonna get from the airport to our hotel— All of these worries really immobilized me for at least a week before our trip even though I wanted to have fun with friends that were visiting the packing and preparation were taking a lot of my energy— and so I was doing a lot of homework and not leaving the house 😂😂

But then we got on the plane and away we went!!  Now all that we needed to do was just enjoy our trip, right? The first thing that we ran into was we were not able to get any Japanese currency at the airport, but we needed to buy tickets to get us to our Airbnb that night which is about an hour away somehow Cael found a train and we bought tickets and I don’t know how we got there, but somehow we we did!! Sweaty hot and tired we made the short walk from the train to our little home for the next four days

Day one begins. We were able to get local currency from the ATM in the 711 hallelujah!! We bought breakfast at the convenience store and headed out for the day

Osaka castle- after a few mistakes on the trains and subways, we finally made it to our first destination of the day. Connor’s phone was the only one that we were able to get Wi-Fi and Internet access so he was our navigator and I have to say he did pretty good most of the time . It was so hot and we were sweating making our way up to this historic location— Cannon almost didn’t make the climb up to the top— but thankfully with our Osaka Day Pass our tickets we didn’t have to wait in the long line like everyone else—  we were able to make our way all the way up the stairs to the top. Each level of the castle was a museum with some interesting history and artifacts. I think my favorite was the samurai armor. But the heat and humidity were really starting to wear us down

A short distance away from the Osaka Castle was another attraction that we could enter with our amazing pass the mini figure museum. This was OK and pretty fun to stop at at least there was some air conditioning and cool place for us to recover before heading out to find lunch. Cael and Connor ate Hot noodles while the rest of us got McDonald’s. A good break to cool down and rest for the next adventure.

The zoo was a fun little stop on our day although we were all starting to feel pretty exhausted and ready to head back home. We were entertained by the chimpanzees and we got a little scared when one came flying up and hit the glass right in front of us! Screams and giggles from all of us — except Brecon was standing back and could see what was going to happen before we did!

I was happy to see a red panda before we decided to leave

We then worked our way over to a tower where we could go down a slide with our ticket! It’s pretty fun, but Brecon said it shook his brain so he was ready to go home.

The famous shot in Osaka!! We did it! I was still feeling pretty anxious and nervous about traveling in this country with all of my kids, but amazed also at how great they all did on our first day!!