Starting our last week here in Hawaii...

...and making the second trip to drop some people off at the airport for their flights home. Weather wise this past week has been an adventure in itself. Rain showers, Thunderstorms, Flash Floods, all have been making things interesting and a bit soggy...

At the beginning of this week we picked up Adam's friend Brandon. We took Brandon for a late breakfast at Eggberts Restaurant. Gracie had the famous banana pancakes, which were phenomenal. Adam & Auntie Michelle arrived the next day. The boys were off to have fun together and us girls decided to go get pedicures together.

Martin & I had our first couple's night out together at the famed "Beach House" which supposedly has the best sunset view on the island. The food was pretty good too, and funnily the waiter we had was from Seattle originally.

We explored many new beaches, the boys hoping to find some amazing boogie boarding and the girls looking for beautiful sand and easy swimming.

The boys wanted to go hiking and since I really wanted to see a waterfall I decided to tag along. Grace also wanted to come. We headed out fairly early to hit the famed "Kalalau Trail". The day seemed perfect for a hike and we set out on the 8 mile round trip. About 3/4 mile into it the heavens opened up and it started down pouring. The trail turned to mud and we plodded on. Numerous people passed us on their way downhill with advice to turn back. We kept going to the 2 mile mark and then decided the trail got too steep to continue to the waterfall part of the trail. Both Adam & Brandon ran up ahead and made it all the way to the 4 mile mark at the waterfall. We stopped at the beach and by the time we were 3/4 of the way back the two boys overtook us and beat us back to the beach where Michelle was waiting for us.

One of our last days was spent going back to probably our favorite, Secret Beach. Gracie had so much fun there this time. Our first trip there the surf was very rough and the waves were high. When we tried to find the famed lava pools described in our handy dandy guide book "The Ultimate Guide to Kauai" we struck out. This time surf was way down and lo and behold there was the most awesome pools just around the corner. This is where our little daredevil spent the day frolicking in the water...(video to follow!)

We are on Fiji Time

Grace & I are at Bulaccino, a Fijian chain coffee shop in Nadi. They have affordable internet and we decided to take advantage of some time to post about our trip so far. I attempted to upload some photos I have taken, but did not have much success in reading my card at this internet spot. Watch for more posts and hopefully photos of our exploits.

So here we are in Fiji on our second day. It's been an interesting ride starting with a 2.5 hour plane ride from Seattle to Los Angeles, then a 4 hour layover. We did not know that the LAX airport was under construction and the selection of food, etc was extremely limited. We ended up with some chicken teriyaki which could at best be called so so. Good thing the folks at Air Pacific served dinner as well as a nice breakfast on the 9.5 hour flight to Nadi, Fiji. I can only say good things about this airline. Everything was perfect, from the in-seat TV with audio, video and even game selections. You can play your seat mate at Tic Tac Toe and believe me Grace took advantage of this and whooped our butts a few times.

We arrived in Fiji at 4:30 AM on Thursday, two days after departing Bellingham on Tuesday morning. It was a little strange to hire a taxi to take us to our hotel in the dark. We didn't get to see any of the countryside as we were whisked away to the Radisson. The hotel is on Denarau Island which is a total tourist area, but it's a very nice hotel with a wonderful pool supposedly the nicest on the island. We took a little nap and after freshening up we headed into town to explore. It's very hot & humid here and we walked around town from one end to the other. Having read in the in flight magazine that the local restaurant "TaTa's" was supposed to be a very good place for lunch we stopped in there. it was quite the experience let me tell you. We ordered a variety of curries. Adam had chicken, Martin had shrimp and I ordered a Lamb dish requesting it to be mild as we were all not accustomed to curry. Wow, what an adventure. My mouth burned pretty bad and needless to say most of my meal stayed behind there. Martin & Adam seemed to suffer through it and mostly enjoyed their lunch.

We had stopped at a grocery store and attempted to pick up some snacks. However we're dismayed to find that prices for anything healthy were astronomical. Yogurt, fresh fruit and such were really expensive and we left just purchasing a pack of bottled water. After some more explorations we visited a local coffee shop since my caffeine withdrawal headache was getting to be too much. One of the employees directed us to a locally owned shop for a truly local experience. We participated in some local rites and a kava ceremony. It was quite interesting to talk to some locals from a nearby village in the mountains. It looks like we may head back there today to purchase some local art stuff. Everything they sell is handmade in the village and profits go towards education for the village children, or so they tell us around here. LOL

Then we headed back to the hotel for some swimming in the fabulous pools.

We had dinner at a local spot around the marina in the complex where our hotel is. It was quite good, martin & I shared a seafood platter, and Adam went all exotic with a Hawaiian Pizza.

We hit the hay around 9:30 PM since we are all tired and jet lag wasn't quite overcome.

Today we hit Nadi again for breakfast at Bulaccino here...next on our agenda massages by locals at the spa here in town. It's amazing how cheap things are, like a 1.5 hour massage for $60 Fijian, which is about $40 US, I think...

Anyway, our 30 minutes are almost up so I better finish off this post. Its beautiful here and we are definitely thinking about a return visit. The most striking thing about Fiji is how friendly and helpful the locals are.

This is Melanie & Gracie sigining out.

Winthrop Visit

On decidedly short notice we decided to head east for the long weekend and visit Grace's grandparents in Winthrop. We were planning on leaving late afternoon, but as usual with the lack of planning on Martin's part we ended up departing our house after 7 PM. This resulted in a hasty dinner on the road, part of grandma's chicken coop flying off the back of the truck and a lot of heartburn (from the bad Asian food we ate on the run!).

We did lot's of walking into town while in Winthrop. Had to visit the fabulous Rocking Horse Bakery, I highly recommend their scones, but my absolute favorite is the chocolate croissants. Second only to the one I had at a small bakery in Paris. My favorite scones are the apricot/ginger ones, yummy! We also sampled some of the ice-cream at the local sweet shop, where co-incidentally Grace's cousin

Alannah worked over the

weekend. Here I highly recommend the Mocha Almond Fudge, it's divine. LOL

Of course after all that food one gets tired and needs a ride on Daddy's shoulders...

The weather for this long weekend was fantastic and I had impulse

bought a slip-n-slide for Grace. Who can say no to that when it's for sale right there in the grocery store with the bread and stuff I was buying anyway??? I tell you those merchandisers are evil!

Grace ended up not quiet knowing what to do with the slide

and ended up walking up and down modeling her swimsuit like on the runway. It was quite entertaining...

We also visited the Farmer's Market with grandma. They had some really cool booths and we bought some huge radishes, a shelf for grandma's stereo, some divine pound cake and we missed out on getting some awesome looking cherry pie by just a smidgen. Too bad, I bet it was delicious.

Mother's Day Walk

We had company over the weekend so a traditional Mother's Day was not in the cards for us this time. Normally we visit one of the our moms and surprise her.This year we did nothing like that, but instead stayed home.  I cooked up a nice brunch, including Asparagus/Brie Eggs, Bacon, Fresh Fruit, some wonderful Blueberry Pancakes and much more...

Our friends from Alaska Stan & Ginger had fun and it was great to see them again.

After brunch we cleaned up, got our rubber boots out and headed down to the river.  

Grace had a blast throwing rocks and taking off her boots to play

 in the sand with her toes. 

 She was a bit reluctant to have her photo taken, but with some

 pleading and blackmail I managed to get a few good photos...

Visit to the Navy!

That's what Grace says when we ask her about our recent trip to Chicago. On September 4th we packed up the family and headed east to attend my step-son Ben's graduation from Basic Training. I had never been in that area before so I asked for my friend Jeanne's advice before booking hotel rooms and such. We ended up staying at a Residence Inn by Marriott in an industrial part of town, which was nice and quiet, yet close to the Naval base where we picked Ben up every day.
We arrived late on the Thursday night and picked up our rental vehicle, (which by the way was a full size van due to the fact that Ben's uncle Matt & his son Oscar, and Ben's mom Pam joined us on this trip!) shortly after midnight. Martin, thinking ahead, had packed our GPS unit to help us navigate around the Chicago area. Well, it took almost two hours to drive to the hotel and let me tell you, the neighborhoods we drove through were pretty scary. We kept trying to figure out what these blue lights were that we saw mounted high up on streetlight poles. Adam thought they were for the cops to catch people running red lights. Well, let me tell you from the looks of these neighborhoods that was the least of their worries. I think they were some sort of security feature, cause we were in "THE HOOD" man.
After catching just a few hours of shut eye it was up and at 'em bright and early in order to get seats at the ceremony. You see the Navy only guaranteed us 4 seats per family (kids under 12 didn't count!) but everyone else was first come, first served. After sitting in traffic for over an hour and then being herded out of our vehicles to be briefed over a loudspeaker system on how not to behave on base, our van was searched, our ID's scrutinized and then we were on our way. The ceremony itself was pretty impressive. There were over 1000 Graduates and a few of these flunked out during the actual graduation ceremony. Imagine spending over two grueling months training and working your heinie off and then passing out just minutes from reaching your goal. These guys (and gals) literally collapsed in front of thousands of people and now have to start all over. What a bummer! I managed to catch some photos of Ben's Division which was the last to march into the hall. None of us could spot him, so I tried to sweep the whole division and did manage to catch one good one of him. It was a good thing I did cause Ben ended up standing right underneath the bleacher balcony we were sitting in, and we couldn't even see him the rest of the time!
After the ceremony was over we headed out and spent the day driving around with Ben. We visited the Bass Pro Shop, which is the coolest store I've been to in a long time. It's an outdoor hunting/fishing/camping/anything else you may need in life kind of deal. They have a full size pond/aquarium inside, an archery range, a shooting gallery, etc. Their clothing selection is amazing and the whole thing just puts REI to shame. Sorry! We then had some nourishment and headed out to the shore. Who'd have thought that there was sandy beach, warm water and beautiful waves on the shores of Lake Michigan? We found a gorgeous beach and just hung out for a bit. Ben had to be back on base each evening for 7:30 PM, so there was no time for late night outings.
Saturday we spent half the day in Chicago, while some of us visited Millennium Park, the Navy Pier and other tourist spots around the windy city. I really wish we would've had more time to look around and especially to take some more pictures. It seems like we hit the jackpot with the weather. Ben said it had been raining most of the week before we came and apparently started raining again the day we left. So that worked out great. Ben had duty that day at 4 PM so we had to have him back by around 3 PM, which gave us the evening off.
On Sunday Martin got up real early to drive Matt & Oscar to the O'Hare airport, as they had booked different flights and were leaving early that morning. Afterward he picked up Ben and we decided to try out sightseeing. We voted between the Botanical Gardens and the historical town of Antioch, and lookie here, the town (which just happened to have a scrapbook store recommended by my friend Jeanne!) won. So after traversing what seemed like maliciously planned construction, (we hit the freeway and were detoured for miles without an available exit ramp) we turned around in Wisconsin and headed back towards our goal. I'm sure we exceeded the 50 mile radius that Ben was supposed to stay within, but we won't tell if you won't.
Antioch was a surprise. The town was quaint to the point of being boring. Some shops were closed and the boys were not impressed. We headed to a local lake/park where we blew off some energy by goofing around on the swings. Poor Ben, all he could do was watch and push Grace "higher, higher!", since he was in full dress uniform and could not get it dirty. Then we headed into town to choose a restaurant for lunch. I had Martin drop me at "Hannah's" the infamous scrapbook store and told them I would meet up with them. Well, let me tell you, it's one of those "been there, done that" experiences. The store was great, large, more of a home decor and more store with a big scrapbook selection. However the gals working there were a bit slow on the uptake. It took me almost 1/2 hour to get some stupid ribbon cut, cause there was no yardstick/ruler/measuring tape, nor any scissors in their fabric/sewing department. Kind of strange if you ask me? Anyway, I met up with the group at an Italian joint which was nothing to write home about. How can you screw up lasagna? Well, their cook sure managed. It was all in all one of the most disappointing stops on the trip.
We made another quick trip to Starbucks (we found a nice one in Lake Forest, a really cute suburb) and bought Ben some "real" coffee. Apparently the Navy serves Folgers and he got spoiled at home. Martin popped into the Navy Exchange store and stocked up on the real thing, Navy branded workout gear. 100 percent polyester, no wonder they sweat up a storm. Go Recruits!
On a more serious note, we saw a lot of people come up to Ben and his classmates, to shake their hands and congratulate them on their choice. Many expressed gratitude and thanked them for their service. So remember that these fine young men and women serve for the whole country and they should be included in our prayers every day.

The Fair (Take Two)

So the first time we went to the fair for the second time this week. When we headed there on Monday we ran a bit late and didn't really have a chance to see any of the displays or the animals. So I promised Miss Gracie that I would take her again later during the week. Of course we had to wait for the hottest day of the year to go...what's up with that?

Anyway, we headed out around 2:30 in the afternoon since I had to have my leg massaged in the morning. I had the stitches removed on Thursday but have been dealing with a lot of muscle pain in the calf. I went in again to see the Doctor on Monday as the pain was so bad I had trouble sleeping. She said it was just tension and to take a painkiller and stretch. Well, the pain medication helped to a point but it was getting ridiculous. So I am still in a bit of pain, but have been icing and applying heat, that with the pain meds seems to get me through the day. Not sure when I'll be able to get back to the gym though...

Anyway, the fair... On the way to the fair Grace fell asleep in the car. So when we got there I got lucky enough to find a coveted spot in the shade. I had packed her stroller, which we really don't use anymore, but thought it may make things easier on my leg. Good thing, cause I loaded her in it and headed straight to Woods Coffee. They had wonderful A/C and of course I had to have a refreshing Avalanche while Grace slept. After about 30 minutes I decided to head into the fair grounds to see if she would wake up. Well, I think I made it through most of the indoor and outdoor commercial exhibits until she was awoken by a band playing on the small stage. We then set off to find the animals. Of course all Grace wanted to do by that time was hit the carnival rides. To our dismay we found that hey had taken out the dog/cat display barn and we had missed the dogs completely as they were there only till Wednesday. What a bummer. Anyway we saw the animals including the calf that had just been born on Monday night. Grace got to pet a few goats and cows, not so much luck at the horses. And I just couldn't convince her to pose with the llama for a photo for Grandma.

We ate some more junk food, (I am proud to say that I did not give in to the looming temptation of having a 2nd Funnel Cake!). Although I really wanted to. LOL


Grace got to choose three rides to go on, and the merry go round with the horses was her favorite. We got home very exhausted and tired that night and hit the hay pretty early.

Saturday at the Farmer's Market

Today we spent the morning in Bellingham walking around the local farmer's market. It took a little bit of arm twisting to get Martin out but in the end the good food won him over. This was the second weekend in a row that we went.

Last Saturday I took my new camera and since the weather was so beautiful we all got a little dressed up and headed out. Any photos in this post will be from last weekend.

Some of our favorites are the crepes, chocolate croissants, pretzel sticks spread with Nutella, Sno Cones, Mallard's Ice Cream, Goat's Kefir and much more.

Grace loves to stop and watch the performers, whether it's the guy with the crystal balls, the musicians or a hula hoop lady.

Then she asked to have her picture taken with Daddy!

Then she shared her new favorite treat with Aubrey.

And finally on the way home we stopped at the car wash...

Rejuvinated and ready for another week...

So the spa was fabulous. How could it not be...?

Well, I did a double take when the person who came to get me out of the quiet area turned out to be a guy. Never had a guy give me a massage before, well at least it wasn't a bikini wax. ROFLMAO His name is Steve and he was very professional and turned out to be the lucky guy who gave me the Apple Body Wrap to boot. When all was massaged, wrapped, heated up, showered off and lotioned all I needed was a side of Vanilla Ice Cream. All that apple scent and being wrapped up in hot towels made me feel like an Apple Pie. LOL

We also stayed overnight and had a great nights sleep after a late wonderful dinner at Fino's. I had a divine Crab Panini, (thanks Amy for turning me on to those awesome sandwiches again!). Breakfast was also included and we enjoyed a beautiful view out to Bellingham Bay watching the ducks and other birds frolick in the water. The breakfast buffet was quite nice, I would recommend it to anyone looking for an affordable light meal in the AM.

Today I finally managed to finish the wall hanging I started out before Christmas as a gift for Grace' cousin. I just didn't have enough photos of the guy to complete it and his parents didn't pull through for me, although Grandma did after an SOS e-mail plea. Thanks G-ma!

So here it is:

What do you think? I love it...but of course I am biased.

Can You Guess???

what Miss Grace's all time favorite food in the whole wide world is?

We had some on New Year's Day and she loved every minute of it. Her standard reply when you ask what she would like to eat, breakfast, lunch or dinner time, is "pasgetty".

I make it with ground turkey and add the chunkiest jar of sauce you can find. Love all those veggies with my tomato sauce...and of course loads of cheese. Not diet food, that's for sure....