ice skating and Caroling

This year for Christmas eve we decided to go ice skating. It was allot of fun. We met our friend the cox's for some ice skating. The place is called the ice palace. It did feel a little wintry in there but the second we walked out the doors we were welcomed to the blazing hot sun.

They had a portion for the kids and they had walkers for them. They were really helpful. If you had a walker then you couldn't go out were the other people were. It was nice that the kids weren't getting ran over by bigger people.

Little Dawson

Walking on the skates

Dawson not ready yet to walk

all set to go

There she goes

Landon doing great

oops fall down

Christmas eve night our friends invited us over for the some caroling, It was fun walking the neighborhood and singing songs all being in good company. We are very fortunate to have such good friends, It was a little sentimental as we were walking through the neighborhood with our friends as this will be the last Christmas's in Hawaii. Being surrounded by such good friends. After we were caroling we had brownies and ice cream.(my kind of dessert). The kids were able to play one last time together. Then back home to put the kids to bed and wait for Santa to come.

caroling in the neighborhood

all the kids having dessert

Good night and merry Christmas

More big island part 2

The next day it was rainy,cloudy and foggy. We went on some small hikes. We went into the lava tube that was cool. It was a big tube/cave that you walk through were only a few hundred years ago lave flowed through. When you are not in the lava tube you are walking through a rain forest. It is really gorgeous.

Entrance to the lava tube

I was playing around with our camera and didn't take it off the black and white setting OOPS

walking around

Inside the lava tube entrance to some more caves/tubes you can explore

Since it was raining and foggy we decided to just do some little walks rather then full oh hikes. We saw some excellent views of the crater.

lookout

After we played around in the park we went to Hilo and went to a waterfall. It was a very pretty waterfall.

rainbow falls

It was such a great three days and two nights that me and David had. It was nice to not have to worry about how the kids were doing since I knew shirlyn was taking good care of them. Did I have to call them once yes and did I make cards for them to open each night from me yes. It was a wonderful time to spend time together. We talked allot and laughed allot. We had our share of relaxing as well. We kept it very simple which was so nice. When we usually get away overnight when we are in Utah we always plan a nice place to stay a nice dinner and Nice event. I am grateful that David treats our time away like that but it was so nice to keep it basic and simple. It was nice to just be together. I have missed him more and more each time he has to go to sea. It was great to sit back and relax and know that I was in the best company I could ever ask for.

The big island

We have some great friends out here. My and my friend shirlyn were talking about switching and doing little getaways for our husbands. We started talking about it in October and we both planned ours and the time came for us to take ours. David was out to sea as I was planning ours so it made the anticipation ever more since I couldn't tell him what I was doing well.

Pool side at the Hale Koa

It was a much needed R&R time for us with how much he has been gone away. We spent the first night in Waikiki at the Hale koa. We were going to hike diamond head but got down there and come to find out it is closed on the weekdays. So we checked in and went and laid by the pool. Then we went to the Ala moana mall shopped a little then we went to dinner. The next day we headed to the big island. We flew into kona and drove to the volcano national park. There are some military cottages there. Our first stop was to see the temple. It is a small temple but gorgeous just like the rest of them.

Kona Temple

We thought it would be nice to drive around the island a little bit. It is so green and the contrast between the green and the lava rocks is really cool. We made a few stops along the way. One was a black sand beach. It is really cool to see black sand beach. We also stopped at a look out point were we saw a guy enjoying the good life with his stuffed pig hanging out of his car,

off to the water

Chill in with a pet pig awesome

We got to the volcano national park and stopped at the steam vents. There was a walkway we took that looked into the crater. It was cool. The setting was perfect it was cloudy and started raining and to drive down the road and see the steam coming out of the ground was really cool.

steam vents

The one thing I really wanted to do was See the lava flow into the water. There was no visible lava flow that day. Darn it. We went to a museum that has a lookout point and at night if there is lava flowing you can see the seam light up. It was really cool. Just as we got to the sot it was bright red and pink and orange. We stayed there a few minutes then as we were leaving it started to die down and it was changing colors like it was when we first got there so good timing on our part.

the many glowing pictures I will just spare you to look at one

The military cottages at the park are the way to go. They are cottages that have fireplaces. They have one bedroom up to three bedroom cottages. When we pulled up the first row of cottages were decorated with Christmas lights. It was really cool. Since it was cold(had to buy a sweatshirt since conveniently forgot mine and Davids), rainy, foggy. It was nice to get a change of weather and really felt wintry with all the fog and rain. The night we were there it was rainy and cold. We put a log in the fireplace. It was nice to say that while living in Hawaii we had a fire in a fireplace once.

All ready for Christmas

the front room of the cottage.

Christmas fun

We were lucky to have my dad out for business. He brought my mom out with him. They stayed an extra day and we celebrated Christmas with them. It is always so good to see family It made it feel more like Christmas with them here visiting.

We meet my mom at the mall to ride the candy cane express train. I love being down at the mall this time of year. even if there is nothing to buy it is just fun to be amongst the shoppers, the music, and the decorations.

We took the kids down to the city hall to see the lights. It is nice to not have to get all bundled up to go see the lights. They have a big Santa and ms clause in sitting at the fountain cooling off with there feet in the water. Inside the foyer of city hall they have Christmas trees that the different departments have decorated. They have a hallway at the back of the building that has different wreaths that people have decorated. It was a fun night.