Waikiki Beach and Joseph's Here

We started off this weekend with another splash in the pool during the 7 am open swim.

I was glad that Hyrum and Wes were able to take a homework break and join us. 

Lily pestered Corey to take a work break too, and soon he was in the pool with us too! Big brothers and fathers are a lot more fun cause they are so strong. 

Natalie getting tossed up high!

I'm also grateful that they are able to offer responsible hands to help hold the little ones. 

I took a few "Little Mermaid" shots of Abi - doing the Ariel hair thing. I remember doing this whenever I went swimming as a kid, and also doing it during soccer tournaments when we had pool time at the hotel. It's a girl thing, I think all girls do it

I showed Corey how the waterfall works as a back massage. He agrees that we should get one of those in our house.

So we spent the morning in the pool, and then we had to hurry and pack up all our stuff for a room change. Good news: we got a better room with an amazing view. Bad news: Tonight Abi realized she left her retainer in a glass cup in the kitchen in the other room. We've gone by the front desk but they didn't find anything, so that's unfortunate, darn. After we packed up our room, Corey and Wes and Hyrum went to drop it off somewhere in the check in place, since our new room wasn't ready yet, and we waited outside. I didn't know where Corey had parked the car, so we sat outside feeding birds and hoped that he'd find us. 

I also didn't get Daniel's shoes or any towels or sunblock, so we weren't really beach prepared. Oh well, it will be an adventure anyway. We went to Waikiki beach. When we arrived and found a place to park, we were glad to learn that Hyrum had grabbed one thing of sunblock as we packed, yay. Corey saw a "surf lessons" van and went and rented four surf boards for two hours for him and HWA to use. As Corey got set up with the boards, the kids found a cool tree to climb.

I have since learned that this is called a Banyan tree and is native to India. 

Very cool tree. The kids loved climbing it. 

Corey and Hyrum, Wes, and Abi getting ready to head out

I stayed with the little ones at the shore.

We tried to stay as much in the shade as possible. Peter and Owen building a sand pile castle

There wasn't a lot of beach and the waves were pretty active and would surprise us a few times by coming up all the way to the wall. I had to move our bags onto the sidewalk to keep our phones, shoes, and clothes dry. I was a little bit on high alert with our belongings being so accessible to some potential purse snatchers and with kids close to strong waves, but I survived the hour as the lone parent. 

Abi came back almost right away. It was too scary for her. I was happy to have a big kid near to help me count heads. 

Wes came back with like a half hour of surfboard rental to spare. He was able to get up twice! Hyrum and Corey didn't have any luck. Corey and Hyrum made a few self deprecating remarks that I can't remember now but they made me laugh. Wesley confessed that he saw the local surfers laughing at Corey when they saw him kick with his feet to catch the wave. Use your arms! Corey said he should probably try to regain his upper body strength. Well, it was fun. Corey wanted a fruit smoothie, but felt he couldn't have one without buying them for everyone. So he did. Such good service.

Just us doing our part to help out the local covid economy. (Corey did not disclose how much they cost.)

Very refreshing, I think we'll buy some fruit and make smoothies this week, cause they hit the spot, and I didn't even have that much. In this warm tropical weather all that sounds good to me is cold fruit smoothies. 

They rinsed off the boards, the kids said goodbye to their new favorite tree...

Then we had about an hour to kill before picking up Joseph at the airport, so we drove around Diamond head, then around Honolulu for a bit, then I googled "french fries" and we thought we'd have a new experience, so instead of Wendy's or McDonald's we tried something NEW - Betty's Burgers! I got some fries, and they were very tasty. And while we were waiting in the car for Corey and Hyrum to come back, some possibly homeless or special needs guy came up to Corey's side of the car, made small talk, opened the door, and started the car. Wesley is my witness. Then he left. He said we needed to put on the air conditioning for the kids. (We were fine, we were in the shade.) THEN we drove up to the airport, and look who was walking out!

We know that kid! Hi Joseph!

It was nice to have fresh meat for the kids. They put him to work - play with us! 

Hyrum throwing Owen, Peter flying, Lily splashing, fun all around. It's great to have Joseph here with us for a few days. He leaves Thursday night, the 19th.