4th of July

Instead of camping out to get a good spot for the Provo parade we decided to go and watch the hot air balloons.

It was a pretty cool thing. We got breakfast at McDonald's and sat on a blanket in the field and watched them fill up the balloons and then one by one take off. I guess they actually have competitions-who knew. They had to try and drop things on targets and pop balloons. They would get points for the things they did.

Later that day the husbands took care of the kids and my mom and all of the sisters went down to the Provo craft fair. We had a great time and spent a lot of money. Such cute stuff and yummy food! We just had to try the deep fried oreos! Evil written all over it-that's one way to gain 10 lbs. in only 3 bites! Thank you hubbys for letting us go play! That night we went and watched the fireworks from Stadium of fire in a church parking lot. I just love fireworks. We probably would have gone home and done some our own fireworks but it took us an hour to drive what would usually take us no more than 5 minutes-craziness!!

The next day we went and played at the water park down the street from Kahi's house while the men went shooting! We had so much fun on the water slides and cooling off in the pool!

The next day was Sunday-thank goodness we were pretty worn out by then. We enjoyed a nice day at church and some ono(delicious in Hawaiian) Hawaiian food! We spent the rest of the day packing up and getting ready to leave early the next morning. We were sad to leave but we had a wonderful time! Thanks Kahi and Mike for opening up your home and everyone else we loved spending time with you!

Mini Olympics

Each family planned an activity on one of the days. Dave and I were in charge of the next days activities. We decided to have a Mini Olympics, family baseball game, and a water balloon fight. Here is Dave getting everyone warmed up with stretches.

Our little Olympic parade. The aunties sang the theme song.
The kids decided to dog pile Kawika. He's somewhere under there, you can see him if you look really hard. Ezzie is sitting on his head! The kids had a lot of fun playing and running around. We had a relay race, discus throw, long jump, and shot put with water balloons. The adults even joined in! We had a great time! Once again I relied on Pua to take pictures so we'll have to do another post later.
When we had down time cousins had a great time playing together and adults had fun hanging out. The older kids had a lot of fun with the legos. There an endless amount of pictures with the kids posing in front of their creations they made.

Family Pictures

That evening a great friend of the family Malia took picture of our crazy bunch. She did an awesome job and we greatly appreciated her willingness to share her time and talents with us. This is the whole clan minus Lia's husband Kanamu who wasn't able to be there-we were sad he couldn't be with us.

My mom and dad with all of the grand kids. I think the crowd behind the camera was funnier to watch than the kids.
My poor dad is so out numbered-I love having sisters!

I had to put this picture up because these 2 were inseparable. It was so cute! They are so much alike and had so much fun playing together. very much girly girls! Kaili misses Nalia!

Let the fun, laughs, craziness, and pure exhaustion begin. . .

After our fun visit with the Smiths we went to Kahi's. We were so excited to be able to spend a few days with family. Just think of all of the fun to be had in one house with 23 of us! So from our last reunion 3 years ago we all decided that we needed to plan more activities to do. So leave to the Kekauoha girls to over book-it actually worked out well-we didn't get to do everything but we got to do a lot and made some great memories. The first day we went up to American Fork Canyon for some fun. As small rock slide happened just after we got settled at the picnic area. So the pregnant She-ra(Kahi), He-man(Mike), and Shegyver(Nia) went off to clear the road for all of the drivers there in the canyon-so nice.

The kids thought it was pretty cool to see how big the splashes were from the rocks. This one was pretty good-as you probably guessed. Go He-man!!
We went on a very short but steep hike just by the picnic area
Kahi and her sweet little girl Abbi
Lia and her cute little man Helaman-who we also can He-man. He looks a little surprised here-maybe I really do look scary that day :)
Kalei having fun blowing all of the puff balls
My mom's dad was a Biologist at the University of Utah-he mainly studied the Mayfly. They live under rocks in streams so my mom taught all of the kids about them and they looked for them in the stream. The kids had a great time! After our little nature walk and learning about the mayfly we had a delicious lunch and then had a marshmallow war. I didn't take any picture because I was to busy shooting everyone. Pua(our designated photographer) took a bunch of pictures so I'll have to get some from her and post them later. It was so much fun! The kids and adults had a blast! There was a lot of laughing and the kids had fun ambushing the adults!

After the picnic we decided to go do some 4 wheeling. We drove to the upper lake and went through the stream a few times. The kids thought it was so much fun! I think it's a toss up as to who had more fun Dave or the kids!

And the trip continues. . .

We left Pua's on Tuesday and spent the day in Salt Lake at Temple Square. We were able be there last summer but didn't have time to see everything, so we saw a few more things this time. The sister missionaries did a cool demonstration to show the acoustic of the tabernacle and you really can hear a pin drop.

After seeing the Tabernacle and walking on the grounds we went over to the Pioneer Museum. It was fun to watch my kids reactions to the neat things in there, or new information we found out.
Their favorite section was the kids section of course. There were so many fun things to do.
The older kids loved going to all of the different stations. But Kalei only wanted to play with the babies. They had a cute station where you could dress baby dolls, give them a bath, and play with them. We could not get her away-which was not a bad thing. She is such a little mommy. It is very fun to watch. The only way we could get her to look at the other displays was if she brought all of her baby dolls with her. She couldn't carry 3 so she made Dave carry one and she had the other.
We enjoyed our day downtown and then headed off to my friend Jana's to have dinner with her and our other friend Maile and their kids. Jana and I grew up together and all three of us were friends in high school. I thought I got a picture but apparently I didn't so I 'll have to get one from one of them later. It was so fun to visit with them and catch up on life. We don't get to see each other often enough. Their kids are so cute, fun and grown up! Maile's girls kept us laughing and Izzy was so cute! Thanks for having us Jana and Maile!

Then it was off to see the Smiths who recently moved which we are very sad about that but we were excited to see them again. And once again I didn't get any pictures, what was up with me that day! Rachelle actually did get a couple of pictures which she put on her blog. It was so fun to visit and we just picked up from where we left off. We miss having them here in so many ways! Thanks for the fun visit!! Sorry we keep you up so late!

Then it was off to Kahi's house!!

The beginning of our Utah trip. . .

My family planned a reunion this summer up in Utah. My parent stopped here to visit on their way up to Utah, so a few days after my parents left we left too. We usually break up the drive and stay overnight somewhere but couldn't do that this time. It wasn't that bad except for the fact the we stopped so many times that it seemed to take FOREVER! Kalani also managed to lose it all in the back seat. Poor thing! Although we couldn't figure out how he didn't get one speck of the stuff on him. He was spotless, the car wasn't. Enough said about that. We went up to my sister Pua's to stay for a couple of days before we were to meet in Provo for the reunion. We had so much fun playing at their house. We cooked smores one night! Yummy!

We went swimming at the rec center. The kids loved the whirl pool and slides.

The kids spent a lot of time playing the Wii together and had a blast. It's a good thing they're smart enough to figure these games out because I sure am no help!
Kalei and Koa riding together while my sweet husband washed all of the cars.
We had so much fun hanging out together. We also had fun hanging out with Aunty Nana who doesn't live too far from Pua! The kids always have a blast with her and we love her so much! Thanks for having us Pua and Matry! We love you guys!

Ketchup time once again!

Well were do I begin?! It seems like forever since my last post. Being home only 2 days out of the whole month doesn't really work well for updating my blog.

My parents came to visit on June 19 and we were so excited to have them! And it not just because they bring us yummy treats and surprises from home-although that is a great bonus! We didn't do a lot since it was blazin hot outside as usual! We did manage to get to the pool one night which was a lot of fun! Sorry I didn't really get any good ones except this one of my parents!

My kids love reading with Grandma!

We also took a day trip up to Sedona, which my mom has always wanted to see. The plan was to go to Slide rock but since there was a 45 min wait just to get in the parking lot we scratched that idea. We parked on the side of the road and hiked down to the stream.
Dave and the kids had a lot of fun swimming and exploring while I stayed on shore with my parents. Someone had to keep them company! I have issues with lakes and rivers-I'll go into that in a later post.
Something got Kalani!!! They found a crawdad claw and Kalani was pretty proud of this little trick he managed to do! What talent!