More from August...

August was a busy month - we spent a day down at the Waikiki Aquarium, celebrated Makenzie Weida's 4th birthday, and found time for a girls spa day at the Hilton amongst other things...

Its really easy to go to Waikiki now that it's a 10 minute drive from home! 

After the Waikiki Aquarium, we went to Tiki's for an early dinner.

Then we took a sunset dip at Waikiki Beach before heading home

Our "tourist" photograph from Tiki's.

We celebrated Makenzie Weida's 4th birthday at Chuck-e-Cheese! Pizza and games are ALWAYS a hit with the kids!

Love the look on Monica's face as she scrambles for tickets in the Blaster!

We celebrated the high school graduation of one of Mark's wrestlers with an awesome view of the city.

Gavin and Kotaro - the day before he moved back to Japan.

Dylan often entertains himself by taking selfies with my phone :) I love finding them in my photos!

I made fresh watermelon juice for our spa day adventure.

Just a rainy Manoa morning.

This is my cohort of 2016 graduates- the future of the teaching profession!  For our first seminar, we held class at Ala Moana Beach Park :)

Mommy Day Camp & End of Summer

A glimpse of July/ August 2014... We got home from our trip and made the most of the last few weeks of summer before we were back to school and work. Mark went back to work before the rest of us so the boys and I spent the last week before school exploring places on the island where they had never been.

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Mark and the boys riding bikes to school

We were able to get in a date night to see a surf documentary for the Surf Film Festival.  This was the only picture I took that night :)

The boys and I went to the US Army Museum- it's free and they boys loved it!

This stained glass was a beautiful memorial inside the Army Museum.

End of summer trip to the North shore!

We kayaked the river feeding into Haleiwa Bay

No trip to the North Shore is complete without Shave Ice!

The Go Pro was a part of many of our summer adventures!

Our favorite sushi bar on the North Shore

We checked out the Art Explorium down in Kaimuki - a place where you pay a flat rate of $5.00 and the kids are free to use all their materials to create masterpieces! The boys loved it!

Gavin created a Superhero Diorama made of recycled materials.

Dylan created a special box to hold his Superhero family.

Gavin had his first friend from school sleep over - Kotaro's family also lived in faculty housing. His parents were both visiting scholars at UH from their universities in Japan.  Kotaro and his family moved back to Japan in August, so we had Kotaro spend a night with us before he left.

Not the best picture, but we went to the movies the second day...Taking advantage of the $1.00 Summer Kids movies.

Kotaro's mom created a care package of food from Japan to share with us as a thank you for him staying the night. Everything on the packaging was written in Japanese, so she labeled everything for me and typed out cooking instructions and ideas on how to use everything.  It was so incredibly thoughtful and fun to try authentic Japanese food!

The boys and I went to Haunama Bay to try out snorkeling.  It is a beautiful place but I was reminded how crowded it gets in the morning when we got there!  My new strategy is to go in the afternoon when the crowds are much more manageable!

Both boys loved snorkeling and did great! I was really impressed with Dylan since he's only 4 and we barely found a mask and snorkel to fit him!

Gavin went back to school on a Friday and Dylan didn't start until the following Monday, so Dylan and I spent his last day of summer at the Zoo (his favorite place) after we dropped Gavin off for the day.

And on the last weekend of summer, we went to the Jack Johnson Concert at the Waikiki Shell....both nights! The first night, we went as a couple with Julie and Jamie and had a babysitter come to the house for the kiddos. On the second night, we packed up as a family and hung out in Kapiolani Park with the kids. We could hear the concert just as good as we did from inside the night before.

Our view of Diamond Head from Kapiolani Park

Gavin also lost his 2nd tooth on the 2nd day of 2nd grade :)

We had an active hurricane season here in Hawaii - more so than we ever have in the 14 years we've lived here. All schools were closed as a precaution. The Big Island took a hit, but fortunately all we had on Oahu was rain and wind. 

We spent the day indoors and found ways to stay entertained that didn't involve TV and electronics :)

That was about the worse of it...rain and some wind.

It cleared up in the afternoon so we walked around the neighborhood to check out the Manoa stream and play at the banyan tree.